I wanted to post this project up Monday, but then Monday came and went and Tuesday came and I now have a cold, so there went Tuesday and now here we are on the eve of Wednesday and I'm finally sharing the bestest tree skirt ever.


This pattern is actually an old one that I had. Its the same pattern that is around my living room tree, except I changed it a little bit. :)

{McCall's Pattern 6453)

Now this pattern is not the one I used, but the skirt is similar. My pattern is out of print {I told you it was old}.

So anyways, I altered my pattern so that each of those 8 scalloped sections was ruched. In order to do this, I measured some paper to a length of 54". I had to cut two lengths of paper to 54" in order to be able to fit the whole pattern on it. Then I taped the pieces together and found the center of both ends of the paper.

Using the center mark of the paper, I lined up the pattern at the bottom of the paper and transferred the bottom curve. Then I moved  the pattern to the top of my paper and transferred the curve there. I made to clearly mark where my curves ended so I could match up my lines.


Then I just connected the two curves. This took some creative ruler making, but I made it work. Don't you just love the fedex thing to extend my ruler?

So after that was done, I just cut 8 pieces of tulle from this pattern. Gathered up each long side and basted it to the white muslin that I was using as the backing fabric. Then it was easy peasy to sew each section to another (leaving one open) and then adding some batting and the bottom of the tree skirt. After that was done I added some grosgrain ribbon to hide the seams and the feather trim for some fun. :)



Now isn't that a fun tree skirt? I love how flirty and girly it is. I did not enjoy being eaten alive by glitter. The glitter that is one that tulle must have the best adhesive ever, because I have glitter on my chest that has not come off even after bathing and showering. I think I may need  to scrub harder or something. Maybe I'm just transferring glitter from me to the loofah and back again. Oh well. I will beat this glitter problem. :)

Guys, I haven't cooked a thing since Thanksgiving. We have been eating leftovers, literally, all week. But I have a project to share with you instead. A project! Me? Indeed! I have actually finished a project. For those of you that don't know, I am notorious for buying all the materials for a project and then never getting to it. Thankfully, this one only took me about five minutes.

I was so excited to show off some ornaments for Harrison's tree today, but fate poked her annoying head into my plans, so now I'm going to show you a humongous fail and some wins.

So here are the ornaments that I've been working on.
Do you see my pile of craft stuff? Yep, that's all stuff I've been using to alter these plain Jane ornaments. I had 12 ornaments. I've made 3 beaded covers, which I showed off yesterday, and then I tried painting 6 of them. 4 of those 6 ornaments were a fail, the 2 green ones above were not fails. The other 2 ornaments up there were my redo's. I have one ornament that I'm currently beading, and I can't find the other one. I don't know where it went. I had it on the table with me this afternoon as  I was painting these ornaments, then we had dinner and now I can't find it. Grumble. Oh well - moving on.

So I painted 6 ornaments and only 2 came out right. I don't get it either. They were all enamel paints. I followed the directions. Why did those green ones come out right? I wish I knew, because there was a lot of time  waiting for these things to dry was painfully slow. Here's what the other 4 ornaments looked like after trying to bake them.
Why did the paint peel? Well there are 4 trashed ornaments.

But I'm not going to be deterred so easily. I pulled out my oil-paint sharpie markers in black and brown and started making my animal print ornaments. I free-handed these two ornaments and just filled in with the marker. I had planned on adding glitter to these guys, but after getting everything colored in I decided that they didn't need it.

After I got the zebra one painted, I started on the giraffe one. I happened to have a metallic gold acrylic paint downstairs so I painted the inside of the giraffe ornament after the paint on the outside dried, which didn't take long - thankfully. :) I still need to paint the inside of the zebra ornament, but at least the giraffe ornament is done.
So those are the ornaments that I've gotten done lately.

Hopefully my missing ornament shows up so I can finish my plans. :) I still have more ornaments to make, and I do want to show off all the new trees, so that will be coming up next week!

See you guys later,