Today was one heckuva day ! Once Dearest Son saw his ‘Hot Wheels' shirt back in his closet, that was all he wanted to wear. He noted the patch, and said it was ‘cool'. What a sweet guy I have !
Sweet big guy in my life, too. Beloved Hubby was home today, and we did a bit of shopping. We got Dearest a Cars sticker/coloring book, much like the DPrincess one. But his stickers were awesome ! He's gonna let me scan ‘em, so we can make more when those are gone. There's some that look like vintage ads, some that look like ads for soft ‘my first' toys, and some that are just plain awesome by design. Others are nothin' special, but Dearest loves ‘em all.
Sam's Club - we're members, it's worth it ! - is starting to put out some toys. Mostly Hannah Montana junk, nothing I wanted, but they had some lovely porcelain Tinkerbell dolls that caught my eye. I'm sure that the closer we get to December, the more stuff we'll see in the ‘seasonal' aisle.
We also hit Borders bookstore. They had zero, zilch, nada darn doll book in the whole store. No new magazines, either. They have an exclusive paper doll DPrincess calendar that was OK... I liked Belle's green underwear, but then I saw something really unusual. By the UPC code, a small printed legend warned of the calendar's exclusive nature, and that all other uses were strictly prohibited.
Um, what ? I'm to believe that if I shell waaaay too much for this overpriced stack of papers, I can't use it in any other way but a calendar ? I can't even use the paper dolls without it ? What if I want to use cuttings from it in my personal family scrapbook ? Or on a photo frame in my own house ? Are owners required to burn it in a solemn ceremony at midnight Dec. 31, 2009 ? If I don't, are Disney Stormtroopers gonna plow down the door, glittery bayonets at the ready, clearing the way for the might of the Borders Patrol ?
Shoot, now I wanna buy the thing and do all sorts of horrible, disgusting things with it, and then sell it on eBay, in pieces. I know, I'm probably taking things overboard the way I invariably do, but sheesh. Don't tell me how to use a *&^% paper calendar, people. It just brings out my creatively evil and downright nasty side. If your legal dept. has nothing better to do, I suggest ya put ‘em to work stocking the shelves. You know, maybe with something besides Transformer and Hot Wheels books in the ‘collectables' section. Hmpft.
After a nutritious and tasty fast food lunch, we ran a few more errands and headed home for Dearest's approaching arrival. I fetched the cat-embroidered kids' jeans from Molly's trunk, and began cutting. I was planning the line of attack, to get the most useable fabric with the least waste, when it hit me. I really, truly, all-of-a-sudden, wanted to make a jeans purse. Out of these jeans. These little-girl size-8 black with tiny kitties in white and hot pink, bought for a quarter at a yard sale jeans.
That made the line-of-attack much easier. I cut off the legs about an inch past the intersection of inseam and front/back center seam. That left the pockets, front and back, intact. I hadn't much studied the ‘jeans into purse' designs I'd seen, but I remembered bits and pieces. I'd probably use the inseam of both legs as the shoulder strap, but the rest would still be available for doll clothes. Win-win, in my book !
The bus snuck up on me, so I was soon inside with Dearest, who loved his new sticker/coloring book. After getting him a snack - we'd bought tons at Sam's ! - I was online looking for directions. Hm. There were legions that all said the same thing, but I wanted to line mine. The reverse of black denim and embroidered cats just wasn't as pretty as it sounds. I know I'd seen lined ones before, but darn if I could find the directions.
But once I sat and thought about it, a lining would be darn simple. Hemmed at the top, and formed as a tube the same size as the jeans, I could just sew it along the inside of the waistband, while I was sewing in the shoulder strap, then sew the bottom together just before I sewed the denim's bottom seam. Not a huge undertaking.
Finding a good fabric for the lining though, was. I went through every box of fabric in the Lab, wanting something cute, but not overly pink. Something sort of cat related, but not necessarily. Something that'd look good with the jeans, but not anything I wanted to use up completely, or wanted to use on something else I had in mind... Something...
Well, shoot. All I could think about was this cat-themed bandanna I'd seen a few weeks ago at Hobby Lobby. I could go get two of ‘em Tuesday, it'd be less than $2. and a few minutes... Inconceivable ! With the metric length and weight of a ton of fabric in here, I was gonna hafta buy more for this cast-off project ? Uh, no. Surely somewhere in this massive mountain of material, I had something that would work...
Bonk ! I could have hit my own head. Didn't I buy a knit shirt with the same design as the jeans ? Cream, with black and pink cat silhouettes ? At the same yard sale, also for a quarter ? A quick trip to Molly's trunk again, and I had my lining. Sheesh.
But before I could sew, I had to cheap-serge the three weekend -new fabrics, so I could get ‘em washed. And before I could cut anything out, I had to clear the other fabrics from the cutting table, so I got them bundled up, finally. I've learned that, if something's tucked away for me to do later, it won't get done. At least, not until I need the space for something else. If it's something I can't do now but need to get done, I have to put it in my way - or it won't happen.
My little project purse went together fairly well, but the lining is far from straight. I really hate mixing a stable fabric like denim with a stretchy one like knit, because they just don't mesh well. Had a lot of problems with stretch when I didn't want it, even with stabilizer. And it's kinda small. But I rather like it, and hey, it used up most of a shirt and a pair of jeans from a yard sale ! Took about two and a half hours, but 20 minutes of that was spent turning the shoulder strap right side out.
And, hey, I went from idea to finished in about three hours. Perfect or not, that's something notable ! I even have the leftover pieces bundled up and stored. Now, if I can just hone in on a doll idea...
