Arms Up

Man guys.  Remember in my last post, when I said Gianna might be the easiest baby we’ve had so far?  Unfortunately, I’m eating my words.  Sweet girl has been a little fussy while she’s awake during the past couple of weeks and that’s why it’s taken me so long to get this post up…and any post at all.  No complaining though and I’m not apologizing because it’s family over blogging but I will say that, while these days are fleeting and I’m trying to soak them up as much as possible, when those days when a routine becomes the norm again come, they will not be unwelcome.

Anyway…  

Our DIY, tufted headboard headboard is finito and we are loving it.  We have upped the comfort anty 1000% over our previous headboard:

Now it’s behind with the old and in front with the new.

In case you missed it, the tutorial for the tufted back of the headboard can be found here. 

The inspiration for the arms of our new headboard was taken from those on this headboard, made by Sarah at Sarah M. Dorsey Designs.  I fell in love with the curves at the top of the arms at first sight.  She gave instructions on how to make them for the most part, which you can read about in her post about them, and in this post I go into more detail showing how we made them.

Sarah used a 2 x 8 and a 1 x 8 for each arm.  We needed a 2 x 10 and a 1 x 10, a tad wider than those Sarah used since we were retrofitting the headboard to our existing headboard.  So, instead of getting two boards and screwing them together, we cut costs by using three.  (It saved us about $10 to do it this way and the look is no different.)

We used:
1 - 2 x 10 (cut in half lenthwise to make them each about 60 inches long)
1 – 1 x 6 (also cut in half)
1 – 1 x 4 (also cut in half)  The wood shown in the above picture is everything needed for one arm.  Like I mentioned above, the boards we bought we had cut in half in-store as they were each 10 feet long and we needed them to be 5 feet long as each arm needed to be 5 feet tall.

We placed the wood together like so to create two, wide arms.

Anthony used wood screws* that were almost as long as the boards were wide to screw everything together.  The screws needed to be long enough that they’d securely hold the boards together but not too long that the points came out the other side. 

In screwing the boards together, we had to be careful not to place the screws where we’d be cutting the design out of the top of each arm.  If you’re only interested in making two rectangular arms, you won’t need to worry about screw placement.

Once the boards were all one big piece, I labeled each side of the arm – back, front, and top.  I did this because the 2 x 10 was slightly deeper than the other two boards put together (you can kind of see it in the above picture) so one side of the arm was flush (front) and the other wasn’t (back).   Also, I wanted the 1 x 6 board to be at the front, inside of the arm.  In case you would be able to see where the two one-inch boards met through the fabric later, by placing the 1 x 6 board in front, the seam would likely be covered up by the tufted padding of the back of the headboard later.  (Turns out that the seam between boards is not noticeable under the fabric at all.)

Next up was creating the curved design at the top of each arm.  First, I drew the design on a piece of thick paper and then I traced it onto the wood.

Like Sarah did, I used the lid of a jar to create the rounded parts and then drew a straight horizontal line to connect them.  The top rounded part is five inches wide (wider than Sarah’s since we had to accomodate for retrofitting) and the straight line and curve at the front are each 2.5 inches wide.

A good friend of ours cut the design out for me using his jigsaw (thanks Matt!)  Anthony has a rotozip he was going to use but the blade wasn’t long enough to cut through both boards.  Once the design was cut out, Anthony pre-drilled three holes at back of each arm where they would be attached to the back of the headboard.  More on that later.

The next step was wrapping fabric around the inside of each arm so that the arms could be attached to the back of the headboard and then finished.  I cut out two rectangular panels of the same gray fabric used on the tufted back – each panel was wide enough to be stapled at the back and wrapped around the entire arm to be stapled at the opposite back and was also long enough that it extended an inch past the ends of each arm on the top and bottom.  I used two yards of fabric to finish both arms bringing the grand total in fabric to five yards for the entire headboard. 

To start, Anthony laid the fabric on the ground and then placed the wood arm we were working on on top of it, placing it close enough to one edge that there was enough fabric left to be pulled around and stapled.  Then he pulled the fabric taught and up and over the other side of the fabric. 
(Note:  At this point, the insides of the arms needed to be stapled at the back so we had to pay close attention to which side of the wood we were laying on the ground and which side we were stapling.)

Then he stapled the fabric to the back of the inside of the arm. 
(Note:  You’ll want to make sure the grain of the fabric is straight while it’s wrapped around the arm for a professional look.  It should be running horizontally across the side of the arm and/or vertically up and down.  As long as you initially cut the fabric panels along the grain, this should be easy to accomplish.)

Here’s what an arm (in this case, the left arm if you’re looking at the headboard) will look like once the inside is stapled:The fabric will hang loose but will be attached at the back the entire length of the arm.

So that the fabric stayed put while attaching the arm to the headboard, Anthony grabbed a small scissors and stuck the pointed ends into the holes he pre-drilled earlier (the holes that would hold screws that attach the arms to the headboard).

We also realized last minute that we should get the fabric at the bottom of the arms situated before attaching them since we’d be attaching them standing up.  To do this, we stapled the fabric at the bottom of each arm to the outside back about six inches up the arm.  Then Anthony whipped out his present wrapping skills, folding the fabric like so on the bottom of each arm and stapling it:

I’ll have another post coming later that shows how we attached the new headboard to our existing headboard but at this point in the project, we had the help of another friend (thanks Dan!) to get the arms onto the back.  (We didn’t realize how heavy the headboard was going to be so, being postpartum a couple of weeks, I couldn’t help like I normally would.) Basically, Dan held the back of the headboard in place while Anthony held the arms, one-by-one, onto each side of the headboard and screwed them on.  Once both arms were attached, they looked like this:

You can see here how the arms and back were held together; where the screws were placed:

Next, we finished wrapping the fabric around the front and outside of each arm, stapling at the back.

Now it gets a little tricky with the design at the top.  To polish off this part, Ifirst folded down the excess fabric at the top of each arm and stapled it to the back.

The arms now looked like this:

Then, I trimmed away the fabric around the design, making sure there was an inch of excess above and beyond the top of the design.

The fabric had to be wrapped onto the design but because of the curves, I had to cut notches around each curve and corner so it could be folded nicely.  So, I basically cut triangles with the points almost touching the wood of the arm around each curve and into each corner.  I made sure I cut the triangle points deep enough that they’d allow the fabric to be folded without being pulled but not too deep that they went into the side of the arm, exposing the wood beneath.

Next, Anthony helped me staple each flap around the curves down – I held them down tightly and he stapled.  (Tip:  If a staple doesn’t go in perfectly; if it sticks out a little, just grab a hammer and hammer it flat.)

The last thing I needed to do to finish off the arms was to make a strip of fabric to cover the front of each.  To make these strips, I cut out two long, narrow rectangles out of what was left of the fabric we used to wrap the arms in.  The front of each arm measured 2.5 inches wide so I cut the rectangles to be 4.5 inches wide so that I could have a finished, one-inch hem on each side.  Length-wise, I cut them so that I had plenty of fabric left to be able to fold it over and under the tops and bottoms of each arm.  That made them about 70 inches long.

Using my quilting square* was super helpful in making sure I was measuring and cutting straight edges.  I drew four lines onto what would be my strips of fabric – two the width of the entire strip pre-hem to show where to cut them out of the fabric remnant and two where I’d fold to make the hem.

To finish the strips, I used no-sew, iron-on hem tape*.  I placed the hem tape on the inside of the fold line on one side, ironed it, and did the same to the other side.   

To get the strip on its arm, I first cut a small piece of hem tape a little shorter than the width of the front of the arm, placed it at the top of the arm, and ironed on the strip of fabric so that it was secured by the hem tape.

I wanted to glue most of the strip on because I wasn’t sure I had enough hem tape to iron it on so by placing that small piece of iron-on tape at the top, the strip was held in place and allowed the glue I used to dry without moving.  I did the same thing with a small piece of iron-on tape to the flat part between the two curves of the design at the top of each arm and also placed one right below the second curve; right on the front, flat part of the arm.

To glue the strips on, I ran two small lines of glue down the middle sides of each side of the front of the arm like so:(I used this fabric glue but any craft glue and even hot glue will work.  Hot glue just requires a lot of careful gluing so it doesn’t get on the fabric where it’d be tough to remove.)

I did it this way all the way down.  There was extra fabric at the bottom of the arms that we just folded under the arm – I folded under while Anthony held the headboard off the ground.  One day, when we move and have to take the bed apart, we’ll staple them down but until then, no one will ever know they’re not secured underneath so shhhhh…

Ta-daaaaa!  That is IT!

It cost us a little under $100 to make this headboard and if we’d have had to buy the foam for it, it would still only have rung in at around $130.  Not too shabby, eh?  Not too shabby at all.  :D   

Right after we finished it, I got really excited and quickly cranked out two new pillow covers for the euro pillows on the bed plus some matching faux roman shades that you might’ve noticed.  I stole the smaller square pillows from the living room to add some more color but really I’m still sulking over the fact that the fabric I wanted to make covers out of for those costs $230 PER YARD.  No way Hosea.  It’s this orangerie floral by Designers Guild…
…and if I ever find a remnant that is majorly, and I mean majorly discounted, I will pounce.  Until then, I’ll forever (but hopefully not) be on the look-out for a similar print and pattern.

So, the headboard is done but what about the footboard?  Well, eventually I’d love to sand and restain it and I’m toying with the idea of upholstering and tufting the flat part in between the two posts but for now, there are bigger project fish to fry in this casa but don’t be suprised if that post pops up one day in the future.  

There are still a lot of things I want to get done in our room before we call it “done” – painting and adding legs to the nightstands, painting the dressers, painting or restaining our desk and bookshelf, hanging stuff on the walls, making a West Elm chandelier knock-off that I’ve had on the agenda for over a year now, blah, blah, blah…  Basically, the room will see it’s final state in a few years at the rate we move.  So it goes and so it is. 

But, now that I have a plush surface to sink my spine into when stress strikes, I don’t care how long it takes.  Slow and steady wins the home decor race…or maybe that’s just an excuse for decoristas with kids.  ;)

Stay tuned for a quick post on how we attached this headboard to our existing, thrifted bed frame.

Adios.  :)

*Affiliate link to product we purchased or something similar to what we purchased to make this headboard.  If you click and buy, we will get a small commission.  Thank you for helping us keep the lights on around here!  :)

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Fur Real

I feel like a new woman!  My head is slowly coming out of the fog that has been the last five days.  A couple of hours after this recent ‘gram, things around here went south…or should I say north.  Sebastian ejected the entire contents of his day out of his mouth on our way home from the playground (oh yes, think carseat…everywhere) and it didn’t stop there.  Oh no.  The next day and a half after that hold the record for the most vomit I’ve ever seen come out of any of my kids mouths…the record because, until now, we have somehow escaped it.  We’d never had to deal with a stomach bug plus a heaping side of vomit before the last few days.  It’s awful to see your kids suffer and not be able to take it all away.  After the vomit came the flood out the other end for all kids and I’ll just stop there because I’m experiencing some feelings of PTSD arise and I’m sure you want to know allll the details.  Right. 

Anyway, I’m just so happy to be here today and I’m overjoyed our kiddos are smiling again.  I wish the screen could exude my excitement a little more.  We had a normal night last night and a normal morning this morning so I’m calling all systems go.  I might even get dressed today knowing that the chances of my clothes wearing bodily fluid are super low.  It’s great and I’m just happy to be alive with all kids in tow!

I even got the kids dressed.

See?

 
But let’s zoom in on the fur, shall we?  That’s why I’m really here today anyway.

Those vests were my miniscule link to reality the past several days.  I made them in two fifteen minute breaks while all sick kids were sleeping (two breaks because poor cries cut me short during the one shot I had to get them all done).  They only cost me about $3 each too!  So, like I do, I’m going to tell you all about how I made them and how you can make them too!

Oh, and did I mention that you can make them without sewing a single stitch?  You can!

The supplies:
-vest pattern (link to free download below)
-a piece of faux fur – I bought mine from Hancock Fabrics and it’s awesome (couldn’t find it on their website for ya – boo!).  Plush and soft and the color is just perfecto.  To make two size 2T-4T vests, I only needed a little over a half yard and since I bought the fur on sale, that meant only $6.  (I actually bought a yard though because, at the time, I wasn’t sure how much I needed but I’m glad I did because with the remainder of the fur I have, I can get at least one fur scarf for mwah and maybe two tiny ones for them!)
-scissors
-staples and a staple gun for the no-sew route (I know it’s weird but read on…)
-hot glue and hot glue gun

I know I said you can make these without sewing; that’s where the staples come in.  But if you know how to sew a simple straight stitch or you’re a beginner hand-sewer, you can use a machine or needle and thread instead of the staples.  Since I know how to sew, I used my machine.

First, you’ll want to grab this free toddler vest pattern from Once Upon a Sewing Machine.  You’ll only need the front and back pages, not the hood.

Print it out and cut it out along the given lines.

On the pattern it says to add 6.5 inches to the bottom of each piece but I only added three because the vests would’ve been way too long with 6.5 more inches on my girls.  To add those inches, I just taped a piece of paper onto the bottom of each piece and cut it so that the sides lined up all the way down and so that it extended that three inches from the bottom of the pattern. I also cut off the small part on the front pattern piece placed there for buttons (that middle strip that’s cut off in the picture above).  I wasn’t going to have any buttons so I didn’t need the extra fabric there.

The next thing I did was make the arm holes a little smaller.  To do this, I pulled out one of the girls jean vests and moved it so that it was laying on top of the pattern armhole with the top of the shoulder and sides of the vest lined up with the top and sides of the pattern.  Then I just traced it onto a sheet of paper I had taped under the pattern armhole and cut it out.
This is before I positioned the jean vest where it needed to be lined up to trace it, but you can see how much smaller the actual vest armhole was.  It’s worth noting though that my girls are fitting comfortably in 2T tops right now so if you’re making this for a child closer to 4T, you might be able to keep the armholes the size they are.  It’d be worth comparing it to a sleeveless shirt or vest you already have to make sure though.

Here’s what the pattern looked like when I was done lengthening and minimizing the armholes:
At this point I thought I was ready to take the fabric to the fur but when I placed the front and back pieces together (they meet at the armhole side), one was longer than the other.  I wish I could’ve said it was my measuring error but as it turns out, the front of the pattern is actually a smidge longer than the back.
It was an easy fix though; I just sliced that extra length off the bottom and to the fur I went.

So, you’ve got your fur.  Lay it fur-side down on a table but make sure that you lay it so that the fur is pointing in a downward direction – the nap of the fur goes down towards the bottom of what will be your vest.  Does that make sense?
I folded the end of the fabric over in the picture above so you could see how my fur was laying.
 
Next, grab both pieces of your pattern and tape them together at the armholes.  Then, along each side except for the far left side, trace around the pattern but trace a half inch out.  (Note:  I used a sharpie because a pencil didn’t show up that well but if you have a washable marker, that would be even better.)
No need for perfection!  Fur hides that really, really well!  :)

Along the left side of the pattern, trace right along the edge of the paper.  This line will just be a guiding line to show you where to line up the pattern for the next side.  (Note:  this line will be the only one that shows on the inside of the finished vest.  I wasn’t too worried since when it’s worn, it’s not seen at all but if you want it eliminated, make sure you do use a washable marker and it’ll come out in the wash.)

Next, flip your pattern over and line it up along that middle line you drew.
Make sure you literally flip the pattern over!  Don’t just slide it over!

Trace a half-inch out again along all sides.  You won’t need to trace along the now-right side again. 

This is what the back of the fur will look like when you’re done.

Now it’s time to cut along every line but that middle line.

Cutting fur is a little tricky.  If you can, use a small, pointed scissors and snip away in small increments from the back of the fur.  If you don’t have a smaller scissors, a regular-sized pair will work too but just remember those small increment cuts.  They’re crucial in not cutting off the fur so it looks like it got chopped at the $5 hair salon.

In cutting in small increments, you’re not really cutting fur as much as you’re just cutting the backing.

Once you have your vest cut out, it’ll be time to attach the shoulders.

I sewed them together but you can staple them if you don’t know how to sew!  I promise it’ll hold up and no one will know but you!  First though, we need to trim away some fur so that the seam isn’t so thick – it wouldn’t fit under my machine foot the way it was.

To do that, just trim off the fur along the top half-inch or so.
 
Then, fold the sides of your vest in, fur-side in, so that the front and back shoulders line up.  If you’re sewing, sew a straight stitch like this but stop a half-inch from each edge.  You’ll glue those unfinished ends down in a minute.
If you’re stapling instead of sewing, just placed a line of three or four staples horizontally along the line I sewed.  Or if you know how to hand sew, you can sew a quick line too!

Once you’re done attaching the shoulders, you can move on to the hot gluing or you can quickly cut a v-neck in the front of the vest like I did.  Starting at the top inside shoulder, I just drew a straight line a little more than half way down the front inside hem.  Then I used the same small-increment snipping to cut that little triangle off each side.
Last step!  Hot glue!  This part was hard to document because hot glue dries so quickly but basically I went around each edge of the vest minus the very bottom hem and glued a half-inch hem.  I worked in three or four-inch sections so that the glue wouldn’t dry faster than I could get it on.  I didn’t do the bottom hem because the fur hangs down far enough to cover the backing completely.

You can see in the picture below that the bottom part of this side is glued.  The white line shows where I placed the glue.  Once the glue was there I just folded the edge of the fur over onto itself, pressed it and held it until the glue was dry, and wala!  An easy hem!
I even folded the arm holes in a half inch and did those.  I feel like hemming all the edges makes everything look a little cleaner because you can’t see any backing peeking out from anywhere.

This is what the vest looks like from the inside, all finished:
 

All that in about a half hour…and that was making two vests.  Uninterrupted, this is an easy breezy project that’ll have your little fashionista right in line with the runway these days.  ;)

 
Taking the after pictures was actually the hardest part for me.  So many acorns.  So little time.
 
 
Here’s the funny thing about this project - I bought this fur last fall thinking I’d make the vests back then and they just got shoved to the end of the project line and now, here they are.  Haha!  But, as it turns out, they would’ve look huge on the girls last year.  The timing will now allow them to be worn this year, next year, and maybe even the next year after that.  Unintentional providence that is also known as procrastination ftw.

Adios.  I have lots more procrastinating to attend to…the dishes for example.  The couch is calling my name.

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