Spring cleaning? No. Spring *crafting*!

March is a busy enough month in our household what with 3 family birthdays in close succession as well as Easter and Mothering Sunday, so why on earth I decided that what I really needed was a few more craft projects is utterly beyond me.  However, that’s exactly what happened so I have been busily crafting away and saving ourselves a bit of money at the same time.

I shortened the curtains from our old house so they would fit our new one better, then made some cushion covers from the leftovers – with a little ‘help’ from the Cub…

The pattern I used was a simple Oxford edged envelope design as explained here: http://www.housetohome.co.uk/articles/how-to-update-an-old-cushion_2_368794.html

I then embellished them with a simple broken line stitch around the edge and an embroidery design in the centre.  To cheer the monotony of beige I used 3 bright colours that will feature elsewhere in our sitting room when I’m done: hot pink, turquoise and orange. Psychedelic  it may sound, but the effect was discreet and pretty.

Oh, and I’m working on some tie-backs for the curtains.  So far I’ve crocheted some turquoise ones and was planning to decorate them with crocheted flowers in different colours, but I’m starting to waver (now I’ve actually made the wretched things) and may go with fabric tie-backs made from leftovers and use the flowers on those.  I may have to fake up one of each and decide which I like best when I’m done.

 Here's a little picture of my shortened curtains and make-do tie-backs. Please ignore the baby jail and laundry drying over it. It rather spoils the bucolic prettiness of a rocking chair by a window :)

Celebrate!

So I don't remember if I had a whinge here about the fact that my sewing machine was broken. I probably did, it was such a disappointment to me, when I'd been waiting so long to have the room to use it. Anyway, the in-laws popped over for a cup of tea the other day and F-i-L, who's handy, heard me telling M-i-L about the machine and offered to take a squint at it.

I'm still not entirely certain what was wrong with it, but long story short: he fixed it - huzzah! The light works and everything! Am so so excited, planning all sorts of stuff to sew with it, including at least one more apron in the same style as before (post on that to follow soon), but a different colour and maybe a couple of full-body ones. Ooh - I'll have to get my mum to bring up the apple print plasticised fabric with her when she comes to visit on Friday!

Now, to plan my Christmas present projects!

Update

So... I've been absent for a few days. Hubby and I've been staying with my parents near London, taking advantage of a wedding present we were given for a lunch river cruise on the Thames and a trip on the London Eye. Whilst I do have access to the internet at theirs, I've been trying really hard to prioritise my real life connections over my virtual ones, and part of that is spending time with family first and foremost, and updating my blog and Facebook second!

I'm gonna give you a bullet point update of the things I've been up to of late, then I can fill you in in more detail over the next few days.
-Made birthday cake and present for one of my best friends
-Did a pregnancy photo shoot of one of my other best friends
-Made soap (yes, I still haven't told you about that, have I?)
-Made Sloe Gin
-Did some tailoring for my sister
-sent off two job applications and a bunch of CVs
-Went on the aforementioned London trip

See? Told you I'd been busy!

I can tell you about the tailoring now, since it's a simple story and I forgot to take any photos to go with it. My sis started her first job on the Monday just gone and, in anticipation of this, bought herself an entire new wardrobe. Insane amounts of clothing. Anyway, due to the family trait of short arms and legs, which we both inherited, two of the pairs of trousers she'd bought were too long, even though she wears 4 inch heels and is only a UK size 6 anyway.

As well as this she had a suit jacket with really cheap, plasticky looking buttons on it. For the small remuneration of £10 I replaced the buttons with some amazing Art Deco style pewter effect ones out of my mum's button box and took up both pairs of trousers. This benefitted both of us, because she can't/won't sew and a tailor would charge her a fortune for the same services.

Unfortunately the task was rather more onerous that it needed to be, since I have no overlocker and it took forever to get the tension right for the zig-zag stitch on my mum's Singer. Plus both pairs of trousers were slightly stretch, prone to fraying and my sister is very particular about her clothes - scary job! Still, I think I did an OK job, using two lines of zig-zag stitch instead of overlocking, then doing a simple overhand whip-stitch to hem it. I could have done what I generally do when I take up a hem and turned it over twice before whip-stitching, but that can create a bit of a lumpy hem and since these were work clothes I needed them to look as smart as possible. I wish I had taken pictures, but even more I wish that I had an overlocker... Though a working sewing machine of my own would be a good start!

Technology Fail

So... I'm making this cute little skirt apron for my friend's birthday. It's bright scarlet cotton, lovely and crisp, all gathered with a deep waistband - very '50s. It should have taken me just a couple of hours to knock up, but unbeknownst to me, my sewing machine (which I have been waiting so eagerly to use) is dead and lifeless.

I was so excited about having my own sewing machine and, after the teeniness of our little flat, the space to use it, but it was not to be. My darling husband performed resusitative surgery on it, but it was not to be. A new fuse would not fix it. It may be the motor. Boo :-(

So I've been hand stitching the whole thing - good job I'm a neat and speedy sewer. It's nearly all finished now - thank God, but I may have to scale back my plans for decoration, unfortunately. I was going to applique beautiful flowers and letters on the front saying 'Domestic Goddess'... Not sure what to do now, but I'll think of something - I'm gonna have to make myself one too in white or pale yellow - it's so cute! I'm also going to use the stiff red cotton to make myself one of those lovely '50s dresses - stunning or what?

Photos to follow!

Pretty Pattern Madness!

So I went a little crazy today. My 'friend' (who shall remain nameless) sent me a link to the most beautiful midnight blue satin evening dress, 1950s style, which she knows I adore. This dress was a piffling £150 -- a sum which makes me blanch slightly to think of spending at the moment, when hubby and I are teetering so precariously on the edge of solvency after a few months of, frankly, insolvency.

Anyway, I mentioned this to the lovely ladies at the D2E forum, hoping one of them would be able to turn up a lovely pattern or something. Well, they didn't as such, but their suggestions got me Googling and I rediscovered a site I had browsed obsessively a long while back - the marvellous Sewing World (don't visit that link unless you want to have a massive attack of the 'I wants'). They stock all the usual pattern makers, including the divine Vintage Vogue range: a reprinted selection of the original, stunning 1940s and '50s dresses, hats and coats patterns that are so chic and feminine and classic that I basically wanted them all, but managed to talk myself down to four...

That's right. I bought four dress patterns (see one of them below). Now, they weren't hugely costly, but they weren't exactly bargain basement either, this is Vogue we're talking about here. However. I reckon I just have to make one evening dress and I'll have made a saving. Even a really beautiful satin in the right amounts for a 1950s cocktail dress will still come to less than £150, right - unless I get some very rare silk and I don't think that's going to happen on my rusty and long-awaited return to dressmaking. Anyway - one evening dress and I'll have definitely broken even, so any dress I make from the patterns after that will be the cost of fabric only - marvellous! Plus a few cotton day dresses will give me more scraps for patchwork.

As the final cherry on the cake I was discussing toiles (or muslins) with Barb from the D2E forum and she suggested that one make up the toile from a cheap, pretty printed cotton, then if it goes wrong you still won;t be very out of pocket and can probably fix it fairly easily, but if it (hopefully) goes right then you have a lovely day dress to wear and can make your evening dress in the happy knowledge that you test drove the pattern already.

Even more cleverly Barb suggested making the toile out of a lightweight lining satin, so the dress is fully lined. Tack that in with a few judicious slip stitches and it'll mean that (unless God forbid you get something down the front of the dress) you only need remove and wash the lining, rather than having to worry about the whole frock being washed.

I'm so excited about those patterns and I can't wait for them to arrive! I just hope they don;t go AWOL in the postal strike we're being threatened with.

Now I know what's next on my wish list... A beautiful, multi-tiered net petticoat... (unless there's a pattern for that, too!)

Patchwork Dilemma

I was rootling through a basket my mum dug out for me of fabric scraps, sewing equipment and suchlike and in it was a project I started in about October 2003, I guess this is the time of year when my mind turns to patchwork...

Anyway, this project consists of 20 large patches made from 6 hexagons of a flowery fabric with a centre hexagon of yellow cotton - each one resembling a large flower. Some of these 'flowers' have white hexagon patches surrounding them, indicating how I was intending to join the 20 into a whole. Anyway, I laid them out on the floor in front of me and had a good look.


Firstly, I don't think I have enough patches for the pattern to look balanced. At the moment it runs 2 patches, 3 patches, 2 patches, 3 patches (going from right to left in the piccie above), so I'm either going to need another 2 or another 3 'flowers' depending whether I add them to the 'top' or the 'bottom'. Secondly I'm not sure if the length and width are large enough for this to work on a double bed, which is what I had originally intended it for I believe. Finally, and most damning of all, sweet and cottagey as the delicate floral prints are, they don't really tone in with the way I've decorated the house, which is plain, minimal, with blocks of solid colour... more trendy, basically, than this sweet, old-fashioned design of mine from 6 years ago. So here's the question - what do I do with it now?

- Finish it as a double and be damned, perhaps my tastes will change, or we'll move house and it'll fit in better
- Finish it as a single and keep it for if I have a little girl in the future
- Turn it into a number of cushions, aprons, whatevers and gift them to people, hoping I can find people with similar tastes. If I do this I'll need more suggestions for the 'whatevers'.
- Finish it and gift it to someone as a wedding present... I've actually just thought of a friend who might like it... although I'm not certain whether they would and they're not actually engaged, so...

Answers on a postcard please...