Ever since I can remember, I have had a keen eye for everything art-related. As a kid, I loved to draw (yeah, I know that every kid does that eventually, but I always stayed inside the lines, I was always very careful with the details, colors, patterns and so on) and I always was a perfectionist. Everything has to be in place, up to the last little detail. I remember being in elementary school, and having the teacher argue with me because I needed twice as much time finishing up a painting than the rest of the class. If we had to paint a landscape for instance, I HAD to paint every single leaf on a tree, or I used to spend too much time mixing colors, just to get the shade I wanted. You get the point.
Not much changed since. If not, it got worse. Up to the point where I sometimes think I have some mild form of OCD. Everything has to be perfect and maybe not everyone's perfect, but MY perfect. This goes with many things in my life, not just art related but that's a whole different story. :)
As I grew up, I never really found time to invest in my painting skills. There was constantly something on my mind, whether it were Barbies, cartoons, school or boys. So I never got the chance to practice more, get better. But I did sit down every once in a while, and accomplished something. I have a small collection of paintings, pencil/coal drawings, sketches of all kind and not to mention the DIYs <3
I did my first DIY projects when I was about 13 years old, but back then I did not know how they were called, and I didn't consider it to be "a something". It was just me, getting bored of my old clothes. So I used to cut the sleeves off of t-shirts, or cut my old jeans into shorts. Only years later, I found out it was becoming a thing and I discovered youtube tutorials. Faster than I would have imagined, it became a passion to recycle old clothes, revive them if you like. I started watching tutorials on "how to" everything! From transforming an over-sized man's t-shirt into a fancy dress, to making jewelry, shoes, bags and more. Of course, not every project was a successful one, but most were :D and I'm still wearing them today. I've got tons of t-shirts that I would have never worn again, but after I drew something on them, they became my favorites again.
Oh yes, back to drawing. This is the DIY part I love the most. Drawing on clothes. It may seem like something rather difficult to do, but practice makes perfect. This way, I got to have over 20 clothing items I drew on and I'll show some of the older ones here:
The one on the left is my first drawing. I found a pic with the moustache-inception (the mustache that had its own mustache) somewhere on the internet and thought it was super funny. So I drew it on a sheet of paper and then traced it to the tank top with a pencil. After that, I went over the pencil with a textile marker, and voilà! It's not perfectly done, since it has some smudges here and there, but I still wear it every once in a while in the summer.
The one with Rihanna was done on the same day with the one on the left, because the first one was way too effortless. I had a pencil drawing of Rihanna, that I did a while back and thought it would look cool on a tank top and this is what came out of it. Although, I'm not really satisfied with the result, because the face stretches when I have it on but all in all, I like how it looks. Might eventually frame it or something. 
Simple but cute! That was the thought here. I have to admit that most of the time I get my inspiration from the internet. Whether I see an interesting print on a shirt someone is wearing in a fashion catalog, a picture with a quote on facebook, or a celebrity wearing something I like, I try to make it my own. So was the case here. Can't remember exactly where I saw it, but I liked it and I wanted it. This one is hand written, no stencil or template used and I love how it looks! The satisfaction you get when you wear something you did all by yourself, is huge and that's why I can only recommend DIYs! 
Last example is this little mess. It was my first try with bleach. Yes, bleach. I saw some tutorials about this technique, using bleach on black fabric and I thought I'd give it a try. Had to look for a design that would match and found this message -which by the way, I find to be quite funny- and so I got down to business. You have to make a stencil for this, and I made it out of some adhesive film I had lying around the house. Drew the letters, cut them out and fixed them on the top. Then you just spray over the letters, basically wherever you wanna have it. Where you can see the lighter spots, I splashed some more bleach and let it stay for a while. When you are satisfied with the result, remove the letters, wash it, let it dry and it's done!
I will come back to this technique, show more pictures and explain better how to do it.
So much to my first DIY post!
Until next time,
xo
Dora
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