Gifts for Crafters

A few weeks ago I made a couple of craft bags for Sam and my DD.

It was a gift for Sam's birthday and I used fabrics she's admired when I bought them.  I wanted her to have something she'd like and use because she gave me such a beautiful gift for my birthday in April.  She's a very skilled knitter so I hoped it would be handy for her latest project.

My DD had recently asked me to teach her to crochet - no mean feat as she's a lefty and I'm a righty but she's doing brilliantly.  She's making blankets for a friend who is expecting twins - the young woman I made this dress for.

I'd had this turquoise floral fabric for a while, I picked it up at a vintage fair last year.  A had her eye on it from the start and I'd hoped to make a simple top for her, even though the fabric was 36" wide I thought I could just about manage it.  However, when I looked carefully there were lots of little holes in the fabric - from being pinned for such a long time.

I'd used the pattern before for a swap gift.  It's free from Craftsy here and I'd really recommend it, it would be great for a beginner.

I now have an order for another one but I don't think I'm going to manage to make it before I go on holiday.

In fact I'd quite like one for myself - I'll add that to the list!

x

Life's Selvedge

Selvedge (also Selvage)

Definition - noun
1.  an edge produced on woven fabric during manufacture that prevents it from unravelling. 
2.   Geology a zone of altered rock, especially volcanic glass, at the edge of a rock mass.

Despite having an O'Level in Geography (and boy do I age myself with that qualification), personally the only definition I'm interested in is (1).

Things have been really busy, barely manageable busy, and my sewing time has been a big, fat zero.

This is no good for me.

I need to do creative stuff, it's part of the very fabric of my being, the selvedge that stops me unravelling. 

But time has been really short and I'm rubbish at sewing in short bursts - I know the '15 minutes a day' method works for some people but not for me - I've just about gathered my wits and decided what I'm going to make in that time!

So I needed a fall back, something I could happily pick up in 5 minutes windows of opportunity.

Guess what I decided to do first ... knitting.  This is what I planned to make:


Fab isn't it? 
This pattern is available free at www.skiffvintageknittingpatterns.co.uk

 

Big mistake, I'm a pants knitter.  Don't get me wrong, I can cast on like a good 'un, knit and purl, cast off, sew up neatly, even cable.  My tension's fine too.  I can't do that clever kind of flicking the wool over thing like a proper knitter, I have to hold both needles in one hand and use the other to wind the yarn around - it's not elegant but it works. "What's the problem?" you ask - and it seems like a reasonable question.  Well, I can't fix it when I make a mistake - and I make plenty. Seriously, I know it's gone wrong but have no idea how to go about putting it right.  In crochet I can 'see' it but knitting stitches look like scribble to me.  Here is a real example ...

I love to make homemade gifts.  I have, over the years, knitted things for my kids.  They understand this means I love them bigger than the whole world - there is no bigger deal, unconditional love.  Knitting is torture for me.  2 years ago I decided to make my boy a scarf because he's at Uni in a very cold, damp place.  Week before Christmas I was in bed with 'flu - I needed to finish it so I struggled on.  I dropped a stitch and it started to run - I had absolutely no idea how to fix it and was desperate because my only option was to unravel the lot and start again!  There was crying (I did have 'flu so it was not my finest hour!). 

My daughter took it and drove to my Best Friend's house (20 mile round trip) so that she could fix it and then brought it back for me to finish.  True story.

So that is why my current knitting project looks like this:

Yep, I unravelled it!  But let me tell you the cast on and 20 rows
of rib were perfect - if only I hadn't started the pattern all would have been fine!

It's not going to beat me, I am totally determined to crack this knitting business but, in my current fragile state I was pushing my luck.  And, perhaps more importantly, my Best Friend is in Egypt on holiday so it wasn't practical to take it to her for fixing!

So, I've gone back to an early, crafty love and I am cross-stitching.  It is just the ticket, soothing my mind.  This is a gift I am making for my brother Yoda and his partner:

The Princess Bride in cross-stitch - genius!

My whole family are PB fans - don't quote from the film unless you're prepared to endure 10 minutes of scene re-enactments!  You can find the pattern here http://www.etsy.com/people/weelittlestitches

I came across the patterns on Jo's blog (www.sewmuchchoice.wordpress.com) - I was lucky enough to be paired with Jo during the IHOP nautical swap earlier in the year.

If you are a geek (or have a geek in the family) then you have to check out the rest of Jacqueline's cross-stitch patterns - suffice to say what you see here is the tip of the iceberg for me, I am beavering away trying to make some super secret Christmas gifts for my family.  I mean who doesn't need Doctor Who (all 11 of them) and his Tardis in the medium of cross-stitch?

Oh, and if you fancy making something super brilliant (Star Wars cross-stitch anybody?), then I've found a really great UK supplier of threads here - I bought DMC threads for half the price I could buy them anywhere else.

P and I are going away for a week, we fly on Thursday - I am so looking forward to the break.  It got a bit 'iffy', we thought we weren't going to be able to get away because of family stuff going on but now it's all organised.  We're off to Lanzarote for a week (neither of us has been before) and my wonderful OH booked a hotel right next to a bi-weekly craft market - good job we've got a generous luggage allowance!  I figure cross-stitch might not be ideal for the 'plane so I've sorted out some wool and a scarf pattern to crochet - perfect, I can practically do that in my sleep.

Finally (I will stop rambling eventually), I happened upon Barbara's blog, I have no idea how I haven't come across it before.  She is wonderful - I have literally gone back to the beginning and read every single post - I have laughed aloud, sat and nodded in agreement, and shed the odd tear.  If you don't follow her blog already I would recommend it wholeheartedly.

x

This photo is unrelated to anything in this post but is Ernie, my DD's new kitten -
he is a little pickle and I am entirely unable to craft when he is around because he is into everything!
 Elmo's nose is entirely out of joint :)

 

"Autumn in Tokyo" Dress - The Sew Weekly Reunion

I have tied myself in knots - staggering I know, it's totally not like me to give myself a hard time!



See that smile?  That's because the dress fits at bust and shoulders with
no pulling at the front and no gaping at the back - result!

 

 

 

In my head this is how The Sew Weekly Pantone challenge would go:

1. I would make a garment using the Pantone Autumn 2013 colours
2. I would finish it well before the deadline
3. It would be a dress - because I need some and I would be brave and overcome my cowardice fear of accommodating my bust - thus achieving my Sewlution too
4. I would use one of the 2 fabulous patterns sent to me by Barbara as part of the swap - both of which were dresses, how serendipitous
5. I would definitely incorporate some of the beautiful notions Barbara sent me
6. I would use only stash fabric, thus adding to the total for August for the Style The Stash sewalong and removing some of the guilt about the amount of fabric I've added to my stash in the last few weeks!
7. I would make sure the inside of my dress was as well finished as the outside, I have an overlocker after all
8. I would follow the instructions to the letter

Well, I managed 1, 2, 3 and 6 - so I guess 50% is pretty good!  I am not going to beat myself up over it.

My fabric choice made a huge impact on my plans.  I'd identified 16 possible pieces but when I looked afresh I felt that this was the best match for colours:

I bought this in Tokyo last September, it's a beautifully soft cotton.
There were challenges because it is actually a sarong, so very narrow - more
on that below

Because of the limited amount of fabric I had to work with I couldn't use either of the dress patterns Barbara sent me in the swap - they just needed more than I had.  So, it was back to the drawing board and a search through my patterns.

I chose Butterick B5450 because it requires so little fabric.   Also, because of the way the bodice is constructed with pleats I thought it would give me the opportunity to tweak a little bit and end up with a fitted dress that didn't pull across the bust.  I made a muslin of View A and, with a bit of faffing around, had a fit I was happy with.

I am so thrilled about this I can't express it - if Karen comes checking up on my Sewlution I have totally nailed it, I won't need to hide behind the sofa!

Sadly, my fabric choice didn't work with any of the notions Barbara sent me either - but that just gives me something to look forward to when I'm not so constrained by colour choice.  I already have a plan ...

So here goes, The Sew Weekly Facts:

As you can see, I was right at the end of my fabric,
I spent a lot of time figuring out how to make all the
pattern pieces fit

Fabric:  A beautiful sarong that I bought in a flea market in Tokyo last September.  The colours were perfect for this challenge, the size of the fabric was not!  Although I had 2.2 metres in length the fabric width was about 75cm.  It was tight!

On the plus side, width doesn't count in the Style the Stash sewalong - as it's the only thing I've managed to make in August I need to count every centimetre.

 

This is how much fabric I had left from each end of the sarong - literally scraps

Notions: Just a recycled zip (charity shop find) and thread. 

Pantone Challenge colors:  Acai and Vivacious.  There are also slight hints of Linden Green too.

Pattern:  Butterick B5450

Year:  Circa 2010.  I bought the pattern last year as an OOP - part of a bundle of 3 for £5 last September at a craft fair.

Time to complete:  This is tricky.  I spent one evening after work making and fiddling with a muslin.  It was totally worth it though and I'm so glad I did.

I made the dress on Sunday - apart from hand stitching (bodice lining and around the zip).  I definitely added time because I really didn't like the instructions for putting the dress together.  I was determined to try to stick to them (because for some reason I'd put that on my list!) but the lining instructions were bonkers - I'm not doing it like that again - there was swearing!

And the zip insertion made no sense to me so I reverted to Winnie's brilliant tutorial - she's never let me down yet!  That meant I inserted, removed and inserted the zip again.

 

All in all, probably about 10 hours - I'm slow obviously.

However, when I make it again, and I will, it'll be much quicker.  And I'll finish all the insides properly - this is totally ridiculous but I forgot to use my overlocker - seriously.  You couldn't make it up could you?  I think I got so befuddled trying to make myself follow instructions I didn't like that I just picked up my pinking shears without thinking!

Most importantly, it fits - so that trumps absolutely everything else!

First worn:  Today, for work which included a multi-agency meeting - I wouldn't wear all of my handmade garments in that environment, this dress felt smart enough :)

Wear again?  Absolutely, I've had so many compliments today.  My favourite was a male colleague asking me if I make my dresses to match my existing jewellery!

Total Cost: 

• The fabric was 440 yen, at today's exchange rate that's about £2.90 
• The zip was part of a bundle I bought in a charity shop, probably about 10p
• I've had the thread in my stash for ages, I have no idea how much that cost, I'm calling it £1
• The lining fabric was scraps leftover from part of a dance costume my daughter had years ago so I'm calling that £0.00. 
• Cost of pattern was about £1.70

Grand total - £5.70 - woo hoo!

Forgive the wrinkles (on the dress not me!)
Photos get taken at the end of the day, when P is here to take them,
at least that way I know garments have passed the wearability test!

 

Well, I've really enjoyed taking part in The Sew Weekly Reunion - thank you to everyone who organised it for all of your hard work.

Jacq
x