July 2021 - Handmade by Carolyn

little black dress

31/07/2021 5:02 pm \ 4 Comments \ Carolyn

I’m so behind on blogging! so this is part one in what I hope is a serious attempt to catch up… so I made this little black dress a little while ago… it’s light and floaty and breezy so really it’s a summer dress. And I’m wearing it here on basically the coldest day of the year… ha! But I do like it styled like this for winter! so I guess… good?

The fabric: which I appreciate you can’t see at all in any of my pictures, because of its matte-ness and it’s blackness, sorry! anyway; it is a lightweight crisp fabric that has a very slightly bumpy, seersucker-y quality to it… I’m not sure if it’s silk or cotton or linen but I’ve a feeling it is a combination of two of those components. I bought it in Fabulous Fabrics quite a long time ago for another project, that I’ve completely forgotten what it was so I decided the fabric was fair game, eventually! I’m seriously trying to use up my stash this year… yes I’ve probably said that million times before but I’m really serious this time. I think I’m doing quite well! because I’ve bought just one piece of new fabric all year. I really want to buy some more lovely fabric that I am really really keen on… but am trying so hard to be good about this!

Anyway, the lightness and crispness of this black fabric was perfect for this design, so I’m very happy I had it and it was pretty much the perfect size piece too… so it worked out really well. Oh, the design! Well, it’s the Fibremood Dolly pattern, which is big and floaty and has huge, gathered sleeves, so it’s very trendy, I think. I do like it though! I really like the neckline with a little tie to pull in a gathered V neck. It was so cold on this day I actually wore it for real with my mustard cowl, and also my shearling coat as well as the usual underpinnings pictured, brrr. I’m excited for when I can wear it all summer long!

Oh ok, so I’m just going to slip another extra thing in here…. did I mention our wonderful youngest son Sam has become engaged to his beautiful lady, Lainey? We’re so happy and excited to welcome this lovely lady into our lives, she’s the most gorgeous girl and has willingly and happily acted as a model for our little pattern company a few times, so her face has definitely been seen around here before! Anyway, they recently moved into their own house and asked if I would mind hemming their lounge room curtains. Of course I hate hemming curtains, but it was absolutely lovely to go and hang out with them while I did it. It took an entire morning basically and we chatted away and it was a really nice morning in the end. So I didn’t hate it at all in the end.

Posted in: sewing \ Tagged: curtains, daily outfit, dolly, dress, fibre mood, home wares, Sam

the Fridgetown hand warmers

23/07/2021 8:34 pm \ 9 Comments \ Carolyn

I’ve made a new pattern! along with the help of my beautiful partner ~~in crime~~ of course, Cassie… it’s for a pair of handwarmers, yes it is quite a simple pattern, which is why we’re debuting it for free, however the “twist”, if you like, or maybe the beauty of it is all in the construction, because you end up with a nice pair of double layered hand warmers with all the seam allowances and raw edges hidden neatly inside. It was a little bit of puzzle working out how to do this, but I think it works out really well and I’m quite pleased with the process!

The pattern is available for free here.

CAROLYN_CASSIE_Fridgetown_Handwarmers_A4_letter

For this one, I did not do illustrations to accompany the instructions, instead I did a youtube video tutorial which I think illustrates the process much better. It can be viewed below or on my youtube channel. Jacqui commented asking about how to find my channel, the direct link is up above in the top right hand side bar of this here blog, if you’re interested..x 🙂

To make the hand warmers, you need a piece of stretch fabric, at least 80cm (32″) in length by 50cm (20″) in width, with the stretch going in the widthwise or 50cm direction. For all three pairs that I have made, I used merino knit, that I bought from the Fabric Store, one pair in colour Vanilla, two pairs in colour Ochre. This is all leftover from various Nettie winter tees that I have made recently. It’s actually the ideal fabric for this design in my opinion, thin and lightweight, deliciously warm and cosy, and of course, beautiful quality.

The name? haha, well the name is our little joke… my parents live in Bridgetown, which regularly gets the lowest temperatures in Western Australia. So a few winters ago this installation gave me a laugh… and it was the first thing that popped into my head when i was thinking of a name!

The pattern is free here, however it’s also available for a very small fee in our Etsy shop… unfortunately you cannot put up free things in Etsy which is why a small charge had to be added on to it. We wanted to put it in our shop too, just for the sake of consistency and to have all our patterns represented in one place…

Anyway. We hope you enjoy the pattern!

Posted in: sewing, Uncategorized \ Tagged: Carolyn & Cassie Pattern Co, fridgetown, handwarmers

my blue corduroy skirt

17/07/2021 5:38 pm \ 9 Comments \ Carolyn

ok sure, I’ve made a few blue skirts before, and I’ve made a few corduroy skirts before, and I’ve even made a few blue corduroy skirts before too… And now I’m welcoming a new one to my wardrobe! The best thing about this one? a totally awesome new pocket!! It’s almost more like a little bag than a pocket, and I could not love that idea more!

Cassie bought this very thin, lightweight, blue cotton corduroy from Tessuti fabrics for me, on my behalf, when she went over to Melbourne on a holiday with her now husband D… it’s quite lovely and it’s languished in my stash for way too long! I made it one of my “use 12” for this year as a way of forcing myself to finally make something with it. It’s crazy, but I often struggle with using my favourite fabrics, preferring somehow to make things with fabric I don’t like very much. It’s like I’m afraid of ruining my favourites… yes I’m trying to get over this…

The pattern is Vogue 1170 a pattern I’ve used several times before, and the ultra cool hip holster pocket is from the Anzu cargo skirt pattern by Waffle Patterns. I really love this pattern and basically bought it as soon as it was released! I would really like to make cargo skirt as per the pattern sometime, when I have the appropriate fabric. Mmm hmmm; as silly as this sounds, because I still feel like I have masses of fabric, I don’t actually have any appropriate fabric in my stash. AMAZING!! I’m really trying to use only stash fabric for the time being, as much as possible. Hey, if I change my mind about this restriction, then I change my mind.

I added a lining, using my own personal skirt block… and some pretty aquamarine teal polyacetate fabric that was already in my stash too. The only thing I had to buy was the zip!

This is the latest thing in my proposed “use 12” for this year…

If you’d like to check out a quick and fun video of the making of this skirt, then please consider having a squizz at my video on my youtube channel… I even worked out how to add music this time, yay!

I’m wearing it here with two of my recently made merino Nettie tees, my self-drafted tights, and boots bought with a birthday voucher given to me by my friends.

https://youtu.be/YzN8_s3kbC4

Posted in: sewing \ Tagged: Anzu cargo skirt, daily outfit, skirt, use 12, Vogue 1170, waffle patterns

pretty green ebony, bibs, masks

04/07/2021 11:23 pm \ 3 Comments \ Carolyn

I’ve made lots of Closet Core patterns’ Ebony tees and dresses for others and this is the first one for me! I finally used this absolutely beautiful, delicate grey/green wool knit that I bought in Tokyo, one of of our trips over there. It’s beautiful stuff, with an almost lace-like texture to it, but unfortunately it had developed a few little moth holes over the years since I bought it.

So I fixed these up with some carefully invisible mending. Yes, I know visible mending is all the rage nowadays but personally I like my mending to be of the other sort if possible.

See my ghost-like hand up there?! The knit is very sheer, so I fully lined my Ebony tee using the leftovers from my recent Forest Nettie, from two posts ago… I had just enough to squeeze the Ebony pieces on for a lining!

I stitched the outer and lining together around the neckline, and under stitched using a wide, shallow zigzag stitch. I also handstitched them together at the underarm points, just to anchor the lining inside secretly.

This is the latest thing in my use-12 challenge for the year, where I’m making a little capsule wardrobe from 12 pieces selected from my stash.

I’m also wearing this skirt from Vogue 8363, drastically modified, and self drafted tights

In the last week we had another mini lockdown, and I kept myself busy by making some much needed things for Theo…. bibs!

These are made using the piece from Butterick 5583, and the fabrics are all scraps and leftovers from other projects. One of them is from one of Cassie’s old skirts, another two are from Craig’s old shirts, and one of the boys’. The other cute prints are all from the leftovers from Craig’s surgical caps, fabric originally from Spotlight. The backing is thin cotton towelling, that I already had in my stash too.

Some of them have completely useless, but also completely adorable little pockets. What can I say, I couldn’t resist!

I made 10 in the end, and I also made a few masks for Cassie, just in case she wants to match her baby. Masks are newly compulsory here again, after a few months without them, so it’s becoming more necessary to have a little supply on hand…

I’d made a few more for myself as well during me-made May, which fell on the tail end of our last period of compulsory masks; here are some of my favourites. These are also from out of those cute surgical cap leftovers. I have successfully and completely used up all these fabrics now, yay! The pattern is from Trend Patterns…

Posted in: Uncategorized \ Tagged: baby clothes, babywear, butterick 5583, Closet Core patterns, daily outfit, Ebony, mask, Theo, top, use 12

nighty night!

01/07/2021 4:03 pm \ 3 Comments \ Carolyn

Last month I also devoted some time to updating the pj situation in my life, and in little Theo’s life too! It suddenly got really really cold overnight, and my fave old bunny pj’s, that I still LOVE btw are sadly too thin to really cut it any more…

I actually bought both the white and mustard, fluffy cotton flannelette at Spotlight very early out of our first lockdown last year… I panicked that we might have another lockdown and I would need new pj’s and that I didn’t have the fabric for a new pair, so rushed out and quickly bought some. Then decided my bunny pj’s would be fine for another year after all. Anyway, they’ve been made now and ooooo, they’re so fluffy and awesomely warm I’m in heaven as soon as I put them on.. 😀

I used my namesake pattern, the Closet Core patterns Carolyn pj’s for the bottoms, and for the tops I used my now standby pj top pattern Burda 10-2009, 121; which is just so quick and easy and comfortable. I jazzed up both pieces by incorporating a bit of faux piping in some horizontally placed seams. I used the selvedge of both white and mustard flannelette in their opposite pieces’ nd found a piece of gorgeous raspberry cotton jersey in my stash in both to tie them both together. The selvedges are just single thickness with the selvedge edge facing out, and the raspberry jersey is folded once with the folded edge facing out. On the inside, all the raw edges are overlocked together to finish, and the seam allowances are stitched UP in all cases.

One of the best things is that I think they look great with my fluffy pink robe, that I made two years ago and that is still going strong. It’s VERY IMPORTANT that one should look exceptionally well put together even in one’s pj’s, ahem…

Also, little Theo needed a sleeping bag… we had some very cold nights during June and Cassie had put in a request. I already had both these pieces of fabric in my stash too… the red fleece, well I’d previously used most of it to make kangaroo pouches last year, when we had the bushfire wildlife care callouts. I still had a few pieces big enough to cut out the sleeping bag, fortunately! I cut the collar and cuffs from striped cotton jersey, just to make it look more interesting and fun. The only thing I needed to buy in all of this was the red zip… I feel like my stash busting efforts are going really well!