Simplicity 2886

This is the first dress I chose to make. I absolutely love it, but it's been a long time in the making. As soon as I have a bit of sun, and it's warm enough to wear (fabric sample shown), I'll show you. It was fiddly, but it's a lovely pattern.

Dressmaking - a beginner - but 'Vintage Vogue Very Easy'!?

I've fallen in love with dressmaking... and this is my 2nd dress (I haven't a picture of my first yet, as first was finished slightly after 2nd!). It's shown here pre-hemming and zip insertion, but I'm really pleased with it. The dress started a few weeks back when I found a Vogue pattern from the 1970s and thought it looked 

a.) simple (it said 'easy Vogue'), and 

b.) a lovely design for the fabric I had in mind and I'd picked up the day or so before.

Haha, now little I knew.

I've since found that 'Very Easy Vogue' doesn't mean that at all. This was a bit of a mare as a first project, and I'm so glad I thought to make a muslin. The fabric was taken from a pair of 1950s curtains, which were in pretty good condition, and I was lucky to find. They shouted dress at me immediately. But I didn't want to risk the fabric, so decided to make a muslin first. Thank goodness I did as I had to change the pattern quite a bit, especially under the arms. I also dropped the collar, but that was straightforward.

The first problem was princess seams. Until a few weeks back, I didn't know what princess seams were. The instructions were basic, but even I knew this wasn't right. Princess seams run up to the armhole and are curved to help the dress sit right at the breast. Pointing up into the armhole isn't the right way. But all my notches and dots and spots and bits and bobs and all those fancy dressmaking terms were sitting together.

No matter how many times I tried, how much easing I tried to do, there was no way these were going to sit against each other. I found a solution after speaking with somebody who's been dressmaking since the dinosaurs, and has been invaluable, and mentioned she'd come across one other pattern many years ago where this problem had happened. The online tutorials make princess seams look a doddle. They aren't and this one certainly wasn't - but please don't despair if you find the same. It's not you and there are ways around it. I ended up easing the extra into the armhole. This isn't considered good practise, but frankly, it worked. I defy anybody to have made it work another way. You cannot tell from the finished dress that this is what happened, and I'm very proud of the way my princess seams sit.

Then the armholes were too tight. I hate a dress sitting tight under the arms. So I had to mark up and cut to allow for this.

which eventually worked.

One thing that has been invaluable in all this is the tailors ham I made. These help with all sorts of ironing, but especially those tricky bits. I didn't find any others on a web search, so have put a make to order one in my Folksy and Etsy shops, here and here.

They are brilliant, and I can't rave highly enough. I used some of my lovely button print and a fabulous Cotswold wool, both of which seem totally appropriate.

So, the birth of my second dress. I've now finished the zip and almost done the hem. Already planning my next dress!

Making a quilt for my son

Seeing the wonderful quilt Jane made for her son, here, reminded me I haven't blogged about the quilt I made for mine recently. My 12 year old asked if I could make him a quilt, having watched my earlier efforts here. I was so pleased, as it's rare for him to ask for me to sew him something. He chose a nautical theme, and had a good rummage through my fabrics. I then cut them into strips, using my rotary cutter (I'm so glad that was an early purchase when I started sewing again) and cutting mat.

We then played around quite a bit with the design.

More photos to come as I seem to have lost all the photos of the finished quilt. It was lovely to work on this with him.

Three easy skirts - first steps in dressmaking

I'm so hooked on dressmaking now. Well, skirt making, but my first dress is coming along. I've finished off three in the past couple of days. The tops and hems were waiting on getting done, and a zip here or there. I'm pleased I've actually got these things tidied up. The stamp print was a fabric I bought from America. The pattern is taken from Tanya Whelan's brilliant book Sew what you Love, which I really would recommend. There are things I don't like about this skirt, but it's an simple introduction to making a skirt, as there's no waistband to worry about, and the zip insertion is easy.

I also finished the hem for the skirt I made for the Abakhan blog challenge in my post here. I love this pattern, and will definitely be using it again, but will practise getting the yoke the right size first. I love the fact it's got a yoke, belt loops (I chose not to make up the belt, as I wanted to wear a contrast belt), a zip, and pockets. And it's easy too.

And I then half used a pattern and half did my own thing. I wanted to try a lined skirt, so lined this one, which has given it a much better feel. I decided to make a waistband, in a contrast red, and I'm pleased with how it's turned out. 

Best of all is getting to use some of my lovely fabrics on clothing where I can look at them.  :) 

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Simplicity 2226 skirt - such a fabulous skirt

So, the lovely people at Abakhan asked me to do another project, and without realizing its fame, I chose to try a skirt pattern, Simplicity 2226 to be precise. This is for their blog challenge on a budget, which I started last year, and for it I received the above: a pattern, fabric, zip, and interfacing. I thought this looked a great pattern, with its four variations, pockets, and even a belt, and belt casings. I've since found this was part of a Sewalong by Noodlehead (which was a lovely way to discover a wonderful new blog) and is a very popular pattern. As the Sewalong was some time ago, I didn't refer to it. I suggest you do if you, like me, are new to dressmaking, as she makes each stage very clear. When I was ploughing through the pattern, I had to backtrack and rectify a couple of mistakes, and in the end fitted a smaller skirt to a larger yoke. But I'm really pleased with the resulting skirt, and that's one of the beauties of the pattern - it really is very adaptable and forgiving. I especially loved the fabric I chose - this one, which I thought was excellent value at £6.25 a metre. So, on to a look at what I did.

I first traced the size I thought I'd be. This turned out to be not such a good move as I ignored the pattern sizing instructions (in my defence, I was coming up a lot larger than I've ever been!). This was my first mistake. Follow the packet advice! :) Anyway, because I traced the size I thought I was, I still have my original intact, to retrace when I next make this skirt.

Once that was done I cut the pattern pieces. I then had to recut the pockets as I cut them the wrong way. :) Told you I made a couple of silly mistakes. This is the way they should be cut if you have a definite print (here lying in place right side down on the skirt front):

I don't know how others do it, but I marked the dots like this, putting a pin through the spot on the pattern, and circling where the pin was on the wrong side of the fabric with a pencil:

It worked for me, though I kind of lost the plot with the dots. I haven't the patience to go matching dots. But the finished skirt still works. :) Popping the pockets in place was simple, and I then overstitched in a contrasting thread.

This pattern is lovely, and comes together so quickly. Even adding the yoke (one of my other mistakes - do have patience (lacking in my approach to dressmaking) and cut a test piece from cheap cotton first, as mine was too small and I had to recut) was simple:

I'm thrilled with my skirt. It fits. It has pockets. It has belt loops. I've just the hem to do now.

I'll post a final picture once that's done.

Happy pigs in mud cake

So, when we saw the internet cake masterpiece of the happy bunch of pigs in mud recently, my daughter knew exactly what she wanted for her birthday cake, as no doubt countless others have wanted since the original was posted. So I made this for her today. Our very own pigs in mud. :)

Here's a link to the original pigs in mud cake. And here's the English translation from the original Dutch.

Regular visitors to my blog may recognize the pigs from a previous cake (I tend to reuse some of the iced makes) but I needed more pigs. Specifically some piggy bottoms. It was really fun putting these together.

I couldn't use the previous pigs on the top, though they tried it out before the delicious ganache went on (boy, I could eat so much of that stuff)...

... so they went on the side, as they didn't want to be left out. This was such an easy cake to make, and it's a really fun one. The party's tomorrow.

A book for a reluctant teen

My 15 year old rarely reads - she's always found reading 'boring' and I rarely find a book that she will get absorbed in. I love books, and I'm lost without a book, so this has been hard for me to accept. Especially a few weeks back when she told me she wasn't interested in trying anymore... which made me determined to find her a book.

I spent ages choosing and settled on Louise Rennison's Withering Tights!

She loved it! Read it in a day. She's not an avid reader by far, but I've persuaded her there are books out there for her. She's now gone on to Me Before You, by Jojo Moyes, which I think is a brilliant, easy read, with lots of issues to discuss. So far so good.