Yellow + Sparkles

Mustard yellow and sequins. Two things I love. 

I think they should be a staple in every wardrobe. 

 Top: Old Navy, thrifted ($3.50)

Cardigan: Target, thrifted ($3.50)

Skirt: thrifted ($3.50)

Leggings: free

Boots: Ross ($17)

Better Late Than Never? [DIY Refashion]

First of all, I apologize for the awful quality of the image below.

Secondly, this is embarrassingly late. I got this dress over a year ago. Isn't it funny how fast time goes by? Just as refresher, I got this at a bag sale and the cost came out to be about $0.33 for the dress. So essentially if I messed it up, it wasn't going to be much of a loss.

But there wasn't much room for mistakes; this is a pretty straightforward refashion.

As you can tell from the photos, I simply cut the dress to the desired length (plus about 1.5 inches to take the hem into account), and then used the excess fabric to make three large ruffles for the front of the dress. 

If you'd like to see how to make ruffles, here's a pretty good simple tutorial! I don't even do two rows of stitches like they do...works just fine.

But essentially, each ruffle is a rectangular piece of the fabric with the sides hemmed. I cinched one long side of each one, arranged them as I wanted them tiered, pinned them, and sewed them into place. 

I also made a waist tie with the excess fabric, but I didn't have that with me to take the "after" picture.

That's all! And now, a whole year later, I have a cute $0.33 dress all ready to go. :)

Merry Christmas!

I hope you all have had a wonderful Christmas day! 

I thought it might be fun to make a hand written typographic poster. I think my idea of fun is a little different from the norm. Just a little.

Just a little way to remember the true reason to celebrate Christmas. :) 

Take care everyone, and I'll see you soon with some outfit posts!

Reunited

It's been a while since my last Goodwill haul! I went this weekend and found some pretty good stuff. 

The numbers are the prices, and the ones that are asterisked are going to altered or adjusted. 

  

This was a pretty good haul! I'm especially excited about the black sparkly dress. The striped Gap cashmere blend sweater was a solid find as well, and I think we've been over how much I love peacoats and trench coats... 

The middle item in the top row is a red velvet skirt. I'm hoping to make it look a little more like this, rather than it's current state:

One thing I failed to find and have never been able to find at a thrift store is a good flannel shirt. It's driving me crazy. So that's my goal this month, to thrift a good, classic flannel button down. We'll see how that goes. 

Hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas Eve! 

Cookie Innovation

The other week I baked for a friend's birthday...and decided to make him cookies. And then I decided to turn said cookie dough into an airplane.

I also made some oreo stuffed ones. So good...yet so bad for you.

At this rate I'm going to be diabetic soon. Need to work on some self-control. But hey, it's the holidays! That means none the calories count, right? Let's just go with that. :)

Oh, and I just used the Betty Crocker cookie mix for these, didn't have time to go for the from-scratch route!

Classy with Twist

 Top: Old Navy ($7)

Pants: J. Crew, thrifted ($3.50)

Coat: Target ($25)

Shoes: thrifted ($6)

I will forever love the button down and trench coat combination. I don't think you can go wrong with that. Nor can you go wrong with green pants.

Holiday Baked Goods

 With the holidays coming up I thought I'd show you guys what festive deliciousness has been occurring in my life:

 

I made these Christmas tree cake balls, a batch of spice cake ones and another red velvet. All you have to do is bake a cake mix, crumble it up and mix it with a container of frosting, chill it until it is manageable, shape it into cones, freeze the cones for at least 15 minutes, and coat them in vanilla coating that's been dyed green!

 Also made some melting snowman cookies...this is such a cute idea and it's super easy. Just sugar cookies frosted and decorated, with a marshmallow for the head. :) 

And some equally easy reindeer cookies! Peanut butter cookies with pretzels and M&Ms pressed in just as they come out of the oven, when the cookies are still soft. 

So if you need an easy but impressive looking baking project for something in the next few weeks, these do the trick! 

Ruffled Shoulders DIY

It's been quite a while since I've posted a refashion!

I got this top at a bag sale, which averaged out to be $0.27 per item. 

So basically, it was free. 

 It was super long, so I figured I could use the excess fabric at the bottom to manipulate the rest of the shirt. I ended up adding a shoulder ruffle:

It still needs a bit of work to make it look nice...as if you can't tell, there's thread coming out from one shoulder in the second picture. I'll be working on fixing things like that so that it's actually in a wearable state. But thoughts? 

Coral Love

I bought a new necklace over Black Friday weekend. Only thing I purchased that was actually relevant to the weekend's sales. I've been seeing these statement necklaces all over the internet, but typically for around $20. I got this one for $10, and I think it was a pretty good value for that price! 

Dress: American Eagle, thrifted ($3.50)

Cardigan: Target, thrifted ($3.50)

Shoes: Smashion.com ($10)

Necklace: Groopdealz.com ($10)

I also have really glittery nails right now. Moment of weakness/procrastination during this insanely busy week. Save me. 

Sorry for the inconsistency in my posting this past week or so, I promise that my outfits have mainly consisted of me waking up late and running out the door with whatever I just happen to find. You're not missing much. :)

But I've been baking up a storm, so I'll share some holiday goodness soon! 

And I know, I really shouldn't be baking, I'm so bad about time management.

New Things

Oh Friday. How I love you so. 

This week has been crazy, so thank you guys for hanging in there and being patient with me! 

I've got some pretty cool things to show you soon, like the plane-shaped cookie I made last night. It's pretty fantastic, you'll see. 

But for today we'll stick with a good old outfit post. :) 

Top: thrifted, DIY ($0.27)

Cardigan: Merona, thrifted ($3.50)

Pants: Rugged Wearhouse ($17)

Shoes: Target, $6

I got these fantastic polka dot pants last weekend. They were actually a bit of a splurge, at $17. Of course, I use the term "splurge" in a relative perspective, compared to my typical budget, not the typical retail price for jeans. But I think they were worth the price. :)

Did I mention they're reversible? They're reversible. Which is a little bit weird, but also pretty cool. The other side is just plain dark wash navy. I told myself I was technically buying two pairs of pants for $17.

The shoes are also new! Got them on clearance at Target for a little less than $6. I love the color, and they're suede. Classy. 

Findings from the Weekend

I've been MIA for days, sorry about that! End of semester craze is starting to set in. 

Hope you all had a great break, anyone get good deals this weekend? I bought a few things on Friday, but they weren't actually part of the Black Friday sale, I just happened to run across them in the clearance racks. 

Target, $7

Old Navy, $9.99

Target, $24.98

Be back soon with more!

Black Friday!

In the spirit of Black Friday, I figured I'd post the discounts for some of my favorite stores:

• Modcloth is having a 'Tis the Season Sale, with 50% off newly stocked items. They're pretty darn cute. I waste way too much time browsing their website.
• Shabby Apple has a 20% off sitewide sale, just use the code JOYFULSEASON.
• J. Crew has 25% off sitewide and in stores. 
• Extra 25% off all sale items from Anthropologie. Again, so much time about to be wasted on my part. 
• Madewell also has 25% off with a code, TREAT. I sense a pattern here. They're also offering free shipping. 
• Gap has 60% off the entire stock, and 20% off your purchase.
• Nordstrom has a pretty good sale section going on! 
• Target, Macy's, and Old Navy may be worth checking out as well.

 Someone also share this interesting infographic with me, so I thought I'd toss that in as well. :) Have a great Friday, hope you find some great deals if you're hitting the stores today!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I hope you all get the chance to relax with family and friends. I'm about to get to work on cooking up the inevitable food coma, so I thought I'd go ahead and do an outfit post before that. :) 

 

Top: Old Navy, thrifted ($3.50)

Pants: TJ Maxx ($9)

Sweater: JC Penney ($6)

Boots: Ross ($17)

Scarf: from Italy ($5)

The scarf is actually a rectangular wrap-styled one, I just tied the ends together to make it like an oversized infinity scarf. I think it works pretty well!

Enjoy your turkey and stay warm!

Painting Adventures, Part 2

Going off of my last post, I also painted this set of drawers for the same project. I'd seen projects like this on Pinterest before and loved the idea, so I was super excited when I had the chance to try it out myself!

So originally they were plain white...

And this is what the end result looked like: 

This took less than an hour and less than $10 in paint. It's also rather fun, if you like painting and whatnot, so be warned--you might feel the urge to run around the house and just paint everything in sight once you get started. :)