Victorian Skirts, Nature Adventures and Berry Pies, What Else is Summer For???

Dear Minions!

As promised something fun! As the Christmas rush slows down at the fabric store it frees up a little time for me to dedicate to writing. There has been so much that has gone on since May I guess I should start from the beginning! first off I wanted to post a few pictures from the March Against Monsanto rally, it really was an amazing afternoon spent with some awesome people!

A lovely couple had extra poster board and sharpies to share with people who didn't have a sign of their own, we gratefully accepted! Monster holding our lovely sign

Quite a turn out! it's hard to tell, but there were about 100 people gathered together!

 A better shot of the sign and I!

 A line up of protesters facing the street! I had two passers by ask me about the protest and what it was all about, hopefully we'll see them there next year!

 

Monster signing some petitions!

 

 

Alright! on to the next thing!

 

As I said the other day much of the summer was spent foraging and berry picking. The foraging was rather pitiful and devolved into tromping through forests in fancy Victorian style skirts( does that count as devolving? It was tremendous fun, we just didn't have anything to show for it at the end of the day!).

Monster pondering a plant on our first foraging trip! We were on the hunt for beech trees, we had no luck sadly......

 

One of our trips took us to the arboretum for an exercise in tree identification when we stumbled upon these two beautiful trees! On the right, next to Monster, stands a beautiful Ash tree and across the path on the left is an Elm tree! The significance may be lost on a lot of people, but my sister and I follow  a Norse/Teutonic path of paganism. According to the Norse myths, the first humans were created out of an Elm tree (woman) and an Ash tree (man). If you stand on the path between the two trees and look up you see their branches intertwined, leaves all intermingled, it struck us as soon as we stepped between them and both agree that it would be a perfect spot for a handfasting!

 

The berry picking was so much fun that we've decided to make it a new tradition! It was an excellent way to hang out and get fresh air, not to mention all the delicious berries!!! The first trip out resulted in a haul of 16L of strawberries! We made 3quarts of jam ( we tried substituting conventional sugar for xylitol, which is a natural sweetener derived from hardwood trees and therefore GMO free, so it turned more into a sauce than a jam, but it is absolutely divine mixed with organic yogurt and granola!)

We also managed to make two beautiful strawberry rhubarb pies! To sweeten we used local buckwheat honey that we picked up at the farmers market! If you aren't familiar with different kinds of honey ( as most honey you buy in the grocery store isn't actually honey, it's a corn syrup concoction! Ahhh!) Buckwheat honey has a very deep, strong and earthy flavour to it, which I find perfect for baking as it creates a beautiful contrast to and rounds out the sweetness of the berries!

We also ended up with a bunch of leftover berries to store in the freezer for smoothies and stuff. So excited for next summer!

The next berry adventure yielded 10L of blueberries, they were absolutely incredible and made many batches of beautiful turnovers, pies and smoothies, sorry I kind of failed in getting any pictures that day! The lady at the farm informed us that because of all the late frosts and lingering snows last spring that it made the berries closer to the ground the best, boy was she right!

Well, that's the end of the exciting berries and fancy skirt post, next week we'll get into some crochet adventures, or maybe an abandoned asylum adventure....... Not really sure which way to go.

So until next time darlings.........

Keep kreepin'

Missa Deadlove xoxo




Long time no post!

Dear minions!

It has been quite some time since my last post and I do apologize! Since our last little visit a lot of things have happened in my life, not all of them awesome, but most of them incredible!

Much of the summer was spent wearing fancy skirts and running around in forests with my dearest monster, berry picking, studying my craft, learning how to crochet, trying to garden and becoming obsessed with making  patchwork pillow cases!

I learned some minor bike repair and Frankenstein-ed my family's bikes together for an easier commute. I quit smoking. I joined a local all girl hardcore band as the new bassist and I've met the love of my life! Also nearly forgot to mention a family trip to Holland in September!

A lot has happened since we last communicated and in all the commotion I've neglected you all terribly, but no more! A new year, new opportunities and new habits! Over the course of the coming months I want to get you caught up to speed on all the exciting things that have happened and keep you current on any new developments!

I know I say that every post, but this time I mean it! For realsies!!!

This post is short and sweet, but I promise something fun for next week, we have a lot of catching up to do and there are so many things I want to tell you it's just to hard to pick one thing to start!!

So until next time my darlings.....

Keep kreepin'

Missa Deadlove xoxo

March against Monsanto and other life updates!

Dear minions!

Lots of stuff has been changing for me lately!

First off, I've started shopping at the farmer's market rather than the grocery store and it's made such a big impact on my health! I eat almost exclusively organic and have severely cut back on my meat intake. On the organic front alone I've noticed a dramatic  improvement in my energy level and sense of overall well-being. People keep telling me that it looks like I've lost weight and I definitely feel less bloated and lethargic. I've even found that my occasional bouts of depression have become more manageable and transient.

I've started cooking absolutely amazing dishes that I never would have thought of making, walking through the sterile aisles of No Frill's (I'll share a few in upcoming posts!). Even just the atmosphere of the market has made a big impact on me.

Grocery shopping used to be super stressful for me. I hated all the crowds and the go go go vibe everyone gave off. Purchasing boxes and cans of processed foods was so depressing and the often dodgy condition of the produce made me cringe!!

I feel good about the foods I buy from the market, all green and fresh, and the best part, local! It makes me feel good knowing the money I spend goes back into my community and not to some faceless corporation. I'm sure the drastic reduction in preservatives and chemicals that I ingest has had the biggest impact on my mood and energy ☺

I've even started chatting with a cute guy who works at the produce stand I frequent *blushes*

Second big change is that it looks like I'll be playing bass in a local punk band come the fall! More to come on that as it develops!

The third thing is that I've made the first steps toward becoming more involved in  environmental activism. Earlier today Monster and I participated in a March Against Monsanto rally.

I was first turned on to the cause by an internet acquaintance sharing posts on Facebook so I figured what would be the harm of following them?

It opened my eyes to a few issues I hadn't been aware of and reaffirmed some of my suspicions. It's kind of scary when you see it all laid out and take the time to absorb it.

We had an awesome time at the rally, heard some amazing speakers and chatted with some cool people! A lot more people turned out then I expected and it was cool to see how many people care about the health of the planet and the people on it. It was really inspiring to see people of all ages come out to support such an important cause! There were tons of petitions to sign and I've also signed up to help out next year!

It felt really good to be out there with so many like minded people and I'm so excited for next year!I hope to get more involved in this and a few other causes in the coming months!

I guess that's pretty much everything for now, I'll definitely keep you guys posted as things develop in the near future. As always my darlings......

Keep kreepin'

Missa Deadlove

Baked Chipotle Bacon Penne knock off

Dear Minions!

Today I have a little culinary experiment for you! I'm totally addicted to Boston Pizza's Baked Chipotle Bacon Penne but can't afford to eat out all the time, so I decided to try making it for myself! It was surprisingly easy and tastes just as good (if not better!). So here we go!

Ingredients:
1/4 cup butter
2tbls flour
1 cup cream (I used half and half)
2 cloves garlic
2tbls Chipotle seasoning
2 cups cheese (1 cup shredded fine, to be used in the sauce. The other cup shredded coarse to be sprinkled on top)
1 large tomato diced
1 can mushrooms or 10 mushrooms sliced and fried
6 handfuls pasta of your choice ( I used rotinis)
6 strips bacon chopped into 1/2 inch pieces

Chop tomato and set aside in a large casserole dish. Drain mushrooms (if using canned mushrooms) or slice and lightly fry mushrooms ( if using fresh) and set aside in casserole dish as well.

Fry bacon pieces until slightly undercooked, we don't want them to be too crispy! Drain bacon on a piece of paper towel then add to the tomatoes and mushrooms.

Using a large pot cook pasta until aldente. Drain pasta and add to the casserole dish.

In a small sauce pan over medium heat melt butter. Once butter is melted add flour wisking constantly. Wisk the roux constantly for about 5 minutes until smooth and slightly thinner in consistency.

Add cream and keep wisking for another 5 minutes.  If your sauce gets a little too thick ( mine did!) Add a little more cream or milk to thin it out.

Crush garlic into your sauce and keep stirring! Add chipotle seasoning and slowly add finely shredded cheese, I used marble cheese because it's my favorite! Keep wisking sauce, it will thicken a little bit until the cheese melts completely into the sauce.

Pour the sauce over everything in the casserole dish and mix it all together, making sure to coat all ingredients and distribute the tomatoes, mushrooms and bacon evenly.

Sprinkle the coarsely shredded cheese on top and bake for about 10 minutes in a 350 degree oven (or until cheese is melted!)

And voila! You can now break up with Boston Pizza! Hope you enjoy it and try experimenting with different cheeses and seasoning levels. I used a chipotle mango seasoning because it was all I could find and it added a subtle flavor that I hadn't expected but absolutely love!

Until next time darlings.......

Keep kreepin'!

Missal Deadlove :)

Seasonal Reflections and a Tiny Rant!

Dear Minions!

First up, since I seem to never post on a weekly (or even monthly) basis, I've decided to at the very least post on the Sabbaths ( the equinoxes/solstices/cross quarter Sabbaths)! Alright, now that that little promise has been made, on to the post!

'Tis the season is supposed to be a happy sentiment, invoking thoughts of hot chocolate by the fire place on a cold winter night, but more and more I find myself using it in a negative way, ie. comment, "That woman was so mean", response, " Well, 'Tis the season!". I work in retail, and see that with every day we draw nearer to December 24th, people are more short tempered, ruder and stingier. Whatever happened to the season of peace, good will and hope? It seems these days the focus of the season is on getting every toy on a 6 year-old's Christmas list or burying your teenager in the newest electronics and trendiest fashions. It kills me a little inside to see people pulling their hair out because they have 34 people to buy for. For (enter your deity's name here) sake, people were shot on "Black Friday" so that someone else could get the best deal!!! By no means do I want to get into a war over which ideology is right, but where is the God in that?!?!?!?!

When did we lose our grip on the widespread meaning of the holiday? Whether you celebrate Christmas, Yule, Chanukah, Kwanza, Saturnalia, or any other religious holiday this time of year, they all have the same message in their core; being with family/people you care about (sometimes families aren't all they're hyped up to be), giving to those in need, building community, rejoicing in the longer days to come and wishing peace upon those you love for the coming year! Not this materialistic brain washing that is rampant in our society! I found a perfect example of this today on my Facebook feed, a woman I know put up a post asking if anyone had ideas for Christmas gifts for a 4 month old! SERIOUSLY? A FOUR MONTH OLD!?!?! It just goes to show the rampant consumerism of our generation and the obsession with "things" that drives many people to bankruptcy in our damaged economy.

I may sound hypocritical for this 'anti-consumerism' rant considering I work in retail and I don't mean to say that you shouldn't buy gifts for your loved ones, I'm simply trying express that you don't need to buy $100 worth of stuff for everyone in your immediate family, extended family, your cousin's best friend's family's cat and everyone/thing in between! How about we all trim down our lists to buying a few gifts for our immediate family, a small trinket for the extended family closest to us and lovely Holiday themed cards for our friends ( you could even throw a $2 scratch ticket in there!)?

When I was growing up my family wasn't well off financially, my mother had to make a lot of sacrifices for us to have food on the table most days. At Christmas time we would get a new dress, a stocking full of things we needed ( like underwear, socks, travel toiletries for when we visited family), Santa/Sinter Claus (we're Dutch) would get us a few small gifts ( maybe a stuffed animal, a puzzle, a sweater, a new pair of shoes for the spring) and our parents would give us the really special present! The special present was generally the only gift we got from our Christmas list and was always reasonably priced ( usually between $25-$60).  A couple years after my father passed ( sadly  his passing relieved a great strain on our finances) my sister and I each got a Gameboy Colour! Other than a very used Sega Genesis, which was a mostly a gift for my dad, it was the first piece of electronic/gaming equipment we ever got and we cherished them! That year Santa got us each a big pack of value brand batteries that had to last us the whole year.

My best Christmas memories aren't of the gifts I received, they're of the times we spent together as a family. I remember my mom bundling us up Christmas Eve to make the 3-5 hour journey (depending on the weather) to my grandparent's house, whom we only got to see about 4 times a year. I remember sitting around the big table at my Aunt's house chattering away to any grown up who would listen. I remember scarfing down my chocolate letters so fast I got a tummy ache. I remember running around the back fields on the farm with my little sister and playing in the big Elm tree behind the house. I remember making snow angels and tobogganing with my older cousins. I remember sleeping in the great room and trying my hardest to stay awake and catch a glimpse of Sinter Claus, I remember my grand father reading us fairy tales while we ate cookies my grand mother had made. I remember staying up late to watch the Lawrence Welk Christmas Special and Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer. I remember making little gift boxes out of old Christmas cards with my aunt and uncle for the small gifts I would give to my grand parents and friends. I remember making bird feeders out of pinecones, peanut butter and seeds and hanging them outside on Christmas Day. I remember waking up early on Boxing Day, not for the sales, but to see the cardinals and blue jays eating from the feeders we made as my grand mother made breakfast for us. The novelty of the toys would wear off after a week or two, but the memories I made with my family are still a comfort to this day!

I guess the whole point of this tirade and fond recollection is that there are many ways to make the Holidays memorable besides spending obscene amounts of money on material possessions. I generally make all of my gifts, it often costs me significantly less than I would spend if I bought all my gifts and my family and friends appreciate the thought, the time and the effort I put into picking out a fabric and making a unique gift for them! My mother always told me that the best thing you could do for your kids is spend half the money and twice the time on them! Cut your Christmas shopping in half, spend less time in the malls fighting your way to the toy section, waiting in line to pay for your insane amount of items and spend that wasted time surrounding yourself with your friends and family! Take the half hour you would spend looking for a parking spot and teach your children that possessions are worth a lot less than memories and fun! Bake cookies with your children to give as gifts to your co-workers, your co-workers and kids will appreciate it more! Take your kids out to the woods and collect pinecones to make bird feeders for their grandparents, aunts and uncles. By not buying so much for your children, you will inadvertently make the gifts they receive that much more special!

If you aren't a talented seamstress or don't know how to knit, there are still lots of ways you can make meaningful gifts for friends and family, the internet is full of craft blogs, cookie recipes, and easy DIY projects that cost a lot less money and take less time when you add up all those holiday line up wait times! It's amazing how quickly someone's expression of mild disappointment can change to sheer elation by simply telling them once they open their gift, "I made that for you"! When you give a truly thoughtful and meaningful gift, rather than a 'Made in China' piece of junk that someone thinks they 'want', it makes a big difference and that thing you made becomes cherished because it shows how much you really love that person. Every year when I ask my aunt what she wants for Christmas I get "Pajamas" as a quick and fervent reply, I've made her pajamas for the last 8 years and every year she's excited!

On the flip side, I know sewing enthusiasts who run themselves ragged trying to make ALL of their gifts while working full time and running a household, you don't have to go to that extreme either, buy a gift and make a gift, do a project that you know you can complete quickly/in an afternoon. START YOUR HOLIDAY SEWING IN OCTOBER! That's the best piece of advice I could possibly give to any new/veteran holiday crafter! Make something useful! Pajama pants/nightgowns are always appreciated, a stuffed toy for a niece/nephew, an iPod/iPad/e-reader case/laptop bag could be good gift ideas for the teens in your life, a little bit of thought goes a long way!

I know this has been a bit lengthy but this has been heavily weighing on my mind since the Christmas music started piping into the store and stirring everyone into a gift crazed frenzy! I hope this has been a bit of a wake up call to some and a reinforcement of values for others. I hope at least a few people ponder on the history of the Holiday Season, no matter what their cultural or religious beliefs, and try to reassert the old adage of 'less is more'. In the true spirit of the season I plan on donating a bunch of stuff to local organizations like thrift stores that donate their profits to local charities, as well has donating to the local Food Bank and Women's Shelters. There are lots of people who have a lot less than I do, that probably deserve a lot more. This is the time to give what you can and expect nothing back! If nothing else, it might quell my stash a bit too :)

So, Blessed Yule, Merry Christmas, Happy Chanukah, Happy Kwanza and Merry-Whatever-The-Heck-Else-You-Celebrate!!!! And don't forget, as always my darlings.......

Keep kreepin'!

Missa Deadlove xoxo

Inspirations and Revelations

Dear Minions!

Sorry for the long silence! I know I say that every time I post, and I am sure it's lost all meaning to any of you who read this blog regularly, but I truly mean it. Sadly I don't have a craft or thrifty little sewing project for you, this post is simply a chance to catch up.

My long silence has been due to a number of things, the first being a time of recovery and healing. Not in a physical sense, I'm totally fine in that respect, but a healing of the mind. I've recently acknowledged that I have a drinking problem. I'm not a drink-three-bottles-of-wine-everyday kind of alcoholic, but I've come to recognize that I can't control myself when I do drink. If there is a bottle of wine/hard liquor, I drink it all, if there is a two-four (case of beer to the non-Canadians lol) present I'll drink until I pass out. Alcoholism runs rampant in both sides of my family and is what ultimately killed my father. It cost me my funeral job and led me to a nervous breakdown, more recently it was a factor in an abrupt end to a relationship and I had to acknowledge it's devastating effect and hold on my life. So since June, under strict guidelines I have only imbibed 4 times, now I'm sure you're thinking "that doesn't constitute quitting", and you're right it doesn't. It's a point of self control that I lack, and by making the conscious decision to limit myself to a single pint on my birthday or my sister's birthday in a pub where the booze is free flowing is the route of recovery that I've chosen to take. A point that I have prided myself on is a bottle of gin that has sat in my cupboard since June with a single shot in it. Gin is my demon, and everyday I look at it and smile to myself that it is still there, no matter how shitty my day or week was, I let it sit there as a reminder that I can and must control myself lest this foul disease of addiction take me over again.

The second reason for my silence is a lack of inspiration/forethought. I've been in kind of a slump the past couple months, brooding over unfortunate situations that I have brought upon myself, being kind of moody when I quit smoking ( I was a right bitch for about 2 weeks), and generally being busy sewing displays for the store and not thinking, "Oh, I could snap a couple photos and make a tutorial". I'm a slacker, and I apologize profusely!

The final reason I've ignored my blog is because I've been in the process of moving for the past month, finally out of my mom's basement. Yay! Only took a year lol.

There was an incident last week that prompted me to write again, nothing bad, in fact something wonderful and long overdue. A friend came to visit me last Saturday, an amazing friend that I haven't seen in a year and a half. The last time we saw each other we were both in very bad head spaces. I was living in Kitchener and drinking too much, he was working himself silly to pay rent on a condo he couldn't afford on his own after the girl he moved in with bailed 3 weeks into the lease. We talked about life and our trials, the things we wished we could change and the hopelessness we felt in our situations. It helped ease our pain a little, and staved off the impending breakdowns we were facing in our lives. When I say this man is my saviour I truly mean it, he was the one who talked me out of committing suicide on my 23rd birthday, if it wasn't for him I wouldn't be writing any of this.  

This visit however, was one of hope and inspiration. We spoke of the progress and positive changes in our lives, for me, my sewing and cross stitch work, which has brought me immense satisfaction and been a form of therapy for me and for him his involvement in a slam poetry team which is taking him to a nation/international (can't remember quite which) poetry competition next week. We discussed the hiccups in our lives that inevitably occur, but the emphasis was all on the positives, the healthy choices we are making, and the unhealthy habits we are breaking. I inspired him through the course of our conversations to write some happy poetry and he has inspired me to update this blog more faithfully, to use it the way I intended when I started writing nearly a year ago. Both of us also found religion. He discovered the merits and is converting to Judaism and I have rediscovered my Wiccan beliefs.

I find it amusing and very fitting that I should realign myself with wiccan practices this time of year, right before Samhain (Halloween). It's kind of funny, I was in Chapters recently to pick up the new Heros of Olympus book ( I've been waiting on pins and needles for a year!) and found myself wander over to the New Age/Occult section where I came upon an almanac for the the Sabbaths. As I casually perused the sections reading a bit of this and a bit of that my soul stirred. Everything I had read as a teenager came flooding back to me and a sense of peace washed over me. I realized that Wicca is, and has always been, my path to peace and enlightenment.

As a teenager (around 12-15) I was fascinated by and seriously studied and practiced Wicca in secret. When my mother came upon my little altar and stack of books she immediately flipped out. I was always encouraged to read up on different religions, but pagan traditions seemed to be right out of the question. The inability to practice my faith drove me to study dark things like Necromancy, Levian Satanism and VooDoo, I guess I figured if she thought Wicca was bad, I'd show her that I could do worse! The years from 16-24 were more often than not dark times for me. Times of spiritual confusion, deep depression and substance abuse.

This past year I have taken lots of time to rediscover myself and how I want to live the rest of my life. There have been ups and downs, times of clarity and times of confusion. The past month or two especially I have reflected, planned and re-planned, researched, changed course and finally decided.

Samhain is the witches New Year and I plan on celebrating it as such, in the coming year I will realign myself with The Goddess, study, worship, practice, ground myself, and now that I have found myself again I will grow, both spiritually and emotionally. I will re-center and fine tune the course of my life.

I hope you will follow me in my adventure, and that my revelations through the coming year can guide you along your path too. May the Goddess bless you with her favour and bring joy and happiness to all of you this Halloween night!

As always darlings........

Keep kreepin'!

Missa Deadlove xoxo

Thrifty Thoughts

Dear Minions!

At some point or another we all must part with garments we love..... You know the ones, the favourite pair of jeans that is now more holes than fabric, the top that fits 'just right' but is covered in stains and has those abhorrent yellow armpit rings. You hate to lose them, but wouldn't be caught dead wearing them in public!

I recently went through my wardrobe on the annual purge and what should I find but my, as a former coworker once called them, 'po' boy capris'. I love these stupid pants to death! And they're just that..... Dead. I picked them up at the local Goodwill for $6 about........ 8 years ago now. I wore these things everywhere! They had a nice cut and that bleached denim look you can only get from 10+ years of washing. I loved them!! Then the fateful day came when I got the inevitable 'thigh rip' that seems to ruin all my pants. However, rather than lamenting too much and throwing them away in a fit of frustrated despair, I continued to wear them over fishnet stockings and patterned tights. To make it a little less devastating I even encouraged my college pub buddies to add a few cool rips to 'punk them up' a bit. The end result was a tattered mess, but it seemed to make them wearable again, at least..... for a while.

My mother just about lost her mind when I came home wearing them under a short dress.  She told me she'd be happy to do my laundry that week, but I learned my lesson from the 'plaid pants incident' when I was 15, no way was she getting her hands on these babies!!! As time passed I gained a bit of weight and the pants no longer fit me well, but I held onto them, and good thing I did!

My sister had a similar issue with a pair of jeans she had loved years ago. We put our heads together for a way she could save them. First idea was to rip them more and cover them in fake blood for a Zombie Walk. They went over smashingly! After that they were completely unwearable in public so we decided to take out the inseam and make them into a long skirt. We dug through my bins of fabric in search of plaid. What do you know, I had about 5 different plaid prints! We set to work using the larger pieces to make panels between the legs and the smaller pieces to patch up the holes we had made. The pièce de resistance was using the wider rips and a few large pieces of plaid to make deep hidden pockets. The concert skirt was born! We call it the concert skirt because you can fit 6 tall cans of beer into each pocket which makes it perfect for the pre-drink bus/subway ride when going to a punk show in Toronto!

So, the time has come to save my beloved po' boys and create a skirt. I found some skull and cross bones knit and some cotton with cute little sparrows on it while raiding my stash one day and set out on my thrifty adventure. The following ensued.....

 Here they are in their tattered glory. You can actually see through them to the table underneath!

 The first step is tearing out the inseam. Leave the side seams intact, we're just adding basically a gusset of fabric to create the skirt. I apologize if it's hard to see but I've off set the front from the back, gives you a better idea of just how shabby these things are!

 You'll end up with two flat legs like this, it's now just a matter of patching the holes and inserting the skirt panels.

 This is the fabric I chose for the skirts panels and pockets, super cute right? I managed to get this for $3/m !

And this is the Sparrow fabric I used for some of the front patches and the patches on the back. The holes on the back side of the pants were very wide and fairly close together so I opted for a cotton rather than a knit to patch them so they would have more stability!

 Next step is to lay the jeans over the fabric for your panels to get an idea of how wide and long you'll need to cut. You should allow about 3-5 inches extra in the length for your hem. I cut my hem on a curve so that the panel would have more drapeyness and not look flat. It gives a much nicer effect. I used a 1 inch hem so that I could turn it under twice for a nice finish.

 Here are the panels for both front and back. The back panel is the smaller triangle.

 For the patches and pockets I simply eyeballed the sizes and cut pieces a little larger then I needed. You'll be trimming the excess fabric off once you sew it down anyway!

This is what the back ended up looking like when I was done patching. I ended up ripping the bum seam out about half way up and sewed it back together in a straight line. This reduced a lot of excess fabric and made the back panel much smaller. It also gives a more A-Line structure to the skirt and a better silhouette. The patches are simply pinned and sewn about an inch around the edges of the holes.

                             

This shot shows where I stitched around some of the worn denim above one of the holes and gives a better idea of how far from the frayed edge I sewed.

Here it is! My newly improved 'Po' Boy Skirt' ! I turned the cuffs back up and tacked them down along the side seams so they would stay up. The cuffs were one of my favourite things about these pants and I didn't want to lose them! As you can see the skirt panel has a sort of wavy drape because of the triangular cut and the curved hem. It also gives me full range of motion so I can still kick some ass if need be!

 Here is a shot of the back panel, you'll notice the back seam is sewn down about 5 inches from the bottom of my bum. The drape on the back is a little fuller than the front but this can be remedied by narrowing the triangle you use for the back panel.

 And here's a picture to show the 'hidden pocket'. They're indiscernible from the other patches when you look head on, but I'm sure they will come in handy! I sewed the pockets in after patching the lower hole and then simply sewed around the top of the pocket hole, down the sides and below the lower patch for the bottom! They may not be able to hold 6 tall cans but I imagine I can sneak a mickey of gin around :P

There you have it! How I saved my favourite pants using fabrics I already had! I used about 1m of fabric for the panels and the patching, and when you think about it, it cost me nothing for this project since I had the pants and all the fabric for a few years already. If I were to go out and buy the stuff for this project it would cost somewhere around $10 (even less if you hit up the thrift shop on a sale day and raid the remnant/clearance area of your local fabric store!).

Times are tough out there and it helps to use every resource you have. Necessity is the mother of Invention. My nostalgic need to keep these pants out of the rag pile prompted me to create something new and fun. Hopefully I'll get another 8 years of wear out of these ol' po' boys :)

As always my darlings.........

Keep kreepin'!!

Missa Deadlove xoxo