MMM '13, Days 12-18

I was finding it a bit more difficult  to find me-made items every day without too many repeats but it it did make me wear a few items that I don't usually reach for and I did manage to exceed my target of four, so that's good. 

Day 12, Sunday (Mothers day). Nothing me -made today and no photo, although all items came from the op-shop. Actually does it count that I was wearing the blue lace Laurel at 1am on Sunday morning?! We were at a party...

Day 13, Monday. At home with a sick LittleFB (he's better now).
Scarf - Made from .25m of Lotta Jansdotter fabric, some leftover linen and backed with velvet from an op-shop curtain!
Jumper, stripey top, jeans: op-shop

Apologies for the dark, fuzzy inside picture..

Day 14, Tuesday. Back at work.

Dress: Cynthia Rowley 2406 in op-shop fabric. I never wear this dress but I like the print and thought I'd give it another try during MMM. After wearing it all day, I know remembered why I don't like it. The fabric is some yucky polyester and it doesn't feel nice to wear; all static and hot. The pockets make it feel kind of lumpy and the facing keeps flipping out. It's going to the op-shop!
Boots: from NZ

Day 15, Wednesday. Work day.
Dress: Simplicity 3835
Top, tights: Cotton on
Boots: as before
Necklace: op-shop

I've worn this dress heaps.  It's comfy, easy to layer up and good to wear with tights and boots (yes Mum, boots again!).  MMSTL calls these my smurf tights!

Day 16, Thursday. Work day (lots of meetings)
Dress:  Corporate Cambie
Jacket: op-shop
Necklace: op-shop

Hmmm two grey dresses in a row this week.   And a new location: our front porch. Not sure what that plastic crocodile is doing there.

Day 17, Friday. At home. Gardening, bit of sewing.
Top: Green Briar (not yet blogged) and striped top, Cotton on.
Jeans: op-shop

Look, I made a Briar! This version was mainly to test the fit so it's made from some mystery green op shop jersey and my twin stitching is a bit wobbly.  I wasn't sure about the high-low thing on me but I do kind of like it - good for layering.  It's clinging a bit at the front when wearing over the stripey top but the back is good.  Maybe I'll add a bit of length at the front for a future version.  

Day 18, Saturday. Social sewing, hanging out with LittleFB

Dress: Simplicity 3835 in donated stretch-linen and pleated pockets from some Internet tutorial. (unblogged)
Tights: Susaan
Boots: Campers.

I don't actually wear this dress all that often but I'm glad that I pulled it out of the wardrobe. It's comfy and fun with the tights, even though the sleeve ties make it a bit difficult to fit a cardigan over the top.

So, there we go.  Over half way through and going well!

Blue lace, hot pink linen.. could it work?

.. What do you think?

It's another version of the Laurel dress.   Remember the beautiful lace that I was gifted recently?  Well, when we were invited to a cocktail party to celebrate a friend's birthday recently it was a great opportunity to make a fancy frock. I thought that the simple shape of the Laurel would show off the lace and not involve too many seams.   Also Rachel made a lovely blue lace Laurel recently: thanks for the inspiration!

Originally I was going to underline the dress with navy, but felt that it needed a little bit of something different so I went through my fabric stash and found a piece of hot pink linen, and there was the combo I was looking for. 

Because I wanted to use the scalloped lace edge as the hem, the length of this dress was dictated by the width of the fabric - about 34 inches (and yes I usually measure in inches when I sew..not sure why). I was worried that it would be a bit too short but it ended up being fine as a cocktail dress.

The dress is underlined with a remnant of hot pink linen from Rathdown remnants.  There wasn't quite enough to line the sleeves though but fortunately I found some identical coloured fabric in my stash which used to be....a doona cover.  I'm classy like that, using old sheets to make a cocktail dress. Whatever. You can't tell right?

So there I was, happily and carefully cutting out my underlining pieces, then using them to cut the lace which I had oh-so-carefully laid out so that the  scallops were laying straight and the motifs looked OK, cutting out the back pieces and then... DISASTER STRUCK.    I managed to cut the sleeves out of the only piece of fabric that was big enough for the front of the dress. 

Grrrr.

No chance of getting more fabric. Determined not to have to abandon this project, I ended up joining two shorter pieces together by overlaying them, matching up the motifs and then hand-stitching them together, before trimming off the excess underneath.  Fortunately it worked and you can't see the join (it's just above the bust line) due to the busy-ness of the lace. 

Phew.

After that, the rest of the dress was pretty straightforward.  I took my time; hand -basted the lace to the underlining along the edges and the darts and handpicked the zip.   It was nipped in a little at the sides and back to make it a little more fitted than my Flamingo dress. I hemmed the underlining separately to the lace so that the scallops would show. The dress is lined (body only) with some hot pink poly lining, slip-stitched to the zip and the seams between the sleeve and bodice were finished on the overlocker.

I wore the dress on Saturday night to the cocktail party and we had a blast!

Another project, another learning curve.  Some more firsts:

• working with lace
•  underlining
• lining a dress without referring to instructions

What I would do differently next time:

• Lay out all  my pieces before cutting
• Fully line the dress, including the sleeves
• Hmm, that's it. I'm quite proud of this dress!

Details
Colette Patterns, Laurel dress: Used before =free
1.5m Blue lace: gifted
1m Pink linen from Rathdown remnants = $6
1m pink poly lining from Rathdown remnants = $4.90
Thread and zip from op-shop stash = 10c

Total cost = $11. Hooray!

MMM'13 Days 5-11

It was a bit ambitious to start MMM last week with that fancy picmonkey collage stuff, so it's back to regular pictures this week, although I did change the locations up a little bit for interest. And as I've been enjoying looking what at other bloggers who are doing this challenge have been up to (which gives a  bit of context on the clothes) I'll be adding this in too.

Day 5 (Sunday): Off to the museum with LittleFB
Top: Marija Denmark Kimono Tee, made from an op-shop jersey scarf) unblogged.
Cardigan: Diana Ferrari
Jeans: Op-shop
Scarf: Bought in China
Boots: Campers, op shop

Day 6 (Monday):Work day
Oops, blurry....  MMSTL obviously hadn't had his coffee when he took this, plus it was too cold to take lots of pictures.

Dress: Belladone rouge. 
Top (worn under dress): too old to remember
Cardi: Op shop
Tights: boots as before

I'm glad this dress works in colder weather with a layer underneath because I love it!

 

 

Day 7 (Tuesday): Work day

Dress:  Stylish Dress book, tunic B lengthened into a dress,  made up in cotton lawn from Spotlight (unblogged)

Belt, boots, necklace: Op-shop

 



 

Day 8 (Wednesday): At work.

Dress: Mad men dress

Cardi: Diana Ferarri, as before

Shoes: Op-shop

 

This dress received lots of nice compliments at work and even got a few people interested in coming along to social sewing!

 

 

 

Day 9 (Thursday), Work day with lots of meetings

Skirt: Simplicity 2444 made up in mystery green drapey op-shop fabric with a slightly rough texture (unblogged)

Top: Polka-dot Alma

Jacket: Zara

Shoes: Op-shop

 

I was originally going to make the full dress but I thought I'd get more wear out of a skirt so I just added a waistband.


 

 

Day 10 (Friday): At home, sewing, food shopping, bit of gardening. hanging out with our chooks - Ninja and Vader. 

Top: Grainline woven Tee made up in cotton voile from Spotlight (unblogged)
Jeans: as before
Shoes: Funkis
Necklace: Op-shop

Day 11 (Saturday): Morning tea with friends, hanging out with LittleFB at home
Top: Wiksten Tank in a cotton butterfly voile from spotlight
Jeans: Op-shop
Shoes: Funkis
Necklace: Bought in the US

I didn't think I'd wear this top again until next summer but it was 25C today!

 I've realised a few things this week:

1. I've been quite hopeless at blogging my finished items.
2. It's not been all that hard to wear something that I've made each day even though my goal was 4 times a week.
3. I need more cold weather tops.
4. I don't have any pants, apart from jeans in my wardrobe.
5. Melbourne has crazy weather, going from 4C to 25C this week and layers are good.
6. Most of my shoes come from the op-shop.  I really don't have a problem with this.  I give them a spray with some tea tree oil and a bit of an airing and they are good to go.

How are you going with MMM if you are taking part?

Five favourite garden things

Passionfruit! 10 or 11 fruit on our two year old vine.  Woo-hoo!

Nature strip garden: mini cauliflowers, edible flowers, lettuce, leeks and asian greens

Lots of lovely kale

Emerging garlic shoots

Rows of root crops: radishes, carrots and beets.

What's growing in your garden at the moment?

Me Made May, Days 1-4

Here we go, I've decided that daily posts might get a bit boring so I'm going to post a week's worth every Saturday. Only 4 outfits this time though as Me Made May started mid week.

A reminder that my pledge is to "endeavour to  wear a handmade or refashioned garment 4 times per week."

So far,so good!  I've already hit my target.

Day 1:  Skirt, Simplicity 2155 (Cynthia Rowley pattern)
Top and scarf, op shop
Tights, Dimmeys
Boots bought in New Zealand.

Day 2: 'Corporate' Cambie, never blogged but worn a lot!
Necklace, me-made (from a placemat!)
Cardi, op-shop
Scarf, a gift.

Day 3: Pencil skirt, Burda  8155
Top, op-shop
Necklace, Elk

Day 4: Black linen Kelly skirt
Top, op-shop
Necklace, as before
Tights, Susaan
Boots, Campers op-shop

Part of this challenge is to see how much of what I have made is wearable on a day-today basis, and also to identify gaps in my wardrobe.    So far it's all about skirts and dresses.... 

Are you doing MMM?  How's it going?

WTF? (What the flamingo?) Is that a Laurel?

Here is my version of the Colette Laurel and despite the amount of fabric wrangling that went into making  this dress, I have to say I'm rather taken by it.   It was supposed to be  a practice for my real version (to be made up in some gorgeous silk cotton that I got on my recent trip to NZ) which I was then going to enter into the competition but this simple pattern took waaaay longer than I anticipated, so Flamingos into the Flikr pool it is.

I'm blaming the fabric, a cheapo $5/m poly from Spotlight. Looks fun, sewing it was not. It was a slippery, shifty, puckery nightmare, but hey let's focus on the positives: this pattern has a nice simple shape and the short length works; any longer and I think it would have looked frumpy on me.   I ended up cutting a size 4 at the front and a 2 at the back but in hindsight should have added on some extra length at the shoulder seams because they don't sit quite on my shoulders.  I'm still getting the hang of this pattern alteration business, although I did manage to successfully lower the bust darts by an inch (insert applause here) so I must have learned something.

I lengthened and widened the sleeves, but they ended up being a bit to big at the top, hence the gathering. Lets just call it a design feature.   The wide neckline and roomy shape meant that no zip was needed.  I did intend on adding a groovy exposed one in hot pink but let's just say that the fabric had other ideas and we agreed that the no zip would be better.

Originally the sleeves were finished with hot pink bias tape but it was just a BIT TOO MUCH and somewhat reminiscent of pajamas so I ended up turning the bias to the inside. The neck was also finished the same way. 

The hem is a bit shonky as it was done on the machine and in a hurry because, and this is the strange thing about this flamingo dress,  it wanted to be worn straight away, and then insisted on being taken out for dinner and drinks.   It's going to be trouble.  I can tell.

One last picture. Come on,  I had to.....

Details
Pattern -Laurel by Colette Patterns, $17 from sew squirrel
Fabric - 2m of slippery polyester from Spotlight, $10
Notions - 1m of pink bias from GJ's, $1.25

Total = $28.25

Finished: Mad men challenge 2 dress

Here's my mad men inspired dress for the man men challenge 2 hosted by the lovely and talented Julia Bobbin. I'm not quite sure who I'm channelling - maybe Peggy with a little bit of Joan thrown in? 

 

I had intended to copy a dress more closely but thought I'd better use up some of my stash fabric, hence the dress being more inspired by mad men as opposed to actual mad men.  Regardless it was a great opportunity to use this unusual  border print fabric that I scored in the op shop for $2.99.  I got two fairly small pieces and I knew that I wanted something without a waist seam that would show off the print so a shift dress - New look 6000- seemed fit the bill  with the collar giving it a bit of a retro vibe. Sleeves would have been good but there was barely enough fabric to cut the dress and collar, so sleeveless it had to be. 

The pattern isn't complicated, but this dress was not without its challenges (well, it was a mad men challenge after all)  I made a muslin in the size 12 which turned out to be HUGE so I ended up taking up about 4 inches out of the back and a couple more out at the hips. What is it with ease in some patterns?

 I thought everything was going to be a breeze after that but the fabric slipped and shifted all over the place and I ended up doing a lot of seam ripping, including the side seams and the zip (twice)  so by Friday with a looming deadline, no zip and wonky stripes I was getting rather annoyed.

Hand picked zip.  See those stiches? Nope, me neither,

Thank goodness yesterday was social sewing and in the calm environment of GJs, supported by knowledgeable sewing ladies and buoyed up by a most-excellent lunch (Hellenic Republic, takeaway lunch with dessert for $12!!!), the dress was finished. It was another learning curve and involved quite a few 'firsts':

• hand picked zip
• patten matching  at the side seams (thanks Rachel)
• sewing a bias collar
• back vent

Here are a few close ups on Matilda:

Collar

Side seam pattern matching, Oh yeah. Just ignore the white thread that has annoyingly attached itself to the dress for photos.

Hand picked zippers might be my go-to method now, it was actually quite quick and relaxing. In fact I was so into the groove with the hand sewing that I also finished the armholes with bias, hand sewed on the inside and finished the hem with a hand sewn catchstich.   Loving the back vent too, much nicer than a regular split.

I'm pleased with the fit. It's close fitting but I can actually sit down and walk, and think I'll be able to eat, although bike-friendly this dress is not.  Ah well, I'll have to save it for occasions where I'm chauffeured about by men in sharp suits. Because that sort of thing happens to me all the time.

 

I pulled out some of my best poses for this dress. I thought it deserved it.  Amanda would be proud.