Tag Archives: Christmas decorations

Sew 348 – Silk wrapped cinnamon

Mr Darcy is so helpful. Suggest he pick up a bag of large cinnamon/cassia sticks when visiting a favourite Asian grocery and he arrives home with four bags! The bark smells so good and represents great value. Some of it has now morphed into Sew 348 – Christmas decorations and potpourri bags created from a repurposed sheer silk shirt.

I’ve been looking at this op-shop found shirt (see photos below) for a while, wondering how to best utilise its embroidered silk fabric and clear plastic buttons after deciding I didn’t want to wear it as a top. With the arrival of the bark, it’s repurpose was determined.

I began the filleting process, cutting off the bottom of the sleeves to create bags and making strips across the bodice to become ribbons and bows. Continue reading →

Sew 346 – Upcycled flower power

Admiring some beautiful big pink decorations on a Christmas tree in our local Brisbane News newspaper inspired me to create a variation using lily pods and an unworn jacket repurposed into flowers.

The jacket was amongst a bundle of clothes given to me for refashion by my friend Robyn Sheptooha earlier in the year and it was likely to be moved on (not natural fibre) until I saw its potential to return to Robyn as bespoke Christmas decorations.

Taking lotus lily pods (which Darcy gathered from a north Queensland friend’s property) and cassia bark (similar to large cinnamon sticks), I glued them together to create flowers bases (see photos at bottom). Continue reading →

Sew 341 – Dolly peg angels

Dolly peg angels are one of my favourite Christmas decorations which are easy to make as simple gifts with meaning and usefulness. There are endless creative options when you gather wooden pegs, quick-drying clear fabric glue, various fabric offcuts and bark (from a paper bark tree in a park near you).

The pegs above which I’ve made as Sew 341 utilise torn silk strips of fabric as bows, with the threads that peel off when you tear the fabric being randomly knotted as a clump to form hair. It is just a matter of choosing a piece of bark or silk to wrap around the peg, securing it with glue under the overlap at the back. Continue reading →

Sew 340 – Clothing in a material world

Reflecting on what I’ve learned from this 365-day Sew it Again journey, I had the opportunity to summarise it in a one-minute pitch at #TEDxSouthBank today, as follows:

Every day we eat and we dress. We’re now conscious of our food – it’s time to become more conscious of our clothes. Do you know: Continue reading →

Sew 337 – Old lights, new decorations

Christmas is coming and we’re Into the final straight of the year for this 365-day Sew it Again project, demonstrating creative ways of reuse for thrift, well-being and ecological health.

Community, connection and care are the fabulous aspects of this time of year and I have always struggled with the push to consume more and more. Australians are tipped to spend $18 billion over the holiday season – that’s up to $800 for every woman, man and child in the nation.

My Christmas thing has always been hand-made decorations because they are useful, pretty and non-fattening offerings. I enjoyed being able to give one of these Christmas dragonflies, right, to my hairdresser yesterday and my friend Wendy Agar when she popped in for lunch today. Continue reading →