The Skater Dress goes Starlion

If I'm looking pretty pleased with myself here, I have good reason.  After two late nights (late enough to be considered morning), the Big Girls' Skater Dress is finally done and with testers!  The moment we  thought we'd never see.

I don't want you to perceive me a disloyalal to Scandi Flowers or anything, but when we're alone I whisper 'I love you most of all' to my Starlions.  I prefer the lighter drape and the fabric is so smooth it's almost liquid.  Dreamy.

Wish all the testers luck and hopefully I'll have good news soon!

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Pin It Forward- UK Edition

You might have noticed that there have been a lot of Pinterest-related blog posts in the UK blogging scene recently. Despite being active for a good number of years now, Pinterest is formally celebrating in the UK this month with their Pin It Forward UK Campaign. In the unlikely event that you are unfamiliar with the site (is there a craft-based blog who isn'?!), Pinterest is a place where you can collect, curate, and share things that interest you.   Prior to its advent, I bookmarked sites for reference but without a thumbnail or annotation it was difficult for me to find links at a later date.  Being a visual person, the pictures on Pinterest help me find what I'm looking for and the community aspect of following and collaborating on group boards means that not only do you see your pins, but also the pins of other people with similar interests.

When I was invited to partake in Pin It Forward UK, I was asked to choose one of my boards as the most important to me.  To the surprise of everyone, I didn't choose the board where I collect pictures of people I have crushes on, but a board that's even closer to my heart..

Nary a day goes by when I'm not contacted by someone asking for advice about sewing with knits; I have spent a lot of time sharing information on my blog as I really, really want to alleviate the intimidation factor for beginners to knit-sewing.  But the wonder of Pinterest means that not only can you find my tutorials, but all of the tutorials I've come across about sewing with knits!  If you don't follow my board already, you can find it here or by clicking on the picture above.

If you're interested in the next stop on the Pin It Forward UK campaign, tomorrow it mosies along to  crocheter-extraordinaire, Sarah, who blogs from Annaboo's House.

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One ironing board to bring them all and in the darkness blind them

I'm delighted to add another addition to the Least Exciting Things I've Made series! Completely necessary though as oh dear god our last ironing board cover was gross, ripped, and stained.  If I'm going to be photographing some tutorials the very least I can do is make my ironing board glorious, right?

And by glorious I mean garish.  I figured it will match all the things, or none of the things.  Like most things that are of paramount importance to humanity, I will keep you posted.

By way of apology for tempting you here with mundanities, I'll give you a tiny glimpse of my sewing room.  Remember that time I said, 'Hey you guys, I finally realised it's okay to spend money making this space work for me'?  Me neither.

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Scandi Flowers Skater Dress hits London, London doesn't notice

The night before my London trip I left the relative comfort of muslin-world and finally sewed up a skater dress in proper fabric.  The prospect of having someone who isn't seven years old take pictures of me somewhere that isn't my garden was too great an opportunity to pass up.  Obviously, being a rushed late-night venture I didn't get any pictures taken of the process so if I'm finally going to get my act together and write the tutorial I'll need to make myself at least one more skater dress.  Not a bad problem to have, all things considered. 

The Scandi flowers fabric is a cotton/lycra blend with quite a bit of body so the fit was less drapey than the viscose and interlock muslins.  Being a three-quarter length sleeve a thicker fabric is appropriate as a autumn / winter / spring dress (or if it's this year a summer one too).  I'll use a thinner fabric and a short sleeve next time to see how that changes the fit. 

Ha- my favourite picture and it's the one that was photobombed! 

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The Roly-Poly Pattern Tour: Knit-style

I was really stoked when my good friend Rachel from Imagine Gnats asked if I wanted a space in the tour for her inaugural pattern, the Roly Poly Pinafore.  I mean, who wouldn't want to help celebrate such a salubrious occasion?

The pinafore has a lovely silhouette, an easy fit, cross-over panels to the back and buttons to the shoulders.  And the best bit?  Reversible.  You know how I'm a sucker for reversible.  It's suitable for cottons and cotton-blends without stretch, or if your name is Amanda: knits.

You probably don't even need to be called Amanda, although I can't say for sure.  In this little number the elephants (and the flowers to the reverse) are cotton-lycra, the polka-dots are cotton interlock, and the stripes a viscose.  Not fabrics that necessarily play well together, but the crucial aspect was they were all stable.

Despite it being a lovely feature indeed, I omitted the pleat at centre front because my pedantic heart didn't want to disrupt an elephant.  The only other changes I made were to place the gap for turning in the side seam rather than the hem (so it'd be easier to press press press the hem flat), and to add interfacing to the straps for the buttonholes.  Buttonholes in knits can massively distort with interfacing. 

In short, the perfect top to make 'bring it on bro' arms at your mum in the garden while balancing on one foot.

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The Rainy Days Peplum

It was Maia's birthday party yesterday and in my typical last-minute fashion I made the party bags the night before, the cake the morning of, and the outfit an hour before. Will I ever learn? Nope.

When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade; when life gives you relentless, soul-destroying weather, you make Rainy Days peplum tops.

Instead of hemming, I edged the flounce with the same knit binding as I used on the sleeve edges and neckline.  This gives the peplum a bit more body and ties the two prints together.  I kind of wish I'd inserted it in the waist seam as well but you can't be too ambitious sewing against the clock.

All in all, we succeeded in sending our message to the powers that be: you can freeze us, you can soak us, you can knock our bins over every week with your preternaturally strong winds, but we will make clothes about it and wear the sh*t out of them.

The party bags are simple drawstring bags in rainbow hues, french seamed throughout. Six year olds are so snobbish about seam finishes.  I made the labels in Picmonkey and printed them on my beloved address label printer.

Now that I've gotten the weather, the top, and the party bags out of the way let's not beat about the bush.  I know that some of you are here for the biannual cake wreck (looking at you, Juicy Tots).... Will it be tagged 'terrible baking'? Or 'not terrible baking'?

Behold the majesty of the freckles, the chin, the cheekbones, those catchlights.  I think we can agree that that is one skillfully-rendered Care Bear head.  Only two people thought it was a pig so I'm calling this a (relative) win.

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Winner, winner foxy dinner

Thanks for all the congratulations and enthusiasm for my Sewing World feature, my heart grew at least three sizes that day (and then promptly shrunk back to normal size due to the stress of Maia's birthday party).  So without further ado, the winner of the foxy bubble skirt is....

 Rachel from Corner by Corner, come on down!

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