The Flair of the Skirt!

Hey everyone!  Hope ya'll have been having a great weekend, and are gearing up for a brand new week to come!  Some people really dislike Mondays, but I love them -- that fresh new start to a whole week of possibilities.  Well, on to the subject at hand.  I've really been looking forward to doing this post, and knew it would be the perfect post for Debbie at Debbie-Doo's Holiday Knock-Off Decor Extravaganza Party; and because this project was very budget-friendly, I knew it would also be perfect for sharing at Dawn's Creative Cain Cabin for Christmas Decor on a Budget Party.  I'm so excited to share!

For a couple of years now, I had been wanting to make a new tree skirt for our main Christmas tree, but it just wasn't happening.  I didn't give up on the idea and kept pinning ideas, and then about a month ago, I was snooping around Blogland and found this:

From The Do It Yourself Divas

It was exactly what I was wanting and I already had everything I needed!  They used burlap,

 muslin, & old lace.  What I had was burlap, some soft linen-like fabric, old "new lace" curtain panels, & an old sheet to use as the backing.

To give the white lace panels a softer and older look, I tried my hand at tea-staining.  I just filled my laundry sink with hot water, tossed in a few tea bags, added the curtain panels & waited........

and waited some more!  It never got quite as dark as I originally wanted, but I decided I really didn't mind just a subtle change.  At least it wasn't white-white anymore....lol!

The Divas tutorial was quite good, & I followed it -- mostly!  The burlap I had on hand is more for crafts and is pretty stiff, so I ran a gathering stitch with yarn on all the burlap strips, laid them out in my laundry room on towels and spritzed them with water.  When they dried, I had permanent ruffles.  For the rows of lace and linen, I simply gathered them by hand as I stitched them onto the backing.  I had to get a bit skimpy on some of the ruffling, because I was afraid I would run out of the linen fabric.  It worked out and you really can't tell.

I added one final row of lace and bound the inside edge of the skirt with some gold grosgrain ribbon that I had on hand.  I added ties with the ribbon in two other places along the open edges of the skirt.

This is the finished skirt!  I just love it!

And this is how it looks wrapped around the tree.  What do you think?

I'm very happy!

Just remember, I'm partying at these fine blogs this week:

Debbie at Debbie-Doo's Holiday Knock-Off Decor Extravaganza Party

Dawn at Creative Cain Cabin for Christmas Decor on a Budget Party

Suzy at Worthing Court for Better Late Than Never Christmas Inspirations Bloghop