Sew, I've Been Thinking ...

Despite eating constantly, consuming large quantities of wine and not going to the gym for six weeks, I am still too skinny for the few clothes I have with me. With the weather cooling and no immediate arrival of my belongings from Hobart, I needed some clothes. I started with this one which is an amalgam of BWOF 02-13-127 top and BWOF 02-13-128 dress without the ruffle down the front. I made the 36.  The fabric is a cheap poly knit I bought the other day for $6 a metre at Spotlight.  Now, I know I've not had many good things to say about Spotlight in Hobart, but let me tell you that Spotlight Lismore is a whole nother story! This is more purple than it appears in this shot and there is a single row of brown that I've placed at empire line for effect. Also made from another $6 a metre poly knit is this version of V8825 .  I chopped about 8 inches off so it's only a little longer than the tunic version.  When I read the reviews on Pattern Review, someone (sorry don

Just when you thought I'd disappeared off the face of the earth ... I'm back with an emergency version of Vogue 1020 which is probably long OOP.  I've come home with very little clothing, most of which doesn't fit. The rest is still in Hobart.  I needed a dress to wear and I thought making this in a cotton lycra would fit, but it was still baggy.  I need to put some weight on! I hope to be back to regular sewing soon.  It's been a hectic three months! More later ...

I've been a bit stuck with what to sew next as I can't find the fabric I want.  I saw it when I didn't want it and now I can't find it but then with only ONE fabric store in Tasmania, what else can I expect.  If anyone sees matte gold or champagne sequin fabric please let me know.  Even a bronze would work. These shorts are a real TNT. It's the Burda Ruby shorts that I downloaded free many years ago, pre blog days, in fact.  The fabric is the same.  It's a lovely soft stretch sateen that is leftover from a dress I made to wear to a wedding many years ago.  As I've been slowly packing I keep coming across things that might work for my SWAP, so this keeps with my stashbusting challenge.  The buttons and thread were from stash, too, so these are free.   The mirror shots are a little dark but they do fit me, despite the odd wrinkles.  It's hard to photograph yourself in a mirror.   Here they are on the floor and below you can see the cute

I've been listening to a lot of the Tragically Hip this week and it's flavoured my mood tonight. Two weeks ago when I started these jeans I had a plan, not just for my pants, but for my life.  My world has been altered in the past 14 days for reasons that I may share in the coming weeks.  I've had to delay my return home by a few weeks and that comes with mixed feelings.  But back to the jeans ... These started life as BWOF 05-11-116 skinny jeans, which I made recently in red.  As I mentioned last time, I frankenpatterned the pockets of Burda Anita jeans onto this pattern and this time I also frankenpatterned the crotch curve from my best fitting RTW jeans (Levis Bold Curve).  I took the back seam in by about an inch, but that could be because this sateen is a little stretchier than the one I used last time. I am quite happy with the fit, although these pictures make me look FAT. These pants are a nice addition to my SWAP.  The pictures aren't great but at lea

Now that I my tenure in Tasmania can be counted in weeks, this long weekend (Hobart gets two more public holidays to NSW) is divided between sewing and packing.  I took a couple of hours out this morning to take Molly down to the waterfront and have a look at the Wooden Boat Festival, but the rest of the weekend has been spent in the house.  Between the horrendous smoke from the fires and the unbelievable wind, it's way more comfortable inside, anyway.  I struggle with static electricity in Hobart at the best of times, but today every bit of thread, dog hair and other assorted flotsam and jetsam are all stuck to me and my sewing. First of all I finished up this pair of high-waisted skinny, slouchy pants.   Sorry about the crappy mirror shots but I am too lazy and too busy to waste time messing with a tripod.  You'll have to wait for the SWAP shots now! These are BWOF 03-11-119 and are made from the same fabric as the skirt from last week.  The line drawing makes them look

It seems that no post of mine is complete without a rant about Spotlight.  When I first started planning my SWAP I wanted to use chocolate brown sateen as my base.  I visited Spotlight in Hobart and they had tons of black and every colour known to man - except brown, in fact they told me it didn't come in brown!  I decided to wait until I got home at christmas time and visit one of the stores up there.  Although I couldn't find brown sateen, I did manage to find a really lovely cotton suiting with a little stretch.  I don't know what it is, but it really is lovely with a great hand, great weight and just the right amount of stretch. While I was contemplating my SWAP, I changed my mind and decided I would like to use black.  Safe in the knowledge that I had seen plenty of black, I went to Spotlight and guess what I found?  No black.  But they suddenly have a lot of chocolate brown. As I am going home at the end of this month, I hope I will never have to set foot in Spotl

I had two glasses of wine last night and that's it! I stupidly didn't take any photos, but I ended up wearing Dress Plan C which was one I made last year and have never worn. I've forgotten the pattern number and I'm too lazy to look it up. Dress Plan A.  I originally wanted to make V1151 but couldn't find ponte in a colour I liked.  There was boring black, washed out burgundy, dirty grey or cream.  I really wanted purple or orange or something bright, but here in fabric starved Tasmania I was fooling myself.  I moved to Dress Plan B. Prior to christmas I had traced BWOF 09-11-104 but never got around to making it, so I decided to give it a go.  I had 3m of poly chiffon that I bought at Spotlight last year for $3 a metre that was perfect.   It's a fairly simple pattern to make, but the double layer of chiffon with pleating and gathering makes it a little time consuming.  I changed the pattern contruction slightly.  For some reason the back skirt is

I've managed all three of these in one garment. I had this scant 1 metre of cotton check fabric that's been in my stash for about 15 years.  I bought it for $3 at a sale of remnants and bolt ends from a clothing store in Mullumbimby called Mokea.  I've pulled it out many times, but there just wasn't enough to make any of the things I had envisioned, so it always ended up neatly folded and back in the cupboard. Somewhere in the middle of the night on Friday I remembered that I owe my friend, Bruce, a birthday gift from December and as he is a smaller guy, I thought I migh just be able to squeeze it out of this fabric.  I've only sewn for Bruce once before (a terry towelling bathrobe that didn't need fitting) and as he is about 2000km away I couldn't measure him, so I guessed.  I used KS3422 a pattern I've sewn for another similarly sized friend so I hope it comes close.  I know Bruce will wear it regardless, because he loves all things hand made.

So far today I have squeezed a long sleeve t-shirt and three pairs of undies out of scraps.  The tshirt is my TNT KS3338 and the knickers are from the a free tanga panties pattern I downloaded from Burdastyle about a year ago.      If you've been reading my blog for any length of time you will recognise these remnants.  The black and white animal print was leftover from a recent wrap top, the red and white stripe remnant was leftover from 2m of really good quality knit that yielded an oversized top I made in 2010 and in 2012 another long sleeve t shirt and the brown spot was leftover from a BWOF gathered tshirt that is a little too big but is still in my cupboard.  Once again, that was 2m of knit that has yielded two tops and a pair of knickers.  As you can see I only have black or cream knicker elastic in my stash.        This panties pattern is designed for for stretch lace but I decided to try it with the knit fabric and it works.  These aren't the greates

You can see by the button to the right that I have decided to join the Stashbusting Sewalong.  This fits with what I've been doing for a while, although with no real plan.  This sewalong has a theme each month and January is all about using up all of those smaller pieces.  This top came from one of them. While rummaging around in my sewing room tonight, I came across a remnant that was leftover from a film I worked on many years ago.  I inherited a large tea chest of assorted drills, cheesecloth, batiks and a few sari remnants.  Over the years I've used much of it for muslins or work clothes, but the sari remnants have been harder to work into my wardrobe.  I also came across a copy of the Sorbetto pattern that I downloaded a while ago and it seemed like  a match made in heaven.  I made this top tonight whilst watching a Queen documentary on the ABC.  The thread and bias binding were from stash, too, so this is a free top. I have a top cut out from a knit remnant so I'

You may recall I chose Vogue 2269 from 1989 as one of my SWAP patterns.  I knew by experience of fitting my longish torso and because this is an 80's pattern that I would need to lengthen the pattern.  I've made halters before and they've been a little troublesome and this one lived up to my expectations. Short version is this: I completely reshaped the front darts to allow this to fit snugly in the bust and waist and then flare out over my pear shaped hips.  In the back I widened the dart at the top as I seem to have a narrow upper back.  It was still too big, so I sewed some wide elastic onto the facing.  This not only helps the back fit more snugly but fixes a small gape at the arm hole.  If I make it again I will need to fold out a wedge at the arm hole area. I've made a wearable muslin that I like.  It's cute and I will wear it a lot, but I don't love this pattern enough to mess around with it to get a perfect fit.  I may use the sleeveless blouse v

I've finally sorted out this silly photo thing thanks to Anna , Faye and Maria who gave me all the answers I needed.  In downloading the Picasa software, though, I was a little alarmed to learn it has a facial recognition element that captured shots of people in photos on my computer and offered to automatically group new shots of the same people together!!!!  I intend to investigate this a little more. Happy New Year to you all, a little belated I know.  I've been away for a few weeks and before that I was very busy so I have a lot of catching up to do.   I'll start by showing the last garment I made in 2012.  These skinny jeans were inspired by Carolyn who wrote a post a while back about red jeans being fashionable.  The very day I read this post I had rediscovered a length of crimson sateen in my stash that I bought a couple of years ago and forgotten all about.  The colour may not show very well but it is a slightly pinky red that I am finding goes with way m

What is going on with this blog thing??  I've been trying to upload for days.  Anyone else having problems?