I made a necklace out of dried rosebuds and the yarn that Marilyn sent me!
I MADE UNDIES
I didn’t use a pattern or anything so they’re kinda crooked and they’re not sewn very well but I’d been meaning to make undies for so long and I finally did! Yay me.
This fabric was a remnant so it was like two dollars! The whole time I worked at the fabric store I would go over and hold the bolt of turquoise shiny fabric but I kept procrastinating on buying it because I didn’t want to pay full price. Anyway, silver is good too! This is actually decently constructed (for me, at least) but it’s a little too big.
[Flash 10 is required to watch video]
I made one of those snowglobe things.
Oof, I know reblogging across my own blogs is annoying, but this is also a thing I made.
[Image: a stack of thin circular discs of vanilla lemon jello (made with water, soymilk, vanilla extract, lemon and agar-agar powder), topped and surrounded by frozen raspberries, pineapple chunks, mandarin oranges, pineapple juice and orange peach mango juice.]
THEY’RE LIKE LITTLE JELLO PANCAKES. OH GOD.
![[Image: A poster made out of fabric: a hot pink background with white flowers; a pale torso down to the upper thighs and part of two arms are visible. One hand is on a belly covered in stretch marks made of pink zigzag stitches and shiny purple fabric, and orange stitches meant to show folds. I tried to give the body pink pubes but it just looks like underwear, ha. In purple, brown and pink letters, it says “STRETCHMARKS ARE” and then against a solid pink background, “BEAUTIFUL.”]
LOOKS WAY BETTER IN PERSON! I realize the body looks ‘messy’ but that’s kind of my point in writing about stretch marks; how bodies don’t have to be smooth and neat and symmetrical to be beautiful. So that’s okay. I might re-upload this when I get a chance to picture it in daylight so you can see it better.
(EDIT 11/14/11) Here’s the text that goes along with it:
Stretch marks are beautiful, despite what the commercials say. They are not scars symbolizing pain, requiring creams to disappear the marks; they are not holes in your skin symbolizing the voids in your personality. Your skin is beautiful, whether or not it’s covered in cocoa butter. “Flaws” are created because “flaws” are profitable. The commercials sell you products to fill in the mythical voids, to fix the so-called unwanted character that your body so regrettably developed. But your skin is not wrong, and it does not require correction.
Stretch marks are beautiful, despite what your classmates said. In the 6th grade lunch line she pointed to the pink lightning bolts peeking from beneath your t-shirt sleeve in horror. Ewww! You insisted it was just ink, a likely story, and from then on vowed to always wear shirts with longer sleeves. But your t-shirt, the black and gold printed t-shirt with your favorite band’s name on it, soft from constant wear and wash, showed your stretch marks. You loved that t-shirt more than any other garment you owned. What was the moment you learned that conforming to impossible standards of beauty was more important than the things you love?
Stretch marks are beautiful, despite the pressures of a pool party. How many summers did you spend inside, or swimming solo in your backyard in less-than-ideal swimwear to save your peers the horror of having to see your skin? How often did you come inside afterward to examine your wet skin, only to imagine ripping it open, creating deep straight scars atop the jagged ones? When did you decide that being aesthetically pleasing to others was more important than living?
Stretch marks are beautiful, even when they lose their symmetry. The day you learned to love the mirrored bolts on either side of your belly button did not lose its significance the day more marks appeared, leaving your tummy asymmetrical, spotted, sloppy. Bodies aren’t meant to be static and neat. When did you learn to fear the inevitable body change? When you were a child and you sprouted upwards and outwards, your bones were simply too excited to grow and your skin couldn’t keep up. Never shame your body’s enthusiasm to grow. Your body will continue to expand and change and your skin will continue its amazing process of adapting even when its elasticity is not enough.
No matter where, no matter why and no matter how many—stretch marks are beautiful.](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lu9wez33WQ1r4o29bo1_1280.jpg)
[Image: A poster made out of fabric: a hot pink background with white flowers; a pale torso down to the upper thighs and part of two arms are visible. One hand is on a belly covered in stretch marks made of pink zigzag stitches and shiny purple fabric, and orange stitches meant to show folds. I tried to give the body pink pubes but it just looks like underwear, ha. In purple, brown and pink letters, it says “STRETCHMARKS ARE” and then against a solid pink background, “BEAUTIFUL.”]
LOOKS WAY BETTER IN PERSON! I realize the body looks ‘messy’ but that’s kind of my point in writing about stretch marks; how bodies don’t have to be smooth and neat and symmetrical to be beautiful. So that’s okay. I might re-upload this when I get a chance to picture it in daylight so you can see it better.
(EDIT 11/14/11) Here’s the text that goes along with it:
Stretch marks are beautiful, despite what the commercials say. They are not scars symbolizing pain, requiring creams to disappear the marks; they are not holes in your skin symbolizing the voids in your personality. Your skin is beautiful, whether or not it’s covered in cocoa butter. “Flaws” are created because “flaws” are profitable. The commercials sell you products to fill in the mythical voids, to fix the so-called unwanted character that your body so regrettably developed. But your skin is not wrong, and it does not require correction.
Stretch marks are beautiful, despite what your classmates said. In the 6th grade lunch line she pointed to the pink lightning bolts peeking from beneath your t-shirt sleeve in horror. Ewww! You insisted it was just ink, a likely story, and from then on vowed to always wear shirts with longer sleeves. But your t-shirt, the black and gold printed t-shirt with your favorite band’s name on it, soft from constant wear and wash, showed your stretch marks. You loved that t-shirt more than any other garment you owned. What was the moment you learned that conforming to impossible standards of beauty was more important than the things you love?
Stretch marks are beautiful, despite the pressures of a pool party. How many summers did you spend inside, or swimming solo in your backyard in less-than-ideal swimwear to save your peers the horror of having to see your skin? How often did you come inside afterward to examine your wet skin, only to imagine ripping it open, creating deep straight scars atop the jagged ones? When did you decide that being aesthetically pleasing to others was more important than living?
Stretch marks are beautiful, even when they lose their symmetry. The day you learned to love the mirrored bolts on either side of your belly button did not lose its significance the day more marks appeared, leaving your tummy asymmetrical, spotted, sloppy. Bodies aren’t meant to be static and neat. When did you learn to fear the inevitable body change? When you were a child and you sprouted upwards and outwards, your bones were simply too excited to grow and your skin couldn’t keep up. Never shame your body’s enthusiasm to grow. Your body will continue to expand and change and your skin will continue its amazing process of adapting even when its elasticity is not enough.
No matter where, no matter why and no matter how many—stretch marks are beautiful.
Technically this is something I’m going to make, but I still wanted to post this so you can see all the pretty fabrics I’m about to use. I have to do a multimedia project on something I think is awesome/beautiful/amazing/whatever, and since bodies are awesome and beautiful and amazing, I’m going to make this project body-positive and make a fabric poster about stretch marks. It’s supposed to be a self-portrait, and the writing that has to accompany the visual portion is going to be sort of a letter to myself past and present about my body and my stretchmarks and what they do and don’t symbolize. This may turn out cool or really disappointing, IDK. You can’t see all of the shinyness of the fabric, unfortunately. Also the floral print is going to be the background; I got a yard of this for 4 bucks as an upholstery remnant and it is seriously fluorescent. I’m using felt, corduroy and canvas as letters, cotton for my skin and the shiny fabrics for stretch marks. IT’S GOING TO BE FABULOUS. IT’S DUE TOMORROW. I SHOULD REALLY GET STARTED.
You may ask, Vikki, what the heck are those ridiculous garments on your body? Or possibly, Vikki, who do you think you are, some type of lion? I’m not. But I feel like one, a lion with a purple mane! Anyway. Here are some things.
- The top is a fucking HALF SWEATER y’all and I dunno, fatkinis were really popular this summer so it seems inevitable that the new thing for fall has got to be fat babes in half sweaters, right? I think I pull it off, though certainly a midriff-bearing top is less effective when it doesn’t actually bear one’s midriff. Anyway. All I did to this was cut the neckline a bit bigger and then sewed this amazing purple fringe around it! I’m really into fringe. I got the sweater for like $1.50 at a thrift store and the fringe was probably around the same.
- The skirt was a sweater vest. What I did was basically cut along the shoulder seams, sewed up (and reinforced! a lot!) the neckline and armholes. SUPER easy and SUPER fast (and super cheap! This sweater was from the same thrift store and was about $1.50 too). As you can see the bottom edge of the skirt is the same as the bottom edge of the sweater, so I didn’t even have to hem it or anything. The arm holes puckered up a bit when I sewed them but I seriously don’t care. Also I didn’t bother finishing the top edge because I’m lazy and it won’t be seen anyway.
- This was supposed to be a dress, but when I realized that the skirt has to stretch a lot and the top won’t/doesn’t stretch at all (and since they’re two very different types of materials), I realized it would probably fuck things up to turn it into a dress. I’m glad though because the separate pieces are going to look so great with other things.
- AND THEY’RE GOING TO BE WARM! My idea for this was initially because I hate winter clothes and I wanted to find a way to be super fabulous while still being warm. DONE.
