Thrift Store Fabric and Findings

Several weeks ago, on one of my Value Village foraging expeditions I passed over a chunk of faux leather.  Hey, I thought as my hand ran over the yellow and brown mass, There's a Dinosaur costume waiting to happen!  And I moved on to some pink ribbing.

Overnight, I kicked myself for balking at the $5.99 price tag, and finally 2 days later I broke down and rushed over on my lunch hour to buy the fabric.  I reasoned that my 10 month old was someday going to be a 3 year old who would want a dinosaur costume.

And, the fabric became a part of my stash.   It was stacked on top of the bin that holds the remnants of my prom dress fabric (26 years ago) and some Nova Scotia tartan that I bought at a garage sale 5 years ago.

My stash in recent years has been augmented by thrift store, garage sale, and kijiji finds. I have been having fun with the penny fabric and making lots of little outfits for my niece.  I am severely limited in my disposable income, and my foraging provides a satisfying shopper's high.

Just a few weeks ago Patternreview.com announced a contest on their site that will run for 4, 1 week sessions.  Each week participants will have a set number of days to produce a project identified at the start of the block of days. I signed up for the challenge and when the first week's project was announced, an A line skirt, I started researching and pinning until I found the right combination of information and felt I could draft a skirt pattern from scratch.

Just before the contest project #1 announcement I spent a day shopping with my best friend, and dragged her to Danier and had her try on a bunch of outfits so I could vicariously experience the fashion I loved.  (Remember, I have a 10 month old).  When she caught her flight back home, a beautiful pair of leather pants in her baggage, I sighed sadly for more than one reason.

So I decided I needed to come up with something special for Project #1 and I was surveying my stash for a winning fabric.  Something unusual.  Something not too conservative. Something....

I wonder a little if the dinosaur skirt was meant to be:

My favorite new word is findings  and I have made it a game lately of buying up bags of buttons and zippers from the wall at Value Village.  I must have bought a bag of zippers from the same lot that the dinosaur fabric came from: there were two exact match zippers in my stash.  One is a perfect 20 cm invisible zipper.

48 hours until the submission "review" is due.  And I have a lovely dinosaur skirt.