Category Archives: Uncategorized

Japanese linen-gauze shirt dress

09/02/2017 1:46 pm \ 36 Comments \

My dear friend Yoshimi sent to me a beautiful birthday present last year; some really beautiful, deep indigo blue linen gauze…   The colour is quite glorious, not a solid colour but mottled and variegated with plenty of depth and character; and the texture is ultra light and sheer, quite breezy and with a slight stiffness very similar to organza.  It’s utterly lovely.

   

It’s taken me quite a while to decide what to make with this precious stuff…  I would take it out and pet it, thinking of a million options.  I layed out several different patterns onto it, only to pack them all up again… obviously it had to be perfect, also I really wanted to make the absolute MOST of every little bit using a pattern resulting in as little waste as possible!  I finally settled upon this Burda pattern, Shirt Dress 03/2016; 112B, The pattern pieces fitted on my piece of precious fabric PERFECTLY!!

However.. modifications happened along the way.  Of course they did.   My dress has the same bones, but the original is actually a very boxy design, with quite a pronounced dropped shoulder.  I’m sure it’s a lovely design for the right fabric; as in, something with plenty of natural “flop” that allows those shoulder seams to drop gracefully down over your upper arm.

My fabric doesn’t want to flop in the slightest; while super-breezy it stil has quite a bit of oomph and structure.  It works beautifully in the tailored details of a shirtdress, but really the shoulders did not drape in the desired manner at all…  So I ended up taking quite a bit of width off from each shoulder and side, and slimming down the sides of the dress bodice too, so my final dress is more like a gentle A-line shape.  I couldn’t say I “self-drafted” the armholes, that just sounds terribly pompous when it was basically just tonnes of super careful pinning and multiple tryings-on.  I’m so so happy with the final result though.  I think the more fitted, yet still loosely relaxed shoulders, the slimmer bodice and A-line shape is perfect for the fabric.

Other alterations: I inverted the pleat the other way in the centre back, also left off the placket to hide the buttonhole band.  Fun fact; my pattern is the German version, and while I plugged the instructions into Google translate I actually couldn’t make head nor tail of them, haha!!  I think I’ve made enough shirts that I managed to put it together ok though  🙂

I LOVE the sleeves which are unchanged from the pattern, they’re only very slightly gathered at the top, and blouse-y at the elbow, with deep pleats taming that blousiness into the bands.  I also love the petite little collar.  The collar stand is the tiniest I’ve ever made, so skinny and narrow, only about 1.5cm deep.  I was slightly terrified how this would go, fortunately, the linen gauze was an absolute delight to sew and eased beautifully everywhere I asked it to.  Like sheer heaven.

I found these awesomely cool yet delicate brass buttons at Fabulous Fabrics.  I’ve previously used these very same buttons before, on my khaki linen “army” shirt; five and a half years ago!!  I’m so glad they still are stocking these; they’re quite old-fashioned-y, a bit dinged-up and antique-y looking, so very much to my taste!

I also made a little matching belt, which is basically an interfaced waistband with just one button and two buttonholes.

With the fabric being the divine will o’ the wisp that it is, my new dress needed a slip; so I hemmed it so as to work well with my ivory crepe Ruby slip.  You can see the slip when I’m wearing it, but hey; you were going to see any slip I wear with this ultra-sheer dress! so it may as well be a nice one!  I really love the way the ivory underneath lightens and brightens and highlights the variegated blues and really brings them to life.

I absolutely adore my new dress; thank you so much, Yoshimi!!

       

Details:

Dress; Burda Shirt Dress 03-2016;112B slimmed down a bit, Japanese indigo linen gauze
Slip; pattern scissors cloth Ruby Slip, a free pattern available here; ivory crepe, details of mine here
Shoes; made by me and my own design, details here

Location, the Crawley boatshed, Crawley, Western Australia

yes; it was blowing a freaking gale, not really ideal but I had the photo opportunity so *shrug*…

Funny story; this is a very popular spot for wedding parties and also for tourists to stop and take pictures.  I rocked up and there was a Chinese man taking pictures, so I waited at a little distance for him to finish… once he had I went over and put my camera on the steps.  However he hung around for a bit, then came back and started gesturing to his camera and at me; at first I thought he was asking if I wanted assistance with my pictures and I assured him that I was fine, gesturing that I had my remote, etc.  However, no! what he wanted was for me to be in his pictures!!  eeeek! he demonstrated where he wanted me to stand and how he wanted me to pose, gazing up into the sun and beaming like a stereotypical sun-worshipping Aussie.  He took quite a lot of pictures, so if you ever see me popping up in some Chinese guy’s holiday photos, that’s why!!!

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white Issey Miyake shirt

28/01/2017 11:54 am \ 20 Comments \

Self-explanatory, really.  #endblogpost  😉
Pattern; Vogue 1384.  It’s a vintage pattern, hailing from 1984, sorry. Yeah, it’s annoying when people make things in vintage patterns that you can’t get a hold of anymore.  But I’m sure this is not particularly aspirational actually, it’s a little weird in that 80’s way.  That high, slightly floppy collar combined with a billowing pirate-y blousiness is giving me serious Duran Duran vibes.  That’s sort of a good thing btw HUGE Duran Duran fan, once upon a time… only you know, dating myself here  #woops  On a side note; watching that clip again, wow I think I’ve suddenly identified the genesis of my lifelong white shirt obsession…   Also, haha, I totally dance just exactly like that, to this day still, lol.

I’d actually vaguely planned to make this shirt for quite a while, then Anna of blogless Anna proposed an IG #sewjapaneseinjanuary sewing challenge; prompting a jump to the top of my queue… sewing challenges are such fun!

I’ve previously made the skirt from this pattern too; here.  That now resides in Cassie’s wardrobe.  Thing is; the pretty floaty pink-ness, while lovely, I’ve decided is just not really ME.  Not to mention that she put it on one day and obviously it looked only like about 999999 times better on her than it ever did me (sob)   I’ve got to stop giving her my clothes to try on!!   Just kidding; I wore it a few times but tired of it quite quickly and I don’t miss it, not one little bit.  Though I do still really like that design and am thinking of making it up again, just in a more me-friendly fabric and colour.

Fabric; a thin, sparsely-dotted swiss cotton voile with ever so faint and equally sparse paisley embroidery on it in bits.  Very very subtle.  I bought it in Potters Textiles a few years ago, when it was in its other location.

The top looks at its best when it’s either tucked in or belted-n-blousy, and while I have a small collection of self-made belts… like, four maybe?  none of them looked very right with this sheer-ish white top, so I quickly whipped up a thin white one in the same fabric to wear with it.  Kt-chaaaaaaa!! *whip-crack sound effect*  Sorry, I simply cannot read “whipped something up” with regards to sewing without hearing a crack o’ the whip sound in my head.  Craaa-aack that whip!  *  (Devo, and a warning, do not click that link unless you WANT to be subjected to some really random and classic 80’s, madness.  Yep, I was a fan of that too, *blush*)

The belt is basically just a waistband really.  A poor, bereft and lonely little waistband, with no skirt to call home…  *sad violins*  It’s exactly the same deal as the one I made for my tartan dress.  Just two buttonholes, and one button, and you wear it so the button is on the inside.

Also, interesting pocket tab/flap detail.  You can’t really see it on the outside, which defeats the purpose a bit really, but oh well.  It’s kinda cute when you notice it!

I flat-felled all seams throughout, as usual.  Btw, you CAN flat-fell all sleeve and armscye seams too… my tutorial for flat felling the armscye seam is here… and the sleeve seam itself can be flat felled by starting from the middle of the seam and stitching OUT.  Be sure to have the sleeve RIGHT SIDE OUT, so that you are sewing inside the sleeve… this will ensure that you are in no danger of stitching down the other side of the sleeve underneath…

In the case of this shirt; I stitched the sleeves to the shirt, and flat-felled that armscye seam before stitching up the sleeve and side seams…
First, stitch the sleeve and side seams in one fell swoop.  Press seam open and trim one side.  If you are flat-felling the seam towards the back of the garment, trim the back edge of the seam.

Press the front edge back over the back edge, turn under the raw edge, and press in a neat even width.

Turn sleeve RIGHT SIDE OUT  (v. important) and from the wrist end of the sleeve; bundle the tube of the sleeve up to locate a point roughly midway up the sleeve.  Position the bundled up sleeve tube behind your machine and pull the wrist end of the tube through until this midway point is under the needle.  Take it nice and slow, and stitch the flat-felled seam from here out to the wrist.

To complete the seam; just repeat the same process as above only bundling up the sleeve from the armscye side… locate that same midway point of the sleeve, and stitch the seam from there, to the underarm, and keep going in one long continuous seam down the side seams to the bottom hem of the shirt.

Done!

Details:

Blouse; Vogue 1384, white swiss voile
Skirt; Vogue 1247, striped stuff, details here and my original review of this pattern here
Sandals (above): my own design, made by me, all details here

   

Denim shoes (below); my own design, made by me, all details here
location at top: Preston St overpass, Como, Western Australia

Replicating the 80’s pattern envelope pose,  just because…. the 80’s.

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the year of handmade, 11

24/01/2017 11:01 am \ 20 Comments \

above are just a small selection of some of my favourite outfits for the last month, the entire collection for the year so far can be viewed in my Year of Handmade flickr album, here

So, a mere 30 days to go…   Wooooooweeeee!

Honestly, I’m now just like, yeah, whatever no biggie.  Coasting.  Yep, counting down the days; One.  At.  A.  Time… but y’know, otherwise pretty chill  ;P

All my clothes are of course holding up perfectly fine, clothes are a piece of cake.  Obviously I’m going to keep on wearing my self-made wardrobe, forever probably.  Can’t see that changing, in the foreseeable future anyway.  Shoes-wise, gawd… definitely counting down the days there…  my white thongs; well I have to admit I’m quite looking forward to hurling  them off a 1000ft cliff with great force  I mean, gracefully retire them as soon as I possibly can.  These have been my summertime walking shoes all last summer and this one too, they’ve done haaaaard duty and are looking pretty rough.  Those snowy-white straps are not so snowy now, I can tell you!  But unfortunately they are essential to my wardrobe, mostly because they are kinda rough now.  In my lifestyle where I do a lot of walking/gardening/spending time in the country; I really need rough-and-tumble, grunge-y footwear.  I was fairly devastated when we were at our beach house recently doing a weekend of heavy duty gardening (as seen here), and some of the cork underneath finally wore through and one wing of one thong pulled through.. aaaagh!  I still need those tacky things!!  So, a few blobs of liquid nails and new heels made of furniture felt later – it’s all I had! – and they’re mcgyver-ed together enough to see out the last month.  They look awful but I just don’t care…  I’m sure my walking friend E thinks I’m completely bonkers, persisting in wearing them whenever we get together for a walk.

Not going to complain now; it’s summer, I LOVE summer… dressing for summer is easy, and making summer sandals is very easy.  I have actually been toying with the idea of making a new pair.  It’s funny, the end is in sight, and I’m actually dreaming of making new shoes!!  I must be crazy, boom! proof right there…

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finishing an edge with bias binding

14/01/2017 2:52 pm \ 35 Comments \

Now, I promised to write this tutorial to show my Mum how I applied this finish to her top… and others expressed an interest too; thank you so much to everyone else who did… I finally did it, yay  😉

Mostly I would use this finish for a neckline that is wide enough to need no zip or button opening, as pictured above. Another example of its use is for a hemline such as the skirt demonstrated here.  I’m making this in a totally inflexible fabric with about zero give, PLUS the design has such a sharp curvature around the bottom edge a regular turned-up-twice hem is quite difficult to execute neatly.  The bias binding finish is a good solution for this 🙂   It results in a clean, banded finish on the inside of the garment, with one row of 1cm (3/8″) topstitching visible on the outside of the garment.

This method is just one of several ways of doing this kind of finish, I prefer this way because I find it the quickest and easiest, results in minimal fabric bulk, and minimal mucking around.

Firstly, make a strip of 2.5cm (1″) wide bias cut fabric long enough to fit the opening to be finished, plus at least 20cm (8″) extra.  Best fabrics to use are something woven that is very thin, fine and lightweight, like cotton voile, silk or handkerchief linen; in an unobtrusive colour toning in with the fabric.  For Mum’s cotton top above I used the self-fabric because it is quite light; for the blue suedette skirt I used a scrap of leftover silk-like microfibre.

Right sides together, pin around the edge to be finished, and stitch in a 6mm (1/4″) seam, leaving a gap between start and finish of around 15cm (6″) and ideally tails of at least 20cm (8″) 

Fold and press the strips to meet together on the bias.  I find it best to leave a very tiny gap, like 1-2mm or so, between the pressed edges.  Don’t have any explanation for this, just that it works better when it can stretch into it just a touch.  Keeping everything straight and right sides together, pin along the folds, stitch, and trim.  Press seam open.

Stitch up the gap to complete the bias strip attachment to the edge.  Press the bias strip, bias strip seam allowance, and garment seam allowance away from the garment.  Understitch these three layers together close to the seam line, keeping just the garment layer free.

Turn the garment wrong side up and press the bias strip back onto the garment, keeping the seam line just inside the pressed edge.

Turn under a 6mm (1/4″) seam allowance on the bias strip, press and pin in place.  Topstitch 1cm (3/8″) in from the garment edge.  Done! and the nice thing is that you won’t ever be able to see where the strip starts and ends  🙂

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2016; a retrospective

31/12/2016 11:55 pm \ 34 Comments \

Soooo.  It’s the last day of 2016.  Cheers! and here’s to the year that was… *chinks champers flutes*   Mwah, mwah, darlings!

Kicking off with my favourite ootd/blog pictures, just one for each month…  Apart from January, well obviously I did not make January’s outfit.. I am wearing a full traditional kimono in Tokyo! but it was definitely a highlight for my year! spending the day with my dear friend Yoshimi and with Cassie and Kelly, getting dressed in kimonos and having a Japanese lunch together.  So very interesting and so much fun!

Apart from this one picture, I made 100% of what I am wearing in every other picture…

January;

February;

March;

April;

May

June;

July;

August

September

October;

November;

December

Oh dear, oh dear; looking through all my old pictures to compile this post has been a little sad, Sienna features in so many of them.  yes I miss her so much, in fact everyday.  We’ve still been quite down here.  But I will not get all maudlin now…

Ever onwards.  So, my year in making:

I made a total of 101 things this year.  I don’t think this is too bad, considering it included a fully embroidered Alabama Chanin skirt, and 19 pairs of shoes.  Yep! NINETEEN pairs of shoes…  ahem, some of them are just a tad better than others, and several of the earlier, shonkier pairs have already winged their way to that big eternal shoe box in the sky…

Da breakdown…  13 dresses, 1 doll with a full wardrobe, 12 skirts, 5 lingerie sets, 5 prs of bathers (1 binned without blogging because it was an abject fail), 1 knitted cardigan, 5 jackets/anoraks, 2 prs thongs (flip-flops), 10 prs oxford/lace-up shoes, 1 pr winter boots, 2 prs desert boots, 2 prs slippers, 20 tops/shirts/blouses, 2 prs sandals, 5 prs tights, 1 pr jeans, 1 pr hand warmers, 13 bags/pieces of luggage.  Phew!

Selfishness vs. virtuous brownie-point earning:  63 plays 38.  Maybe a little tipped towards selfishness, but since that figure includes all the shoes, and practise shoes! that I needed just so I could lead a self-shod, but functional life, well I don’t think it’s too terrible.  I think I make just enough things for others that I’m not a pest about it, you know?

Costs… dunno.  Haven’t been keeping track.  Probably a small fortune?!  😉  No really, I did 3 refashions, and also 24 items were made from free “old” fabric being tossed out by others, or using leftovers, or scraps.  Really could improve upon this though…

Most worn items:  ah, this is my favourite bit…  For four years now I’ve kept track of what I’m wearing, three of those years via my ootd blog..  I keep a spread sheet that I update every month, so I know just how often each and every thing has been worn.   I know I know, super nerdy stuff.  But, real talk; it’s been an eye-opener I tell you… someone who tells you they’ve worn something hundreds of times…? well, if you actually add it up, for real; you may not have worn it as often as you think!  Truth!  Anyway, my most worn clothing items for this year can be summed up in the following outfits:

 

The obvious basics were my black winter boots (70 wears), black tights (109 wears over 4 prs), white LS woollen winter tees (30 wears over 2 tops), other white beige/ivory Tshirts(41 wears over 5 tops); my staples are all 4 of my coloured Miette cardigans, my little mini skirts for winter, and all my loose linen, cotton and silk dresses for summer.  For the most part I stick reasonably well to my autumnal palette but I’m not strict about it

Favourite creations:

I would have to say, topping of the list are my winter boots!!  so unbelievably proud of these things!!! and which as mentioned have been worn a TONNE.  I can still hardly believe I managed those things!

Followed closely by my Magdalena Dusk Alabama Chanin 3-piece ensemble.  I’ve worn it twice this year, not very much! I think I suffer from might-ruin-it-itis.  Gottta snap outta that.  This thing deserves to be paraded about more, not just for the several months worth of hand-embroidery it represents, but of course for its connection to my lovely friend Lisa of Lisa’s Carolina 🙂

I’m also pretty pleased and proud of my Tosti jacket...  🙂

Goals for 2017; Mainly, I want to see out the end of my 100% handmade challenge of course! I have just 53 days to goooooo!  But in making goals, well I don’t need anything, so my creating is going to be aimed at maintaining a useful wardrobe, and concentrating on higher quality, and more interesting things.  I would like to occasionally make some more fun and frivolous things too.   And to continue making shoes, and improving my cobbling skills.

Finally and most importantly of all, I just want to say THANK YOU to everyone who reads my blog and who takes the time to leave a comment, I am grateful for each and every kind thought.  Thank you so very much, and I’d like to wish all the best to everyone for a safe, happy, peaceful and creative 2017!  xxx

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… some clothes for Cassie

30/12/2016 12:07 am \ 17 Comments \

… and finally, I made some clothes for Cassie for her Christmas pressies too.  At first I had wanted to make some luggage or a travel set for her too; but we were hanging out in Spotlight together, you know as you do… and I discreetly sounded her out about the particular fabric that I had in mind for her.  And she basically nixed it.  Aaargh!  So I had to change tack.  Realistically, she probably needs clothes more than she needs a travel set, anyway!

Particularly she needed little separates and dresses for work.

Et voila…

1. a little spotty top.  The pattern is the cap-sleeved crop top;  Burda 02/2015; 127 and is one I’ve previously made for myself, here.  This one is sized to fit her and lengthened by about 5cm too.  The fabric was a surprise goodie from Spotlight.  I prefer polka dots to be irregular in some way, either in size or arrangement.  When I spotted (hehe) this one, well I just couldn’t resist!  A lovely soft grey crepe, with ivory spots in a satisfyingly random, non-grid pattern, and feels very luxe, just like silk.  I don’t think it is actually silk but it does feel exactly like it; lovely, slippery and whisper-soft.

Funny story; I made this nearly two months ago… and risked posting it on IG for bpsewvember “spots and stripes”… I don’t know what I was thinking … that she might be too busy at work to notice it or something? but she did! and commented “thanks, Mum!” eek!  I proceeded to just keep quiet about it and hope she wouldn’t actually come around asking for it, and luckily she didn’t think to do that!

that IG pic… with my own striped skirt

2.  a white cobwebby, lace-y skirt, with a very pretty border.  I used Vogue 1247… again! and spliced the pattern pieces together so there’s just one seamless front, and the two back pieces with one centre seam for the zip.  The white lace shell and cream suiting gabardine lining/underlining fabric are from Fabulous Fabrics.  The waistband is cut from the same cream fabric.  I like the cream peeping through from underneath the pure white lace, I think it makes a really nice, tonally subtle contrast.  The waistband looked a little bland by itself but I didn’t want machine topstitching, I thought it would look a little… I don’t know, like it would lower the tone of the skirt or something.  But it needed something.  So I did some hand-picksitching along the top edge… and really like how this looks; it adds a little bit of something, a certain handmade je ne sais quoi, and practically speaking achieves the stabilising effect of topstitching without the regimental look of machine topstitching.

note: shoes are Melissa

3.  finally a plain pink Tshirt. Looks boring, but she was over the moon with this!  This is my attempt to clone her favourite and beloved Cotton On Tshirt style and make a pattern from it for her… she has several of these and they’ve all been loved almost to rags!  I borrowed one that hadn’t been stretched out toooooo badly, and made a pattern from it; this was also a Christmas gift for her  🙂  I think it turned out pretty good , the fit and style is just about identical to the Cotton On one, so yay!  There’s nothing quite as valuable as an excellently fitting Tshirt pattern! and, bonus; they take barely an hour to whip up.

I finished the hems and sleeve edges with my twin needle, and since I was too lazy to wind up a new bobbin of pink, the double topstitching has one strand of pink, one of white.  You can only really tell if you look right up close! and I kind of like it.

And that’s it for my Christmas pressie making this year!

Oh! I almost forgot! not a Christmas present, but a few months ago I also made a Named pattern Inari tee dress for her.  This isn’t for work obviously, it’s just a casual, slop-around-at-home thing… the fabric was leftover from a hoodie that she made for herself previously, and she bought it in Tokyo during one of our holidays there.  I added a kangaroo pocket at the front because, well you know; pockets! and finished the neckline and opening edges of the pocket with a bias binding; left off the slits and finished the bottom gently curving longer at the back than at the front, mimicking the high-low hem of the original pattern.

It’s not a very exciting dress, but she likes to wear it on the weekend, or in the evening when relaxing, or to watch tv and stuff. An after-work, but pre-pyjamas thing.

Ok, now that’s really it.

Now, to make something for meeeeeeeeee!  she skips with a clear conscience to the sewing room, self-indulgent frippery in her heart… 

(btw; I apologise for the terrible quality pictures.  I just snapped most of these very quickly with my phone, on Christmas Day, as she tried everything on.  I’m hoping she will give me a little time for me to take some nicer pictures sometime… but she’s currently away and I reeeeeally wanted to get these blogged before the end of the year, to round all my “made” things off!  This post to be updated, in time!)  Update; DONE IT!!

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a whole swag of bags (portside by grainline)

26/12/2016 11:25 pm \ 32 Comments \

I haven’t felt like blogging very much, but absolutely must otherwise I’m going to get SO far behind… it’s time to get back on the wagon.  I’ve been super busy busy BUSY, sewing up Christmas and birthday presents; including this bunch o’ stuff.

Luggage, or “travel sets’.  This was my choice for a lot of my pressies for this year.  I made three complete sets, plus four extra toiletries bags.  Everyone (said they) loved them!
Pattern; the Portside travel set by Grainline Studio.  I bought it during their Thanksgiving sale and got going on it immediately…  It’s a nice little pattern for three pieces of luggage, a duffle bag, which is quite large,  a “dopp kit” which is what we would call here a dilly bag or a toiletries bag, and a “pouch” which is a nice and handy, flat little purse-thing that you could store phone/device chargers, keys, cards, or just any small things that you don’t want getting lost as they knock about in the duffle bag.

Fabrics; all fabrics and bits and bobs are from Spotlight, except for the lining of Craig’s set, which is from Homecraft Textiles.  The shells are constructed in thick, strong nylon drill from the upholstery section, intended for use in outdoor cushions and furniture, and all pieces are interfaced with the thickest, iron-on interfacing I could find.  It stands up by itself rather nicely, and it should be nice and tough too!  I lined everything with thin, waterproof, plastic-coated fabric, so the bags can be wiped clean inside.  The interior of a dilly bag should be wipe-cleanable and waterproof in any case so your fabric doesn’t get stained and dirty from makeup/shampoo/toothpaste leakages, and I decided to use the same stuff for everything because I was thinking they all might want to sometimes use the duffle bags as gym bags, or alternately as beach bags.  I just wanted all pieces to be both practical and tough.

Tim’s; made first.  All grey/black/white, very masculine which at first I thought perfect for a professional young man.  I actually made a matching grey/white dilly bag for him to start with, then suddenly felt all that extremely tasteful grey-and-white was all a bit plain-y plain blah blah blah, and decided it desperately needed an injection of FUN somewhere… we’ve been in sore need of fun around here lately… and Tim is naturally a pretty fun-loving kinda of a guy.  When I saw this black/white Darth Vader/stormtrooper fabric in Spotlight, well it all just fell into place.  I had bought some Star Wars Lego key rings for gifts when we were in Copenhagen last year; and had some leftover, and thought C3PO made a good zip pull for Tim’s bag.

Kelly’s set is all tropical palm print.  Also fully lined with the same thin, white plastic waterproof fabric.  And may I say… if only Spotlight had had this fabric in when I was planning my raincoat! I would not have resorted to using a shower curtain.  But they didn’t. Oh Spotlight. you crazy hit-n-miss, lucky dip of a fabric store, you.

I also made a full three-piece set for Craig, for his birthday… the grey is the same as in Tim’s, and I bought a dirty camel-brown for the contrast, and a dull, air force blue webbing for the trim.  I love these sludgy colours together, this one is actually my favourite colour combination out of all the sets…  I didn’t like the thought of a white lining for this set, too stark; so went hunting for a “browner” alternative; and found this great, beige plastic at Homecraft Textiles.  Actually, Homecraft Textiles had a really great range of waterproof fabrics… I’m seriously contemplating going there to get some raincoat fabric, hmmm.

In addition; I made two more of the Star Wars dilly bags; pretty much identical to Tim’s, except for the zip pulls.  One was for Sam, and theother for Cassie’s boyfriend D.  Unfortunately I only had one more of the Star Wars key chains, R2D2, which I put on Sam’s dilly bag; I had to promise D that if we ever got to Copenhagen again I would definitely get another key chain to finish his off to perfection!

I also made a pink flamingo dilly bag for my friend P, who LOVES hot pink and wears it a lot, thus the choice of this fabric.  It’s funny, I wouldn’t have chosen this otherwise but I kinda fell in love with it while making it, and ended up utterly adoring it.  Actually, it’s been pretty hard to part with any and all of these, for real  🙂

Finally, I made a second palm frond dilly bag, for another friend, M.  She’s been so kind and sweet and generous to me all year, and I just wanted to make something for her.  The only thing I’m super ashamed of is that I ran out of time and only just finished this one on Boxing Day, so it was a little late.  Eeeeeeek!

I enjoyed making all of these.. the only difficulties I had was in getting the hardware, I cleaned my local Spotlight out of their entire supply of 25 and 35cm white and beige dress zips, 51cm white “chunky” zips, and also all their swivel clips and D-rings; completely! and had to visit Homecraft Textiles for more.  I like the plastic swivel clips a lot; I know metal ones would be more “classy” and sure I could have found some online, but I just wanted everything lightweight and easy care, and I think these plastic ones are far more practical.

Some thoughts about the pattern and its construction… it is a good pattern, it works, fills a niche, all that; but I made a few minor little upgrades/mods/changes to the way I constructed mine, which I thought were an improvement to the outcome too.

As follows…

When sewing the side edges of the duffle bag and the dilly bag; start and stop the seams 1.2cm (1/2″) from the bottom edge… doing this makes it far easier to stitch the bag bottom piece on to each.  Trust me, it really really does.

pictured here is the lower corner of a lining bag, but the same tip applies to the shell also

Also; before the stitching the lining bag to the inside of the zip tape: secure the linings to the duffle and dilly bags, between the shell and the lining bags, up the side seams and the four upper corners, as well as the bottom of each duffle bag.  This helps further to keep the lining tamed firmly in place inside the bag, and not billow inside of the bag whenever you take things out.

Zips… the bane of our existence,  no?  Never the right length… for the duffle bag the pattern calls for 53cm zips, the closest I could find here in Perth was 51cm.  To  cover up the shortfall, I made a little inset bit to slip into the end of the seam covering the bottom of the zip.  I think this looks really nice.

Likewise, the pattern calls for 33cm and 23cm zips; here they only come in 30cm and 35cm; and 20cm and 25cm.  So for the 33cm; I bought 35cm zips and just cut the bottom ends off; and for the 23cm zips, well Spotlight ran out of the colours I needed and for several of the dilly bag pocketes I had to resort to a 20cm zip instead and made similar inserts to cover the bottom edge in the same way.

I added a little tab to the bottom end of each dilly bag zip, giving you something to grab at that end when you’re zipping it up.  It’s just a short piece of the same webbing that I’d used for the duffle shoulder strap, folded in half and stitched in with the bottom of the zip.  This helps a lot when you’re closing the bag.

I also lined inside the side pockets of the duffle bag, and also the side pocket of the dilly bag. It’s just neater and nicer, and more complete that way, I think.

To line the dilly bag pocket neatly… after stitching the upper side piece to the upper zip tape, lay the lining piece right side to the wrong side of the lower zip tape as pictured below, and stitch.

Proceed as per the pattern instructions, by topstitching the lower side piece over the lower zip tape

Not a mod, just a self-evident necessity; for the dilly bag I found I had to clip the freakin’ heck out of the top pieces, to get the top to fit in to the curve of the front/sides.

stretched out to the utmost…

Now, it has to be said; the complete absence of metric measurements in the Portside pattern is pretty annoying.  When I saw this I was like, really?!  I mean, I can forgive that in a pre-70’s vintage pattern… but not in a modern day pdf, sold internationally.  It’s not a deal-breaker for me, but still, this is just not good enough.  Sure, it’s not hard for us pattern purchasers to convert all the measurements ourselves and jot them directly onto our pattern, that don’t forget, we had to print out ourselves too; but when you’re paying $14 for it… well, I just don’t think you should have to do that.

Now it looks messy…. should NOT have to do this….  

… I’ve only just noticed this; that under “gather your supplies” the list includes “sewing machine”  ;D

…  but I don’t want to end on a down note.  Overall I’m pretty happy with my decision to buy and make it, well obviously, since I’ve made so many!  Maybe I should … er, make one for me?!

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thank you

26/12/2016 11:21 am \ 7 Comments \

To everyone who left such caring and lovely thoughtful words on Sienna’s last post, thank you so very much.  Your kindness has meant so much to me, more than I can say.

picture from 1 year ago, Bunkers Bay

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