Harvest of Daily Life » gift ideas

Turn and outgrown child’s dress to a keepsake apron: Tis the season to be crafting!

Talina — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 14:00:27 +0000

I have to tell you I am loving the toddler apron I just finished making for Everly as a Christmas gift! I knew I was set on making aprons this year but I was mildly anxious about the undertaking and didn’t have the money to buy adorable fabrics and the ones I have on hand just aren’t inspiring or fun…

I have been looking at this pile of outgrown, cute little sun dresses that Everly wore this summer and it hit me. Why not take a dress apart and make it in to an apron?

For starters, it is way less clothing construction hassle. This is always a good thing for me! Plus, it means reusing and re-purposing a perfectly good clothing item so it is eco-friendly of me and also cheap because I don’t need to buy any fabric. Double yay!

Here is a photo of Miss Everly in the dress I used for the apron. This was taken back in July when she fit in to it.

Now the dress wont zip up and it is too short to be worn as a dress anyway. It is a cute dress though and being the “visual” learner type I knew I could make this work better than going off a pattern anyway.

I basically just took a stitch ripper and deconstructed the dress piece by piece. I first separated the skirt portion from the top part, then I removed the skirt’s side zipper and continued to split the skirt’s side stitches until the skirt portion could lay open and flat on the table.

Next I pleated the skirt at the waist so it was the width I needed it to be. I used some coordinating ribbon to sew over the pleats I made and to also serve as the skirt’s waste tie. Then I tied it on the little one to check sizing and length but she wouldn’t stay still for a photo. Here is the back view, lol.

After disassembling the chest and back parts of the dress I discovered I could piece the back section to the bottom of the front section just above the joining of the skirt to lengthen the apron’s chest area.

I kept the shoulder straps and ruffles intact but simply detached them from the back portion, I also attached a length of the coordinating ribbon to the end of the shoulder straps. These lengthened shoulder straps now serve as the part that ties around her neck.

I still want to re-attach the butterfly shape that came off the back of the dress back. I thought it would make a good front pocket either on the skirt or on the top-front but I haven’t gotten that far.

I only get to sew in spurts with Everly peering over my shoulder. She even brings her step stool in so she can be at eye level with my sewing machine watching the fun.

I think it turned out pretty good for just winging it and was super easy-cheesy too. Only took me two days of sewing here and there. I say it took about 2 hours to turn the dress in to an apron and that is 2 hours of beginner sewing skills.

Now we will get some more good use and memories out of an outfit we loved so much the first time around! She should fit in it for another year or two now and it can be an item we save in her memory box once she’s too big for it.

So what kinds of crafts are you working on this holiday season or what ideas did you have? If aren’t working on anything and you need some ideas you should check out some of my past projects here.

Personally, no holiday season is complete in our home without some handcrafted gifts under the tree!

Everly’s Photo Shoot

Talina — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 15:48:51 +0000

Several months back we managed to have some professional photos of Everly taken by a Julia of Livingstone Photography. After trying for months to hook up with our previously selected photographer we were just about to throw in the towel and have photos done at a department store or something.

I tweeted my photographer frustrations and someone recommended I give Livingstone Photography a try. Julia came to our house and was very nice, unfortunately our dog wasn’t so friendly to her and actually tried taking a bite out of her hand…

Dog drama aside we had a good experience and have many nice photos to choose from like this one:

We are having a really hard time deciding which photos to order because each one captures something different in Everly. If you are curious you can check out Julia’s blog to see the rest of the shots from our photo session by clicking here.

I would totally recommend Livingstone Photography to anyone in the Southern Indiana/ Northern Kentucky area because of the great pictures and the surprisingly affordable prices. I am not joking about the prices either!

We were fully expecting to be stuck only choosing one pose and having to buy portraits that only came in packages. When we got Julia’s price list we were stoked that we could buy photos a la carte and that we weren’t limited to only selecting on pose.

Livingstone Photography is seeking a new child “Spokesface” to represent our company in Evansville, IN and the Tri-State area!! The “Spokesface” will be featured in conjunction with Livingstone Photography’s 2010 marketing efforts.

Eligible entrants must be between the ages of 6 months and 12 years at the time of contest entry.

Please submit a non-professional, non-copyrighted photo taken within the last month of your child to livingstonephotography@gmail.com. No prints will be accepted. The entrant must not have been photographed by Livingstone Photography in the last 4 months. Livingstone Photography takes no responsibility whatsoever for any copyrighted material erroneously submitted.

The parents of the winners must sign a model release allowing the use the winners’ likenesses for Livingstone Photography’s marketing and promotion material.

A giveaway for an expectant mom!

Talina — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 13:19:33 +0000

I am giving away the following brand pregnancy related/ expectant mother books:
This isn’t a sponsored giveaway. I just have these items on hand (I actually received multiple copies of them from friends and family) and rather than having them here collecting dust I wanted to pass them on to a blog reader who could use them.

To enter you must do the following:
1. Tweet the following message:
Expecting your first baby? Know someone who is? Win this pile of mother to be essentials -> http://ow.ly/RwSQ Ends 2/4 – Pls RT
2. Leave at least one relevant comment on another post.
3. Come back here and leave ONE comment telling me which post you commented on and include the permalink to your tweet.

Please don’t leave generic, two word comments here or on other posts. They will be deleted, I hate spam and so do my readers.

For extra unlimited entries you may leave as many relevant comments on as many other posts as you want. Only one comment per post per person though. Come back here and leave me additional comments with the name of the post you’ve commented on.

Contest will close On Feb 28th 2010, winner will be drawn by random number generator. Winner will be emailed and announced here so please leave a valid email. Contest is open to US & Canada. International entries are welcome but winner will be expected to help cover the extra shipping costs (I am not rich guys).

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Update: It is now March 15th and I’ve been a slacker. Was hoping to get a few more entries to the contest. Soory it’s taken so long to draw a winner. We just drew with random.org:

Winner has 72 hours to respond to my email and provide me with a shipping address for the prize. After 72 hours a new winner will be drawn.

The 2nd to last commenter, comment #7 (comments list from newest to oldest, so first shows last on the list) is Ann! Congratulations.

Back to school with Scoolio-Von-Hoolio and OfficeMax giveaway. Get Organized Today!

Talina — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 19:49:13 +0000

Last week I was invited to participate in a “Get Organized for Back-to-School” webcast & twitter chat and it was a blast. First off I love twitter chats of any kind so I was stoked to participate, I was also interested in getting some organizational tips because our “office” is anything but organized.

The idea of the webcast was that Peter Walsh and several panelists would present organizational tips for the home, for kids and for the classroom while allowing viewers to submit questions via twitter that the panelists would answer.

N isn’t the most organized person in the world so I was stoked to get some organizational tips from the webcast. They presented lots of good info and many good reminders about organization. Here are a few:

TIPS FOR HOME
1) Find the Vision you have for a Space
2) Make Organization a Family Value
3) Use the Right Tools for Great Organization

TIPS FOR ORGANIZING YOUR CHILD
1) Show that you Value Organization
2) Establish Clear Limits and Routines
3) Always ‘Finish the Cycle’ (Complete a Task)

TIPS FOR THE CLASSROOM
1) Establish Clear Routines
2) Involve Kids with Classroom Organization
3) Use Words, Pictures and Color to help Organize

Just before the webcast we received this surprise box of adorable cupcake themed school supplies courtesy of OfficeMax. The school supplies are adorable and were a fun gift, unfortunately we can’t really use them.

I decided it would be fun to host a giveaway here on the blog so I could pass these cute school supplies on to a lucky reader who can put them to good use. So here are the giveaway details: This giveaway is now closed.

Prize: Back-to-school supplies from Scoolio-Von-Hoolio (includes binders, mini notebook, drawstring backsack, notebook, 2 pocket folder, composition books, pencil set and pencil box)

To enter: Leave a comment on this post with your best organizational tip (this is a mandatory step). Once you have commented with your organizational tip you can make the following optional extra entries. For the extra entries be sure to use the form to enter each of your extra entries or they wont count.

Comment on any of my other posts (besides this one), tell me which one. Unlimited entries.
Follow me on twitter, leave me your username. 1 extra entry.
Tweet the giveaway, leave me the link to your tweet. 1 extra entry per day.
Follow this blog publicly via friend connect, leave me your username. 1 extra entry.
Follow this blog on facebook, leave me your facebook name. 1 extra entry.
Use another media sharing tool (stumble, technorati, digg etc), tell me what you did to share. 1 extra entry per sharing tool.

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Eligibility: This contest is open to those with a US mailing address (unless you are willing to pay for shipping costs to ship out of the USA) and will close on August 31st 2009 at midnight.

The winner will be announced here on the blog. Be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss the announcement of the contest winner!

The winner will have 72 hours following the announcement to contact me and claim their winnings. If the winner fails to contact me within the 72 hour period they forfeit winnings and another winner will be selected and posted here on the blog.

Random.org will be used to draw the winner.

Homemade holiday gifts are IN, what are you making?

Talina — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 06:31:46 +0000

My top search terms right now are homemade gift ideas. There is no doubt that the economy is impacting the way people are thinking about holiday shopping. People would rather make things to give as gifts because it saves money.

I personally like creative homemade, do-it-yourself gifts because they are more from the heart than store bought ones. Plus I have a blast making gifts for people cause I am crafty like that.

Now since so many are flocking here in search of homemade holiday gift ideas and craft projects I wanted to take a second to suggest some easy gift ideas for you to try this holiday season. If you want to check out the instructions just click on the linked text! you have a project you have written about on your blog use mister linky below to share the link with us.

Turn scrap fabric in to braided usefulness by making your very own braided rag rug. These are super easy, have tons of character and can be used almost anywhere in the house.
Make a sentimental gift and clear out some closet space by taking all those stored clothing items you can’t bear to throw away and turning them in to a functional throw or quilt. Anyone can make their own t-shirt quilt quickly and easily just in time for holiday gift giving. Use baby clothes, shirts or just about any special piece of fabric and turn those memories in to a great gift for someone special.
Have an environmental lover on your gift list? You can make several fun earth friendly gift items (like a biodegradable bird feeder or a shoe scraper) that they will enjoy and they’ll love that you took and interest in being earth friendly too.
Have some small trinkets to give? Why not make your own paper gift box using origami? It is super easy, it is fun for kids and you can decorate them exactly the way you want them. You can even make them hang from the Christmas tree.
Got a cell phone fanatic on your gift list? You can make them a cute cellphone cozy out of fabric or yarn to keep their phone protected and also in style this holiday season. Theses are also insanely easy to make and can be oh, so unique and personalized.
Know someone who is in need of some new bedding this holiday season? Put your sewing skills to work and make them a homemade duvet cover or comforter. Don’t worry even a beginning sewer (me) can do this and it is pretty fun too!

Now I know you have a project you are just dieing to share with us. If you have written about on your blog use mister linky below to share the link with us. If you don’t have a link to share but want to just tell us about your project just use the comment field below to do so.

Lookie what I got…

Talina — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 18:35:45 +0000

Just wanted to share the gorgeous soap I just got in the mail today from Maiden53. It is a bar of fresh and energizing tangerine soap, yum! I love handmade soap for a number of reasons. The main one is because homemade soap is usually more natural and it leaves my skin feeling so nice.

After checking out the Garland Prarie Soaps page I got really excited about the occation soaps idea. N and I have been brainstorming fun wedding favor ideas and homemade soaps are a really good idea! With our forest wedding theme we wanted to encorporate the scents and textures of the forest in to the wedding reception. Giving individually wrapped homemade soaps to our guests is a very cute idea. Fun!

Thanks Maiden53 for the bar of soap tell Nicole it is beautiful and I can’t wait to use it! I am also loving the textures and colors of it, I know that can’t be easy to do.

If you want a chance to win a free bar of Garlan Prarie Soap head on over to Nicole‘s blog for her friday soap giveaway.

I was not making porn I promise!

Talina — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 01:09:22 +0000

Just because I have a tripod set up at the end of the bed does not mean we were making porn! I am sure that is what the neighbors are thinking though.

It’s a kind of funny sight and thought so I snapped a photo of it and thought I would make it the title of this post. Nice huh? I am sure I’ll get lots of 1 second hits from people searching for homemade porn now huh?

Seriously though I was recording a video demonstration for another craft article I wrote. As I mentioned yesterday I sold another article and have been feeling highly motivated to write these days. Plus the search terms on this blog have been super instructional craft project oriented. The people have spoken and want more craft instructions so I got busy writing some more tutorials.

I sat down and wrote up an article on how to make your own t shirt quilt from shirts you have collected over the years. I used our bed to record the demonstration video that goes with the article and I just happen to leave the tripod at the foot of the bed. Nice and random huh?

What? You want to see a t shirt quilt? Well lookie here:

Found some collectors items, wanna buy them?

Talina — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 17:28:00 +0000

While going through stuff we found several items that we are hoping to sell online, they are collector items and well I don’t want to sell them at the yard sale for only $1.00… Here is what we found:

1 Arizona State ASU 1987 Rose Bowl Champ Coca-Cola Bottle

This 1987 ASU Sun Devils Rose Bowl & Pac 10 Football Champions Coca-Cola Full Commemorative Bottle! 10 FL OZ. Coke Tab on Top of Bottle! Sealed! Add this item to your Sun Devils Collection!

In 1987 ASU led by MVP Jeff Van Raaphorst defeated the Michigan Wolverines in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California! Arizona State led by Jake Plummer, Pat Tillman, Jeremy Staat, Derrick Rodgers, JR Redmond and the rest of the team went perfect during the 1996 pac-10 Season and a trip against the Ohio State Buckeyes in the Rose Bowl! Mint Condition! ASU plays Football at Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe, Arizona. The current team is led by Rudy Carpenter, Ryan Torrain, & Keegan Herring.

We are selling this for $48.00 for the 1 bottle (includes S&H)

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6 Superbowl XXX 1996 Unopened Coca-Cola Classic Bottle

Each 8 oz. bottle of Coca-Cola Classic is unopened and full. This is a collectible bottle with one side marked with the Coca-Cola logo and info, and the other marked with Superbowl XXX (30) info. for Sunday, Jan. 28th, 1996 – perfect condition. A rare commemorative item, we have 6 of them.

We are selling each one for $12.00 (includes S&H)

So, are you a football memorbelia collector? Want to buy these items and help us pay for our move? Common, you know you are itching to buy these!

Bloggy Giveaway winners!!

Talina — Sun, 04 May 2008 21:10:11 +0000

I promised I would announce the winners of my bloggy giveaway soon after the contest closed. I’ll admit it was hard to figure out who was the most deserving so I decided to give two away instead of just the one. Here are the winners of the heartwarming mini message in a bottle gifts. Thanks for all your entries guys!

Becky S

Well, my message would sort of be for two people. I recently adopted our beautiful daughter from China. I would write a thank you to her birth mother for giving us life’s greatest gift. However, we don’t don’t who her birthmother is, so I would have my daughter hold onto it as a keepsake. Then she could someday add her own thank you, too and remember the special woman who loved her enough to let her go.
witchypoo

I would love to brighten my Grammie’s day because ever since she had to give up her car, she has been depressed.
She’s 95.

I’ll contact the winners to get appropriate shipping address and to find out what message they would like written on the scroll. Now, don’t be to disappointed if you didn’t win, you can still buy one for your loved one over at Custom Gifts by Talina, they are only $10.00 plus S&H!

Bloggy Giveaway- Mesage in a bottle gift

Talina — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 06:22:01 +0000

Okay, I was tempted to host my own giveaway after entering Witchypoo’s giveaway. So here I go joining the Bloggy Giveaways Carnival!

This giveaway will run for one week from today closing on May 3rd, 2008 for US residents. To enter just leave a comment below that tells us why you should win an adorable and heartwarming mini message in a bottle gift. The most worthy comment will win the giveaway so pour your heart into describing who you would send the gift to. Oh and don’t forget to subscribe to my feed!

The message in a bottle gift is for sale on my gift site as a Custom Gifts by Talina exclusive and is a great way to send a special, sentimental message to a loved one. Reaching out and showing someone you care with this message in a bottle gift will surely make someones day and that is the goal with this giveaway! Making a difference is as easy as a simple heartfelt gesture, that is where the message in a bottle gift comes in.

A Message in a Bottle gift is simply a note nestled in a beautifully decorated bottle. The gift giver authors a touching message that I inscribe on a message scroll that is placed inside the decorated bottle. This is a great gift for a birthday, anniversary, holiday or any occasion! The special thing about these message in a bottle gifts is they are fantastic personalized keepsakes that will be cherished for years to come. Give the gift that will keep on giving by bringing back wonderful memories year after year!

Tell us who you would like to reach out to if you win this giveaway and why it is important to brighten their day. Be sure to leave a valid email address when you comment. I’ll use that address to contact you if you win. The winner will be able to author a message that I’ll inscribe on the message scroll, then I’ll ship this touching gift off to the recipient you choose! Good luck!

Wait! Don’t just comment for the giveaway and run! Subscribe to my feed, check out some of my other posts
and consider stumbling this post! Thanks dude..