gingham!! carrot cake!!

Hello!   I made a fun new frock…

I received 2m of this gorgeous blue gingham from Minerva; it’s very light and floaty and so I decided to make a little sun frock. I spent several hours laying different patterns down on the fabric to see which one would result in minimal leftovers; something that has become really common for me now when I’m deciding on a project for a piece of fabric .  The Deer and Doe Myosotis pattern “just” squeezed on with absolutely no leftovers at all!  and even then I had to cut the sleeve cuffs out on the cross instead of with grain.  Which is no hardship at all, of course…  Can you even tell?  The gingham squares are so regular and even … it’s hard to see if you don’t really check it out very carefully!

I’ve used the Myosotis pattern once before, for this favourite little sun frock, and this time I did a substantial small bust adjustment to the pattern.  Basically I rotated out the front waist darts completely and reduced the bust dart by about half, and the result is a really good fit for me!  I left the back waist darts unchanged, because I do have a small sway back and so this shaping suited me well.

it appears that the shoulder is altered in the right hand photo, but it hasn’t; it’s just that the paper is floating up a bit at that point

I used three small white buttons for my stash for closure, and all the raw edges inside the dress are overlocked with ivory thread to finish.

I submitted a long blog post to Minerva on the dress, here, which you can read if you like..

In baking news, and yes! I do seem to be doing a bit of baking lately!  I made a carrot cake for Dad’s birthday… to be clear, this was not THE birthday cake, which Mum made, but more of a consumable treat for Dad as a birthday present, since he’d stipulated absolutely NO birthday presents, please.

I did a bit of sleuthing to find out his favourite eatable treat, and lo! it is carrot cake (surprise!)  So I made one! I figured at least this is a present that will be consumed and then it’s gone, and doesn’t need storing or dusting or anything.

 I used this recipe from the cooking tree, yes she is my favourite thing to watch at the moment! and it was absolutely delicious.  We all liked that there was a much higher proportion of icing to cake than usual.

I really enjoyed decorating the cake!