DIY: Alice and Olivia Leather Skirt

*NOTE* I have a giveaway going on! check out the sidebar!


Alice and Olivia skirts usually cost 100+ dollars, but I made this for about 15 (pleather, needles, thread). What a steal!


<-- Alice and Olivia


Instructions:


1. Buy your crap. It costs 14 dollars a yard or so for pleather at Mood Fabrics. I bought about 3/4 a yard of chocolate brown. It looks black in pictures. 3/4 a yard is really generous (I'm a US size 0 or 2 ish, 6 at H&M, children size 14 in jeans at Old Navy if it helps). Then I got the leather needles and matching thread. For the presser foot, I went the super ghetto way and put some tape on the underside of the foot. The zipper I got from an old pair of high waisted pants. 


2.  Cut out your crap. Cut out a 2 rectangles for the skirt and one for the waistband. It's better to have one really long rectangle but sometimes you can't cut out 1 really long rectangle. It needs to be like.. your waist*1.5 by length of skirt. The waistband is like.. 4 inches by your waist size+ 2 inches. 


3. Sew that shit together. First sew the 2 rectangles into 1 long rectangle. Then start pleating it. Make a seam that holds the pleats together. 

I swear, it's not spandex shiny leather. It's the lighting. 


4. I heard that you need a waistband. Sew the waistband onto the skirt. Don't fold the waistband down yet. I mean if you want, go ahead. It was just difficult for me lol. 

5. Add dem zippers and stuff. Add a zipper and sew it up. Then finish up the waistband. Add a eye and hook. 

6. Hemming the skirt. I just chopped it off. Leather doesn't fray. 


Finished Product: 

DIY: Old Jeans into a miniskirt without the "DIY" look

If there is one thing I really don't like, it's the whole "DIY" look. I don't like having people look at my clothing and saying "she for sure definitely made that herself. Of course professionals would know if something is home-sewn but I don't want regular people on the street to know. Why? Because "home-sewn" stuff don't match my wardrobe. Some people like that look but it's not for me. 


Step 0: Cut off the legs. You don't want to cut too short. Cut off at around the knee. 
Step 1: Take out the crotch seams. You want to take out the leg seams (inner thigh part) and up to the zipper and up to the waistband in the back. 

Step 2: Then fold the top flap under and sew it down. You want the seam to be straight. 

Step 3: You can make some decorative top stitching if you want. Hem the bottom and trim the seams on the inside. 

Remember that i have a giveaway going on! Click on the link in the sidebar!

DIY: Making a Bandeau top out of a halter top

Hey ladies! Recently, my sister found an old halter top that didn't fit her anymore. It was too short on the bottom. So, she asked me to change it into a bandeau top for her. I also took pictures so you ladies can do the same. 

What you need: 

• Old halter top
• Scissors
• Elastic (measure above or below boob- 2 inches)
• Sewing stuff

Instructions:

First off, cut the "halter" part of it off so it's like a tube top. 

 Great! Now, you want to measure and cut off the excess bottom part. Basically, what you want to do is to measure from right above your boob to right below it. Then, add an inch for hem/elastic. Add more if you have a really thick piece of elastic and less if you have less. That is is your height. For your width, measure around your chest (tip of boob to all the way around your back) and measure it in half. You want the part at the boob to be taut and for it to fit well. Then, fold down a hem a little larger than your piece of elastic and pin. 

Great, now sew the hem down. You want to make sure to leave around 2 inches of unsewn hem so you can insert your elastic. Insert said elastic. Then, you want to tie off the elastic. Or you can sew it. Whatever floats your boat. I just tied it off. Then, you want to sew down the remaining hem. 


Now, since you aren't supposed to wear a bra you might want some nipple coverage. I mean, by all means, still wear pasties if you want. Noone's stopping you. Basically, cut out two strips and sew them in. When you sew them in, make sure to sew under the elastic. You want to leave the elastic alone!

Lovely. This is the finished product

I would show it on a model (aka my sister) but it would be indecent and this is not a website for soft porn (I mean you guys already know this but just in case). I also don't have a mannequin. 


(hopefully) Helpful tips:

1. I actually needed to take the bandeau in by 1/2 inch. If you need to adjust a little for size, remember to sew in the space between the elastics. It is actually a problem when you sew the elastic because then it doesn't stretch properly. 
2. Before you insert the elastic, make sure to try it on to make sure that the bandeau actually covers. Please remember that your boobs are 3D, not 2D. Unless you have none, you need to have more fabric allotted for said boobs. 
3. When inserting your elastic, use a large safety pin. Attach the safety pin to the end of the elastic and insert. It makes life a hell of a lot easier. 

I hope that you try this out and you have fun ladies!

DIY Tutorial: Petticoat or Tutu-like skirt

Hey guys! So I'm back with a tutorial. This is to make a petticoat skirt. Errr, I forgot to take a picture of the final product... so sorry... >< I have a half finished product which basically looks like the final product. I just don't have it on a person. Sorryy >< I'm also not going to say that this is "upcycling" old skirts because that's just dumb and I don't like saying it.

Items Needed:

•  A few skirts of different sizes. You'll need a skirt that actually fits you, and in sizes much larger than your size. It also helps that the skirt that fits you be ruffled as well. 
• Sewing things. 
• Embellishments if you want

Instructions:

• First off, for the skirts that are too large for you, take off the waistbands. You just need the "skirt" part. Also, cut apart a seam so it's basically a rectangle

• Take the skirt that is the smallest (of the large skirts) and gather the top. You can do this by hand (ugh) or by sewing machine (also ugh). If you use the sewing machine, you want to basically set the lower bobbin tension to really loose, then pull of the bottom thread after. It'll gather. Or you could google this. You know, either is cool. 

• Then, you want to pin the gathered part to right underneath the waistband of the skirt that fits you. Picture below: 

• Okay, so now we want to attach another layer. Take it and ruffle it as well. We will attach this one inch below the waistband so you might not have to ruffle it that much.We're doing this because that way, it isn't THAT much bulk up in the waist area. It's distributed a little. Picture below:

• Cool. So now, we want to sew up the part that's open. Basically, sew it up so it's in a skirt form again. Picture of what I'm talking about below:

• Okay, this is the final product basically. Errr with one layer. Picture is above.

Some useful tips:

1.  When choosing your skirts, you want to try to choose skirts that are about the same kind of material. You don't want to attach a chiffon to a wool skirt right? If you are going to do heavy and light materials, always attach the light to the heavy. You don't want the heavy skirt to rip the lighter one right?

I hope that you enjoyed this tutorial!

Let's do the limbo! How low can you go? Tutorial: Changing waistbands on jeans

Most of my family lives in Taiwan, the Netherlands, and Hong Kong. My reletives in HK and Taiwan like to buy me clothes, except well, frequently the measurements are wrong because they have to guesstimate by some numbers that my dad sends over every year. This usually results in clothing that are too large, or high waisted or not my style. Luckily, I've found a way to make the waistbands on jeans "lower". This means that if have you have a pair of jeans that are "mid- waisted" or "high- waisted", you can take them a bit lower, like 1 and a half inches. This is especially good as well, if you buy a pair of jeans from Macy's or something, and they fit your butt, thighs, legs, but not waist, becuase you can tailor the waistband to fit you.

This project is not for the meek! This is especially good if you are trying to make a new waistband to kick up a pair of pants, trying to make something fit your waist, or trying to make your pants a lower rise. I'm not going to teach you guys to make your jeans like 5 inches lower becuase that's some serious stuff right there. You have to move the pockets, cut off a substantial amount of cloth, move zipper etc. That's scary stuff right there.

Here's the original pair of pants:

Instructions:

1. First, take off the waistband. This isn't that hard actually. There's some thread holding it to the jeans and you just have to snip that and you'll find that the waistband comes off pretty easy. Underneath the waistband is just the jean pant part that has fraying stuff.

2. Now, you want to put in a new waistband that is lower than the original. You see the fraying edges? You just want to take some cloth, denim or not (whatever floats yo' canoe), and wrap it around the edges. If you don't understand, I have a picture below and lemme give you an analogy. You know when you have to tape together two edges of a piece of paper? How do you do that? You tape it together by putting half of the tape on one side and half on the other side right? It's the same concept, except you are "taping" the frayed edges down.

3. Be careful of the zipper. Try not to cover it too much. Now you have some space right? Put a hook- and- eye clasp there. They come in many different sizes and you can find them at a local craft store. I've put a link HERE. I chose not to use a button because then you have to make a button hole and those are seriously annoying.

4. I forgot to mention, save the belt loops. If you've thrown them away, just make some. Sew the belt loops back on, and if you want, put a li'l button on the front and you are fantasticlly good to go!

Final look:

Just a Quick Tutorial: Puffed Sleeves on Shirts

So since today I was bored, my sister asked me to put on new sleeves on an old shirt. So, I decided to rip apart a different shirt and then make new sleeves from that.

What you'll need:

• Sleeves. About 2x the hole that you need to put it on. See pictures
• A shirt without sleeves. If it has sleeves, just rip 'em off.
• Pins- to pin the sleeves and ruffles together
• Needle and Thread- does this actually need explanation?

Instructions:

1. The sleeves should look like this (see below) so that you can make the "puffiness" and "ruffliness".



2. The shirt should be inside out and the sleeve should be right side out. Put them together as so (see below)
   
   
   
   
3. Now, pin them together. As you are at the top of the sleeve, start pleating them, evenly.
   
   
   
   
4. Sew. I suggest that you lightly handsew the pleated part then run it through with a sewing machine. It's easier that way
   
5. Do the other sleeve. This is my finished product. I cuffed the sleeves so it looks cool! Happy sewing!
   
   
   

Toodles- and by the way, does anyone have any good places to get a layout, or anyone want to do a layout for me? I would really appreciate it. Also, if i get a new layout, does it mess up stuff i've added like the "reminder/contact info" box or the "hit counter" box"? Thanks loves

Sequins are a Labor of love

Today, I finally finished the long term project that I've been working on for AGES. Literally, for ages. I have successfully sequined the sleeves of a t-shirt that I bought from Old Navy. One arm is slightly tighter than the other arm, but it's not a big deal to me really. It's not really uncomfortable, but it's different becuase the sleeves aren't really movable. You know? The sequins overlap like scales and I designed it to be like a fish caught in a fishnet. At first I wanted to do like this rainbow thing, but that would require that I actually sort out all the sequins into thier respective colors, and just no. Absolutely not. I am planning on wearing this in the summer with a pair of skinny jeans. What do you guys think? Is it too ostentatious? Too flashy? Or do you like it. Leave your comments below! I do apologize for my dirty and disgusting mirror. I didn't even realize all the fingerprints until I took the pictures!

I just sewed the sequins on with plain black thread and then interlinked them by layering the sequins. To do that, follow these instructions. First, push the needle through the sequin hole, then push the needle through the fabric next to the sequin edge. Pull it back up through the fabric and add another sequin. Now, take your needle and push it back through the original sequin hole. Now, push your needle through the fabric so it comes out at the edge of the second sequin. I will post pictures to help.

Toodles

Tutorial: Turning a shirt into a skirt!

Ew, this shirt, is so ugly. I mean it looks OKAY now, but in reality it's so gross because the top, doesnt actually go below the belly button and its humgoly WIDE. I mean, I would wear this if I were:

1. Pregnant- This is wide enough to be a maternity shirt.

2. If I had a stomachache- to give my stomach some space so it can breathe

3. Were to go to a thanksgiving party- to give my stomach space to expand

Unfortunately, none of those things apply to me, so I decided to be thrifty and make it from a ugly shirt into a fabulous skirt!

Instructions:

1. First you want to just cut off the top part, the part with the sleeves/arm holes. You don't need them anyway!

2. Now, take the top (assuming that the bottom is nicely hemmed), and hem it. You want to leave a space open so you can put the elastic in. Also, the hem should be around 1 inch wide or so. And if the fabric is sheer, before you do the hem, please pleaseplease put a lining. Just sew one in underneath the skirt so that your thigh muscle doesn't like, stick through because that's so gross.

3. Now, take a piece of elastic and cut off a piece that just wraps around your waist. Shove it through that space that you left open and drag it all around through the waistband. Now, tie it so that the waist becomes around 2-3 inches smaller than your actual waist. You need it to GRIP not just hang loose on your waist, unless you like the "my ass sticks out" look.

4. Now, notice how on the bottom it's really weird? This is your chance to pick off any weird stuff, make some outside decorations etcetc. I added a lace piece on the outside of the skirt and sewed the bottom so that it's not so flippy.

5. Finished product! Beayuuuuuutiful. Lovely. Now, I must do my Stats Extra Credit!

Toodles<3

Tutorial: Skinny or thinnish Jeans

You know what's really annoying? When you recieve a pair of jeans and they don't fit as well as you'd like. Maybe there's a pooch in the thigh area, the jeans are bell bottomey instead of skinny, or they're just 1 cm too big all around. Annoying right? Well, I'm going to teach you how to thin down your jeans to make them skinny jeans.

Instructions:


1. Start off with a pair of jeans, and flip them inside out. You know when you try to lay them flat, there's always a bit of extra fabric on the butt side to well, accomodate your butt right? So, pull all of that extra fabric towards the outer seam (not the inner seam where your crotch is). I'm using a pair of corduroy pants and they are bell bottoms.





2. Now, take a pair of your own store bought skinny or straight legged jeans and lay them over the pants. Those will be your beginning template. take a piece of chalk and draw line marking where you want to sew. It's better to make it not skinny enough than to make it too skinny. I swear, it take forever to pick out so many stiches. Trust me of this.





3. Sew! Use a sewing machine before your hand falls of from exhaustion. Then, try the jeans on. If they're too big, make the jeans a tiny bit smaller by sewing another line on the left side the original stiching. Aka, sew a line nearest your crotch pants area. If you someone have it perfect, sew another seam on the OUTSIDE, aka to the right of the original seam. It just gives you extra reinforcement.

4. Now, cut off the excess fabric, hem it up if needed (max half cm deviation) and voila! You have a new pair of skinny jeans. I'm sort of bending over becuase the light is shining in my eyes.



Tips to get you by:

- This isn't meant to be skin tight. It just helps to keep any excess fabric in place. I suggest going to a tailor if you want something skin tight.


- If you have particularly thick denim, you'll need a thicker needle and specially made for denim thread because regular cotton stuff isn't going to hold too well for denim.

- If you have to sew away too much, just consider getting a new pair of jeans because it's kind of difficult to go from a size 6 to a size 1. You'll be sewing over pockets which is a horrible hassel.

Toodles<3

Swap+ Tutorial+Personal

Today, my psychology class finally ended for the week. Ugh, it's been seriously draining catching the bus a 7:11 AM, filling out those damned college applications (Some are online, some aren't blahblahblah. Some colleges aren't too clear about how to apply online...), studying. I don't know. And so today, my family and i went to this sushi place one hour away. Sorry, but I don't care how good the food is. 1 hr is just too far to travel for me. Especially if we need to shop after. So, we go around to Marshalls, Wal-mart etcetc. And guess what I bought? NOTHING. Honestly, I wasn't expecting to find anything that fits because usually those large retailers or those warehouses where dept. stores send unwanted extras rarely have sizes like 0, 2 or XS, S etc. Those sell out first or something. This sucks. I haven't been to the mall since Black Friday... of last year... I have been a hermit for my Junior school year. I hate that! All they had was XXL, XL, L, M in shirts and maybe like Sizes 4 and up for pants. They had like maybe one size 1 pants that I hated, and a couple ugly small shirts. Whatever.

So, I recently completed a swap with Roxyjones again via MUA. I actually completed this like last week but really, I don't have time anymore to update as soon as I complete something. Now, I am taking a BCC class in psychology as well as doing some independent studying. Moving forward!

I love the Miss Sixty Perfume. Actually, its more like an appreciate feeling. It's sweet, but after a while, it can be overwhelming. I think that it's only for a night time thing, not something I'd wear in the daytime. The face highlighter I gave to my sister. The nail polish will not be swatched because at the end of summer before school starts, I will be doing a HUGE Nail Haul with swatches and everything. I'm really really dissapointed with the Mark get in line eyeliner. It sucks! The liner is so watery and you need to shake it up to get some pigment. Also, there seems to be a metal ball inside of the thing. Maybe to help to shake it up? I don't know. Also, it NEVER dries. Like, never dries. It's ridiculous. It gets tacky, but the only way to get this to dry, you need to set it with some powder. And this is not waterproof. Mark, I was inlove with the chrome liners. This is a major dissapointment.

Now for the Tutorial part. I mentioned before that I would do a tutorial on how to make your heels not slippy. Well, what I mean is that some heels have NO traction at all. It doesn't help that linolium and wood floors are slippery. So this is what I did.

First, walk in your heels. Notice where it is slippery. For me it is the heel and the toe part.

I took those rubber dishwashing gloves, and cut off the traction-ey part that goes on your palms and fingers. It has a different pattern to it. You'll know what I mean. So, I took a hot glue gun and glued three pieces to the place where the shoe slips the most. The shoe toe part has a fabric like thing there, so then you can use hot glue gun to glue the rubber pieces on. For the heel, you need to put a thin layer of hot glue on it. It makes a rubbery surface. For all plastic-ky surfaces that aren't fabric-ky you need to put a thin layer of hot glue. I hope that this helps. If it doesn't, message me or leave a comment!

Toodles<3