From a sweater to a miniskirt!

Here is a fun tutorial! And font… trying something a bit bolder out because people have been saying the other font is too hard to read, and I don’t want to hinder anyone’s experience reading this delightful little blog! J Here is another sweater shirt refashion!!

I have fallen in love with these miniskirts that look like sweaters; example

 

This gorgeous number is from www.JimmyJazz.com, and is actually a really reasonable price. $9.95 for a pretty new sweater skirt, or free ninety-nine because you have a sweater that you can refashion?? Um I think I will go with the ladder than you!! I have this horribly fantastic sweater that I bought for an ugly sweater party….

 

Ain’t she a beauty?? Well she may be awkward and slightly hideous but she was really darn comfy, so I didn’t want to give her away. I honestly was never going to wear it outside of my house in its original state ever…EVER again, but I kept a hold of her in case something wonderful came to mind. After looking at pretty clothes on the internet for inspiration to repurpose I remembered Big Ugly (what I have kindly named this sweater)!!

So here goes a basic transition from Big Ugly to Little Pretty!

First thing you will need to do is lay out your sweater and grab some cutters.

 You are going to chop the top of the sweater off. Ok, right about now you are staring at the picture of the sweater and wondering what in tarnation is going on with this thing.?!?!?!?! I know right??? I couldn’t tell you what one specific design the person who made this was going for, there are people, and  numbers, and the ABC’s, something that looks like award medals you would win at the Olympics… Any who moving on!

I found it easy with the stripes to line up with one closest to the armpits and cut there. To make sure I cut evenly I used a long ruler.

 

Make your slice,

 

and then throw away the top… or try and invent a new fashion…

 

Yeah I didn’t think so either!

Thankfully with the material being knitted nothing unraveled and the edge stayed nice for me while I sewed it. I used a zig zag stitch to give it that room to stretch and move a bit.

 

 Make your edge about a half an inch or so; it really depends on how big your elastic is. I used a quarter inch elastic so I knew a half an inch would be perfect. Make sure to leave yourself about an inch opening so you can slide your elastic in. If you have one of those really cool do-hickey things that help you thread elastic through hems, now would be a good time to use it, otherwise you can grab a trusty ol’ safety pin like me!

 

Once the elastic is in, sew the elastic together tightly and then close your opening up. Voila, a mini skirt!

 

With the weather being cold this is a great layering tool. Throw this skirt over some leggings, with a plain colored long sleeve tee and a super cute scarf and you will be Miss Fashionista!!

 

I did happen to find a good use for this left over chunk of sweater… it was cold in the craft room/computer room and I was too lazy to get up from writing my blog and editing photos so I just grabbed the sweater top and my vest and got cozy! Ha Ha Ha

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Uber Bean Chili

Tasty Tuesday

 

Welcome back to Tasty Tuesday. I didn’t know a good recipe to try out this last week, but my mother in law came to me practically begging me to make my chili! It is not really my chili; it is a friend of mine’s concoction that I have adjusted here and there until it has become my own special creature. I have named it: Uber Bean Chili! The best part about this chili is that it can be made completely vegetarian. We in the Purcell house don’t eat vegetarian on a regular basis, whenever I try the husband speaks in his caveman voice and says, “Me big strong man, me need meat, yummy for my belly!” No I did not make that up; he loves randomly talking in his caveman voice! On the other hand we don’t eat hamburger either, we use ground turkey. The leaner the better!

So here is what I use:

1.25 pounds of 97/3 Ground Turkey

Two cans of Dark red kidney beans

Two cans of pinto beans

One can of black beans

One can of chili beans

One can of corn

Two cans of diced tomatoes

Chili season packet – I love Carroll Shelby’s Chili Kit

Half an onion, diced

 

(I know my picture only shows one can of tomatoes but I have a toddler that insists on “helping” momma sometimes and he was not giving up that can!)

This is how simple this fantastic chili is, are you ready for it?? Brown up your meat in a sauté pan on the stove, adding additional seasonings… my go to are salt, pepper, garlic, onion powder, and for chili, a dash of cayenne and chili powder. While that is browning I get my crock pot ready and drain all the cans of the beans and the corn. Throw those in the pot. Then I open the cans of tomatoes and add them in. DO NOT DRAIN THE TOMATOES! Add one can full of water to the crockpot, and then stir in your seasoning packet. Once that is all stirred in, add the onion and your turkey should be done by then and can be added in as well. Because my family and I love garlic I also add a spoonful of minced fresh garlic to the pot. Stir it all up, throw the temp to low and let it cook most of the day. Your house will smell fantastic! I promise!

 

      The chili kit I use has mesa in it, when it comes time to serve up your chili if it isn’t as thick as you like you can use this great little packet instead of boring tasteless flour     Again, you can make this vegetarian by just leaving out the turkey. I have tried it both ways and it tastes fantastic either way it is made.

Well that was a simple Tasty Tuesday, so I thought I would share with you a trick I have learned from Pinterest that helped make the prep for this even faster. When I buy onions I will either one, by them pre chopped (yes I am lazy and willing to pay the extra buck so I don’t spend a half hour crying in the kitchen chopping up those horrible buggers) or two, actually spend a half hour crying in the kitchen chopping them up yourself. Then put them in a gallon size freezer bag, squeeze all of the air out and chuck it in the freezer! They stay fresh and good for what seems like forever. My husband loves onions and would eat them cooked in every meal, but who really wants to cut up onions for every meal or keep buying them and they go bad in your fridge… cause that doesn’t smell delightful at all! I do this will green onions as well, but I have heard that throwing the green onions into an empty bottle is better.

        If you happen to try this chili let me know how you like it or if you throw your own spin on it. I love to hear feedback!

 

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Making Tags

Tags:

One key thing I find crucial to starting a small business is a good logo! Then whoreing that logo out wherever you can. Yes I did take it a bit vulgar, but honestly I couldn’t think of a more accurate analogy! (Insert precious smiley face here in hopes anyone offended will forgive and continue reading on) When I first started out I went onto Vistaprint.com and made one of their generic ones.

 

It is simple and cute but not too literal. I didn’t want the typical hair bow or thread on the logo because I was afraid that would tie me down to one specific category of products. Once Paige P. and Seams like Sunday came up with the plan of Pins & Needles, I was in search of a new logo. Nothing on any site was tickling my fancy! This was a log I really did want to find something literal for. My oh so smart husband says to me after hours of frustratingly perusing the internet, “Baby, just make one yourself, you are crafty.” That I am dear husband that I am indeed!

          After a quick trip over to Adobe.com to download the oh so magnificent Photoshop, I was a rockin and a rollin! Amy and I knew we wanted something with a vintage feel to it, but really wanted the pins and needles to be incorporated. After scouring the web for a couple more hours I found a fantastic site www.freeprettythingsforyou.com!! She has amazing things and they all have a vintage feel to them. You have to check and make sure that if you download something from there to make into your own logo, that the original owner has okayed it for commercial use! That is a very important fact otherwise you will make a logo, fall in love with it, and then have to take it down and get rid of it because of copyright laws! Yucko!

          After completing the Pins & Needles logo I wanted to test it on some merchandise to preview how it would look. So back over to Vistaprint.com I went. While testing the logo I happened to see that the one I used for Paige P. Boutique was no longer on there, making things difficult for me! Oh shucky darn I guess I get to go play in Photoshop again and make a new logo!!!!!! I couldn’t be selfish and not make one for my bestie Amy, so Seams like Sunday has a new and pretty logo too!

          So about now you are looking back up at the title of the blog and wondering, “Did she have a brain fart and name the logo blog, tags, or is she actually going to talk about tags sometime today?” To answer your question, yes. Oh I should be more specific, yes I am going to talk about tags now, but I needed to lead into it by saying why not have a cool logo to go on these said tags. Any who here is how I make tags for my crafts!

          After playing around in photo shop I made two tag logo’s. One main one and a small one for those little guys that hang out the sides of things like so.

 

Yes that is one of Amy’s bags; she helped inspire me to do the side ones!

          Once both designs are made (and if you want to keep the same one and just do it two different sizes you can) you will need to flip it. It will need to be mirrored for the technique I use. Once mirrored, you can do your tags one of two ways. You can put the design onto fabric or ribbon. I have done both ways and prefer the ribbon way so that is the way I will show you. Measure your ribbon and then adjust the size of the logos to fit. I do that in Word because it is easier for me, then plaster as many as you can on one page. It will be at your discretion how many you do as you will know how well you can cut the designs out. I then print it out on a regular piece of paper so I can compare it to my ribbon.

 

 You don’t want to waste a perfectly good transfer sheet on something that is too big to fit do you? Me neither, those things aren’t as cheap as I would like them to be!

I use the Stretchable Fabric Transfers,

 

 just so there isn’t any cracking or peeling of the transfer sheet once it has been applied and worked with. Sometimes the image that you transfer, if it has been tugged on it can crack and look icky! This can be stretched all around and stay just as you want it!

          Load up your printer with those and print away! Once printed you now have to cut each logo out before ironing on to your ribbon. *** Side note, remember how I said you can use fabric instead of ribbon? If you wanted to do it that way don’t cut out your logos yet. Iron the whole sheet onto your fabric and then you can take a rotary cutter and a ruler and cut them out that way. It is actually easier and faster to do than the ribbon way but I am more partial to the way the ribbons look. Here is what it looks like on fabric.***

 

 

They really aren’t bad looking at all, I just happen to like the ribbon better… and I think I’m a glutton for longer more painstaking tasks that make me want to curse under my breath from time to time.

          Okay back to cutting, I use my paper cutter, because it is the most accurate way for me to cut.

 

 Give me a pair of scissors with no ruler to help guide me and I cut so badly you would actually debate on giving me a breathalyzer to make sure I haven’t been hitting the sauce! Since you have to cut each one out this can take some time, especially with the little ones. You think being able to fit that many onto a sheet of paper is great until it comes time to cut those little buggers out! You have to pay attention to them to make sure you don’t cut too big or too small, so you can’t entertain yourself with a nice episode of 90210 or anything, but you can sit there and hum the 99 bottles of beer on the wall song while you are doing it!

          Once all of the beers have fallen off the wall… uh-hem I mean the logos have been cut out, it is time to iron them onto the ribbon. This will take about the same amount of time if not more… actually I’m pretty certain more time, than cutting them out did. When using iron on transfers you can’t use your ironing board, it is too soft and squishy…he he he not sure why but that made me giggle… so you must find a hard surface to iron on. I use my craft table, and then I throw an old apron down so I don’t hurt my precious table.  Cut your ribbon to the size you want, if you want you can reference a t-shirt or a pair of pants you have with a tag in it and go with that size. I cut mine at 2 inches, for no real reason, just because it was easy to measure and looked good!

 

          Once your ribbon is cut you will want to fold them,

 

 

And then press them with your iron.

 

Not to make a crisp fold but to prepare the ribbon for the transfer sheet and then to mark where you will want to place your logo.

 

Place logo down and iron the heck out of that guy! I like to iron the transfer sheet and then flip over the ribbon and iron the other side too, just for extra oomph! I didn’t get a chance to take pictures of the actual ironing process, well because it is quite boring and I was trying to focus on not burning the ribbon!

          Once you feel that the transfer has adhered well to the ribbon pull off the paper backing and take a look at your masterpiece!

 

 I like to flip over the ribbon so the image is facing the table/apron and then press the ribbon to make sure it is crisply folded in half and now resembles a tag!

 

 

          This is the final outcome of the large and small tags! I love them! If you don’t have an entire afternoon/night to iron tags, you can make them as you complete each project. Having a toddler and trying to manage a daily blog, doesn’t give me the time to make them all at once, so when I have an extra half hour or so I will whip out as many as I can! If you decide to make some tags please feel free to share them with us and give us any feedback you may have. We would love to hear from you all!

 

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Simple remodels.

I wish when we bought our house I would have documented some of the upgrades we did. I have some before and after pictures but no during the process pictures.  Our house is a 70’s style rambler. Fantastic bones to it, but still very 70’s looking. When I say orange plush carpet and you think back to That 70’s show… well the production designers for that show are even jealous of my carpet, ok!

 The kitchen was very dark and even had that indoor/outdoor carpet in it. I googled and searched Pinterest until I became slightly obsessed with how to update the kitchen. We just put down a hefty down payment so there was no way we could afford a kitchen remodel. Again the bones were good; the décor was just… awkward. Thankfully I found a cheap and easy way to redo the kitchen cabinets.  Do I remember the exact directions to do so… nope, but really it was just removing the cabinet doors, cleaning them with a degreaser, priming them, and then painting. We threw on some pretty knobs handles and it is a brand new kitchen! Here is the before:

 

Sorry for the distance in the picture, I was trying to capture the whole thing, but you can see how dark it is right?

And the after:

 

Much brighter! I believe the name of the paint we used was Country Classic, from Home Depot.

            Next was the flooring in the kitchen, it had to go… pronto! Thankfully some good friends of our had a couple boxes of flooring left over from when they bought their house, so we got that super cheap! The husband and one of his friends started at 8:00 in the morning on a Saturday, ripped up all of the carpet,

 and started laying down the new laminate flooring.

 They had the whole thing done by 3:00 that afternoon.

 It isn’t a lot of square footage to cover, but there were a butt load (I’m pretty sure it has been awhile since I last referenced the butt or things that the butt does so I needed to hit my quota) of cuts to make. It came out really nice! Unfortunately for my husband I am now expecting that great handiwork on the rest of the house! Bye-bye orange squishy carpet! You saw a bit of it in the before kitchen photo… yeah it is a beut!

            The other room of the house that needed immediate attention was the main bathroom. You can tell the previous owner tried to update it from 70’s to the 80’s… bless their hearts. There was calla lily wall paper and matching calla lily boarder and a black tub to help match, gold accents and that horrible awful dark wood!

 I prayed that the wallpaper would come down easily because I didn’t want to paint over it and it look junky. Thankfully it was put up in the early to mid-80’s… you know way before I was born *wink wink*… and it came down really easy. We decided on the same color that we painted the cabinets on the kitchen on most of the walls and an accent of blue on one wall.

 

 Because of the dark brown décor accents that we had bought the dark brown “awful” cabinets didn’t seem too bad. The wonderful and surprising gem in this house happened to be the fantastic original light fixtures throughout. Before even seeing the bathroom and it’s fixtures we had picked out brand new bathroom décor. When we moved in and saw that it went perfectly with it I’m pretty sure I heard a chorus of “ahhh ahhh ahhhhhhh” from angels! Hey it happens!

            Some of the other upgrades happen to be things we owned that I updated because if you have a big new house, you want to showcase your super cool stuff right?!?!?! Unfortunately that will be for another day because I am currently re-doing something fun and will include those other goodies on that tutorial!

Oh and P.S… if you happen to be in the area and don’t believe me about the fantastic 70’s squishy carpet, stop in and I will let you marvel at its wonder!

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Meet Virginia - I Mean, Amy

Hi there! I’m Amy, the other half of Pins & Needles – I figured I better get around to introducing myself one of these days!

I’m married to a great guy (he actually let me turn our spare room into a craft room instead of a man cave, so you know I'm keeping him around) and I have a crazy nineteen month old, John.


 

                                                   Aka his royal highness, the keeper of our home

Hopefully he’ll calm down a little when his sibling gets here. I’m fourteen weeks along, so basically my life consists of telling John not to pick his nose with things and trying not to puke. Oh, and "Dooby dooby do, ba dooby dooby do. A-gent Pppp!" is pretty much the soundtrack of my brain...

I will warn you right now: I am not a good blogger (I’m just glad Tasha is - personally, I think she has a blog-inator that I haven't discovered yet). My own poor little blog that's been up for almost a year has a total of six posts, one of them talking about why I don't post more. Basically, a narcissistic complex (here's the proof: I spelled that right on the first try and am not ashamed to brag about it) and a fear of people mocking what I write don't mix well.

(The point of that paragraph being: I plan on writing MAYBE half the posts my amazing partner does and totally blaming the baby for it)

Tasha told you about how we met and it's pretty much the same on my end. I have to admit, I was more nervous for that blind play date than for the blind date where I met Andy!


 

My own shop is called Seams like Sunday on Etsy, where I sell my sewing projects. I have a few crocheted items on there, but my wrists decided to start giving out, so there probably won't be any more of those! I have been sewing since I was twelve (we'll just say that was more than ten but less than twenty years ago...) when my mom taught me and haven’t stopped since! I currently have four bookshelves full of fabric and a moratorium on buying any more, so here's hoping I can start getting things cranked out (again, I'm going to blame the baby for making me tired).

 

And John - for doing this to my craft room. Busted!

 

 Maybe I'll even be inspired to whip up a tutorial or two!

I am so looking forward to what this year has to bring: I think between a new baby, the Farmer's Market, my regular shop, and a blog to keep up, it's going to be busy but amazing! Thanks so much for coming along for the ride!

 

PS: I always thought I would write a classy, crafty blog, but I think I've already made too many Phineas and Ferb references for that...

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Other Opportunities

Paige P. Boutique was my first ever craft baby. It was also my first ever business venture. When I was young I always wanted to have some sort of business, I just always assumed it would be selling Tupperware. Now don’t get me wrong there is absolutely nothing wrong with selling Tupperware, I actually debate selling it like every other week. There are so many consultant/distributor type of business out there and I have tried a couple out myself. They didn’t do very well. It could be that I didn’t have the time to commit to them because I was still a working mom, or who knows what, but now I have decided to try my hand at a couple new ventures.

Starting two different “at home” business while trying to run a blog and a boutique seems a bit much but I like to go big or go home… well I am actually already home but you get the jest! So let me introduce you to my other babies!

The first is It Works!

 

I was hesitant to try it, but very curious at the same time. I had seen so much about the body sculpting wraps and the defining gels but didn’t think that the results were actually possible, and if they were that they would last. A friend of mine became a consultant and I was able to see her progress of using the wraps and decided to give one a try. The advertisement says see inches lost in as little as 45 minutes. My first wrap I didn’t see any inches lost, but looking at my tiger stripes (stretch marks for any of you whom don’t proudly have stretch marks) they were almost completely invisible! Holy crapper right! Have they come back you ask?? NOPE!!! So I decided to try another one, and saw an inch or so difference. I tried a third one and lost two more inches. At this time I was convinced that I needed to become a distributor. Not just so I can continue on in the process of toning up those spots that aren’t so sexy, but because I find it more exciting to be a part of other’s progress as well! I wanted to be honest about my results so that way people don’t feel fooled if they try one and expect a miracle! Granted I was later complimented by a distributor saying my first wrap didn’t tone anything because I didn’t have much to tone… bless her crazy little heart!

So stop by my website and take a look for yourself! It Works! website There are great deals to help get you started. There is a loyalty option to set up auto shipments which save you moolah! You can buy a wrap for $25 buck – a –roos, or sign up and have a box of 4 sent to you equaling at $15 buck – a – roos each! And don’t think that these wraps are just for your tummy, they can go just about anywhere, legs, arms, hips, waist, back, they even have neck and facial ones to! So check out the website and explore all that It Works has to offer!

 

My next adventure is becoming a stylist with Gigi Hill bags!

 

 Anyone who knows me knows my love for bags and purses. Yes I do happen to make them in my boutique, but these are such high quality bags that they don’t compete! Not that I don’t think mine are high quality but these babies are gorgggggg!!

 

Gigi hill is known for their signature pockets. Every bag brand has to have something to make them stand out from the rest. There are so many pockets in each bag that it will always be organized. You will have to take a look for yourself!

 

And don’t think they only have things for the ladies, they have a men’s collection that is very attractive and still very manly too.

 

But also, who wouldn’t be excited for a company when this is their tag line:

 

Let me be your stylist, click here to see my site!

 

With each of these you can book parties and get free stuff! Free wraps and potentially free gorgeous bags. There are a couple ways to contact me about each of these so feel free to stop by the websites to contact through there or you can leave me your info below in the comments with what you are interested in.

I hope to hear some feedback from you guys and maybe even schedule time to help you pamper yourself, because come on if you are losing inches and looking fab, why wouldn’t you want to celebrate with a great bag?

 

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