Make a Pirate Play Kit

Did you know that tomorrow is "Talk Like a Pirate Day"? We Have Aars made a fun play kit full of things to help bring out their inner pirates.

 

See how to Make a Pirate Play Kit.

Dress-Up Armoire



What little girl wouldn't want this gorgeous armoire from About Family Crafts to fill up with all her dress-ups? Heck, I'd love one of these for my own clothes!

 

See the Dress-Up Armoire.

Princess Belle T-shirt Dress

Chances are that if you have a little girl, they love princesses. I've looked at the price on princess costumes/dress ups and they are expensive and fall apart easily. I'm thinking a Belle dress made from t-shirts is not only inexpensive and adorable, but durable! Check out this princess dress that Little Sprinkles of Fun made using a few tutorials she found. (She links to the tutorials in her post.) Great for a Disney vacation or for parading around the house.

See the princess Belle dress made from t-shirts.

3 Fun Links!

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Here are 3 fun links from today's party!

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Once again, I wish I knew how to crochet and read a crochet pattern!!!! It might as well be Mandarin to me. This crochet heart garland is very endearing!!! Get the pattern at Sarahndipities.

These love notes in a pancake are a fun idea for a Valentine breakfast (or for an anyday "I love you.") See how to make them at Random Thoughts of a Supermom!

Every little girl wants a dress-up center. See how My Creative Escapes made one for her daughter!


See more party links~!!!!!

Costumes On Parade

Welcome to the
COSTUME
Categorically Crafting Show
where you can show off all of your fun Halloween costumes!

Here are just a few of the many awesome costume ideas out there!!!

YOU MUST GO VISIT THIS POST for a bunch of amazing family themed Halloween costumes! They are seriously so cute. I am saving this post to remember for next year! See it at This Mommy Loves.

This is one of the funniest costumes I have ever seen. My family and I am going to do this (not for Halloween, but for our next church talent show and dance!). See the upside down man it at Sugar Bee!

If you son loves Thomas Train (like mine does), he would be thrilled to be have a train costume! See this tutorial at Today's Fabulous Finds.

Have your family be the Flintstones with these three tutorials from Naptime Crafters. Here is the one for Pebbles, Wilma, and Fred.

Create an adorable and easy Jessie costume from Toy Story with Fussy Monkey Business.

Make your baby one of these darling costumes from a onesie!!! These are so fun and look relatively easy. Will your baby be a strong person (PC), a munchkin, a witch or a sasquatch? Find the tutorials at PBS Parent .

If you want to see more costume ideas, check out my costume archives.

(If you would like to have free advertising for your blog by rounding-up a Categorically Crafting post, email me at somedaycrafts@gmail.com)

Please join your crafty post if, and only if, it corresponds with the category and theme of COSTUMES. (If it doesn't fit in this category, please link it up to Whatever Goes Wednesday.) Link up crafts, decor, sewing projects, food, tips, etc, that has to do with COSTUMES. If you have joined a COSTUMES project to a party on my blog before, feel free to add it to this show too! If you have a lot of candy corn projects, please choose your favorites. (Please no more than 4 posts per blog). Link to the specific posts, not to your main blog page.

Let's see what you have created (either recently or in the past)!

You can paste the "Categorically Crafting" button onto your blog post. I would love to see these floating around so more people can post their themed projects. I will leave this linky post open until next CC Show. Keep checking back for more ideas!!!
The next 4 Categorically Crafting Shows are as follows:

Oct. 29 - HALLOWEEN
Nov. 5 - Sewing/Craft Rooms

Nov. 12 - Turkey

Check back here to see the rest of the Pumpkin ideas from the last CC Show- Amazing!!

3 Ideas - Mod Podged Leaves, Leaf Crown, TP Roll wreath

Head over to Twigs and Toadstool for some great inspiration! So many fun activities to do with your kids (or by yourself). Here are three projects I quickly found on their blog!

Decorate a bowl, latern or pumpkin with some fall leaves and mod podge. It looks great! Read more about this leaf latern.

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Use the colorful fall leaves around you to make some fun crowns. It doesn't look to hard! Learn how to make leaf crowns.

Look at this fun rainbow flower wreath made from one of my favorite craft mediums - toilet paper rolls! See more of the rainbow wreath.

Visit Twigs and Toadstools today!

Cinderella Tutu

This beautiful Cinderella tutu is contributed by Crafterhours

Hello everyone! Adrianna from Crafterhours here.

Supplies:
- 4.5 yards of 60 inch wide light blue tulle
- 1 yard of shiny white fabric (I used a polyester satin) You'll have plenty left over.
- 1 yard of synthetic white ribbon
- length of 1 inch elastic, cut to fit around wearer's waist
- fire

Using these supplies, I was able to make a size 4ish tutu, but depending on how long you want your tutu to be, this could easily fit a 2-100 yr old :)

Step 1:
Cut your tulle into 60 x 32 inch rectangles. If you fold your tulle lengthwise into fourths, you'll have an easier time cutting across the entire width. You should end up with 5 rectangles and a little scrap leftover.

Step 2:
Take your rectangles and stack them all on top of each other like a big tulle sandwich.

Step 3:
Carefully fold that entire stack in half lengthwise, so you now have a 60x16 inch rectangle. Pin at the fold so nothing shifts. It is more important that the tulle stay put at the fold than at the raw edge. If the raw edges aren't perfectly equal, that's just fine.

Step 4:
Using a very low heat setting, press the fold to secure it, but leave the pins in. Make sure the iron doesn't melt your tulle!

Step 5:
Sew a seam 1.5 inches away from the fold, all the way across the 60 inches. You will be sewing through 10 layers of tulle.

Step 6:
Thread the elastic through the tube you just sewed. Sew the ends of the elastic together and arrange the tulle over the elastic so it is all covered and the gathers are evenly distributed. Now you should have this:

See how the uneven hem just makes it more frothy and tutu-ish?

Step 7:
Fold your white fabric and cut 2 rectangles that measure 15 x 13 inches. You'll end up with 4 rectangles.

Step 8:
Lay all the rectangles on top of each other so the 13 inch sides make the top and bottom, and cut them all so the two bottom corners are rounded.

Step 9:
Sew two of the rectangles right sides together: First, sew a seam across the flat top. Stop halfway across and leave a 2 inch hole so you can flip it right-side-out later. Then, using your longest stitch length, sew 4.5 inches down both sides of the rectangle. Continue sewing around the rounded corners at a normal stitch length.

Step 10:
Pull on the bobbin thread to gather the top 4.5 inches of each rectangle where you used a longer stitch length. Once these are gathered as tight as they'll go, sew over them with a regular stitch to secure. This picture might help:

Step 11:
Flip the rectangles right-side-out, push out all the corners and curves, and press. Repeat steps 9 & 10 on your other two rectangles.

Step 12:
Find the point on your tutu where the tulle is open and sew one top corner of each white rectangle to the elastic at that point. This will attach the white parts, but also ensure that your elastic doesn't flip around. Seriously, what are those white parts called on Cinderella's dress? I'm calling them "white parts".

Step 13:
Bring the white parts around to the front of the tutu, and sew them down, leaving a gap in between.

Now your tutu will look like this. See how the white parts stick up at the top? Let's take care of that, shall we?

Step 14:
Flip the white parts up and find the center point.

Sew that point down, right sides together, to the elastic of your tutu.

When you flip it back down, it'll look like this. Now we have that nice poofyness and drape like the white parts on Cinderella's dress!

Step 15:
Use your ribbon to make a bow and sew it to the front of the tutu. You could do this by actually making a bow, or by assembling each bow "part" separately and sewing them all on for a "faux bow". Ha! Faux bow! I've got to copyright that! Ok, sorry, it's been a long tutorial.

The fire I mentioned earlier is to melt the ends of the ribbon so it doesn't fray. Make sure you don't actually put the ribbon into the flame, but hold it near enough that it begins to melt. My Faux Bow© construction looked like this:

Step 16:
Slip that tutu onto the cutest belly around and enjoy!

Wow! I see a lot of these in the future for lots of little girls.

Thanks Crafterhours.

Belle Dress

Crafterhours

brings you this fabulous Belle Dress tutorial!

Pick up your jaws off the floor!

After the success of the Snow White dress, the whims of a 3 year old wanted a Belle dress. So, Belle it is.

Again, I used knit fabric to make this a super comfy dress-up dress, and a peasant dress pattern to make costume changes easier and eliminate the need for zippers or buttons.

You will need:

Your trusty peasant dress pattern and directions

2 yards of yellow lightweight knit fabric

1 yard of a sheer yellow or white fabric with lots of drape (nothing stiff like tulle)

lots of 1/4 inch elastic. lots.

Step 1: Cut out your peasant dress pieces. The pieces below are still folded in half, and obviously you will need 2 sleeves. As you can see, I cropped the sleeve so it would just be a slight cap sleeve. The bodice pieces should be cut just past the natural waist. The front bodice piece (pictured on the left) has a lower neckline and a pointed center.

Step 2: For the skirt, you'll need to cut a lot of rectangles. Use at least 8. The more you use, the fuller your skirt will be. The length of the rectangle will be the length from the natural waist to the ankle plus 6 inches. I used a width of 7 inches and I thought it worked pretty well.


Step 3: Cut all of your rectangles so they are tapered on the sides by about 2 inches and round out the bigger end, which will become your hem.

Step 4: Estimate on your skirt panels where you want the swags to sit. Mine are about 11 inches down. Measure across the skirt panel at that point. Cut rectangles from your sheer fabric with a width of your skirt panel width plus 1 inch. The length of the rectangle should be about 12 inches. Fold your rectangle down (so your 12 inch side is now 6 inches). Cut the bottom edges so they make a crescent. That was painful. Just look at the picture:




Step 5: With right sides together, sew the crescent closed and flip it right side out. Press.

Step 6: Pin each crescent to each skirt panel at the same height, making sure to scrunch up the swag on the sides. Since your swag is slightly wider than the panel, it should gape a little bit in the middle as well.




Step 7: Sew all the panels together, catching the edges of the swags as you go.




Step 8: Sew your bodice and sleeves together using normal peasant top construction directions.




Step 9: Gather the top of the skirt to match the bottom of the bodice and sew them together.




Step 10: Finish the sleeves and neckline with elastic per peasant top directions.

Step 11: Cut 1/4 inch elastic to the length of the skirt panels minus 6 inches. Pin the elastic to the waist seam on top of one of the skirt panel seams.

Step 12: Pin the other end of the elastic to the hem, again right over the skirt panel seam.

Step 13: Stretching the elastic taut, sew down the elastic, directly over the seam. Once you've done that for each of the skirt panel seams, it'll bunch up and start really looking Belle-ish.

Step 14: Using the same sheer fabric as you did for the swags, form a circular tube of fabric. First take a rectangle that is 5 inches x the measurement around the upper shoulders plus a couple inches. Sew the rectangle right sides together down the long side so you have a long tube. Flip the tube right side out. Fold the edges of one end to the wrong side and press. Put the edges of the other side into that side and topstitch down, forming a circular tube.




Step 15: Tack one side of that tube down at the neckline of your dress, centered on the shoulder. Find the opposite side of your tube and do the same thing on the other side.




Step 16: At the front and back, scrunch the tube up and sew down directly at the center of the bodice.




Step 17 (optional): I made a little rose by rolling up a tube of knit fabric and hand sewing it to the center front bodice.

Now you're finally done! End the constant "is it done yet, is it done yet, is it done yet?" mantra from your kid.

Super optional Step 18: Use photo editing software to make the MOST RIDICULOUS pictures EVER, much to your daughter's delight.




Any guesses on what princess will be next?

Read more about the beautiful Snow White dress made by Crafterhours.

THANK YOU Crafterhours

for sharing your talents with us!