Tag Archives: Top

green Quilla and some small T-shirts

17/05/2023 1:07 pm \ 1 Comment \

Hello!  I’ve made some new things… actually I’m always making new things but am seriously behind on blogging them.  Bad me!

First up; a new little top for myself… this is the new Fibremood Quilla pattern, I and I love it!  It’s super cute in my opinion, very easy to make and uses a very small amount of fabric.  Is that a good thing? well pretty wonderful when you have lots of small leftover cuts that you wish to “gainfully” use up, like I am.

something I should mention: several times I have had to go back and lowered the necklines on a few of my fibremood makes, retroactively; because I’ve found them to sit quite high in general.  So this time I proactively lowered the neckline by 5cm on this and I’m glad I did! it doesn’t feel too low at all and is in fact very comfortable.   Something to bear in mind!

 

I used a raw silk hessian from Le Stash… this is leftover from when I made this green dress.

I stitched with green thread of course, but didn’t have any matching cotton for the bias binding nor green overlocking thread, so used white for both of these so there’s kind of a match-matchy situation going on with the inner seam finishes.  This is quite a pleasurable sight to my eyes.

This top has a reverse pleat going on with the front/back panels and side panels; so I thought I’d share how I do the hem in this circumstance; the pattern just has you hemming as usual, but I’ve always found you get a sharper pleat if you doit like above.  You need to snip the seam allowances at the hemline point so the hem seam allowances can wrap out the other way around the side seam allowances.  Yes, sounds like it makes no sense but it does if you’re doing this sort of hem, trust me.  Because I didn’t have matching overlocking thread, I just did a zigzag stitch to finish the raw edges in the hem allowance.

This gives you a nice, permanent fold at that point and enables the pleats to sit the way you want them too.

oh, see that cute little T-shirt Theo is wearing in the above pic? that’s the one I blogged about in my previous post.  I’m happy to say he loves wearing it as a regular T-shirt and not just for pj’s!

Also, since Arthur’s T-shirts were a tad on the small side I made him a few more… These are made from out of two of Tim’s old T-shirts and also some more of that tomato red cotton jersey that Theo’s top is made from; that I’ve been using up lately.  There will be some more things from this stuff appearing very soon, once I get around to modelling and photographing it.  It’s actually finally all gone now, hurrah! and I have moved onto other fabrics!

Extras: yes, I made those jeans, using old jeans and the Closet Core Jenny pattern, previously blogged here

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I made a dress, a cool skirt and three tops; aka I actually used all of my 2022 labels, yay!

31/12/2022 1:11 pm \ 3 Comments \

I’ve made a few new things, thus appropriately using all my “circa 2022” labels, hurrah!  I know, I know, using up labels should NOT be a criteria for making anything, and yet.. and yet… I still felt compelled to do so.  And these are all things that I am going to be very happy wearing, so I’m ok with it all  🙂

First up!

this dress, another from my self-designed pattern that Cassie and I are working on right now.  I made this one from this dress that I wasn’t wearing any more.  I really loved the large scale check linen, but the length and sheer volume of the dress made it unwieldy if not borderline uncomfortable to wear on the beach…  which let’s face it; is a large part of my life nowadays.  I’m much happier with the fabric usage now since I am more inclined to wear it in this more streamlined iteration!  Technical deets; I had to cut many pieces on the bias and there’s a centre back seam in the back bodice, which shouldn’t be there; but I covered it up with a bias cut strip of dark chocolate cotton.  Mostly to obscure the complete lack of patten matching here, which was visually jarring to my eyes.

Second! a simple little white Booragoon top.  Actually; and Third!  I’ve just remember I made TWO simple little white Booragoon tops; one for Lainey for Christmas, which I have totally failed to photograph.  Picture this top, just in white.

 

 

btw, I didn’t put labels in things I made for others, just because you never know if people are going to get the same kick out of them that I do…   Anyway I made another white one for me too…  pictured on Cassie here.

This is Cassie’s and my Christmas post for our pattern company this year; I’m wearing my mustard Yallingup dress, Cassie is wearing her yellow Booragoon skirt and the aforementioned new little white Booragoon top.  You might be able to see it’s a tiny bit big on her, since it’s my size.

Fourth!  I made a new skirt, using some Ikuntji Artists fabric, that I did purchase during this year, using the voucher that I’d won for this outfit.  The print is called “Mintjinperri”, by Kelly Dixon, which sadly seems to be no longer available.

Having said that though, I think the print is what totally makes the skirt!  Pretty amazing, huh?!  The skirt is partially lined with dark blue lining fabric.

The pattern is my own, another that I am developing right now.  I made it long, with two side splits, and the also split lining is attached to the splits at the sides.

 

Something giving me joy?  sounds a tad obsessive, but I used coffee coloured thread for most of it, including the topstitched hem, which is the only visible stitching on the thing.  A few spots had coffee coloured top-stitching on solid dark blue areas which was a little distressing, so I switched to dark navy blue for these bits.

Fifth!  I made the matching, dark navy-blue Booragoon top.  Well, I still had my pattern pieces out so just cut it out and ran it up very quickly.  I’ve already written just about anything I can think of with regards to the Booragoon, my own pattern, but just know that I’m not making it up again and again just to big note myself, but because I truly love this little pattern right now.  It’s very flattering to my figure, and because it’s sleeveless it goes nicely under cardigans in the summer too.

So that’s it!  The very last of my 2022 labels, and the very last day of the year too.  Seems fitting  🙂

I’m going to try to squeeze in a retrospective post before the VERY end of the day too, so fingers crossed!  If I did, then it’s going to be very obvious, very soon!

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featuring a top and a skirt and some other miscellaneous wearable things

20/12/2022 7:25 pm \ 1 Comment \

I’ve made a new little top and skirt, as well as a few other odds and sods …  so here’s the thing.

I bought a batch of 20x “circa 2022” labels at the beginning of the year, used these up in 6 months, and so bought a second batch of 20.  These are neeeeeeearly finished! and now I’m basically on a mission to use them all by the end of the year.  I have four or five to go… let’s see if I can make it! aieeee, it’s going to be tight!

First up! a little brown top…

this is our own Booragoon top pattern…  and like Cassie with the ones I’ve made for her, I’ve found it to be such a wonderfully comfortable and useful little top to make and wear.  I used the leftovers from this little tee I made for myself at the beginning of the year; scrummy merino from The Fabric Store, in colour Nutmeg, bought last year.

I’m wearing it above with my BamBam Pietra shorts, first blogged here.  The fabric is cotton drill from Spotlight, the shorts are made using Closet Core Pietra pattern, adapted to have no elastic waistband and a centre back zip.

next up! I made a little white skirt…

Yes, it’s kinda of mini-length, thus the tights and boots.  I think it will be a winter skirt!  This is another of my own patterns that I’m hoping to release next year some time.  The fabric is again cotton drill from Spotlight, obviously the same fabric as my BamBam shorts just in the white colour way.   Yes, I really liked it!  It also came in a dark green colour way but I figured I had bought enough already…

The skirt is fully lined and closes with a button and a hook and eye over one of the side pockets.

Here are some other little basics I’ve made recently too, to which I did not attach any labels.  Necessary things, but not really label-worthy things, unfortunately!

A simple double-layered neck warmer using the very last Nutmeg merino as my top, above.

I’ve also made a five more pairs of little sockettes, using the now sadly unobtainable syttochprytt ballerina sock pattern, adjusted as outlined here.

All the fabrics are either leftovers from other things or old T-shirts that I’ve kept for this very purpose.

A brief update: I’m going so well on my not buy any new fabric pledge!  I have to confess to feeling the desire for new fabric every now and then, but have quickly managed to overcome it.  Mostly by forcing myself to go to my stash and sort it out.  Always a great cure!  Anyway, I have plans, lots of lovely plans for the fabric I do have… aaah, so many plans, so little time!

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it’s curtains for you! otherwise titled; why should windows have all the fun?

03/12/2022 1:21 pm \ 6 Comments \

This year, my friend Raina gave to me a couple of bags of fabric that she’d been hoarding for years, finally sensibly throwing them out… or should I say.. throwing them my way?  I really should throw out a lot of my fabric too but not only am I not sensible, I’m also such a sucker for a lonely, unwanted piece of fabric that is just screaming out to be made into something wanted and loved…  *sigh*

Anyway; amongst the odds and ends and bits and bobs was a length of really beautiful curtain fabric.  Samarkand by Sanderson, no less.  I thought it was lovely and had lots of potential.  Interestingly, I’ve just searched online and can find not even one picture of this print?!  Weird!

Raina tells me this was the leftovers from the bedroom curtains in their old house in England, and since they left England more than twenty years ago that should give you an idea of how long this has been kicking around!  I’m so happy it’s finally been put to good use!

I made a skirt using my own skirt block pattern, that I’m developing to be a pattern for our pattern company actually, and this time I managed to remember to add seam allowances, hurrah!  Yes, I finally got my matching top and skirt set, yay!

For my top I used the Closet Core patterns Cielo pattern.  I didn’t have enough of the curtain fabric to cut everything, so the sleeves and sleeve cuffs are a co-ordinating grey linen, which was given to me by Mum when she cleaned out her own stash.  I know, I seem to be using everybody else’s stashes at the moment and not much of my own!  I really should remedy that for the remainder of the year… if I can!

I lined the skirt with a leaf green lining fabric, also from Mum’s stash. Later on, I also noticed that the lining of the skirt peeped out a bit in a few of my photos so since then I’ve gone back in and shortened the lining by a few centimetres.  Always telling myself; it’s really worth me doing this sort of thing properly because otherwise it would bother me forever.

I finished off the raw edges inside the top and skirt with bias tape cut from dark olive poplin.  Now, this is actually from my own long term stash!  I also finished off the neckline facing with the same poplin; it makes the inside look so nice and neat, as well as being far more comfortable and soft against my skin.  I try to do this as much as possible nowadays.

 

I really love this new ensemble!  the beautiful bird print on the fabric is so elegant.  I’m so happy I was able to pattern match quite close to seamlessly everywhere.  I kept and incorporated the colour legend from the selvedge on the waist band of the skirt, because… well just because I can!  I love it, and I believe that a print with such a lot of colours in it like this is the mark of a really quality print.

I wore this to morning tea with Raina this past week because I knew it would give her a laugh, and she was satisfyingly very happy to see it too!  Gave me lots of warm fuzzies to see how much she loved it actually.  Very satisfying.  It’s very comfortable, and a style that makes me feel really good too.  I’m going to get lots of wear out of this outfit, for sure!  I only have a few more of those “circa 2022” labels left now.  Hmm… what label-worthy things should I make to finish up the year?  Better put my thinking cap on!

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in which I make yet another tartan thingie…

27/11/2022 8:04 pm \ 2 Comments \

Hello!  I’ve made a new.. blouse? jacket?  the more open-ended “top” would be the least controversial, I suppose!

This is the new Rhonda pattern by Fibremood… I always tend to go for the weirdest pattern in any collection because that’s just my preference in just about anything, and I was not disappointed with my choice this time either! It’s quite unique; sorta boxy giving a tres-flattering square shape to one’s torso  #imjoking and an up-and-down hemline all around.  The sleeves are wide and a little flared without being annoyingly big.  If I’m being critical I’m not super sold on the buttoned back; such a thing has a tiny whiff of “homemade” about it and maybe I would substitute a zip or even an invisible zip in a lighter fabric next time.  But, I’m ok with it for them most part.

I didn’t have matching buttons in my stash, so got some blue fabric covered ones that I’d rescued off a cardigan, many years ago, and used a sharpie to colour them in black.  Perfect!  I really like how they’re a little woolly looking, just like the fabric.

Oh, the fabric?  This was a leftover, given to be by Mum.  She’d bought it in Melbourne, during one of our girls’ trips over there; and subsequently made a pair of trousers for herself.  In true Mum fashion she had bought about 2m too much.  The wrong side is a bit fluffy, like a blanket, and this is the side I used as a right side.  The actual right side is a lot more defined and sharp looking, which is nice but I just wanted the slightly fluffy, ill-defined felted look of the wrong side.

 

I managed to get this little jacket out of it, and also a little matching skirt.  Oh, you’ve noticed I am not wearing the matching skirt?  That’s because while I used my own perfectly fitting skirt block to cut it out, I foolishly failed to add seam allowances.  And then steam-rollered through without pausing to try it on at any point, until it was completely finished.   So it turned out depressingly tiny *sob*  Fortunately it fits Cassie just fine, so she accepted it happily.  I’m quite sad because it honestly looked so cute with the matching jacket! but really; I have enough skirts planned top of that one to suit my needs.

I’ll attach a picture of Cassie wearing the skirt here when I can get one… until then!

please say hi to my darling little grandson and BooBoo … and yes, I am … just a little bit dying of heat right here.  But hey; summer is here at last, and I am NOT complaining!

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22/10/2022 8:31 pm \ 3 Comments \ \ Quote

I made a pretty new top… isn’t it gorgeous?  It’s a slight different style that I might usually go for, and I absolutely love it!  So elegantly feminine and floaty and chic.

This is the new Nicks pattern by Closet Core patterns; it comes as both a dress, a blouse, and a tunic top, which is the view I chose to make.  It also comes with two different sleeve choices, a slightly puffy long sleeve, and the short sleeve.  I really like the mix and matchability potential that this pattern has, I really reckon you could play about with the different bits and pieces and come with a whole tonne of different garments that could look quite distinct from each other.  It’s not pictured on the pattern cover, but the blouse option does not have the buttons, nor any frill, so it stylistically looks quite different from the sweet V-neck buttoned front of the dress and tunic pictured there.  I’m quite excited to try some of the different options out!

My fabric is actually the leftover ivory crepe from Kelly’s wedding dress!  I had just enough to cut the tunic out, and not much more!  And fortunately I still had buttons leftover from when I covered 100 for her dress too… phew boy was that a project and a half.  I think I still have a little ptsd from all that.  But excellent that I still have the buttons to use for other things like this!

 

I think I’ve pretty much decided to only make white or white-ish tops from now on actually.  I’ve realised that during warm weather in particular, whenever I go to select a blouse or top from my wardrobe, I hone in on the white ones; they go so much better with all my more colourful or patterned skirts and other bottoms.  Or maybe it’s just a mood I’m in at the moment.  A sorta boring mood.  Or maybe just in need of streamlined, uncomplicated comfort dressing, which to me means the visual peace and clarity of white tops.

This may very well be a mood that changes in the next instant, but for the time being; that’s the plan. Or maybe it’s just because the last time I sorted through my stash discovered I have a small mountain of white fabric that needs to be productively dealt with? To assuage the guilt?  Either way!

I’m wearing my new top here with my Closet Core patterns Sasha trousers, still my favourite jeans.  These are getting a touch sad nowadays, which in turn makes me sad.  I think I should set aside a little time to make some more!

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the Booragoon skirt and Booragoon top

02/07/2022 9:24 pm \ 5 Comments \

 

phew… I’m beyond exhausted, but also absolutely thrilled to announce the release of our latest two patterns… the Booragoon skirt and the Booragoon top!

So; here’s the story -yes, there’s always a story.  That’s what a blog is for, right?!

For our niece’s 21st last year, for which I made this bumblebee cake; Cassie made a self-designed skirt for herself.  It was a seriously cool skirt and brought forth many oohs and aahs and the inability to keep oneself from checking it out.  Fortunately, not only did Cassie welcome the checking out part, but also excitedly declared on the spot that we should most definitely make it a pattern.  So the horses were out of the gate and we were off!  Of course, it did not proceed as swiftly as hoped; not only did work get in the way like a great big ol’ nuisance (not like it pays the bills or anything) but Cassie also returned to work after maternity leave was over, which slowed things down a little too.

And while Cassie’s skirt was beautifully made; she had done a massive amount of hand stitching to make the zip insertion and design lines work; which I knew would have be worked on before we could even think of releasing it.

See; the top tier of the skirt has a sharp edged, right-angle panel encircling the waist; very architectural in its genesis; that incorporates the waistband and a front panel.  The front panel folds down to hide a zip closure; and the waistband has an attached, very long and skinny tie to further pull it all together.  Sounds interesting?  It is!

It took a bit of experimentation and fiddling, but I eventually worked out the zip insertion; so you could do it all by machine.

The top is one I’ve made for Cassie many times before; and we both decided the top really complemented the skirt very well; so we decided to release the patterns as a set.  But of course you can always buy them separately as well.  Actually; while I would rate the little jersey top as an Advanced Beginner level of pattern, the skirt really veers into Intermediate-Advanced level, thanks to the difficulty in mastering those nice sharp angles..  I would never tell anyone not to give it a go, however,  Honestly; if I’d been scared off by Advanced ratings in my early sewing days I reckon I never would have got anywhere!  I’m a big believer that’s it’s a good thing to push yourself.  At the same time, the skill level thing is there for a reason!

We are offering a special, release day sale on the new patterns; the Booragoon Top, the Booragoon Skirt, and the Booragoon Top & Skirt are all 20 % off for the first 5 days, starting today.  You even get a little special, and permanent discount for buying the set of patterns, as opposed to separately.

All three options re listed for sale in our Etsy store; here.

Is this a good time to mention that the skirt has a pocket?  It’s just big enough for a phone and some small things, and it’s surprisingly unobtrusive.  I’ve got my phonon my pocket for all my photos and it can’t be seen at all!

My lovely daughter-in-law Lainey agreed to model for us again; and the set I made for her is an all-in-one colour set; so it gives more of a dress vibe: for this one; I bought cotton from Spotlight for the skirt, and the cotton jersey for the top was a lucky match from Mum’s stash.

This next set is one of my earlier attempts; it was not particularly well made because I was still working out the zip at this point; but I really liked the skirt-over-a-dress look of it so saved the idea for my “real” one, above!  Cream cotton jersey inherited from Mum’s stash, brown gabardine leftover from a long-gone pair of jeans/trousers I made for myself years ago.

And this set is playing with a dress-over-a-skirt look, just for fun.  Both fabrics inherited from Mum’s stash.

All these different looks are achieved simply by different combinations of self and contrasting fabrics, and I really love this kind of versatility in a pattern!

Working on this pattern also contributed substantially to my #use30 challenge, for which I am quite grateful too, hehe.  Thanks for that, Booragoon skirt and top!

Oh, the name?  Booragoon is a local suburb here in Perth, and the location for a very popular shopping mall, which was actually both mine and Cassie’s introduction to department store shopping, for me dating back to my childhood years.  Well, for Cassie too; but I mention for me in particular just to illustrate how long the mall has been there.  It is also where my Dad had his practise for many many years; so when we went shopping we were always popping in to visit him while he was there.  So “Booragoon” just has sentimental memories for us both; being a place “to shop” if you like.  And we thought the Booragoon skirt and top was that kind of outfit that you might put on in order to sally forth for a day of genteel shopping and maybe a cup of tea and piece of cake to fortify yourself during the ordeal.  Aaah, memories!

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brown

16/02/2022 8:52 pm \ 8 Comments \

Yes, it is still extremely hot here.  And I am dying a little bit in these photos.  But what can I say?  I found all of these coordinating fabrics in my stash -mostly leftovers! – and each one was the perfect size to cut out the individual pieces for the skirt.  Win!  And I also had the acorn brown merino, that I’d bought last year during a sale from the Fabric Store.  So I feel like this is a totally seasonally inappropriate outfit that was nevertheless just crying out to be 🙂

The skirt pattern is the new FibreMood Crystal skirt… with some alterations, of course!  Let me explain… the pattern is very simple really; the front and back are the same except mirror images, and the waistband is straight.  Very uncomplicated.  I’ve made several skirts like this in the past and they’ve usually been fine.  However, nowadays I have higher expectations of my skirts, and I really really want for all my skirts to have pockets.  I know pockets can sometimes be a bit of a hot-button topic.. I’ve been seeing sewing peeps on instagram lately saying that they usually leave off pockets?! and that they hate them?!  amazing! but well to each their own.  This is why we make our own clothes, yes? not someone else’s.  I personally, love to have pockets, so I set about plotting how I could add them to the skirt.

I cut my waistband at my regular size, but cut the skirt pieces a size bigger than I would normally go for to allow for hands in pockets. I also cut and put in slanted pockets, and added darts to the skirt front and back to bring in that extra width to the waistband.  Instead of a zip, I made the skirt closure to be part of the pockets, as per this side-opening-over-a-pocket tutorial that I published previously here.  It’s quite a good method for adding pockets to a skirt actually  🙂

Added bonus is that my skirt fits really well now too, thanks to the darts!

I bound the edges of the pockets with some other brown cotton from my stash, which appears mysteriously to be grey in these pictures, but honestly it’s a deep black/brown.  I used the same brown cotton to bind the hemline.

My top is, of course, my usual modified Closet Core patterns Nettie.  This time I used my twin needle to finish the sleeves and hem, instead of bands.  I used thread from stash also rather than go shopping just for new thread, and the close-ups show how it doesn’t really match very perfectly… but honestly, the difference doesn’t show up quite that much!  Actually, all the close-ups here make the different browns look shockingly different, far more so than they are in real life!

Of course I added some of my new date-stamp labels.  Love these!

 

the caramel corduroy at the top of the skirt was leftover from these jeans, and the two middle cotton canvases were leftover from my Blanca flight dress and my Issey Miyake trousers… the dark brown, lightweight cotton corduroy that I used for the frill at the bottom was not a leftover, but one that Cassie had bought for me from Tessuti during a trip she took to Melbourne one year.  And, as mentioned, I bought this acorn merino last year.

Taking into account that I do have some leftovers still; these two pieces used up about 3m of fabric from my stash…  meaning this outfit brings me up to 13m for the year!  17m to go!

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