Tag: rainbow

Other Crafts

Extreme Makeover, T-shirt Edition

wittychild

I’ve been tie-dyeing since I was knee-high to a grasshopper an idealistic teenager who really wanted to be a hippie. I’ve gotten over the hippie stuff, mostly, but still enjoy the tie-dye. And although I’ve added vinyl transfers to a shirt I’ve already dyed (like my Canada Day shirts from a few years back), it didn’t occur to me to try dyeing a shirt that already had a graphic on it, until I saw someone do it on Lettuce Craft.

Back in the spring, I found this lonely guy in the clearance section:

I’m not a fan of white, and would normally never have looked twice, 40% savings be darned. But ah, as a blank canvas…that’s a different story.

After dampening the shirt and wringing it out (this is after prewashing, of course), I decided to go for a classic spiral pattern. My hands were covered in gloves which were in turn covered in dye, so I didn’t get an in-progress picture. If you’ve never tried this and want to see how, Tulip offers a really cool step-by-step.

After waiting the requisite 24 hours or so, the shirt was rinsed until the water ran clear, and it looked like this:

It still had to be run through the washing machine, though. It’s a little crazy how much dye there still is to be removed! Here’s the final product:

It might not be as brilliantly bright as it was post-rinse, but the colours are still vibrant and transform it into something summery and fun.

Thanks for looking! 🙂

Cross-stitch and Embroidery

When the veil of dreams has lifted and the fairy tales have all been told

wittychild

So here’s something you may or may not have known about me…

I love colour.

Colour, all of it, all the time. Seriously. I’ve never been able to pick just one favourite. I can admit that I’m not a fan of earth tones and that super-washed out pastels don’t do much for me, but everything else is fair game. The only thing better than bright colours is bright colours in a rainbow order, because I appreciate order and routine.

(Order and routine slightly outweigh colour, however. Don’t get me started on bookshelves arranged by colour rather than alphabetically/by author/by subject area.)

Since no books were misfiled, is it any surprise that when I saw this pattern on Etsy it called to me like a siren song? How could I not stitch something with twenty perfectly gradient shades?

One of my favourite things about cross-stitching is watching the design come alive (like Peter Frampton, but…not), stitch by stitch. Normally it happens so gradually that you don’t even notice it happening until you look at the design with fresh eyes and marvel that you can see the outlines developing, but it happens just the same.

It definitely harshes the stitching vibes to stop and take a picture after even the littlest bit of progress, but watching the heart form colour-by-colour is vaguely hypnotic.

As I stitched, I realized the rainbow heart reminded me of something. This song lived in my head rent-free while I worked:

If you haven’t seen A Mighty Wind, stop reading this right now and go watch it. Now.

I wanted something suitably punchy to display the finished piece in, so I painted a simple bamboo hoop from Michaels using acrylic paint pens in matchy-matchy colours.

Thanks for looking! 🙂

baking

Rainbow Rah-Rah (Lisa Frank would be proud)

wittychild

At the risk of sounding like a crazy cat lady, Saturday was my cat’s birthday.  I’m not the best cat-mom when it comes to remembering stuff like that; in the eight years that I’ve had her, I think I’ve only remembered once before this.  But hey, my bad parenting/sieve-like memory doesn’t mean she shouldn’t have a fabulous celebratory cake, right?  The stars were aligned: it was a long weekend and I had icing sugar in the house.  And truthfully, I had been looking for an excuse to do up something like this, and what better reason than a birthday?

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Say, that looks tall.  How many layers did you say it was, again?

I didn’t, but: six.

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Proof that “vegan” ≠ “healthy”.  I used the basic vanilla cupcake recipe from VCTOTW, doubled it, and divided it amongst six bowls to tint each one separately.  You definitely don’t want to attempt this if you have a serious aversion to artificial colours – but my theory is, as long as the majority of my diet isn’t neon-coloured, a piece of cake now and then isn’t going to kill me.  I made a huge batch of the fluffy buttercream frosting recipe from the same book, and barely had enough to finish the cake.  Even though each layer is only 6″ across, it still used a lot!

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The birthday girl was somewhat intrigued by this candy-coloured confection, but quickly lost interest and resumed the nap from which she had been so rudely awakened.  Hey, more for me!

I’m not sure if I’d try this again.  It’s not difficult, just a bit fiddly, and is a bear to store as none of my cake-takers are tall enough to house it.  But I can cross “rainbow layer cake” off my baking bucket list.

Thanks for looking! 🙂