TUTU-rial

This past weekend I threw my daughter a Bubble Guppies themed birthday party (she turned TWO yesterday!).

When I started planning things a few weeks ago I started out by hitting up Pinterest for some cake and outfit inspiration - which is when I came across THIS - SO cute!!! 

I had wanted to make her a 'no sew' tutu for some time but sort of forgot about it lol... 

I actually considered purchasing the above outfit, but then realized I could probably do this myself for a fraction of the cost. 

SO without further ado here is my version of the 'no sew' tutu along with all the details!

What you need:

• Tulle
• Elastic for waistband
• Scissors
• Measuring tape

For the tulle I chose a rainbow assortment of colours to fit in with the theme of the party, but you can of course go with less colours or even 1 colour if you want a simple classic look.

I purchased the tulle from the local fabric store for $2.50/Metre. I ended up buying ¼ of a metre for each colour x 8 colours = 2 metres total of material. This cost me a whopping $5!

Steps

For the waist band:

1. Cut the elastic to the appropriate length (measure the child’s waist and then add on a couple inches)
2. Tie a knot at the end (but not too tight because once it’s complete you will want to adjust to the perfect fit and sew it closed so it lays flat)

For the tulle:

1. Fold the tulle and cut into thirds (this will give you approximately 11 cm x 140 cm wide strips)

 2. Next take each cut piece and cut again into thirds (this will yield three 11 cm wide x 46.5 cm long strips)

Now for the fun part!

Assembly:

1. Simply take each strip, fold in half and loop over the elastic waist band
2. Slip the ends up and under through the loop
3. Pull into a knot (but not too tight, you can adjust the tightness of the knots later to reach the desired look)

    
 4. Now repeat with alternating colours

Ta Da à

  

The great thing about this project is that nothing needs to be perfect, in fact half way through I stopped measuring and just eyeballed the length of the pieces to be cut.

The tutu took me just over an hour to do.

I later ended up adding some ribbon to the tutu as well as a custom fishy flower which I also made.
If that wasn't enough I then decided to also make her a custom Bubble Guppies t-shirt lol - but this was equally as easy; I simply bought a pack of white onesies from Carters, iron on transfers (for light fabrics), designed the image in Illustrator, print, iron and done!

For the tutu (including the tulle, elastic & scissors) this project cost me less than $10!!!!

The skirt alone online would have cost me at least 3 times that amount PLUS shipping!

Woo hoo to saving money and having complete creative control! lol

she wasn't feeling to good in the first picture...

... but much better a little later on!

p.s
check out the INCREDIBLE birthday cake one of my best friends Cassandra had made:

(it's Molly from Bubble Guppies!!)

It was made by Sharon (owner of Bloom Cake Co.)
(she also did Azaria's 1st birthday cake, which you can see in her gallery)

Thanks Cass & Sharon!!

Mother's Day Gift to ME - DIY Camera Bag!

I recently purchased a new camera, which has quickly become one of the many loves of my life! 

It is my first DSLR camera - Canon Rebel T2i.

It came with a 2nd lens and a camera bag but I quickly realized there was no way I was lugging that case around with me day to day let alone to a party, BBQ or the Zoo.

This prompted me to look online and see if there were any trendy yet practical options that would look cute, hold all my gear and most importantly protect my camera.

I came across many amazing designers and found a few bags I actually loved; such as this one, I even checked eBay... but it didn't seem like there was anything that met all my requirements (looked cute) and cost me much less then $200.00! Which is certainly not in the budget right now so I was thrilled when I came across this blog post. The perfect solution!

So the hunt began for a cute inexpensive bag that would have everything I needed and cost less then $40.

Voila!

This bag cost me $35 from Marshalls!

Next up was getting the supplies I needed:

• 1" Foam - $10
• Self adhesive velcro - $5
• Fabric - $8

Here are the steps for the easiest DIY camera bag EVER:

Steps

Cut the foam to the desired size to fit the bag, I was lucky that the pack of foam I got had two square pieces and one of them fit perfectly when folded in half in the bag so I didn't have to cut this one at all.

For the dividers I didn't measure I just held the foam to the bag with my camera inside and figured out how big I wanted them.

Next, I cut the fabric to cover the foam, placed the foam on top of the fabric (with the fabric inside out) and pinned around all the edges (leaving one end open)

Now it was time to get sewing!

I was so happy to have my mother's old sewing machine for this part, it is quite possibly older than me but it definitely does the trick and saved me a ton of time.

I started with the larger base piece of fabric, then the smaller divider pieces and sewed all pinned sides; I then turned the fabric right side out, stuffed it with foam and sewed the open edges.

Assembly

First I placed the larger foam in the bag.

Next I cut the Velcro to fit on the sides of the dividers.

I then stuck the rough sided strips of Velcro on the dividers and the soft sided strips of Velcro on the bag, making sure everything lined up as I wanted it.

That is it!

Happy Mothers Day to all those Mama's & Mama's to be out there - I am going to get myself  together for some yummy breakfast and then if the weather holds up we are hitting up the Zoo!

xoxo