DIY Cage Bralette

Tags

bra, bralette, cage, DIY, dollskill, lingerie, nastygal, project, sewing, summer

Maybe it’s a little too late in the year to be thinking of summer dresses with exposed backs, or extreme 80′s tank tops with giant arm holes… but I’m very excited for warmer weather!  Because I made this little beauty:

…and now you can too!  Normally I don’t wear bralettes, but lately I’ve been bitten by the Nasty Gal/Brandy Melville style bug and I’m stepping out of my comfort zone with this.  Nasty Gal and Dolls Kill sell this very popular caged bralette/swimsuit top for around $75 or more, but I didn’t want to spend that much for just a bra.  This is my first time sewing a bikini/lingerie type piece and I’m glad I did…. it turned out amazingly well for my first try.

I spent $5.22 for 10 yards of elastic from Etsy, $0.99 for the black thread (I had just recently run out), and $2 for some stretchy little girl’s dance shorts at Goodwill… for a total of $8.21.

What you’ll need:

• Stretchy black fabric for the two chest pieces
• At least 5 yards of 5/8″ fold over elastic, or “FOE.”  I bought 10 yards and only used about half
• A sewing machine
• Black thread
• 2 bra rings, 2 bra adjustable sliders:  I cut up an old black bra and used it for its parts
• Scissors (or rotary blade, but that’s optional)
• A ruler or measuring tape to make sure things are even

Fold over elastic can be found on Etsy and Ebay.  They come in different widths but the most common is 5/8″.

There are 2 sides to fold over elastic (aka FOE).  I chose to use the matte side.

You’ll be making a LOT OF STRAPS. A LOT.

Play around with your zig zag settings and tension to get the best amount of stretch in your straps.

Find some fabric to use for the cup/chest area.

Cut it up!

Let’s finish the edges with fold over elastic.

Make sure you have extra length for the straps. Just in case.

I’m a size 32, so I cut enough for a 32″ band.  Sew to attach.

Close your bra band together to make a loop:

Now it’s time to work on the back straps.  Find some bra parts!

Make your adjustable straps:

Now add the decorative straps to the cup area:

The loops should fit around your bottom ribcage.

It will seem very repetitive now, but we’re almost done.

When you’ve added all the straps you want… you’re finished!

Have fun and good luck!

♥ E&I

DIY Project – Minnie Ears Headband

Tags

crafting, disneyland, DIY, mickey ears, minnie ears, minnie mouse, project, sewing

Justin and I are going to Disneyland in a couple weeks!  I sported mouse ears when I was a kid and I thought it’d be fun to do it again as an adult!  At first I scoured Ebay and Etsy for some ears… but I found that they don’t come cheap.  The cheapest ones were actually sold by DIY’ers so I thought I could give it a go myself and save some money in the process.

Everything I had was already here at home so this project cost nothing!

What you’ll need:

• Two old greeting cards, or two scraps of cardboard you can fold down
• Scotch tape
• Fabric pins
• A circle template (I used a large lotion container)
• A thin headband
• An old black T shirt you don’t mind cutting up
• A black lace remnant
• A white pencil (I actually used a cheap $0.99 white eyeliner)
• Sewing machine (or you can hand sew)
• Red or pink felt to make a bow (see my bow tutorial here)
• Hot glue

Here’s my folded card, headband and my template (old Bath and Body Works lotion tub)

Use whatever is around the house (perhaps a mug?) to trace your template onto the folded side of the card.  Leave about 1.5″ or so of fold.  Cut out.

The headband will slip through the card fold. If you want, reinforce the fold with scotch tape.

Lay your t-shirt flat, and place the cardstock on top as a guide.  Cut out your t-shirt fabric to size.  You’ll end up with two layers.

Cut out two squares of lace of the same size as your t-shirt fabric.

Sandwich the lace (with the right sides facing in) between the two layers of t-shirt fabric.

Pin the layers together and trace around the cardstock with your pencil.

Sew the layers of fabric together on the white markings with your sewing machine.  If you decide to hand sew this, the right sides of the fabric should face out. (Lace, T shirt, T shirt, Lace)

Trim the fabric

Turn the ear inside out.  Roll up your cardstock and stuff inside.

Flatten out the cardstock inside the ear.

I couldn’t get a good picture of this, but open up the fold of the card stock and carefully slip your headband through.  (This is where the reinforcing scotch tape comes in handy.  If the cardboard rips, you can scotch tape the card stock to the cardboard and then sew your fabric over the headband.)

Optional:  My sewing wasn’t perfect, and there were a few bumps/corners poking out.  I used some hand sewing to tuck these imperfections in.

After slipping the ears on and making sure of the placement I had to hand sew the base of the ears closed.  (You can glue on scraps of fabric on the ear base using hot glue if you don’t feel like sewing here)

Minnie wouldn’t be Minnie without her bow, so we’re going to add one here.

I made a felt red bow using my bow tutorial here, but with a rectangular backing.  The center strip of the bow holds the bow and the rectangle piece together.  I then cut the corners of the rectangle to give it a cute finish.  You can add whatever type of bow you want here.  Or get creative and add a little tiara, or a bridal veil if you wish depending on the occasion!

Using hot glue, I glued the 4 corners of the bow to the ears.

And that’s it!  Hopefully this wasn’t too complicated.  I did this project on the fly and I think it turned out well for an hour of work!  The lace really helps to conceal any sewing mistakes.

Thanks for reading

♥ E&I

 

 

DIY Hemming Linen Beach Pants

Tags

beach, DIY, hemming, linen, pants, roxy, volcom, zappos

I finally got around to hemming a couple linen beach pants that were purchased this summer!  Here’s a quick recap.

Volcom Rev Up Linen Pants - On sale for $35.99 at Zappos at the time of this post

I bought mine in a size XS.  The strange fabric overlap reminds me of yoga pants.. I’m not a huge fan but I don’t mind it.  I guess it makes the pants look a little more interesting.

I bought these for only $14 at a Volcom outlet store a few weeks ago… I’m not familiar with wearing linen and these are 60% linen, 40% viscose.  I hope they won’t shrink too badly.  I know linen is notorious for wrinkling but its ok since this is a casual pant specifically for lazy days or for the beach on vacations.

I tried on the pants, flipped the leg cuffs inside out and pinned them.  Using a ruler, I found that I needed to remove about 5″ from the bottom.  I didn’t use any ironing for this since the fabric was quite heavy on its own and after pinning it down, the fold stayed in place.

With my trusty Singer Brilliance 6180 (bought from Costco for around $150 I believe) I sewed the hem down with a straight stitch and then followed that with a decorative vine/star stitch, #15.

The finished product:

Pretty!  I had a hard time choosing which stitch to use and I kept testing them out on scrap fabric until I finally settled on this one.

ROXY Ocean Side Womens Pants (Black, Sand) – $38.99 at Roxy.com or More colors here at Amazon

I did the same process with this pair of XS white Roxy pants.  I added the decorative stitch detail here too but its barely visible with the white.

Yay another pay of DIY hemming projects complete!  When our Fiji rolls around these will be ready to go  I love DIY hemming because for inexpensive pants like these I don’t have to go to the tailor…that would probably cost 1/2 the price or more of another pair of casual pants.

♥ E&I

Paint Project Before & After: Be@rbrick & Frame

Tags

bearbrick, decor, DIY, home decorating, paint, painting, spray paint

I finally got around to painting these two guys!  I found the frame at a thrift store for ~$1 and the large Be@rbrick was $25.  I don’t think it was authentic but I was planning on painting it anyway.  I still need to buy more photo paper to print out a photo and fill up that frame.

I really LOVE spray painting now.  It’s so much cheaper than buying new items for the home.  Paint cans run around $5 or so.  2 projects down, many more to go!

♥ E&I

Easy DIY Necklace from Chandelier Earrings

Tags

crafting, DIY, earrings, jewelry, necklace, project

I have another quick and easy DIY project for you!

Well, maybe this doesn’t really count as a real DIY project. It only takes a few minutes to do and although you probably won’t have the same materials as I do, hopefully it’ll give you some ideas for your own jewelry stash.

So this month I visited Urban Outfitters during a 50% off clearance haul (blogged here) and I picked up a couple of gold and silver chandelier earrings for $2.50 each (buy here for $5 each):

After taking the earrings home I realized that they overwhelmed my face. But! The connector rings for the bottom tier were easily bent and I removed them from the earrings. I decided not to waste the extra pieces and use them in a new necklace.

The finished product:

What you’ll need:

• Chandelier earrings that are cheap, broken, or ones that you’re bored of
• Pliers (or your fingers if you wish)
• A leftover necklace chain

Earrings before:

I removed the lower tier with my fingers first.

Ahh much better! The earrings are a little smaller and more wearable.

I took the original connector ring, opened it up, and closed it around the necklace chain. Then I did the same for the other side.

Easy, right? Almost TOO easy!

I could have stopped there, but I decided to add the extra gold piece onto it as well for a nice contrasting effect.

I ended up making two necklaces since I had two bare chains laying around.

A short one:

And a long one:

Yay! I already wore the long one out already. I like it because it’s dainty yet eye catching.

If I had the materials on hand, I think one of these fringed crescent pieces would make a REALLY cool ear piece, kind of like this one from Boticca:

Here’s another example!

Take these earrings from Forever 21 for $4.80.

If you connect them to a silver chain, you’ll get a dainty version reminiscent of this $258 Anthropologie necklace.

The shape is not exactly the same, but you get the idea, right?

The nice thing about working with metal jewelry is that it’s so easy to change it up: add pieces, take pieces away, combine pieces… the choices are endless and very easy to switch around as long as your connectors don’t break.

Have fun!

♥ E&I