Thursday, March 29, 2012

Perfectionist Need Not Apply

I had a super long work day today.  I left the house at 6:45AM and I didn't get home from work until 6:45PM!  I knew today was going to be a long day, and I had planned a DIY to have ready for today.  However, the best laid plans don't always come to fruition.  The first project I had planned, I never bought the materials for, but that's a whole other story.  My back up project I thought I had enough materials for, but it turns out I need twice as much as I thought I would.  I don't want to spend too much on this project, so I'm waiting to collect enough material to complete this one. Either way it's a pretty cool DIY, so I'm going to share what I've gotten done thus far.  A little warning though these photos are TERRIBLE, don't judge, I live in a dungeon.  Just kidding, my parent's house is lovely it's just rather dark in our family room.  

I saw this great rag banner on pinterest, and though I don't have a wedding to use this for, I knew this project would look great in a whole bunch of places.  Like over our fire place during the warm months.  Our fireplace isn't the most attractive feature in this home, so I wanted something bright and fun to hide it with.  This will only work for the warm months when we aren't using the fireplace, but hopefully we will be in our own home before we want to have a fire again!  I started by figuring out where I wanted my hooks for the rope, and putting them in place.  Then I played with the way the rope hung, until I found the most visually appealing spacing.  

Once I was happy with the rope I cut it to length, and tied slipknots at each end.

Then I cut up three t-shirts, a tank top, two pillow cases, and a yard or so of fabric.  I cut them into varying lengths and widths, because this is definitely a project that looks better if I don't let my OCD tendencies get the better of me. :)  Perfectionist need not apply to this project!  My pieces ranged from 1.5 inches to 3.5 inches wide, and 8 to 22 inches long.  After  I cut everything up mixed all the pieces together.  That way as I tied the strips of fabric onto the rope, I could just reach into the pile and grab a random piece.  

This is how it looks after I tied most of the pieces on. I ended up with more orange and the green patterned fabric than anything else, so I still have those left over.  To tie the pieces on you just simply tie them on at the middle, and then slide them into place.  You can play with the spacing to get the look you'd like, and if you'd like to trim any of your pieces when your done you can do that too.  

Sorry about these awful pictures.  This is a super weird angle.  I was standing on a chair leaning against that lamp you can see in the first photo.  l like the way this is looking so far.  To add in the new fabric I'm going to slide the pieces on there around, and add in the new colors evenly dispersed through out.  I went to Goodwill and bought a couple shirts to add in, but I only got two and I still spent five dollars.  i don't want to spend more than 20 - 30 dollars on this project, so I'm going to wait until I naturally gather cheap fabric.  So this is on the back burner for the foreseeable future.  I hope you enjoyed what I've gotten done so far, even with the less than perfect photos. :)

Happy DIYing, chris

Here are some better photos of the rag banner.  I added the two new shirts I bought at Goodwill, and spaced the rages a little further apart.  It still looks awesome, and now I can use it for this spring!  xoxo, chris!