DIY Swan Sweater Tutorial

Hello beautiful readers! Here is promised Swan Sweater DIY (velvet circle skirt tutorial later today!) (He looks a little different than yesterday, that's because I gave him a little bowtie after seeing this swan cardigan from Modcloth!) Inspiration: Modcloth's "Swanning Over You" Cardigan Dorothy Perkins Swan Sweater What you do: 1. Get your sweater. Woolen knits work fine for this, as well as more synthetic ones. Too thick though, and you may run into problems.  2. Cut out your swan from white (or any colour!) fabric. Either use a stencil (search swan silhouette in google images perhaps?) or draw by hand!  3. Place it onto the front of your sweater. Pin to sweater, make sure you're pinning ONLY to the front.  4. Put your sweater on carefully to check that the placement is correct. If it all looks good, you can start sewing!  5. Using a small zigzag stitch, go around the edges of your swan, stopping to lift the presser foot occasionally to readjust and make sure it isn't wrinkling! 6. Now you've attached your swan! Add details such as bows, eyes, feathers, little feet... whatever takes your fancy! Get creative! I decided just a little necktie bow was enough for my swan. I used just a small length of white ribbon, tied it in a bow, and sewed it into place by hand using white thread. Come back in a few hours for my velvet circle skirt tutorial! xxx Annika

DIY Swan Sweater & Velvet Skirt!

Hello! This post today has three purposes. The first is to show you this DIY Swan Sweater! The second is to show off this velvet circle skirt I made yesterday! And the third is to show off these gorgeous ballerina tights c/o Oasap! Wearing:  Sweater - DIY (& vintage) Skirt - I made it! Tights - oasap.com (here) Shoes - yesstyle.com (here) Blouse - Vintage Belt - Vintage Hat - here Bag - Vintage A swan sweater, a velvet circle skirt and ballerina tights. Three things that I've  desperately wanted/had my eye on for ages - and now mine! So I threw them all together in an outfit. Hooray! Keep an eye out for the full DIY for both the Swan Sweater and the Circle skirt in the next couple of days! Much love! xxx Annika

DIY Heart Sweater

I’m basically going through half of my clothes and DIY updating them. This stripey sweater was looking very lonely and unloved, sitting at the back of my closet – so I added this red fabric heart to the front, and now it can be worn many more times – it’s almost a brand new piece! That’s what I love about DIYing your clothes: you can update your whole wardrobe just by adding a few quirky details to pieces here and there. Wearing:  Sweater - DIY Skirt - Vintage Belt - Vintage Shoes - Rubi Shoes Socks - Vintage How I did it: 1. Choose your sweater and fabric for your heart 2. Draw HALF a love heart on your fabric with a pen. 3. Then pin the fabric together in half and cutout (this will ensure the heart is symmetrical!) 4. Wearing your sweater (but nothing else underneath, or you will attach pins to everything!), pin the heart where you think it should go. Carefully take your sweater off, and then lay flat and properly pin the heart to the sweater. 5. Using a close zigzag stitch, go all the way around your heart in a similar colour thread (or black thread, if you want it to stand out), and you're done! Make sure you're not sewing through both the front and back of the sweater when you do this as well! I went over my heart a few times to make sure it was well attached. Alternatively if you don't have a sewing machine, hand stitches also look quite effective (and should work just as well, if you have a bit more patience! But be wary: if your heart fabric easily frays, you will need to go around the outside quite a few times!) LOVE, Annika xxx Pin It

A little bit of Do-It-Yourself Inspiration: turning weird things from thrift stores into nice things you can wear!

How many times have you gone into a thrift store and giggled at an over-the-top, overly puffy, brightly-coloured or multi-patterned dress from the 80s, that sure, is completely FANTASTIC, but at the same time, just far too hilarious /impractical to ever be worn out in public? Well if you don't feel guilty about cutting these dresses up, they can actually be the perfect project, and you can turn them into something much more on-trend. Take this puffy-sleeved, bright blue velvet number here, for instance: I bought this the other day because it was just TOO fantastic to leave sitting there. It needed a good home! Unfortunately, I would not look normal if I were to wear this in public. (The photo doesn't do it justice, the sleeves are just so ridiculously huge and puffy when wearing it. And, it was also far too large.) But, it is the perfect base to make something prettier out of! I actually ended up chopping it in half, and making it into both a tight-fitting blue velvet skirt, and a cropped peter-pan collar embellished singlet top. I'm just wearing both here at the same time! (And they work together as well, as a dress!) So next time you're laughing at that ridiculous dress in a charity store, stop and think for a moment: actually, maybe that could become awesome with a little DIY! Hope you're all super well & happy! xxx Annika

So I got the urge to paint birds on my wall today...

Today I got this random urge to paint the wall in my study. It was pretty easy because I just recycled these stencils: which I also used to paint my DIY swallow/Miu Miu inspired tights. My mum liked them so much that she said she'll commission me to paint some in her house! (I was worried at first she'd have a typical parental attack and be annoyed that I'd painted stuff all over my walls. But then I remembered that luckily, my mum is awesome.) They give the room such a lovely free, airy feeling, and they look quite pretty as well, which doesn't hurt. I wonder what else I can do with these stencils? I think I'm going to paint some across my kitchen table... BIRDS ON EVERYTHING! I'm actually not joking. Have a beautiful day! xxx Annika

Do-it-yourself Hand Painted Deer Print T-Shirt

I've been so in love with sweaters, t-shirts and cardigans lately which feature these kind of kitschy animal prints: These are the inspiration behind this deer-print t-shirt DIY. Enjoy! You will need - Fabric paint - A fine paint brush - A plain t-shirt - A square of cardboard (can be from anywhere, an old cereal box, etc) - Scissors - A pen - An iron 1. Wash your t-shirt first (this helps the fabric paint stay on later). 2. Iron it 3. Now you need to make your stencils! Use an image from online and print it onto a piece of paper, then trace it onto your cardboard, OR hand draw onto your piece of cardboard. The design should measure around 4 by 2.5 inches, but you can vary this depending on what you want. When you've drawn your design, cut your stencil out with scissors, and join it back up with stickytape. 4. Place the stencil onto your shirt, making sure it's parallel to the top and bottom of the shirt so that it's straight. Fill the stencil in thickly with your fabric paint. Once it's filled in, remove the stencil carefully and fix up any edges with your paintbrush. If you found antlers too fiddly to put in the stencil, but want little reindeers like me, you can also hand paint your antlers on at this point! 5. Paint your deers onto your shirt using the above images as a reference, or however you would like them to be arranged. When you flip the stencil over to do the ones facing backwards, make sure to clean your stencil with some tissue paper first! 6. When you're done, let it dry for a few hours. Then, run over each deer with a hot iron for 1-2 minutes. This should make it washing-machine safe (as long as you started with a decent fabric paint). You're done! Enjoy your lovely updated deer-print shirt! Here's some photos of it in an outfit: (My cat Rufus snuck into the last one! At least he goes with the dress.) Wearing: Shirt - DIY Bag - Vintage Skirt - Momo, Wonder Rocket (Tokyo) Socks - Tutuanna (Tokyo) Boots - Vintage Diana Ferrari Hat - Markets in Osaka Hope you're having a sweet day! xxx Annika Pin It

DIY Knee Patches & Vintage Dresses

I bought this vintage dress for $5 from a small vintage boutique in Newtown, Sydney the other day. Isn't it incredible? It's basically perfect. Well, it was after I shortened it (it was considerably longer when I bought it, reaching the most awkward dress length at mid-calf. It's either got to be floor-length or very short, when I'm choosing a dress!) and washed (well, scrubbed, a lot) a suspicious stain off the collar. Ahh well, it's not proper thrifting until you can bring back stories about suspicious stains and the like! And there's also a button missing that I have to find a replacement for. Still: $5!! Ahh.. and I forgot to iron it. That's a little embarrassing. And these below are some cream knee-high socks that I added knee-patches to. I think they're pretty cute! I hand-stitched these because I thought it suited the fabric. And my rings! (I took photos of everything today, so you can see all the pretty details.) Wearing: Dress - Vintage Bag - Vintage Necklace - here Elk Ring - here Cat Ring - Vintage Shoes - here Socks - Tutuanna (Japan) and DIY'd Hat - From Markets in Osaka This outfit is just one in 4 in which I'm remixing this vintage dress (wearing it 4 different ways). I'm doing a wardrobe remix for the lovely Polly at The Littlest Polly, and am so excited about it! More about that to come! It's embarrassing, and shows just what a new blogger I am, that I didn't even know what a wardrobe remix was until Polly explained it to me! But now I've done one... I'm addicted! So keep an eye out for this wardrobe remix in the next few days, and very quite possibly as a regular feature on the Pineneedle Collective! I hope you have all had/are having a beautiful day, wherever you are! xxx Annika

A sneak preview of my next outfit post ;)

I think maybe I'm a little bit obsessed with love hearts?