For my contribution to Skirt Week 2012, I made this little tutorial for turning an old, rather boring skirt into something a bit more interesting. Sometimes you don’t need to make a new skirt, but you need to liberate one from the back of your closet. I had planned on doing a tutorial for a button placket, but then I saw this picture and could not stop thinking about it:

These pants are from a shop in New York that specializes in super awesome Japanese children’s clothes. The idea is so simple and so effortlessly cool that I had to steal it.

painterly skirt tutorial

materials:

• 1 unloved skirt
• a bit of cardboard or freezer paper
• paint of your choice, fabric or acrylic or even house paint*
• stamps
• very small paint brush

directions:

1. The first thing I did was carve some starts out of an old eraser. If you’ve never done this before it may sound hard, but I assure you it is not. I carved two stamps from a big eraser and two from the tiny erasers on a pair of new pencils. It took me all of 10 minutes. There are many good tutorials for carving stamps from erasers out there (this one and this one for example). The stamp you make should be quite small, so stick to a simple shape–stars work well!

2. Put a piece of cardboard under where you will be stamping, or you can iron a bit of freezer paper to the back. You need something under your design, so the paint doesn’t bleed through to the other side.

3. Start stamping! You can be as fussy or as messy as you want. The look we are going for is paint wiped on the side of your skirt, so there aren’t too many rules you have to follow. It looks nice if the stamps are concentrated a bit in one area and then fade out towards the edges.

3. After you have stamped to your heart’s content, take a very small paintbrush and go over some of the stamps with more paint. This will make some of the stars stand out better and give the design a little more dimension.

4. Let the paint dry and go over it with an iron to set it.  Waalaa! a new skirt! One that will be loved and worn again!

*a note on paint: I don’t paint on my clothes very often, but when I do (like here and here) I like to use a product called fabric meduim. You mix the meduim with any acrylic paint and it makes it into a fabric paint. A good friend of mine turned me on to it. Another good friend told me to get out of the not-so-great craft acrylic paint aisle and go to the actually-an-artist acrylic paint aisle: the colors and the quality are better.

A few days ago my daughter said, wistfully, “Remember last summer when we did a craft project every day?”. My first thought was, wooo hoo! I made an actual memory for my kid! and it was a good one. Parenting win! My second thought was, dammit, how am I going to do that again?  Then I got an email from Beth (of Sew Mama Sew fame) telling me about an online summer crafts camp called the Summer Camp Adventure Club. Problem solved.

What is the Summer Camp Adventure Club? I’ll let Beth describe it:

Summer Camp Adventure Club is a subscription-based, online “camp” (an eCourse/online class) where Pre-K through 3-4 grade campers get fun, new ideas every day throughout the summer. There’s a new theme every week in June, July and August. Each weekly theme includes tons of inspiring projects, activities, journal prompts, downloads, recipes and more. Kids get the inspiration and guidance they need to work more independently to create projects they love.

Full disclosure: I was given a free month of club membership in exchange for spreading the word, but honestly I’m going to purchase subscriptions for July and August. I could be my normal cheapskate self and do it all myself (with the help of my pinterest boards), but with three little kids running and screaming around the house day in and day out, I don’t always have the brain power to think up, organize, and get a project going for the kids.  Summer Camp Adventure Club to the rescue! Come on, join the club!

Have you been following along with Jess and Kristin’s Vintage May? These two bloggers teamed up to show off handmade vintage-y kid’s clothes all month long. Many amazing bloggers have been making many amazing garments and tutorials too.  Today, hey, it’s me! Head on over to skirt as top to see more of this button up shirt made from a vintage sheets.

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While I was making this shirt, I started to think of all the other things I’ve made from vintage sheets. I used to be skeezed out by second hand sheets. All that yardage in awesome prints, though? Hard to pass up.  To over come my heebie jeebies, I wash the sheets a few times with extra hot water and let them dry in the sun. When you iron the sheets that thrift store smell appears again, but I power through knowing after I sew whatever it is I am making, I will never iron them again. All the projects above are new sheets made from old sheets (and one quilt). I’m a genius I know. We have extendable beds from Ikea, so the kids’ beds are all different weird sizes.

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Clothes from vintage sheets are much more fun. I think pajama pants from sheets and pillowcases are my favorite, but obviously I like a good floral tie too. More boy’s button up shirts from flowery sheets are definitely in my future.

When I am frustrated with a project, but not frustrated enough to pour a big glass of wine and watch some trashy tv, I make pillows. We have a lot of pillows. Tell me I am not the only one who does this. Do you turn to simple projects to make you feel better when you are failing miserably?

The fabric for the new ones are, from right to left: some ikea fabric left over from the crib bumper, plain old random blue fabric (some of which is half way to being shorts for my son), and this awesome drop cloth print by Jay McCarroll.

One more too, because that Wiksten tank I’m trying to fix is looking pretty Becky HomeEcy. This print is by Geninne who did a lovely line of organic fabric for Cloud 9.  I fell for it when Erin made this top (it seems the wiksten tank is haunting me).

Usually, I hold off posting recipes here until I have the exact measurements and directions for making it, which means I never get around to sharing any recipes with you. Dinnertime is always crazy and often straight up chaos. My cooking style has become a few glugs rather than tablespoons, half a palm full rather than teaspoons, and whatever cup-like thing is in reach rather than a cup, because the actual measuring cups are in the sandbox. But I still want to share some recipes with you. If you keep in mind that my ingredient measurement are estimates and the directions are guidelines, then I think we’ll be okay.

Lamb and Feta Burgers with Tzatiki

for the burgers:

• 1 1/2 – 2 lb ground lamb (I like to make a lot to insure I can have some for lunch the next day)
• 4 or so oz feta
• 1/4 cup (handful) chopped cilantro or parsley (a little mint thrown in there is nice too)
• 1 clove garlic, finely chopped
• zest of one lemon
• salt and pepper

for the tzatziki:

• about 6 inches of a cucumber, peeled
• 1 cup good yogurt
• 1 clove garlic (optional, my children think it’s too spicy, silly children)
• salt and pepper

directions for the burgers:

1. Put the lamb in a big bowl with the garlic, herbs, and lemon zest. Crumble the feta into the bowl as best you can, smallish is better but really if there are big chunks it doesn’t matter. Mix everything up with your hands. Salt and pepper the mixture liberally.

2. Shape the patties. I usually make them on the smaller size: 3 inches, I’d say. Obviously any size is going to work.

3. Fry or grill those suckers until they are done to your liking.  If you end up frying them, use only a bit of oil in the pan because lamb gives off a lot of fat.

for the tzatziki:

1. Grate your cucumber into a bowl

2. Put all of it in your hands and working over the sink squeeze out the excess water–there is a lot. See unsqueezed, squeezed cucumber photo above.

3. Add your yogurt. As a side note, I really love this whole milk yogurt. We used to get the Stoneyfield yogurt, but then they very abruptly stopped making the cream on top kind and now their yogurt just tastes like gelatin to me. Obviously I’m picky and should probably make my own, but until I stop being lazy this Super Natural yogurt is totally delicious.

4. Add chopped garlic, and salt and pepper to taste. That’s it. I’m going to show you this picture because when it’s all mixed up it looks rather boring.

Tzatziki is delicious slathered all over the burgers. The kids use it as a dip. I try to get away with not even putting the damn ketchup on the table for the kids, but one of them usually remembers (the picky one).  We don’t use buns, but you of course could. To round out the meal, I use the rest of the cucumber for a salad and then make some other vegetable. That night it was peas (because I was so freaking busy taking pictures), but sweet potato fries are perfect with this meal.

There you are. This is dinner for two adults, one first grader, one garbage gut of a 5 year old boy, and one very picky toddler. Adjust to the size (and size of appetite) of your family.