the paper doll project

04/03/2013 5:08 am \ 16 Comments \
26th February – 3rd March
(I’ve pledged to wear only clothes handmade by me this year and to sketch my daily outfits in my Fashionary.  I’m calling this the paper doll project)

from left:

sunset maxi dress
clementine top, denim skirt
Japanese print dress
blue dress
dress with wavey welted pockets
pistachio linen top, hot pink linen shorts
Hello  🙂
Tuesday night saw us back at the Quarry amphitheatre for take two of our picnic followed by the Ballet, after last week was rained out.  It was a wonderful night, easily my highlight of the week.  The performance was breath-taking.  We decided it was our favourite Ballet at the Quarry, so far.
My maxi dress was pressed into service again.  It was a veeery hot day, but this really is the best thing to wear to a summer evening picnic… you can scramble about on the grass setting up and distributing nibblies with absolutely no danger of flashing anyone!
So.  Le stash-busting, pour le February…
I’m doing OK here; since another old thing from the refashioning pile (Cassie’s jeans) was remade into something new and useful (a sunhat), PLUS four more pieces of fabric have winged their way from Le Stash to be transformed into usable and wearable garments during February.  Namely, my piece of Liberty, the silver seqinned fabric, the large leftover piece of grey jersey knit, and a small piece of pewter silk dupion.  And no new pieces of fabric have joined the flock.  Yay!  Obviously, the piece I am most thrilled to have used is the 2m of silver sequinned fabric… not only am I thrilled with the results but it was sure burning a hole in my conscience!
Actually, I’m kinda amazed that any sewing has been done at all, since I don’t feel like I’ve been very productive lately.  More like a sad, wrung out old rag. Thank goodness today is cooler.  I might actually get something done.
Talking of baking bread… oh, we weren’t?  Sorry.  But we are now, right?  😉  Anyway; I discovered this little gem on youtube.  This gave the whole family a real laugh, so I hope you enjoy it.  For the record, my husband does NOT bake bread like this, more’s the pity….
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Pisces II

26/02/2013 3:30 am \ 63 Comments \

… the other fish!  Because we all know Pisces has two fish, right?  🙂  although I’m afraid the best I could eke out was one and a half fish from the length I had!

I made a skirt for myself from the remains of the sparkly silver sequinned fabric.   I do think that when it comes to the problem of wearing a
fabric of a colour and/or texture that you don’t really feel suits you: then having it in the form of a skirt, thus away from your face, is a terrific solution!

Although I am not sure as yet as to the wisdom of drawing attention to my hips, the widest part of my body by dressing them to closely resemble a disco ball, but we shall see…
I used Vogue 8363, and made the skirt to be a single
pieced, double darted front, with deep, front slanted pockets, and a two piece,
double darted back with a central invisible zip closure.  It is fully lined.  Basically the same as the little black skirt I made for Cassie, except that I made the silhouette a tad more A-line,
rather than pencil.
I have another piece of … er, dressmaking advice? a thought? for this sequinned fabric: I didn’t want to blunt my good dressmaking shears on those sequins so I tried using my ordinary, cheap household scissors, that I use for paper, sticky tape, cutting open plastic food packaging and just about anything and everything household-y.  They worked like a charm! And I saved my good scissors 🙂
The pewter/silver silk dupion I used for the
pockets, pocket lining and waistband was a scrap from the bundle of fabrics,
given to me by my friend C from her late mother’s stash, and the grey polyacetate
lining fabric was a small leftover piece from this maxi skirt; made years ago
and long since passed to charity.  btw, I switched back to my good dressmaking shears again for the “proper” fabric  🙂
The darts in the lining are not stitched but simply folded at the top, and the fold sewed down in the waistband stitching line.  This is a good idea when sewing skirt linings, it reduces wearing strain on the thin lining fabric.
I even had the right shade and length grey zip and hook and eye closure
in my stash too.  So this is a
terrific little stash buster skirt, using up a three smallish, different but
nicely co-ordinating pieces of fabric which were individually awkward but whose
joining together created a harmonious whole arguably more useful than if they
had remained a pile of nicely co-ordinating scraps. 
And barely a skerrick of
fabric is leftover.
Well, maybe just a skerrick…. 😉

Details:
Shirt; Burda 8497, white cotton, details here
Skirt Vogue 8363 fully lined, silver sequined
stretch fabric, with pewter silk dupion pockets, pocket lining and waistband,
my review of this pattern here.
Sandals; Misano

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the paper doll project, and a thermal

25/02/2013 9:20 am \ 29 Comments \
20th – 25th February
(I’ve pledged to wear only clothes handmade by me this year and to sketch my daily outfits in my Fashionary.  I’m calling this the paper doll project)

from left:

Hello!
It’s been an up and down week, weather wise.  We had tickets to Ballet at the Quarry for Friday night which we look forward to so much every year! because it is outdoors under the stars, very casual sitting on the grass, and you always take a picnic to enjoy before it starts.  The performances tend to the contemporary; raw and athletic, and set against the backdrop of gum trees and stars it is always a mesmerising evening.  And just before starting time the heavens opened, we had a sudden, crazy rainstorm; and the performance had to be postponed!  (gobsmacked)  We simply could not believe it!!!   Of course rain, is always very very welcome here … since Perth has been as dry as a bone for about four months.  But it had to be right then?
Looking on the bright side, the garden had a good drink and we still have the ballet to look forward to now.  I’ll be making another picnic.  🙂
I’ve made a top.  This will be a thermal.  Ha! anyone in Perth reading this will be laughing hysterically that anyone here is even thinking about thermals right now!!  but while the temperatures make it feel like we’ll never be cold again, of course we will!  If I am going to get through winter in only my own handmade clothing I am going to need at least a few long underthingies.  Plus the fabric was already sitting out after I had cut out the lining for Cassie’s dress so (shrug)
This is a prototype.  There will be one or two more before winter arrives.   The lower hemline when pulled right down sits over my bottom  🙂 I know, oolala, tres uber sex-ay, non?  Non! but these things are a necessary part of any seasonally well-stocked wardrobe!
The fabric is a thin, clingy, soft, and slightly fluffy jersey knit, the last of the leftovers from this drape drape dress, and the lining from Cassie’s Pisces dress.  I used my self-drafted Tshirt pattern.  btw, just a reminder, this pattern started out as Burdastyle 06/2011, pattern 120, but has been fiddled and diddled with it so much there is literally not a single cutting or stitching line remaining that is original.  Which is why I’ve taken the liberty of giving it self-drafted status.
Anyway, it is now a perfectly custom fitted-to-me Tshirt pattern.
The neckline, sleeve and lower hems are all finished with self-fabric bands, attached as per this tutorial.
In general blog housekeeping, I have made the decision to disable Anonymous commenting.  I feel a bit sad about this, since I do get lots of kind comments from real and genuine people who seem to prefer the anonymous option.  But I’m sorry; the spam was driving me crazy! and I just had to.  Saturday night was the last straw, in just 24 hrs so many new spam comments got through the filter that it wasn’t funny.  I had to go through my published comments, and individually “spammed” about 60 NEW comments… I wish I was exaggerating or kidding, but I am not.  It was crazy.  And that is not even counting the comments that had been caught by the spam filter… then I went into the spam box and there were ALSO over 650 new spam comments there.  And I had cleaned it all out only 24 hrs previously!  I usually flick briefly through, to check that no “real” comments have been erroneously marked as spam, and occasionally I get a laugh out of some of the whackier spam comments.  Sadly spammers are getting boringly repetitive and unimaginative in their spam nowadays, and I’m over it.  So, I’m really sorry to my lovely genuine Anonymous’s.  Like every other blogger I love genuine comments and feedback, so maybe you could create a google or an open ID, or something?  🙂
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Pisces

21/02/2013 5:00 am \ 79 Comments \

… the fish.  Look at my little silver tiddler!
So, a few years ago, at the annual Fabulous Fabrics
Christmas sale, I was moved by some mad irrational impulse to purchase 2m of silver sequined
stretchy fabric.  Exactly why is mystery to me now… since silver sequins are completely unsuited to my colouring and just about everything in my wardrobe.  Must have had a brief
“ooh, pretty shiny!!”  moment,
compounding the alluring thrill of 50% off euphoria.  But anywho I succumbed, and it has since been sitting in my
stash taking up shelf space for too too long.  February’s stashbusting theme is to make something for
someone you love.  So I made
something for my daughter.
Fortunately she looks utterly fabulous in silver.  I must have unselfishly and subliminally planned it  😉
Now, I know it seems like I am making a lot for
Cassie lately, and not much for any of the boys in my life… well, I tried.  I offered the sparkly silver fabric to
each of my boys, really I did. 
Inexplicably they did not respond to its sparkly gorgeousness with much enthusiasm.  I only
wish I could capture and show here the expression on Sam’s face, when I showed
him the fabric and straight-faced said I was planning to make him a silver sequinned hoodie …
priceless!!!   You’ll just have to
imagine it for yourselves….   still giggling about it….
Anyhow; the only person in my family who leapt upon
it with cries of joy was Cassie. 
So (shrug) it couldn’t be helped.  I’ll have to make it up to the boys somehow  🙂
My lucky daughter has the ideal year ahead for her
to make good use of a sparkly silver cocktail dress.  She has masses of 21st’s on the horizon.  Word; she goes out a lot anyway, lucky little social butterfly that she is.
I adapted a pattern that is one of my oft-repeated standbys …
Burda 8511.  This is a plain and
simple sheath dress pattern, with two bust darts in the front and two long
shaped vertical darts in the back. 
I’ve found this an excellent style to adapt to individual shapes, just
by subtle alteration of the darts and side seams.
For Cassie’s dress; I sewed up the side seams and
left off any zip closure… the fabric is stretchy and doesn’t really need a
closure.  The dress pulls over her
head quite easily, like a fitted Tshirt dress.  It looks tight but it’s actually not at all, she really is quite tiny!
At her request, I custom fit the dress to skim her
figure closely, and fully lined it with a sewn-in lining.   I redrafted the pattern pieces to eliminate all darts in the lining, and used a soft, stretchy, grey marled
jersey knit, leftover from this drape drape dress that I made for myself.  Note how the lining looks completely
skewiff???  That marle/stripe in the
fabric really is printed on that random slant. 
The lining is cut perfectly on grain, I assure you!
The neckline, armscyes and the lower hem are turned
under  and hemmed by hand.
Actually, a word on that.  Remember my sparkly gold cardigan, that I stitched entirely by hand??  The thought of doing more of the same was inducing a slightly depressive status, so I consulted with a lady in Fabulous Fabrics who I recalled had made herself a skirt of similar stuff.  She reckoned a denim needle worked fine.  So I tried it out… and hehe, of course it was.  (blushes)   Not that I regret stitching that cardigan by hand ……  much.  No, really; I guess it does me good to slow down and spend loads of unnecessary meditative time on a project every now and again.  Teaches one humility, yo.  
Repeating that like a mantra to retain some shred of self respect.
So, stashbusting, yeah!!  (air fist punch)  Actually, the dress did not take up the entire 2m of the silver fabric… so there might be some more silver sparkliness to appear here, anon.  
‘Til next time, lovelies!
Details:
Dress; Burda 8511 modified, silver sequinned stretch fabric
Sandals; Betts
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the paper doll project

20/02/2013 8:00 am \ 16 Comments \

14th – 19th February
(I’ve pledged to wear only clothes handmade by me this year and to sketch my daily outfits in my Fashionary.  I’m calling this the paper doll project)

from left:
pink lace dress over pink satin petticoat
border print dress
Bamboo shoot top, embroidered yellow shorts, ivory hat
navy/white check top, green gingham shorts, green knitted hoodie
blue top (worn as pictured in the last look here), white shorts, ivory hat
dress made from an old polo Tshirt

You can see we had a brief but refreshing and energising cool spell.  Sunday felt positively wintery after the last few sweltering weeks we’ve had, so I actually had a woolly cardigan on hand for early morning and late evening.  Today it’s back to 38C.  Craziness.

eta: Thursday was Valentine’s Day  🙂 so I wore my most romantic dress.  I made a picnic of pate and bikkies, prawn and avocado salad, and strawberries, and we took it along with a bottle of champagne down to the river, to sit on the grass and watch the sunset.  Just lovely.

Have you joined “Map the Sewintists”?  A fun and informative initiative by Vicki, of Another Sewing Scientist.  If not then get thee to Google maps posthaste and pin yourself onto your spot!


View Map the Sewintists in a larger map
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You can leave your hat on…

17/02/2013 5:30 am \ 52 Comments \
I’ve made a hat.
I used Vogue 8844, and the fabric is a soft ivory
corduroy, harvested from a pair of Cassie’s old worn-out jeans that has been
living in my good sammies pile for the past four or five years.   As evidenced by that half gone
leg there, these jeans were also the source of the White parliament, pictured here…
The hat is lined with blue and ivory striped stuff
leftover from Sam’s stripe-y shirt, and the inner seam finished with white grosgrain
ribbon.  

You know that very stiff, heavyweight,
iron-on interfacing? that is useful about once in a blue moon?  I’ve had a huge length sitting
untouched in my stash for many many years.  Well, I guess we must have had a blue moon since I managed
to use a bit in this project.  The
hat pieces are all interfaced with this stuff.

I felt pretty good about getting all of the hat
pieces cut out from the jeans. 
Most of the pattern pieces were too big to cut out in one piece, on the
grain and with the nap of the corduroy (they all are, btw… self pat on the
back)  So I had to do a bit of
piecing.  You can see some of the
seams in this picture, but I’m OK with those seams.  I feel too smugly virtuous about re-using old textiles to
feel bad about a few extra seams in a thing!  Eco-smugness; don’t you just hate that biz  😉
I
wondered about the sizes, which is partially
why I decided to use a re-cycled textile for my first time making this pattern…
not the main reason, I am firmly
committed to mindfully re-using old textiles when I can.  But anyway, about the sizing;
My
head measurement almost exactly corresponded to the S, so I made this
size.  And I couldn’t be more
thrilled with the fit, it cups my scone snugly and is neither tight nor
loose.  There was a brisk-ish breeze
on the beach the day I wore my hat for the first time and photographed it here,
and it stayed firmly and comfortably in place.  I never felt it was in danger of flying away!
The sizing
in this pattern works, y’all!!!

incidentally there is a just-there dog in the below picture  😉
Some advice for those wishing to re-purpose those
long skinny jeans leg pieces into a new sewing project requiring wider pieces?  I recommend doing all the piecing for
each component, using your pattern piece as a rough guide as to where and how
much to add on, and leaving at least
a few centimetres leeway around all the edges.  Stick religiously to cutting the joining edges and sewing
seams along the grainline of the fabric AND ensure fabric nap is consistent.   After sewing pieces together, lay the patchworked piece down flat
and only then accurately cut out the
pattern piece.  This way is much
easier than accurately cutting out little part-pieces and then trying to join
them together to fit the pattern piece. 
J
Details:
Hat; Vogue 8844, ivory corduroy
Top; the bamboo shoot top, Pattern Magic by Tomoko
Nakamichi, white linen, details here
Shorts; Burda 7723 slightly modified, embroidered
yellow cotton, details here
Pattern
Description:
Four
lined hats, each offered in XS, S, M and L.  A; contrast lining, D; contrast band and bow.
Pattern
Sizing:
XS 52cm
(20.5 in), S 55cm (21.5 in); M 57cm (22.5 in); L 60cm (23.5 in)  I made the S.
Did
it look like the photo/drawing on the pattern envelope once you had finished
sewing it?
Yes. I
made view C, leaving off the chin straps.
Were
the instructions easy to follow?
Yes
What
did you particularly like or dislike about the pattern?
It is
a nice stylish hat, easy to make.  The
slightly shaped top and crown lend a chic, vaguely Indiana Jones-ish air to the
hat.
Really,
there is absolutely nothing to dislike about this pattern; it’s a hat, and it
works!
Fabric
Used:
Cotton
corduroy
Pattern
alterations or any design changes you made:
None.  But if a wider brimmed hat was desired;
it would be a cinch to just add a few centimeters on to the outer edge of the
brim curve to achieve this.
Would
you sew it again? Would you recommend it to others?
I
expect so, and yes  🙂
Conclusion:
This
is a great basic pattern which I think will be very useful. I made mine in
ivory corduroy for a summery-looking, wide-brimmed sunhat, but as illustrated
on the pattern envelope it would work equally well made up in tweed or a richly coloured
velvet or some other winter appropriate fabric to make a smart version for
winter.  
let’s play spot the dog again
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One Week One Cat

17/02/2013 1:35 am \ 10 Comments \
Monday’s cat …
Tuesday’s cat….
Wednesday…
Thursday…
Friday…
Saturday…
and finally; Sunday’s cat
A natural to the modelling business, yes?
This is an ode to One Week One Pattern; brainchild of Tilly and the Buttons 
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Paper dolls

14/02/2013 6:23 am \ 33 Comments \

8th – 13th February
(if you’re new, I’ve pledged to wear only clothes handmade by me this year and to sketch my daily outfits in my Fashionary.  I’m calling this the paper doll project)

Black Issey Miyake dress, gold stilettos
aqua dress with wave-y welted pockets
blue top, hot pink shorts
purple-brown dress, ecru scarf
blue dress
Japanese print dress

I apologise if it seems like everything is way too repetitive with my paper dolls’ daily outfits.  The fact is that I am not a fashion blogger; I’m making all my own clothes and so my wardrobe is really not all that chocka with stuff.  I am going to be repeating myself, on a regular basis.  But y’know what?? I’m absolutely fine with that.  It matters far more to me that I have a small number of garments to suit any particular combination of expected activities and weather conditions and man, it’s been hot!!!… and that I love and value each of those garments highly enough to reach for them over and over.

And then, there are the special occasion pieces, which by their very definition are not meant to be frequently worn.
I included above a black Issey Miyake dress that was worn twice during the week, for evening wear.  Firstly, our family went to a swish-o restaurant to celebrate my daughter’s birthday on Friday (thank you to the commenters who wished her a happy birthday!), and secondly, we hosted a big party for her at home last Saturday.  The party was formal; rellies* all arrived dressed to the nines, all the girls in gorgeous little cocktail dresses and towering stilettos, all the boys in suits.  Cassie looked lovely in a dress I had made about six years ago and all my boys wore shirts made by me (happiness!)  Of course the hors d’oeuvres wielding, drinks topper-upperering, cake bearer (moi) had to look presentable too… so I frocked up in my serious LBD and gold stilettos, hair up in a chic, messy bun.
The party went like a blast!!  lots of laughter and chatter, cool jazz music and dancing, funny speeches and good food.  The cleanup was fabulously easy.  Our children are at the age where their friends are quite civilised now.   I had to laugh; the following day, Craig said to me; “… and no one threw up so it was a good party”  I was like “ohhh, we have such low expectations!”

*transl. “rellies” = relatives

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