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 :)

 

Valentino - A Sewing Adventure

Yesterday I went on my first sewing/blog related adventure and it was a great experience. There are 2 halves to this post really (1) meeting a fellow blogger and (2) the actual exhibition.

Some months ago Sam, blogging at A Little of What You Fancy, suggested a trip to the Valentino Exhibition at Somerset House. I really wanted to go, I don't have any IRL sewing friends who would want to go for the same reasons as me, even though they'd happily come along.

It's a funny thing, this blogging lark. You kind of know somebody but not really. I'm not always very brave and tend to talk too much to overcompensate (I suspect I did do that - sorry Sam!). Well, my recommendation is - be brave! Sam as is lovely as her blog suggests and it was a joy to go to the exhibition with another sewer. We exchanged emails and a phone call beforehand and all the arrangements went really smoothly. It helped enormously that we've seen photos of each other and she was wearing her new coat which is beautiful (and lined - more on that below!), saves wearing a pink carnation!

We'd never have met if it wasn't for a shared love of sewing and having new blogs. Even if this blogging business has been harder than either of us had expected. It was a great ice breaker to go to an event we were both interested in and we had lunch afterwards and a good chat. My OH picked me up at the station and said "I can tell you had a lovely day." - I did, thanks Sam.

So, to the actual Exhibition - it was wonderful. Of course you can't take photos, the ones I've used here are the official press photos. It was £12 for a ticket, I think it was worth every penny. And Somerset House is easy to get to, Sam and I travelled in to different London mainline stations but it's a straightforward tube journey. The exhibition is at the Embankment side of Somerset House so aim for that entrance.

There were far more garments than I expected to see and although behind barriers they are not behind glass. This was a real positive, you could actually get quite close and see details. The guide book contains a brief description of each garment and the collection it came from. Also, there's a glossary in the back for all the couture terminology - very useful.

The clothes weren't arranged chronologically but rather by technique or theme (eg all the handpainted fabric garments were together, spanning decades). I loved it and would recommend it, you get a morning or afternoon ticket which lasts 4 hours - Sam and I were in there over 3 hours so allow yourself time.

One of the best bits for me was the last section of the exhibition. There were examples of different techniques, some unique to Valentino, and then screens showing how they are achieved. We even identified a couple we thought we could do - although we weren't sure how we'd turn them into a garment!

There were a couple of things that really struck me:

Attention to detail - I guess this is obviously going to be the case for couture garments but, oh boy, the work in some of those dresses was amazing. And, just because you can do all the techniques doesn't mean you should, sometimes the absence of something is what made the garment stunning. Some of my least favourites were from the 80s/90s when there was a definite fashion for throwing everything at it - just not my cup of tea. My favourite tiny detail was on a shirt cuff - I'm going to give it a go and blog about it in the new year.

Don't be too hard on yourself - there were details both Sam and I picked up on that we would have fretted over if we'd made the garment - isn't that bizarre? Now Sam is a much more skilled sewer than I but neither of us would have had a bias binding hem on a skirt with the bias join practically in the centre front, I'd have had to do it again! And there were unlined coats all over the place. Now I'm going to try to take a different view - 'if it's good enough for Valentino' is my new mantra!

And finally, an important message:

Dear Father Christmas

I haven't actually been terribly good, there's no fooling you. But, if you're feeling forgiving, please could I have the outfit on the left in this photo, cream organza with flower detail, as worn by Audrey Hepburn in 1968. It is absolutely perfect.

Thank you

Love

Jacq

XX

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