Salvaged Baby Hoodie Tutorial

If there are any of you moms like me out there, you will probably have a stash of adorable baby clothes you can't bear to part with that are filling up space in some closet somewhere. I am lucky enough that right now, the rmy has allotted us a 3 bedroom house as accomodation. However, with my husband's possible promotion coming up and his reposting imminent, it is highly unlikely that we will ever get this lucky again, so we are being forced to have a massive clearout. I managed to part with about 1/3 of the baby clothes that I'd kept, but there were some certain key pieces that I just couldn't part with. Take this hot pink all-in-one I had found, complete with a little black smiling skull pattern and cute little skull appliques. Totally punk rock, totally adorable, and totally unique. But also, totally too small. I had a black jumper and a hoodie lying around from a friend who'd left me some of his extra clothes and given that my daughter has now outgrown her other hoodies, I decided to make her a new one.

The first step was to figure out what parts I wanted to keep and use of the original baby outfit. I decided to take the pach on the back and use it as the same in her new hoodie, to cut off the legs and use them as the lower sleeves. I then cut two pockets for the front and the remaining fabric I set aside for trim. Then I measured my daughter, which seriously, I should have received a medal for, she was soo wriggly! Just a measurement around the ribs, a measurement from the top of the shoulder to the hip, a measurement of the top of the shoulder to the wrist, and finally, a measurement around her armpit to which I added an 2 inches for seams and space (except for the armpit, I added 3 inches so she'd have more wriggle room). 

The it was the easy part, I basically layered the jumper and the hoodie on top of one another, and just cut out the same shape that the main body of those were, only smaller, going by my measurements. For the bi-coloured sleeves, I measured the width around at the tops of the leg pieces that I'd cut off the baby garment, and measured their overall legnth, and cut a rectangular piece that was the same width as the leg piece, and the remaining legnth of the arm measurement (example, total arm measurement, 11inches, leg piece 6 inches long so the remaining sleeve piece would be 6 inches long, including an extra inch added for seams). Then I sewed the patches and pockets on, and put the sides together. 

I then added a small decorative patch on the tops of the shoulders just for fun, and sewed the top part of the sleeves on, and then the bottoms. Finally I cut out the hood, sewed it together, added the trim and then stitched the hood to the rest of the garment, and fitted it to my daughter. Perfect! All of this took 45 minutes give or take. All that remains now is to sew on the zipper, which I don't have yet, so my daughter is wearing it fastened with funky safety pins, which actually add the the punk effect!

Cutting out the main body of the hoodie, go with the same shape as the bigger garment you are using, just use the measurements of your child. Don't forget to add a few inches for seams and wriggle room!

Next the patches and pockets are stitched onto the top layer, and then both layers of the body pieces are stitched together along the side seams. If you'd like or if your armholes look a bit tight, cut out a rectangular patch for the tops of the shoulders and sew it on now, otherwise, stitch the shoulder seams together.

The main pattern pieces should look like this. Sleeves are just a long rectangle, or 2 shorter rectangles if you're doing ones like mine. Make the hood a bit bigger than you think you'll need.

From the front, finished, minus the zipper. The pockets look crooked but they're not. The patch on the back is, but I really don't care with this one!

From the back. Note the little patches on the shoulders.

All things Witchy and Wonderful

Since the date for the Practical Magick Blog party is coming up soon, and Halloween/Samhain is just around the corner, my mind has been wandering to all things witchy and wonderful...I have been extremely inspired by the digital collages of many talented graphics artists out there, especially the lady at Plumrose Lane, and was thinking that I just might give the idea a go and make my very own Halloween blog theme using witchy and magical graphics and photos from vintage sources.

I have also found a very sexy painting called Faust's Vision in which there are a number of nude & nubile witches flying (it seems) and have a brilliant (if not a bit naughty) project planned for that image as well! I may have to mark this blog as adult if there is going to be anything of an adult nature, even if it is vintage paintings...on the subject of nudity, I also found some beautiful hand-sculpted pendants on Etsy, although I'm not sure if I'll shock my dear readers if I dedicate a post or two to things of that sort. Being of the openminded sort, I find them quite beautiful and would like to make something similar, but there are those people of a more, umm, reserved nature out there so I'm still debating on whether or not to post anything more on it. (If you're curious you can visit http://www.etsy.com/listing/40123251/cameo-necklace-scroll-setting-with-pink or http://www.etsy.com/shop/VulvaLoveLovely). Other things I'll be posting soon are a project I'm working on for my daughter, a hoodie I made out of a friend's recycled sweater and one of her sleepers that she had grown out of. I just need to find a zipper so I can finish the thing! I'll also be posting a few recipes I have for delicious and quick meals that are great for fall, some kids Halloween craft ideas, a few more tutorials on potions and decorating potion bottles, some tutorials and ideas for quick and easy Christmas gifts and I'll be adding some free potion bottle labels that I've made for you to download! I've been a bit spaced out lately and not able to post quite as often but I'll get back to it soon!

New Classes Starting Soon in Tidworth, Wiltshire!

I'm working on starting a new class series in Tidworth where I'll be demonstrating how to make your own natural bath & beauty products including soaps, body butters, massage oils, shampoos, bath salts, salt scrubs and bath bombs just in time for Christmas!! In each class you will be able to make your own product to take home. I will provide all the ingredients including pigments, glitters, molds, essential oils, & soap bases and help each of you make your own custom products! For a few of the classes you will need to bring a couple supplies of your own such as a jar or bottle to keep some of the products in, and maybe some favourite stickers or ribbon to wrap the soaps in, but these should be easily available and very cheap, if not free. Anything else I will cover. I need to know what days of the week any interested ladies would be free, and preferred times for the class??

If this class goes well I will be offering other classes such as making your own jewelry, with several different styles of bracelets, necklaces and earrings and perhaps even making your own found object keychain and zipper pulls!

Any ideas? Let me know!!!

Helloooo all!!

This is just a quick post to say that I've gotten all the comments on link exchanges, and I'll be adding your links in the next 24 hrs or so, right now, my daughter is running around like a lunatic so my computer time is limited! If anyone has any links to a photo or logo they'd like me to use for their button, please email the photo or the link to me at sensualdecadence@gmail.com and I'll add it, otherwise, if you don't have a button, I'll be creating my own for you mwahahahahaha!! aaand......baby has found the cola, tata, I'll be back later!

Link Exchange Request

As everyone who writes in a blog knows, readers are very important. But in order to have readers, one must have traffic, and a great way to increase traffic, is to have a link to your blog in as many places as possible. So, if anyone out there reading this has a blog or a website which covers topics such as crafts, handmade, handcrafted, natural products, making your own wine/beer/cider/soap/perfumes, making or upcycling clothes, herbal remedies, herbal, pagan/Wicca/Druid related, or anything similar to any of the topics of my posts and would like more traffic, 

Will you please do a link exchange with me??

I have two boxes on my page, one on the sidebar and one on the bottom with an html code to add either my button or my banner to your site. In exchange, I obviously will place a button or banner for your site/blog, on my blog! Simple!

Let me know, I already have a few, and you know who you are, THANK YOU! 

Homemade bread

My nearly-two-year-old daughter LVS was being a pain. My foot is broken so running around outside and going for long trips to places is currently a no, and she was bored to tears inside. So I decided to make some bread with her and see if she'd find it interesting.

Now I have never had success with making bread and the other day I realized why. My yeast has an expiration date. Therefore, it doesn't activate, or rise, so my bread is always thick and heavy! I promptly made a trip to Tesco's to fix the problem. I found some very cheap quick-acting bread yeast, some stone ground whole what flour, and we marched back to the kitchen. 

I really don't know how much flour I used, it was a good 3 cups or so and I dumped in a heaping teaspoon of salt, a little more sugar, and the dry yeast and mixed it around. I then added some warm water very slowly and mixed until the dough was a big clump that stuck together but was thick enough to lift out of the bowl with my hands. I placed the lump on my floured counter and gave my daughter her own to play with and together we kneaded it for a good ten minutes, adding flour as needed until it was a nice thick elastic dough. Needless to say, my daughter loved it! 

I put both lumps in their own floured bowls and stuck them in the airing cupboard for a little as I showed LVS how to clean the counter and wash the mixing bowl. 30 minutes later, she got to knead her dough again, and then it was placed in the airing cupboard for another half hour or so while the oven preheated to 200C. I dumped the dough out onto a floured counter again, lightly dusted the top with white flour, and cut a simple design into it before setting it on a baking sheet in the oven. about 30 minutes and it was nearly done, but the bottom was a bit soggy so I flipped it onto it's now hard top and baked for another 10 min. Then it went onto 

a cooling rack while me and LVS watched the evening news.

A little while later and the loaves had that nice thunk sound when you tap them and the crust crunched just so. I sliced off a couple pieces and we had lovely warm buttered break for a snack. The only thing I'd change next time, is to use a tiny bit more salt. Too little, and the bread is just bleh. I'll add a few heaping teaspoons next time, and maybe one more just for good measure...

The lighting is terrible but the bread was awesome!

Wine, women & song, the best things in the world!

Ok, so I am listening to the song titled that, but I'm just going to focus on wine, to be specific, brewing your very own super cheap wine, with things you have lying around the house, and some wine yeast. (Cause the bread yeast makes gross tasting muck, yes, I have tried that). I have two batches of wine lying around the house at the moment happily brewing away. At the moment, nothing has gone wrong, and they smell lovely, fruity and best of all, alcoholic! I'll outline the basic steps and ingredients I used for both here, and update this when I finally taste my wine in another week or two...

Supplies:
Balloons
Screw-top bottles or jugs. I find plastic 1 gallon milk jugs work amazingly (keep the lids!)
Water purification tablets (or you can just wash all fresh fruit very well)
Antibacterial dish soap
A very large bowl or pitcher

For wine #1 I used
1/2 packet of Vintner's harvest premium wine yeast CR51 ''used for making light fruity red wines for early consumption'' (I packet will make about 4 gallons)
2 litres 100% grape juice- I used Welch's Concord grape juice
Fresh fruit-fresh strawberries and red grapes (one box of each)
10 clove buds
5 tsp cinnamon
10 tbsp honey
1 cup of sugar
2 cups of black tea (to add tannins)

For wine # 2 I used
3 litres of Welch's white grape juice
1 bag of mixed frozen berries (approx 500g)
1 bag of black tea
2 cups sugar
1/2 packet of of Vintner's harvest premium wine yeast CR51

For wine # 1 I poured a couple cups of boiling water over the fruit and mashed it into a pulp. I then added the honey, cloves, cinnamon, and juice, and finally, the yeast and stirred well. I then poured this into my bottles, and put a balloon over the mouth of the bottle. The balloon is my cheap way of figuring out when the wine is ready to be strained and re-bottled for further fermentation (usually about 3-4 days). Then I put all the bottles in my nice warm airing cupboard, try not to let this temperature go above 20 degrees C, usually an even 15 or so is best, and any lower than 10 may cause problems. I left it for a few days until the balloons inflated with gas, and then deflated. Then I took out my large bowl, a clean dish towel and poured the wine and berry gunk through to towel into the bowl. I discarded the berry skins and kept only the liquid to which I added the tea, and put back into the rinsed out bottles, and screwed their tops on and back into the airing cupboard they went. they'll stay there for a week or two when I'll do the next step of straining them again and beginning to clear them.

For wine #2 I poured a few cups of boiling water on the berries, mashed them, added the juice, sugar and yeast and the bag of dried tea (well minus the teabag, I just ripped it open) and poured it into bottles, and put the balloons on the mouths. Slightly different method and ingredients, as I am experimenting to see what I like best! Everything is now sitting in the airing cupboard, fizzing away nicely :-).

This is what your bottles should look like. When the yeast starts working the bubbles you see in the bottles here will increase, and the balloons, after a day or so will start to inflate a little. When they start to go limp again, then you can strain the wine and re bottle with the lids. Poke a tiny hole in each of the balloons with a pin to et out any excess gases. More sugar = more gas = bigger balloon. Explosions in your airing cupboard are generally not fun to clean up.




http://www.thewinepages.org.uk/