DIY: A Flowy Skirt Into...

As I mentioned last week, I've had a lot going on the last month or so and that was my main reason for blowing you guys off. I don't think I mentioned another pretty big reason I haven't found the time to blog: Books! Ever since I got my library card earlier this year, I've consistently been reading 3-4 books per month and this last month, I read 9 books!

Anyway, I am in between books right now (just finished "The Girl On The Train" by Paula Hawkins and "Sharp Objects" by Gillian Flynn. I loved them both!! But I won't be getting a new book for a week or so), so I have some time to work on some stuff I've kept on pause. I started with this skirt:

I was having a skinny day this picture was taken. I wish I had those every day!

I picked this dress up out of a pile of clothing. I was specifically looking for something made of about 2 yards of cotton fabric in a light color. This dress was perfect. I did have a moment of apprehension when I realized this dress was new, with tags, and originally sold for $34.99! To hack or not to hack?! Considering I got it out of the $0.25 bin, I figured, what the heck.

This lamp has been sitting in my basement for 3 years!

Let me back this story up, so you get an idea of where I'm coming from. My sister gave me this lamp like 7 or 8 years ago. I had it displayed prominently in my old house, but when we moved to our new house, it didn't really fit in like it had before, so it was relegated to the basement. I had no idea what to do with it. That is, until I got on Pinterest and realized this lamp had life in it yet.

I wanted to give that lamp shade some flair but just in case I royally screwed up, I bought an additional shade from Goodwill for next to nothing:

Super plain, but that's just what I was looking for.

I had a lamp. I had a shade that I didn't mind ruining. I had a dress. I had some time. It was time to start my project...

I also grabbed scissors, a needle and thread, and my teeny, tiny glue gun.

Let the longest project I've ever worked on begin!

These scissors definitely got a good work out!

First I cut the dress up. I had to cut the hem off of the bottom of the dress. I also had to cut the cotton part away from the lacy part.

I am a on the cutting edge!! (Sorry, I love that movie. I couldn't help myself!)

I cut all the fabric from the skirt into workable strips. I wasn't worried about the length but I wanted the width to be about 3ish inches.

There's the easy way and the way I did it.

I'm sure my sewing machine has a setting that makes ruffles, but I wanted to do this the hardest and longest way possible. Actually, I wanted to do this in a way that my peeps that don't have sewing machines could do. I did this for you! I stabbed myself 50 times with that needle for you guys! Lol.

Aww.. it's getting so cute already!

So, yeah, these pictures show how I made the fabric all ruffled. I threaded the needle, poked it through the middle of the length of fabric, and pulled tightly until it I got a little ruffle. This part took forever. 5ft of fabric, ruffled, becomes about 1.5 ft of fabric.

About 1/10th of the ruffles I'd need for this.

Hello there, tiny glue gun!

Once I had a fairly decent amount of ruffles, I decided to start hot gluing them to my lamp shade. Before I show you the "half way" picture, let me just add: I started with a bland shade and a darker fabric for the ruffles, so I didn't cover the shade in my new fabric first. If you happen to take on this project, you might want to keep in mind that you may need to cover your shade with your new fabric so your old lamp shade color doesn't bleed through.

Ok, back to the process:

Yup, I'm a Diet Coke drinker.

This constitutes about two hours worth of work. But, so far so good. It's starting to look like what I had in mind!

I took a lunch break, played with the kids and finished the rest of the lamp without incident. This is what I ended up with:

For the sake of pictures, this is in Quinn's room, but I think it will end up in my room.

A close up view.

Another close up. Pictures don't do it justice!

I love it!

I am so thrilled with how this turned out. It's hard to believe that this one little shade took enough fabric to cover me from waist to ankle! Oh and did I mention that the skirt had a little built-in slip? Yup, I used that, too, and had almost nothing left over!!