Hand Painted Vans: Dalmatian Hearts.

The laid back surfer girl shoe style of choice is a classic, yet canvas shoes often take a worse for the wear. With tears, rips, and toe holes over time, they often need some cheering up. These worn in shoes can be easily spruced up with some fabric paint, a patch, magazine cut outs, or even some hand stitching and sewing. I first fell in love with the idea of revamping Vans when my cousin Jenna hand stitched brightly colored thread over the tears and holes in her well loved navy blue Vans slip ons. I would always ask to borrow those shoes when I would visit her. They made me feel ever so thrifty and cool. Just as any young high schooler wanted to feel at the age of 14 and 15. And although I don't need shoes to help me feel this way any longer, they are still thrifty and cool ten + years later. And yes, she still has them (see below).

I'm not the first to hand paint canvas lace ups, and I'm definitely not the last. There are some really cute ideas out there, and I'm sure even more to be blogged about. You can see some other canvas shoe revamps here, here, and here. For my personalized canvas shoes, I decided to go with Dalmatian hearts. Black silhoutted shapes printed on neutral tones has been a trend popping up over the past few seasons. I have loved seeing prints of horses, polkadots, and foxes in black and white prints. One of my favorites is the hand stamped pony print dress over at ABM. To Hand Paint Dalmatian Hearts: 1. Gather your fine tipped paintbrush, matte soft fabric paint, and your canvas shoes. 2. Outline hearts on the front/toe area of your shoe. I used the seam as a border of where I kept my hearts, keeping the area around the laces heart free.  You could also make and use a stencil if you like! 3. Fill in the hearts with more paint,  using your paint brush, adding touch ups and making the hearts a better shape if need be. 4. Allow a few hours for your shoes to dry. 5. Slip in your feet and get ready to be ever so cute in your dalmatian heart shoes. Care Instructions: This is the same fabric paint I've used when painting tea towels for my kitchen. After countless washes, the paint has not come of and it does not spread. Hand wash cold, air dry. (BTW That adorable puppy still needs a name. Suggestions welcomed. And no he is not mine, although I wish! He belongs to my neighbors so at least I can borrow him.)

photo credit

For more of your peep-toe-problems, cast your woes over Jenna's blog 

for some ideas to keep your toes tappin' and your feet 

from catching a cold (holes can do that to ya).

XO,

Lauren (& Jenna!)

Featured at Hi Sugarplum!

Hand Painted Tea Towels {Maraschino Red}.

When I first got out my flour sack linen, Tulip soft Fabric paint, and flat rounded paint brush, I had the thoughts of painting my next tea towel with a geometric pattern such as stripes or chevron. Yet something held me back from painting. I love chevron, yet I am beginning to feel its loosing its novelty as every other DIY I come across embraces the zip zag pattern. Believe me, I still love it, and you would most likely wow me with your very own DIY showcasing the pattern, as I am still adding chevron pins to my Pinterest boards--however, I am needing a new pattern to be my new chevron, you know what I mean? And in regards to stripes, my hand felt a bit wobbly, so that idea went out the window!

To try a pattern with the similar zig zag that is near and dear to the chevron lover's heart, yet add in a new little twist, I decided to go with this hour glass shape that I continued to dream about from a recent perusing of West Elm pillow cases HERE. The pattern still embodies that zig zag quality, yet it somewhat tricks the eye with the brush stroke length increasing and decreasing in size like it does. I also love that the pattern goes well with the Ikat prints in my home and compliments the last tea towel I painted HERE.

To start, I used blue painters tape to hold in place the plain white flour sack towel on my kitchen counter. Underneath the towel was a drop cloth as the paint does seep through a bit because the material is rather thin. I started painting from the top left corner of the fabric and worked my way down.  Each vertical line painted was either a bit larger or shorter than the proceeding line (as you can see in the photographs). Each line was the width of the brush I used. I did this purposefully to keep a consistent and easy line width. Below you can see the process of painting one line:

After painting the very first hourglass row at the top of the linen, I went back to the left side of the towel and began line two. To master the zig zag pattern in this hourglass look, each row needs to compliment the row above and below. This means that where the row is in its thickest points, the rows above and below should be in their skinniest. After your first two rows, it is easy to see the zig zag and use that as reference for the spacing of your following rows. The main trick is to stay consistent in spacing of where you start and end each row. Just use your eye and your gut to make the call on whether it looks right, that's what I did! After completing about ten rows, I left it to dry for about 3 hours. When washing, wash on cold and preferably not with your clothing (you never want to chance getting any remnants of fabric on your favorite comfy tee!).

This tea towel is so bright and cheery. I have a lot of aqua blue in my kitchen along with the almost black cabinets and stainless steel appliances. This red really adds a color pop and I just love it! And, like I have said in the past, my outfits always seem to translate into whatever I am painting, designing, or swooning over. 

Its true,West Elm pillows have been a common inspiration for my projects. You can see the fabric chevron inspiration HERE. And in case you missed the last tea towels painted, you can check those out--over here. Any thoughts on the next hand painted tea towel design?

Hand Painted Towels {Just in Time for Tea}

The tea towel to the English, the dish towel to the Yank. The companion of the freshly washed dish, the linen for the cook, and the fabric to soften a table. Before the tea towel was mass-produced (post Industrial Revolution), and popping up everywhere making its way to every home store near you, this linen was held as something novel. In the 18th century the dish towel was "a special linen drying cloth used by the mistress of the house to dry her precious and expensive china tea things" {source}. Sounds quite pristine doesn't it? I have always had a love for dish towels, and I can distinctly remember the very day that I took notice to this particular linen. I was close to 7 years old, in North Dakota, at a lady's house. She was a relative that knew my mom well, but I was just a little girl, and I don't recall much about this particular day except for the tall set of stairs in this old house, the wooden banister, the warm yellow hues, and the drawer that was opened upstairs. It was filled with vintage hand embroidered tea towels. I had never seen something so delicate and detailed like that. Embroidered deer, kittens, geese, daisies (the obvious details a 7 year old would notice). I remember looking at the few towels that my mom took home with her from North Dakota to California after that day in that old house. I think in some small way, those dish towels are part of the repertoire that made me love pretty details in home design, with bits of vintage flare. 

SO fast forward to now. Just like those hand-made embroidered dish towels, I wanted to make my own hand-made set. I had stumbled upon some flour sack towels on sale at the grocery store, purchased soft matte fabric paint, and set out with my paintbrush. For my first towel, I hand painted the design that is on my favorite pot holder from Anthropologie (a bridal shower gift that I use daily still, almost 4 years later!). It is a really unique design, and I felt up to the challenge. Using the kitchen counter as my painting space, I placed my paint cloth and a hard plastic board under the flour sack cloth (the paint does seap through  just a bit, if the cloth is thin) which I secured with a few pieces of tape (to ensure it would not move while I painted!). The painting process went like this:

I still have yet to wash it, but I know it will turn out fine as fabric paint is washable. I still have three more towels to paint on! I would say this first one was a success. I love the idea of painting a set of two or three towels to give as a gift {or maybe a future Giveaway?}. Hand painted towels can be so personalized and range from intricate to simple. I just love the way they can bring extra life to a kitchen, and for the Brits, tea time! Someone put the kettle on.