In case you missed my post for Christmas in July over on It’s A Good Day…
I’ve got a gift idea for you: a flat iron travel case. This would be the perfect handmade gift for your everyone from your teenaged niece to your BFF….anyone with a flat iron, really. Before we get started, let’s take a moment in honor of flat irons. Seriously. My halfro (totally not curly on the top) and I salute you!
Supplies:
Fabric
Cotton batting or Insul-Bright (I really wanted to use the Insul-Bright, but I had to order it and it didn’t show up in time. The good news for you is that you have 5 months ‘til Christmas and PLENTY of time to track down your own!)
1.5” of Velcro
Double fold bias tape ~ 50” (I made my own)
Cut 2 of each from fabric and one of each from batting:
6” X 11”
10” X 12”
Sandwich your batting between the same sized pieces of fabric, right sides facing out, like this:
Take the smaller piece and position the soft loopy side of your Velcro so that the center is 6” from the right end. The Velcro will NOT be centered. Make sure it’s up slightly higher than the width of your bias tape.
Stitch in place.
Position the hard pokey side of your Velcro so that it’s centered 6” from the right end as well. This piece of Velcro WILL be centered. Again, make sure that it’s up slightly higher than the width of your bias tape.
Stitch in place.
Sew a piece of bias tape on the right hand side (short end) of your smaller piece.
Hook your Velcro together.
You’re going to sew 1/4” from the left hand side of the top (smaller) piece.
Undo the Velcro and fold the flap to the other side, lining up the edges.
You may want to use a couple of pins to keep it in place.
The next step is rounding the corners. I used a glass and traced the curve…
and then trimmed the corners with scissors.
Sew bias tape around the perimeter.
And you’re ready to put your flat iron inside,
wrap the cord around,
fasten the Velcro,
and go!
Even if you’re not going anywhere, the other stuff in your drawer will be safe from burns and melting. Not that I’d know anything about that. Because I’ve sure never melted a hole in the side of a hairspray bottle.
Did you know Crap I’ve Made has a Flickr group? You can find the link at any time up on my menu bar under Crap You’ve Made. Go add your stuff! Please?
Projects from the Flickr group will be featured on Fridays.
And, there’s now a Flickr stream widget over in my left sidebar. Click on over from your reader and check that out.
Today’s feature is from daisygirl78. She gets the distinction of being the very first poster of a picture of a skirt made from my tiered skirt tutorial. Like, before I even put my own version in the Flickr group. Note to self: Get on that!
I like how she added some lace to the bottom to fancy it up a bit!
Just keeping it real, folks.
Macy has this book:
We have others in the series and have found some fun projects in them in the past (Vaseline and Kool Aid lip gloss, for example).
We decided to try out a project that claimed you could turn a chip bag into a brooch (hate that word) type pin. Perhaps that right there should have been my “sign”, but we carried on. I had visions of something all Shrinky Dink-y and darling.
We preheated the oven to its highest setting:
We put the chip bag on a baking sheet:
And we sat down to begin our “up to 10 minutes” of baking.
About 10 seconds in, I suggested Macy turn on the oven light. This is what we found:
In 10 seconds.
We tried again at a much lower temperature and got this:
I still don’t think anyone in their right mind would wear it.
So folks….DON’T TRY THIS AT HOME.
You’re welcome.
It’s that time of year…at least if you’re doing anything handmade. Time to start thinking about it, right?
I’m going to be participating in the
Rachel from A Southern Fairytale will be hosting the baking.
Kelly from According to Kelly will be hosting the crafting.
And, Cindy from Skip To My Lou will be hosting the sewing.
I’ll be posting over there on the 29th, with a brand new tutorial for this laptop cover:
There are some INSANELY talented bloggers participating, so be sure to check out all 3 sites every day (starting NOW) through the end of the month!
In case you missed my guest post over at seven thirty three on Tuesday…
Tiered Skirt
I’d say the fullness of this skirt would probably be best for kids’ sizes 2 through a slim 12. (Here’s the part where I admit to trying my 10 year old daughter’s skirt on my 2 year old son, just to see.)
Determine the length you want your finished skirt to be. Divide that number by 3.5. I wanted my finished skirt to be about 12”. 17/3.5 is 3.42-ish. I rounded up to 3.5”. All the strips you cut will be this measurement plus 1” high (so 4.5” in my example) EXCEPT for the very top tier/waist panel. That strip will be 1/2” taller than the others (so 5” in my example).
Tier 1 (the waist panel) will be cut the entire width of your fabric, roughly 45”.
Tier 2 will be 60”. Cut 2 30” long strips.
(tiers 1 & 2)
Tier 3 will be 80”. Cut 2 40” long strips.
Tier 4 (the bottom band) will also be 80”. Cut 2 40” long strips.
(tiers 3 & 4)
You’ll notice that with seam allowances and whatnot these tiers won’t end up precisely the measurements I’ve listed. IT’S OK! This skirt is SUPER forgiving.
All seams are 1/2”, unless otherwise noted.
Start by sewing the short ends of each tier together. You should have 4 giant loops. Tangent: Because I have issues, I seamed my tier 1 twice. I like having a seam there to match up with all the other seams. You really don’t need to do this and you’ll be 100% fine just matching up the half way point with the seams on the other tiers.
(actual seam on the left, seam I added in support of OCD on the right)
Take tier 4/the bottom band and press it in half, wrong sides together.
Matching seams, sew tier 4/the bottom band to the bottom of tier 3 (right sides together).
Serge, zig zag, or otherwise finish your seam.
Press seam allowance up towards tier 3.
Top stitch.
Run a long gathering stitch (stitch length as long as it’ll go on your machine and NO BACKSTITCHING) along the top edge of tier 3.
I did mine about 1/4” from the edge and did one for the front and then one for the back. I know many people like to do 2 rows of gathering stitches, just in case one breaks. I never do…I like to live on the edge. Or, I’m lazy. You decide.
Gather (by pulling the bottom/bobbin thread) the top of tier 3. Matching seams, middles, and/or anything else that makes you happy, pin it (right sides together) to the bottom of tier 2.
Stitch in place.
Finish your seam. Press seam allowance up towards tier 2. Top stitch.
Here’s what you’ve got now:
Run a long gathering stitch along the top edge of tier 2.
Gather the top of tier 2. Matching seams/middles/etc., pin it (right sides together) to the bottom of tier 1/the waist panel. Stitch in place. Finish your seam. Press seam allowance up towards tier 1. Top stitch.
Fold the top edge of tier 1 down 1/4” and press.
Fold the top edge down 1” and press.
Stitch along the edge, creating your waist casing. Leave a 2-3” gap in the back for inserting the elastic.
Thread elastic the same length as the waist of the intended wearer through your casing. Once it’s threaded, have them try the skirt on if at all possible. It seems like my elastic always gets stretched out a little during this step!
Overlap the elastic ends and stitch together.
Close up your casing.
Aaaaaaaaaaand you’re done!
Did you know Crap I’ve Made has a Flickr group? You can find the link at any time up on my menu bar under Crap You’ve Made. Go add your stuff! Please?
Projects from the Flickr group will be featured on Fridays.
And, there’s now a Flickr stream widget over in my left sidebar. Click on over from your reader and check that out.
The subtitle for this post should be “Mad for the Plaid Fad”. And here’s the part where I admit to actually writing that on one of my folders in junior high. Apparently I was destined for weirdness.
Both of today’s features use my appliqued tie onesie tutorial. And they’re both plaid.
First up, we have this one from MrsEFP. That baby is almost cute enough to make me reconsider the ban on residents in my uterus.
And then there are these hilariously awesome matching ones from Alysa @ Inspired Results, blogged here. She made a matching shirt for her daughter, too, so be sure to go check that out.
I’ve got an exciting day planned with lots of email responding. If you’re waiting for a response, today’s your lucky day! Have a great weekend!
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