For Keeps

This dress was an unfinished project of mine for a whole year..I'm done with it now...so what do u think???:)

Jolteon(Pokemon)cosplay tutorial

This Halloween 2013..my 7 year old daughter, Rachel, chose her favorite Pokemon to be on Halloween..An electric Pokemon named, Jolteon...I began with the ears first because I figured would take me the longest to make..

First..I drew a template of the ears on cardstock and cut them out..inside and the outer will be 2 different colors..

Second..I pinned the outer ear to some yellow felt and cut out 4 pieces..

Third..I pinned the inner ear to some black felt and cut out 2 pieces..

This is what the outer and inner ear look like after cutting them out..

Fourth..I bent and hand sewed some 24 gauge beading wire to 2 pieces of the outer ear..Leaving an inch of wire on both sides at the bottom..

Fifth..I filled the inside of the hand sewn wire with stuffing from a pillow I never use..to give the ears some fluff..

Sixth..I pinned the remaining 2 pieces of the outer ear on top of stuffing filled wire and machine stitched close to the edge around both ears..

Seventh..I wanted to use a wide head band to attach the ears to..so I cut up some yellow felt to resemble Jolteon's hair, wrapped and hot glued it in the center of the head band..

Last...I wrapped the wire left from the bottom of the ears around the head band and twisted firmly in place..then I cut out some strips of yellow felt, wrapped and hot glued around the head band, and over the wire so it wouldn't hurt her head..and that's it for the ears...

For the body of her costume, I bought her a solid white long sleeve leotard and some tights and dyed them yellow...

ok..this is a picture of the finished piece that goes around the neck and shoulders...I sewed white felt onto a long strip of white fabric I folded in half...I also sewed some Velcro on the ends of the strip to hold it in place while she's wearing it...I cut it up to look just like the fluff around jolteon's neck..

I did the the tail in less than an hour...using 2 pieces of yellow felt I cut to resemble jolteon's tail...sewed it together leaving the top open to put some stuffing in it...packed the spikes first then added just a little bit more to fluff the top of the tail(not much). I decided instead of safety pins to sew some elastic to the tail so she can just slip it on over her leotard...and stitched some yellow felt to the elastic cause it was white...so that's it...Jolteon An Electric Pokemon hand made...:)

Retro dress

I am making a Retro dress from this pattern my friend, Holly found at a Catholic thrift store...

I've completed the vintage dress...it's a reproduction of the third one from the left(letter C)..I really enjoyed making it..& this one is for sale by the way...ill b making more vintage dresses in several different styles...to b continued..

Applique

I cut out an applique of the hidden leaf village symbol from Naruto and hand stitched it on the pocket of a shirt last night...

Decoupage it!!...

To decoupage it...

Step #1: is to cut out a lot of pictures from magazines...you can also find and save pics online & print them out..I also got my son to draw some of his favorite characters to use...like Sonic the Hedgehog.

Step #2: is deciding where & how you want to put all of your cut outs together...it's like a puzzle.  Decoupage- is the art or technique of cutting out pictures or designs from paper or other material(like fabric) & applying them to a surface(like wood, glass, metal & ceramic). Covering up all of those little spaces you will be overlapping pictures but that's alright..it looks good that way. 

 Step #3: There are very few steps to decoupage & this is the finishing touch.  The glue I used i got from Hobby Lobby.  It is a fast finish decoupage glue, clear, low odor, dries fast, acid free & its not sticky or tacky. After gluing all of the pictures, let it dry & when its dry, spray a clear acrylic coating all over & let it dry.