Slip on Bandanas

I love how my golden retriever/chow mix looks when she is wearing a bandana. It just gives her a little additional cute factor, something unique. And that becomes even more unique when the bandanas are something that I hand selected fabrics for and handmade myself.


The reason I don't just cut the fabric into a square with pinking sheers and tie it on is simple. My dog is constantly going in and out of the house, she gets put on a run/line and a regular bandana often gets in the way. Also wears a training collar for walks and traditional bandanas gets in the way of that too because it makes her have 3 items go all the way around her neck. These slip on (to any collar) bandanas stay in place (on the back of her neck) because of the balance of her buckle and ID tags. They make putting on a leash. line, or training collar much easier. They work great for us I hope they will for you as well!

The measurments I used for this bandana are for my 80lb golden/chow mix, but this can easily be made for whatever size dog you need just follow my directions for the correct measurments. 

First thing you need to do is measure you dogs collar. I measured the space between where her ID tags hang, all the way around until the buckle, this was 15 inches. Then I measured that her collar has a 1 inch width.

So depending on if you want your bandana reversible, and if your fabric has an orientation to it you need to start with either a square of fabric or 2 triangles (that you sew into a suqare). On my first one I cut the corners then just folded a lip to cover the raw edge, since then I've found it easier to just fold them (the red areas in the left graphic) in instead of cutting, less work same result. Just make sure that the straight line is more than double your collar thickness.

Sew down these corners. I used a zigzag stich to help with fraying.

Fold with right sides together. Find the center. Sew from the bottom of the collar width area (1 1/2 inches  down in my case)  to the midpoint and back up making sure to stop before the other side of the collar area. I've marked it here with a red dotted line. Make sure to backstitch at the edges so that its nice an strong for turning.

You should be able to turn the triangle right side out throught one of the hole that have been left for the collar. Once you've done this you should topstich across right below the openings. I've shown it here in red dotted line. This just helps it keep its shape and makes it fit the collar better.

Now you should be able to slip your collar through the open ends and buckle it on to your pup!

Here are some pictures of my dog's Halloween, Thanksgiving/fall, and Christmas slip on bandanas.

Flo and Mayhem Costumes

So my boyfriend and I were invited to a Halloween party and since I'm big into Halloween and we've somehow never done matching costumes I made it happen this year. We went as Flo from the Progressive commercials, and Mayhem from the Allstate commercials. They were both really easy and can be done from things right in your closet.


Flo is easy. I wore a white button down shirt and white jeans. I already had the plain white apron but if you don't it is only about $5 from Target. Then progressive actually has a website to print the name tag, progressive, and I heart insurance button. Then I just glue stocked them to a cereal box, cut them out and taped a safety pin to the back. Pinned them to the apron, put on my orange convereses, a watch and all that was left was hair and makeup. I put some neutral eye shadow on. Used liquid liner to create a thick line that curved and gave a cat eye effect. Then put some bright red lipstick on. Simple a that. I had to buy the makeup. It was less than $5 at Walmart, but I know that most people won't have to. I got a "bump-it"  and a navy blue headband at the dollar store. I used the tallest bumpit in the set. A little teasing, and a whole lotta dollar store hair spray, and BAM! you're suddenly Flo!

Mayhem is pretty simple too. Mayham aften wears a three piece suit, but we didn't have any luck finding one of those. We got my boyfriend a suit jacket from Salvation Army, and beat it up a little with the seam ripper and some sand paper. He wore a white shirt and a black tie with his black jacket and slacks. While we were at the dollar store, we found a pink cell phone (for 16yr old girl mayhem) and a pink headband (for hot runner mayhem). We also got him some bandaids to put on his face. I used some eye shadow and red lipstick to "beat him up" a little.

Pretty simple right!? We had a great time and pretty much everyone knew who we were. And I'm pretty sure we were the best dressed couple around! :)

Russell from Up! For halloween

I know it's late but I thought I would post it anyway. I was Russell from the Pixar movie Up for Halloween. I picked it since my dig is pretty much a dead ringer for Dug.

My first step was googling Russell the character an then googling other peoples costumes. I saw that I needed some wilderness explorer patches, a badge sash, his hat and backpack.

I bought a bunch of 4/$1 felt from Hobby Lobby. This is what I made the patches out of. I just googled a picture if the wilderness explorer logo and recreated it with the felt. Then I sewed one onto a khaki hat, one onto a yellow button down shirt ($1.75 from the Salvation Army) and one onto a felt pendent/flag thing from Hobby Lobby (2/$3 - %50 off coupon = $1.50). I also created a different WE patch from felt and grosgrain ribbon that is sewed on lower on the shirt. I also bought a $1 solid orange bandana from Hobby Lobby. Then I threw on a backpack (with the flag pinned to it), brown khakis, and hiking boots. The hardest part if the costume would have been the badge sash but luckily my sister had a girl scout one that I borrowed and it worked perfectly.

You can't tell in the pictures and couldn't really tell in real life either (sad face), that I made Layla a solid brown collar out fo some broadcloth and  felt to mimic Dug's collar, but Layla had to much hair for it to make a difference. Either was most of the kids we saw during trick or treating with the kids I babysit for knew who we were. And that made me happy!

Since it was cold and I didn't want to cover my costume, I wore thermals, wool socks, and a yellow long sleeve shirt under my clothes to keep warm.

Baby leg warmers

There are a bunch if good tutorials out there for these so I wont get into it but the only thing I did different was I did an overlock stitch in addition to a zigzag on my raw edges. It helps keep the stringy edges under more control than the zig zag alone. I forgot to take a picture of the finished product before i sent it but you get the idea.

Little Miss Momma Silhouette Giveaway

Little Miss Momma is giving away a Silhouette Cameo!! I'm hoping I win it!



http://www.littlemissmomma.com/2011/11/silhouette-cameo-giveaway-little-miss-momma.html#comment-45782

Pinterest re-do

Okay so I saw this adorable turkey onesie on pinterest. And as soon as I saw it I knew how I was gong to recreate it. The one I have pinned is painted on, but I envisioned mine in felt. So i found an all brown onesie at hobby lobby, I already had some felt from my Russell from up costume. I googled a feather outline and found one I liked. I cut out four felt "feathers", big white circles for eyes, little black circles for pupils, an orange beak, and I just kind of winged a red snood thing that hangs by the beak.

I sewed the back first in a fan pattern, I thought about doing 5 feathers but I didn't have a great fifth color so four worked fine in the end. Then I sewed the face on the front, making sure that some of the beak was in front of the snood. And to make it a little bit girly a sewed on a cute little pink bow. Because there were so many colors I sewed with invisible thread.

I am totally in love with how it turned out! It is on its way via USPS to the beautiful baby girl who it now belongs to.

Christening Onesie

My bet friends baby was getting christened and I wasn't goon to be able to make it, but I still wanted to send up a little something. So I got a plain white onesie, some adorable lacy trim with some pink ricrack accent, and some t-shirt paint.

I sewed on the trim with white thread. The trim was already ruffled a little so it looked great. I did three rows.

Next I looked up pretty crosses on google images and found one that I liked. So I traced it on freezer paper, cut it out, ironed it on, and filled it in wih pink t-shirt paint. Once it dried I covered it with some gold glitter t-shirt paint to top it off.

It is as simple as that! It came out so cute, and baby ended up wearing it under her christening dress which made me smile.

Mmm seven layer dip

So I've been with my boyfriend Joe for seven years as of today! So I thought it would be fun to have a seven theme. So I got some 7up! And then I made some delicious seven layer dip.
The best part about seven layer dip is almost all of it comes out of a can or container! The only thing that didn't for me was the guacamole. And since tere was so much going on already I just mashed up alvacados and squirted some line juice in it.

So my seven layers go as follows:
1. Refried beans
2. Black beans
3. Guacamole
4. Salsa (pico de gallo)
5. Sour cream
6. Cheese (fiesta mix)
7. Sliced Olives (In the shape of a heart, of coarse)

A lot of the recipes I saw online had chives or onions as a layer but I don't like onions or chives, so i just did two different types of beans to make my seventh layer. I also saw people using lettuce as a layer but I knew the dip would last a few days in my house so I wanted ingredients that wouldn't get yucky.

I didn't have a truffle dish so I just put it in a Pyrex bowl and it worked out fine. I got Tostidos scoops just so we could get some of every layer on each chip.

I just layered everything right out of the containers. I microwaved the two different types of beans but other than that is just draining and stacking! I had one container of each and it still made a ton of dip. Yum yum!