DIY Dog Cross-Body Carrier

October 6, 2016October 5, 20169 Comments

Hello! Welcome back to Home on the Corner! I missed Finds and Fashions yesterday, so today I am showing you a simple project for your special pet. I put dog in the title, but it could be for something else small like a cat or guinea pig or whatever other critter you might have!

Our dog Chica is 16, but she still likes to go places with us. The problem is she can’t walk very far. Lauren and I found this idea somewhere on the internet, but I don’t know where as it was several years ago. We were going on a long walk at the coast and knew Chica wouldn’t make it the whole way, but I also couldn’t carry her the whole time without some support. So we thought we would give this project a try and it was really easy.

We took a piece of fabric 26″ wide and 58 inches long. If you have a really small pet, you would want to go with a skinnier piece, but probably the same length.

I don’t know why these pictures are so blurry, but I am sure you will get the idea. Hem each side of your fabric. This will keep it from fraying when you wash it. After it is hemmed, fold it in half so it is a long skinny piece. I guess you would fold the width in half.

Then fold it again so the open ends are together. Fold the length in half. (This took a lot of thinking on my part to figure out how to explain it!! :))

Now you are going to sew the open ends on the short end of the fabric together. When you are finished, you will have a long tube that is open along one long side.

That’s it for the sewing! Now it is time to test it out. The carrier will go over one shoulder and under the other arm. The pouch opening should be on the top. Open it up and place the animal inside. This usually takes 2 people-1 to hold the carrier open and the other to place the pet inside. Munch had never been in one before, but she didn’t seem to mind at all! Her bottom fits right down into the pouch and she is able to sit comfortably. If your pet is in far enough, you don’t have to support them at all.

This carrier really helps to keep the weight off your back and shoulders and also helps the animal feel secure. Munch never fidgeted or tried to get out. Chica was the same way, even the first time we used it.

We have used this many times over the last couple of years and it has definitely come in handy, especially with an older dog.

I would love to know if you have ever tried a carrier like this and what your experience was! Let me know in the comments!

Corner News-April 2. 2016

April 2, 2016April 1, 20164 Comments

Hello! Hope you are having a wonderful Saturday and weekend! I don’t have much to share today. I haven’t been feeling very inspired lately :(.

Here is our family picture from Easter. The weather was absolutely perfect for an Easter morning.

This is one project I worked on during my spring break. See the cover? And the guilty party?! This happened awhile ago, but with my ‘love’ for sewing, I kept putting it off. I finally just made myself get it done.

I used a painters canvas for this cover. This is probably the fourth one I have made (not because of Rozy!). The canvas was really easy to use and it was great to have the edges already hemmed. That is one of the parts I really dislike about sewing. Too monotonous! I used all the hemmed edges for the skirt part of the slipcover.

The pillow top cover is a giant envelope cover. This way I can take it off and wash it whenever it needs it. This is often with so many dogs! Isn’t the bicycle pillow cover awesome? They have some great deals on Amazon, under $5.00 and they are so much easier to store than pillows are.

Thanks for coming by today! See you on Monday!

Upcycle A Clementine Box Into A Doll Bed

October 26, 2015August 16, 202014 Comments

A long, long time ago, I wanted to be a princess-for Halloween. Isn’t that most little girls dreams? It was kindergarten. I wore a long purple dress and my shoes were covered in tin foil in order to make them shiny. There were no sparkly shoes at Target back then :). Such simple times.

My little, now 3 year old, niece, loves Minnie Mouse. She has loved her since she was one years old. So I created something special for all her Minnie Mouse dolls.

I had several of these clementine boxes. I have used some in my classroom, but still had a few left over. Who better to give them to, but my sweet little niece!

I first spray painted them, one white and one pink. I didn’t find Minnie Mouse print material that I liked, so I went with black with large white polka-dots and pink with little white polka-dots. I found some Minnie Mouse ribbon and some black/white polka dot ribbon to go around each bed.

My disclaimer: I am not a seamstress. Please don’t think I really knew what I was doing. Besides, I had help. Lauren. She is much better than I am. My directions will be very simple and I am sure, not very complete. Just try to play along :).

I cut a piece of foam for the mattress and cut my material to fit around plus a couple inches extra. I wanted to make it like a pillow sham pillow case, with the opening in the back. This was so it could be washed if needed. I folded over a bit of the edges of the fabric, ironed and pinned. Lauren sewed.

We also made a quilt for each bed. We used both fabrics so it could be reversible. After sewing up 3 sides, we filled it with quilt batting and then sewed up the fourth side. Lauren also sewed an ‘X’ across the top so it would wash up better, if needed.

I love the polka-dots!

We also sewed a pillow for each one using fabric that was left over. It is just a large rectangle, sewn all around the edges, leaving a little space open for stuffing. After we stuffed it, we stitched up the opening. I also added some ribbon around the outside of the box and a narrow black ribbon along the top edges.

They turned out so cute!

She has so many Minnie Mouse dolls, she probably needs lots of these, but hopefully Minnie will share!

These would be great gifts for little ones on your list! They could be made for both boys and girls, depending on the type of fabric that is used.

My niece absolutely adored these! She already had a Minnie tucked in at her birthday party! I would love to see yours if you decide to make one!

Have a great week!

Blanket of Memories

August 27, 2015August 27, 20159 Comments

As we get older, we get rid of things that may have a lot of meaning to us. Maybe it’s an old tee shirt from a charity event that you helped with and it doesn’t fit anymore. Or maybe it’s a baseball that you received from a foul ball at a baseball game. Or maybe it’s a toy that you had a child that you don’t have room for anymore.

This was something Haley did. While cleaning her room, she decided that she wanted to get rid of old tee shirts. But, these tee shirts had memories and things that she had enjoyed when she was in high school. There were old track shirts, 4-H shirts, and other shirts from her favorite things like tech crew and volunteering.

So, creativity ensued, taking these memories to turn them into something beautiful.

I took all the shirts and cut them so that I could get the design that I wanted off of the shirt. I wanted them in squares so it was easier to make a blanket. But, there was one shirt that was a little bit more difficult because the picture was bigger the rest. Urgh…

First Layout

Once I had all the pieces from the shirts, I bought thin interfacing and a mature black and white fleece for the back. I didn’t pick something really thick because Haley gets hot really quickly.

I then ironed all the tee shirts to the interfacing and started to lay out the tee shirts into the design that I wanted. I wanted a slight pattern to make sure that all of black shirts weren’t on the same side. Also, I tried to have a shirt from high school, a shirt from track, a shirt from 4-H, and a random shirt on every row.

Then the sewing began!

2nd Layout

I sewed the pieces together to get the finished product. I first sewed the panels together in the rows, making four individual rows. I then sewed the four rows together to make the entire front of the quilt. I then sewed the front of the quilt to the fleece for the back. As a final step, I sewed the corners of where the panels met to the fleece. I did that as a small security so that the front and back didn’t separate all the time.

And here is the final product!

It looks so good! As you can see, I changed the layout yet again. I felt like this was the most conducive look and it turned out really good. I love how there are no colors that line up and there is a different shirt in each row. I also had to make one of the shirts in the row with the Pirates of the Caribbean shirt skinnier so they would fit.

This was an easy project that I thoroughly enjoyed working on. And the best part is that Haley absolutely loves it and uses it all the time…when she is actually cold.