Davis, CA

Yay I'm back! Over the weekend I went to Davis for my sister's soccer tournament. My coach didn't take our team because we didn't have enough players, but I got a t-shirt anyway because there were too many. We went to BJ's and I got two mini burgers, garlic cheese bread, and root beer. After, we went to Fenton's, and I got a lemon lite ice cream (ah, lemon ice cream is the best). My sister got a huge sundae; my mommy and daddy a coffee milkshake. I expected it to be really hot, but it was more gray and drizzly. Perfect weather to take off my (un-needed) flip-flops and play around with a soccer ball in the wet grass. Davis has now inspired me to want to ride a bike. I mean, I can, I just don't really like to. Overall, it was pretty cool there. In more ways then one.

i can't sign into blogger on my computer and I'm writing this as a title because my iPod won't write a full body of text (wow longest title ever)!

Lululemon Knockoff: Braided Sport Headband Tutorial

How do you pronounce Lululemon? My friend pronounces it like Lulu-lem-ON. I always thought it was Lulu-lem-in. Don't know. But, my friend says she really likes their headbands. So I went on their site. Their headbands are cool. The price tag was not. I mean, $12 for a piece of cloth? Honestly. I saw a nice braided headband. Again for $12. It looked like knit with a piece of bungee cord braided in. I can make that.

This, of course, isn't my idea. I've seen a lot of braided headbands; this is just my version because I don't like seeing that unsightly piece of elastic sticking out of the ends. Sorry for my head shots. I couldn't take a picture of myself very well.

Tutorial

Materials: 3 1" strips of knit. I had a stretchy, spandex-y fabric. I cut them 30," but I had a lot leftover. I think 20" would be fine, probably. Experiment (you can also get the strips from an old tee). A piece of the same fabric about 3" by 6," and 3" of elastic. Needle and thread and sewing machine.

1. Tack the strips together with a few stitches. Braid your strips until they're about 6" shorter than your head circumference. The elastic and knit fabric will stretch to accommodate your head. Hand sew the end closed.

2. Take your 3" by 6" piece and fold in half so it's 1.5" by 6." Sew it closed so it's a tube with 2 open ends. Turn it right side out.

3. Now thread your elastic through the casing.

4. Hold the elastic at the end of the casing, and now stuff the end of your braid into the tube. Pinch it closed, sandwiching the braid and elastic, and pin it together.

5. Sew over the end of the casing, catching the elastic, braid, and tube. Now scrunch the fabric over the elastic and pull the elastic to the other side. Repeat step 4 and you're done! You can cover the stitching by gluing a strip of fabric on the ends if you want.

Put the headband on and pull the rest of your hair in a bun or ponytail, and you're ready to go! Yep, I just saved myself $12, thank you.

(o^__^)o

Whirligig Dress

Isn't this dress pretty? Find it here. I don't wear dresses (seriously. I think the last time I wore one was at my fifth grade graduation. Actually no; it was the summer before sixth grade when we went to Hawaii. I think. and my dress thing tutorial doesn't really count, because that was supposed to be a smock thing.), but I'm always looking for things made out of jersey because I have a lot of it. I've been pretty busy, but I do really want to sew and do some crafty stuff.

Slouchy Raglan Tutorial

My newest shirt! It's an oversized raglan with a kangaroo pocket! It's made with a black double-sided knit (is it called a ponte knit?) and a blue spandex-y fabric. I got them from Fabrix in SF. You should go there, prices are very cheap, and though i've seen many complaints in reviews on the organization, I like it and I'm sure real fashion districts just sell bolts of fabric on the sides of the streets. Besides the blue and black fabric, I also got a beautiful purple fabric. It's one of the richest, deepest, wine-y-est purples I've ever seen. Even though blue is my 2nd favorite color (olive green forever), I like the purple better. I don't know why. Here's some pics of the fabric. (the 1st pic color isn't very accurate, the other pics are better, but it's still not the right shade--my lighting's not very good)

This shirt is based on jmorco's raglan here. It is comfy and slouchy and I love that there's a pocket, because I usually have something to put in there, like my glasses case (they are for distance, so it's a hassle to put them on and take them back off to stick in my backpack).

Tutorial

Materials: 1 yd of black knit fabric, 1/2 yd of aqua or contrasting color, sewing machine, thread, scissors, pins, old loose t-shirt, newspaper or pattern paper

1. Get your old t-shirt and cut an off the shoulder neckline.

2. Now fold your shirt in half and mark a line (with pins) a couple inches below the shoulder seam on the neckline down to the armpit. Now fold the sleeve on the line in. This is your 'pattern.'

3. Fold your black fabric in half, line up your 'pattern' on the fold, and cut around it. Cut another. (note: in the pic below i messed up at first and did a fold from the shoulder to the armpit. DON'T DO THIS. fold it a couple inches down from the neckline to the armpit, like in the above picture. and don't forget seam allowances.)

4. Now unfold the sleeve and line up the shoulder seam on the fold of a piece of creased newspaper. Trace around your sleeve and cut out your pattern piece.

5. Now cut out 2 sleeve pieces from contrasting knit. Add seam allowance.

6. Sew sleeves on. I do this by sewing the side of the sleeve to the armhole, and then repeating with the 2nd shirt piece. Here's some pics to help explain this process.

7. Now it's time for a pocket! Cut out a rectangle the size you want the pocket to be. Now fold it in half and cut out 2 quarter-circles from the upper hand corner, opposite to the fold.

8. To sew on the pocket, mark the center of the pocket with a pin. Now fold your shirt in half, and pin half of the pocket to the shirt. Unfold your shirt and pin the rest of the pocket on.

9. This is what you should have now. I hemmed the bottom and added binding to the sleeves, but you don't have to since knit doesn't fray.

10. Now add neck binding. I followed this tutorial (using the last method).

11. Ignore the purple pajama bottoms.

12. Wear with pride!

Have a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious day (yep, i had to copy and paste that word from google)!

o(^__^o)

(o^__^)o

Gotta Catch 'Em All!

Look how cute... my 5 year old cousin gave me a pokemon cell-phone charm/screen cleaner! It has a fuzzy backing and a stretchy cord so you can rub the dirt off your screen. I think I can make some of these. :)

Oh, I think I am going to go to the fabric store soon! Yay!

On thursday, I went on a field trip to watch the Giants game. i'm not a big baseball fan, but I enjoyed myself! I think I wouldn't have been nearly as happy if I hadn't ordered some garlic fries to share with my friend C (though they were extremely expensive--$7.25!).

A classmate, L, told us she sawBuster Posy at the Coke bottle slide, and about 5 of us went down. Then we realized that all the players had to be in the dugout. We just decided to tell L we saw him, because we assumed she was lying. Then one of our classmates called and we told her we saw him at the Coke slide. When we got back to our seats, our whole class was gone.

Turns out they were all at the Coke slide. Even L, who supposedly saw Buster Posy already...

Anyways, I had a great time. There was a cool asian guy who was dancing really oddly when the Giants scored. Like, he looked like he was driving a very large car with a giant steering wheel. Then he made his arms into a Y and jerked each hand down separately in a short, stiff motion. People were asking for his autograph and stuff (he's not even famous or anything). Then he looked at me and my friend (or at least that's what we liked to think), pointed at us, and said, "Never give up!" I wish I got a video of him... Dang it.

Here's a few stalkerish shots I got of him... he's in the orange shirt. In the 1st pic, that's him starting to lean over and say, "Never give up!"