I found one frumpy shirt from my mom’s discard pile, added one old, waffle-weave, water resistant shower curtain and created a unique, quirky, dress.  I used McCalls 7500 dress pattern.  The shower curtain was a beast to sew as it frayed with every move.  I had to surge all the seams prior to attaching the pattern pieces.  It was nearly impossible to decipher the right-side of the curtain fabric.  Yet, I prevailed and managed to get a sassy spring dress. I left the ‘top’ part of the shower curtain intact and used it as my dress hem.

Men’s Shirts, Short Skirts … no one says it better than Shania Twain.   Using an Ambercrombie & Fitch scandalously short skirt and three men’s button-up permanent press shirts, all found at my local thrift store.  I cut the shirts just under the pocket and then again into six equal sections leaving the tails of the shirt intact. I cut off the buttons and stitched together the shirts and then gathered at the top.  Sewed the shirts under the skirt hemline, leaving the frayed portion showing on the outside

Using the vintage Butterick 6600 wrap dress pattern ( $.25 at the local Deseret Industries ) I upcycled a skirt and lace top ( $7.00 from Thrift Town ) The unique thing about this pattern is that the dress can be worn both ways … V-neck or High-neck.  Backwards or Frontwards … It makes no difference in the fit … It’s like two dresses in one.   I cut the skirt for the skirt part of the dress, and I used to extra fabric to line the lace top.  I did not have quite enough solid fabric for the lining, so the cap sleeves are unlined.  The outdoor photos show the…

My girls had so much fun with this!  We took a white bed sheet, turned them into dresses and tie dyed them!   And since girls always need some great accessories we took some old lanyards, removed the hardware and used the Windham Fabrics from our box to make cute chapstick holders!  Dress pattern and tie dye tutorial from Tie Dye Diva Patterns.    

So our upcycling journey took us to many places, but when my youngest daughter got her first dollhouse, I knew that’s where we were going. It started with a dollhouse shaped bookshelf. Each room is full of upcycled items, and we made almost everything! (Minatures are expensive! And what’s the fun in buying them?!?) Starting on the ground floor: -The kitchen cabinets and countertops, appliances, etc are made from scrap mat boards and paper that we had in our craft stash. -the coffee bar table was made “industrial” with skewer legs, fitted with grommets to make the connectors. -the lights are from old suction cups, and grommets as connectors as…

I created a prayer chair with fabric that has bible verses on it.

For this project, I took a two-layer knit dress and upcycled it into a skirt with attached leggings. I also made a matching shirt with a heart applique using the dress and a knit fabric from my stash.

For this project, I used a maternity skirt that I made a few years ago and upcycled it into an asymmetrical hem dress with split sleeves.

I created an upcycled top by shortening the original top, creating a casing and inserting elastic. I almost got rid of this top but I am  so happy I was able to see a vision for a new top!