Can't I get anything right?!

After making and loving Miss M's skort I felt it was time to make another one, especially as we are off on holiday soon and they are great for playing.  I used a different woven this time and set about making the skirt, in doing so I decided my life wouldn't be complete unless I had a ruffler as I find the whole sew-a-line-pull-the-thread method although successful a bit time-consuming and tricky to get the gathers evenly distributed.  I've been umming and aahing about one for a whole and decided enough was enough!  So I've ordered one now and can't wait for it to arrive!  Anyway, skirt was done and all beautiful french seams, overlocked edges and OK gathers, onto the shorts......

OMG even though I had made them before I had a nightmare!  I had made a pattern based on a pair of her leggings and they were OK last time but I wanted them a little closer-fitting so I had trimmed the pattern slightly but not made another pair yet.  I cut out the legs and then proceeded to sew the legs up but when I came to sew the legs together I found that I had sewn one inside out!  I'd used stretch stitch which is really tricky to un-pick.   I was doing them late one night and I wanted her to wear them the next day as we were going to a play centre and they are perfect for that so rather than unpick them I decided to cut another one out.   So I sewed that one up and did exactly the same thing!!!!!!!  Aarrrggghhhh!  So I cut another pair out and guess what I did?!  Yep!  So now I had like 7 legs none of which seemed to fit together!  At that point I threw the towel in and went to bed!   


When I came back to them a couple of days later I decided the problem was the pattern and admitted defeat and went to the fabric shop to buy a commercial pattern (I know, I know, surely for something as simple as shorts I should be able to do it on my own!?  Did you not read what just happened?!)  So anyway came home, got the knit fabric out again, cut out the view I wanted sewed up the legs and guess what I did?  Yep yet again!  How can I make the same mistake so many times!!!!!!!!!!!  I managed to quickly unpick this one and do it properly and once I had the shorts I was able to finish the garment quickly!  Finally!  I can't believe how much trouble I had with this, I'm not even sure how I kept making the same mistake but now at least I have a better pattern than my original one as it does fit better, its closer fitting and the crotch junction looks neater and more comfortable.  Also it brought Burda patterns to my attention, what great, modern, clean-lined, easy to wear clothes they have. Especially for Miss M who at 7 is needs more mature designs (but not as mature as the clothes in the shops!) so I shall come back to their collection after the summer I think.

So finally a great skort, she wore it the next day to the park and was climbing all over the equipment and flying high on the swings with her modesty intact!  Now I just need to sort out all the legs I have left over........

Baby Shower Gifts

A friend is having a baby in the next month and so we're having a baby shower next week for her.  Surprisingly I've never been to a baby shower before and I found it much harder to chose a gift for a baby that hasn't arrived yet and we don't know if it is a girl or boy.  Usually I buy a gift after the event so I know whether to go to the pink section or the blue!  I wanted to make something for this baby so after getting inspiration from the blogosphere (as ever) this is what I made.

A taggie blanket and ball

I had this great Maisy Mouse fabric and the beige fleece is a baby blanket both my kids used so I thought it was fairly gender-neutral.  I thought it would be nice for the blanket to comfort another child.  The ball and blanket was made using this tutorial from New Conceptions.  The blanket was very easy but the ball was a little trickier, the fleece slipped a bit as I was sewing so the points don't quite meet as neatly as I would like but it looks good.  I also tried to make some matching shoes but as the fleece was slipping I've ended up with one shoe bigger than the other!  There was no way I was going to give them to  my friend so now the girls have some shoes for the dolls!  I think if you used fabric for both layers you would have no problem and they would be absolutely adorable! 

After the disaster of the shoes I wanted to make something else so I settle on a baby busy book. 

More fleece.......

Continuing the Maisy theme......

Busy/Quiet books seem to be quite popular across crafty blogs (I think a lot of kids have them for church and there seems to be a correlation between church going and crafty bogging esp in the US!)  Most of them were for older kids so I just blagged it with mine, must admit there was a bit of trial and error and some of it was determined by the size and colour felt I had.  When I know the baby's name I'll offer to put the name on the back of the book.  In my searching I found this great blog to make a quiet book for an older child, there were other tutorials out there but this one was comprehensive. 

The pink corduroy came from a old pair of trousers that both Miss M and Miss C have worn but how have an unrepairable hole in them!  The orange triangle is left over from the Superhero cape I made for this baby's big brother.  I made that ages ago but will give it to him at the Baby Shower.  I quite like the fact that I managed to recycle some fabric in this project to make it a bit more meaningful.  I hope the mum likes them, just in case I bought some babygrows and bibs in the sales!

Boden or Anthropologie?

So I just got the new Boden catalogue in the post, I covet Boden very much, in fact its been part of the inspiration to make a lot of my own clothes now as I love the fabrics they use but I don't like their prices.  Whilst browsing this morning I was struck by how familiar lots of their pieces are and I realised that they are similar to loads of posts that various bloggers I read have done recently which have mainly been influenced by Anthropologie (which is not a company I was not aware of until recently discovering all these great sewing blogs) and J Crew, so I thought I'd show you a few and see if you agree.

 

 

Embellished Tee-shirts
Frilled T-shirt
Pleated neckline top
Ribbon trimmed cardigan which exactly like this one
Ruffle top which I already made a sorta similar version
Rosette cardigan
Corsage necklace
Pleated neck
Circle Applique Dress
Ruffle jacket

 

I can't link the images from the Boden website!

 

I've seen so many examples of these kind of garments in recent months, Suzannah (who's fabulous at making her version of stuff she sees), Disney (even though she's gone into retirement)  to name just a few!

 

And look what I saw in Phase Eight yesterday and heres how you can make one yourself!

So the question is

• have Boden been reading all the blogs I do and making their own versions,
• have Boden been looking at Antropologie for inspiration,
• is there a world-wide common inspiration source
• or are there no original ideas and we all steal from each other!?

 

 

 

 

Drafting Tutorials

One of my most favourist blogs is doing a brilliant new series.  Lorraine at Ikat Bag and her life-long friend Jen from My Measuring Tape are starting a series of posts to show you how to draft your own patterns starting with children and hopefully moving on to adults as well!  I'm very excited about this as this is exactly what I need.  I like making clothes but I find commercial patterns a) expensive b) restrictive c) not always flattering for my body shape.  I've made some garments that I drafted myself, some using Cal Patchs book some just winging it with varying success but its the thing about sewing that I really enjoy.   I was going to go to college to do a dressmaking course but basically all they would teach you was how use a commercial pattern which I already know.  What I want is a real-life person to show me how to draft but as I don't have one I'll have to rely on Lorraine and the beauty of the blogosphere.  I've already told Lorraine how much I admire her work and how I need a real-life version of her but I think I'm starting to move into stalker territory so these tutorials will help me!  If you are interested in expanding your sewing knowledge then check her out!

T-shirts

As part of my new venture I put some t-shirts in my Folksy shop this evening.  They are really cute and I've been getting good feedback from people about them so hopefully they won't take long to sell! 

Got some other things planned so watch this space.......

Superhero!

A friend of mine is having a baby soon and she already has a  4 year old boy so I thought I would make a special gift for him to show that the baby won't get all the attention.  I was thinking about how being a big brother or sister means complete adoration from the baby (usually!) so I made him a Superhero cape. 

I also made a certificate to give him

 

I think its all really cute and I'm hoping that the little boy and his mum will like them too.  Just need to get one and make some stuff for the baby.........  Any ideas?  Not sure of the sex so needs to be gender neutral.  Baby shower is in a few weeks so need to pull my finger out!

Geocaching

As a family we've started geocaching recently which involves wandering around the countryside with a satnav, drinks, things to swop etc etc etc so I decided to make a bag to carry everything in.  The design brief was to make a bag which would hold the satnav, a book, a flask, pencils and assorted junk to swop (usually old party bag toys and Happy Meal toys!), the bag need to have an adjustable strap as it would be carried by both me and my husband and due to that point absolutely no flowery fabric!  So I ended up with some brown corduroy and some stripy material for the lining.  I took all the things we wanted to carry and spent a while designing the internal pockets so that the lining was flat but the pocket was big enough to accommodate the object.  I got some heavy sew-in interfacing to give the bag structure and I ended up with.......

I had to google how to put in an adjustable strap and found this helpful tutorial from Nikki.

Inside you can see the pockets for the pencils on the left and a larger pocket which has hygiene gel and probably keys will end up in there.

The big pocket on the right holds a book with details in it and the pocket on the left has the satnav.  In between the pockets is a large 6" base which I will put some plasticard in as a firm base to hold the flask and swops. 

So there it is, it was tricky to sew such thick fabric especially with the interlining and turning the bag through was a bit awkward.  The top-stitching probably isn't the best I've ever done but given the thickness and the straps I'm just happy I managed to get round!

Try doing some geocaching, its a great excuse to get the kids out and about and find somewhere you didn't know was on your door step.  The kids love the whole secrecy aspect of it and how people who aren't in the know are called Muggles, in fact we're not allowed to say the word geo-caching out loud, we have to say You Know What!