Handmade cuff

Last week I was due to start work on a design project for a friend's company (woo hoo, someone's going to employ me to do something useful again! And there's no child wrangling involved... wow). I wanted a new cuff to go with my outfit so I scouted around Google looking for tutorials to use as inspiration. And basically I found that strategically placed cuts were the way to go, and that as the cuff wraps around your wrist it forms a really nice shape.



I've had a few odd shaped scraps of leather hanging around for a little while, which I had bought with bag straps in mind. I found them at a little shop selling all sorts of bits and pieces and the lovely owner told me that they were offcuts from a shoemaker friend of hers who had been planning to throw them out. I only tend to use leather when it comes to me from another life - like the second hand jacket I cut up for slipper soles.



So I got out a few tools (scalpel, steel ruler, cutting mat, wooden button and waxed linen thread) and a short time later had myself a new cuff...



You just wrap it around your wrist twice and fasten.

And of course as tends to happen with us craft nut types, a couple of days later this one appeared ;-)...



...to be an accessory for this dress.

Ah, don't you love a craft where no new equipment is needed, that uses upcycled materials and is fun?! It's so satisfying :-)

UFO blitz

... that's UnFinished Objects of the sewing kind.



You know that feeling you get when you've got a cluttered desk - slightly out of control and just generally a bit unsettled? Well that's how I've been feeling about my sewing space, and I was just thinking about what to do about it when I read this post from Lladybird. The theme of her post is getting time to sew, but one point in particular resonated with me: Don't have UFOs!!

Now, I definitely do have UFO's, and they're not working for me... they're dragging me down mentally, cluttering my physical space and robbing me of all those new garments I could be enjoying wearing! Plus, my mental list of summer sewing is growing all the time and I can't, in good conscience, start on new projects with so many old ones hanging around. So... I'm challenging myself to get these all out of the way ASAP and I'm hoping you can help me stay honest by checking in on me ;-)

Here's my, um, quite substantial pile. Apologies if this is boring...


Pattern Sewaholic Thurlow trousers
Fabric Bottle green cotton drill
Stage of completion All cut and ready to go
Time in UFO pile About 3 months
Reason for procrastination Sheer terror at the thought of attempting my first zip fly
Ranking in priority High


Pattern Wiksten Tank top
Fabric Black cotton voile with contrast hand shibori dyed top section
Stage of completion Not yet started (so maybe not technically a UFO? But definitely a UFO in my mind!)
Time in UFO pile About 1 month
Reason for procrastination Concern over getting the shape of the top section right, hence not wrecking my precious shibori dyed fabric
Ranking in priority High



Pattern Simplicity 2226 skirt
Fabric Melody Miller Ruby Star Vinyl cotton/linen blend
Stage of completion Fabric cut
Time in UFO pile About 1 month
Reason for procrastination No so keen on the idea of this anymore - I had a vision for it, complete with a Briar in solid colour to wear with it, but I've gone off it
Ranking in priority Reasonably low



Pattern Wiksten Tank top again
Fabric Melody Miller Ruby Star Vinyl cotton/linen blend again (to use up the rest of the yardage I bought)
Stage of completion Fabric cut
Time in UFO pile About 1 month
Reason for procrastination Too many more 'urgent' UFOs in the pile
Ranking in priority Low




Pattern BurdaStyle Assymetric Jacket 03/2012
Fabric Navy blue mid weight linen
Stage of completion Fabric (almost) cut
Time in UFO pile About 2 months
Reason for procrastination Being totally sick of this pattern after having to add @#$%%^ seam allowance to the pdf pattern. Never again. I love the design of this jacket but am worried about not getting the seam allowances right. Oh, and the instructions are extremely brief... and there are about a million pieces... which I haven't finished cutting as I was sick of it = too hard!! But I love the fabric too. Oh dear.
Ranking in priority High in terms of desire to wear it, low in terms of desire to sew it!!




Pattern Elephants and Elegance bubble shorts (kids)
Fabric Chocolate brown linen
Stage of completion Half cut out
Time in UFO pile About 1 month
Reason for procrastination I hate to admit it but all the selfish sewing UFOs have been getting my attention: this is a present for a friend of my big girl's, which is now running very late.
Ranking in priority High due to guilt



DISCLAIMER:
I'm fully admitting here that the garment below is a no-goer (blogged here). I just can't seem to make it work, and am tired of trying. But I do love the fabric, so it will sit in the stash until an idea strikes...

 

So hopefully I'll start posting some of these finished projects here soon! And hopefully I won't need that labelled storage basket in the top pic. Wish me luck!

Do you have UFO's? I'd love to know.

Basic Briar

Just a quick post as I know I've raved on and on about how much I like Megan Nielsen's Briar top pattern. I think this is my 6th version (including one for my mum and one that I haven't blogged) and I'm nowhere near sick of this pattern he yet ;-)

I made this longer length version a few weeks ago as a winter basic, out of a navy blue merino wool (on sale from The Fabric Store). For a bit of interest I added shoulder patches (tutorial here on Megan's fab blog) made from some upcycled scraps of  suede that I keep for making soles for my felted slippers. And by the way I haven't had to hand wash this or treat it delicately - the suede washes up really well. Which is what I was hoping for - a garment that needs handwashing in this household is one that doesn't get worn very often!



And speaking of Megan, who probably thinks I'm stalking her, poor woman (hee hee), imagine my surprise when I saw her recent blog post on her latest Briar and it looked very similar to this. Hey, great minds think alike ;-)

Taking stock

Hello! It's been such a long time since I posted here that I kind of don't know how to restart. Ironically, when I'm busiest creatively I seem to blog the least. I guess that's to be expected but I've still missed it. And it has been feeling hard to get a post done too - no time to take pics, edit them, write etc... so I thought I'd join Pip and try something different to get back into it :-). Here we go...

Making : 4th birthday party stuff & Book Week costumes
Cooking : orange cake for a lovely friend's birthday
Drinking : red wine
Reading: The Inconvenient Child by Sharyn Killens
Wanting: More time to sew (what's new ;-)
Looking: at nature with the kids
Playing: Lego
Wasting: some food scraps: too much for our compost heap :-(
Sewing: Red Riding Hood costume
Wishing: I could get my stash down a bit
Enjoying: a burst of cooking inspiration
Waiting: for everyone in the house to get well again after a bout of colds & tummy bugs
Liking: dreaming of my next sewing project
Wondering: if I should try to get more organised with my sewing (probably)
Loving: watching my kids play
Hoping: my scratchy throat won't develop into more
Marvelling: at the colours of spring flowers (in winter)
Needing: to get to bed earlier, as always
Smelling: carrots roasting
Wearing: one of the growing number of Briars and my new Fly boots
Following: some inspirational Instagrammers
Noticing: this post on sewing and getting so much from it
Knowing: if I keep trying hard I can be more patient with my kids
Thinking: about the trials and wonders of motherhood
Feeling: like I want to fix everything for them
Bookmarking: kids clothes patterns/ideas
Opening: my very welcome subscription to Inside Out magazine
Giggling: about my crazy 8 year old's sense of humour
Feeling: OK

Have you tried taking stock?

An admission, mending and knitting

OK, OK, I'm going to admit that sometimes... just sometimes I think it's better to buy a ready to wear garment than make it yourself.

It's not often I feel this way but recently I'd been finding myself wanting a drapey cardigan - you know the type: soft and flowy with interesting drape giving movement and shape. I scoured Pinterest and pattern companies for ideas and patterns. It didn't even occur to me to go and look in the shops. These days I hate having to shop (except for fabric or patterns of course, which goes without saying ;-) Nothing was appealing to me and in the end I got out of my stash a mid weight wool and thought I'd sew a poncho type thing.

But then I went to my favourite charity shop to look for some woollen jumpers to felt and repurpose (more on that another time) and there lurking in the bottom of the crate was a lovely Country Road fine wool blend cardigan in soft grey in my size.



I quickly scanned it for any tears or staining and all that seemed to be wrong with it is a couple of small holes in the sleeves which will be easy to fix. And that is another issue that makes me so glad I sew - if I had to throw a garment away because it needed mending and I didn't know how it would be such a shame. What would our Grandmothers who were brought up with 'make do and mend' think of this I wonder? Maybe they'd be horrified at the way we throw away anything that's not perfect nowadays, or maybe they'd be happy that we have the option to buy new more often, who knows... but I do think its a shame not to pass these skills down to our children at least, which makes me determined to be more patient when teaching them!

- - - - -

And in other crafty news, something I have been loving working on lately is knitting another seven circle scarf. I love wearing my grey one (seen in the pic above) and had been thinking I'd like to knit another one this winter. Even though I am a novice I do enjoy knitting (though I only seem interested in winter) and I find it so much more sociable than sewing. I can sit in the lounge room with the Mr and knit of an evening rather than disappear to my sewing space. It's portable in a way that my sewing almost never is and just a lovely relaxing activity. And I just love this pattern, it's fun to knit.



So when I was fabric shopping with my crafty buddy Deb recently and she took me on a detour to a wool shop (bad influence ;-) I couldn't resist this lovely blue wool/cotton mix to go with all the blue I've been enjoying wearing.

Deb also introduced me to her favourite metal circular needles and I am in love - so smooth and lovely to knit with. Do you have favourite needles? A favourite pattern you love knitting? And are you a cop-out knitter like me and just knit in winter? :-)

Little boy pj's

Before we went on a trip away recently I looked ashamedly at my little boy in his tired old pyjamas and decided it was time to raid the stash and make him some new pairs. I mean, he's almost 4 and I was still squeezing him into size 2's. For a sewing mad mum it was embarrassing!

For the first pair out came the 'sleeping johns' pattern from the book Growing Up Sew Liberated. I used a groovy aeroplane print jersey I'd been hoarding for a while, adding a yoga style waistband, which I find works well with knitted fabrics and kids love for the softness - it's just a folded over band of ribbing, cut a few inches smaller than the waist of the pants and stretched and sewn to fit. For the top I chose a RTW basic t-shirt I'd also been hoarding and embellished it with a pocket in the plane fabric.


For the next pair (he could do with a few) I used the pants pattern from Oliver & S's Bedtime Story pattern. I find this is a good simple shape for woven fabric pjs. I bought the goldfish graphic print flannelette at Spotlight with this very purpose in mind, so it was satisfying to finally use it!

And this time I made the top too, finally succumbing to buying the Made by Rae Flashback Skinny Tee pattern. This pattern had definitely fallen into that mental category of mine called something like 'patterns I like but don't want to buy because they're too simple to spend money on and I could draft it myself'. Hmm. The problem is that I don't get around to drafting them myself, and what I'm finding is that patterns in this category that I do buy end up being incredibly useful and used lots. This pattern I've used 6 times already! Lesson learnt.



And here's the third set, again Skinny Tee / Bedtime Story combo, this one in a little boy's perennial favourite - dinosaurs :-)


Again using the Flashback Skinny Tee pattern I also refashioned an adult t-shirt (remember this one?) into little boy size. He likes the monsters and I like the feeling of satisfaction of ticking something off my huuuuge sewing list.


And this final one I like for it's cute colours and I'm thinking it could be a daytime t-shirt rather than a pj top but needs something printed on the front. I'm waiting for inspiration to strike. Any ideas welcome :-)

Denim Belladone

My 4th version of Deer & Doe's Belladone Robe had been sitting in my UFO pile for a few months when I decided recently to reduce the size of the pile (it's still big unfortunately!!). Plus, as we were going away for a week I really wanted something new to wear and knew it would be much quicker to finish this rather than start something new with limited time available.



All those months ago I set out to make a simple denim version of the Belladone to wear as a plain base - I often find myself sewing with prints and bright colours which can be nice but I end up lacking some basics. Still, I couldn't resist embellishing it by adding some colourful piping to the waistband. I made the piping using leftover pieces from this belladone.

Adjustments I made to the patterns were to take out the pleats at the front (I think overall I prefer a flat front to my dresses) and I just turned up the hem rather than using the hem band from the pattern (laziness). I also used a metal exposed zip at the back (see 1st pic, and BTW I'm wearing the dress here with a short sleeved t-shirt underneath, though it looks a bit like the sleeves are part of the dress here).

And can you see the glaring error I made on this one? The back is crossed the wrong way - the shoulder pieces should go over the pieces below. I realised the mistake as I was about to hem the dress and just laughed... no way was I going back to correct it!



Well I'm not sure if I achieved what I set out to do with this dress, and I'm not even sure if I like it but I think I'll keep wearing it and see if it grows on me. I have no idea how to style it at the moment (not great in these pics), but maybe it will come to me, or maybe it will be a better warm weather dress sans t-shirts, tights and boots.

Hmm, I'm going to pack this pattern away now unless I get a sudden urge to use it again - there are things that frustrate me about it, like never quite getting the fit right (my fault for not persevering) and I don't think the armhole and neckline cut really suits me (I keep thinking about adding cap sleeves to see if the balance is better). OK, I am getting picky now... I think it's just a case of 'the honeymoon is over' for me and this pattern ;-)

How about you - do you fall in and out of love with patterns or are you loyal til the end?