Dusting this off again!

So *gestures vaguely at the dumpster fire*, lets’ move on shall we! I’m basically restarting (let’s nor provaricate!) this blog because I’ve started sewing, and need somewhere to document things other than my brain and a messenger chat which moves too fast to scroll through!

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So this is the third iteration of the shirt (the other two are muslins). First muslin was too big overall, second muslin I went down a size which mostly worked. The sleeves needed shortening, the shoulders needed taking it (I went for a thumbs width here, which isn’t quite enough, especially if you look from the back), and I needed to grade out for the hips. Thsi is the smallest size grading out to the next size after the waist.

Changes to make next time:

• Take in the sleeves a good 4 inches (2 each side)
• Raise the waist a ‘smidge’. I’m guessing this is why it raises and I have to keep pulling it down (I say keep, I don’t mind that much). I’ll check how much it raises by and raise the waist that much.
• Take in the shoulder seams again. Not by much, and I’ll actually measure it next time… and do it on the yoke and the back piece, rather than fudge it all on the yoke bc I forgot when cutting the back piece. Doh!
• Lower the yoke some at the neckline. It’s difficult to see in these pictures, but it’s bunching at the back at the neckline. I wasn’t sure whether it was because there was too much fabric in the up-down direction, or not enough in the left-right direction, but I finally found another blogger with a similar (on a smaller scale) issue who took fabric out so let’s go with that (it also doesn’t feel tight at all accorss the back, which I guess it would do if it was too tight… I’m flying by the seat of my pants here, can you tell?)
• That last one I’m hoping will bring in the collar a smidge too. Otherwise that’ll stay the same this time around and try again after.

This time will be my first try at tracing the pattern onto pattern paper before sewing, which I’m kinda excited about, and also annoyed at it taking more time. I’m sure it’ll be worth it in the end 🙂

Side note- I am still knitting, crocheting, cross stitching, plan to embroider these clothes, want to get into polymer clay, etc. It isn’t going to just be sewing! (Although a lot over the summer may be, and while I get to grips with pattern adjusting!) (p.s., where do I put the tags?)

Hiiiiiiiii *shoos the dust bunnies away*

So yeah, long time no see. Life has been crazy, and is definitely not planning on slowing down until August at the earliest.

 

Anyway, I inherited my mother’s old sewing machine, and pulled it out to shorten some jeans. No pictures because I am focussed, but have some timings:

I had 4 pairs of jeans to shorten. Because I am a muppet very enthusiastic I didn’t note what time I started, so the first jeans took more than 15 minutes to do. I then did the other three pairs all together, which took an hour to cut and pin, and then an unknown amount of time to hem them all. (I know, I really rock this timing thing…). I think had to support the thighs in one of the pairs (thinking back I should’ve done all of them…), for which I used the offcut from the hems. It took an hour to hem and support the thighs, so in total maybe 2 and a half hours??

In future, I hope to have more accurate timings for things (I’m recording time spent knitting etc as well, it’s a bit of a learning curve to get used to it, but I think it will be useful and eye opening to learn how long things take me!)

A new craft!

So after my brain vomit a long while back here, I did in the end fall down into the EPP rabbit hole (at this point, is nyone really surprised??). It’s slow going (bc it’s not a priority, not bc it’s a massive time sink!). But I’ve now cut up some half hexagons and have started basting the first few. Ad then naturally I had to get a little pouch to keep it all in! Im still waiting on the puch, but it’s hella cute and you’ll see it in the future!

 

I’m not doing anything typical with the half hexies I’m making (although I do have a cool idea for a second quilt, when I’ve finished this first one). Instead, I’m piecing them together like this:

The yellow hexies are smaller because they’ve been pieced, while the red and blue ones haven’t been yet.

It’s a very mathematical design which Im really thrilled to be doing. Because it’s made recursively (you’re building larger half hexagons from smaller ones, rather than adding small hexagons all the time), I will probably reach a stage where I get heartily bored of wrangling larger and larger half hexies about an chart the damn thing, and then follow a very irritating chart with lots of room for error. We’ll see! I’m not in any rush 🙂

Finished Friday- The Secret

Jacob and Florian, I love you very much but please don’t read this post 😉

 

Ok, now that’s done, I can show everyone else—Jacob, go!—the super secret thing I had approximately one week to make over Christmas because I don’t own a sewing machine.

 

Baby quilt!!!!!!!!! It’s a bit brighter and more colourful in real life, and I love it. I had to do it over Christmas because I don’t have a sewing machine so I had to use my mum’s (she has said that I can have her Juki when I move somewhere I will have the space for it 😀 )

Now I have to send it off to get quilted, which I’ll look into when I’m back in Bristol. Any recomendations for UK quilters/things I should be looking for/anything I should avoid??? IT’s all very new and slightly scary because this baby is important so I want to get it right.

An update on everything(nearly…)

Wow, what a wonderful reception to come back to! Thanks everyone!

Firstly, that picture I showed you last time is a giant slice of cake with eyes! The dark pink is jam between the layers of sponge, and the light pink is icing.

Secondly, I had a great time moving, and I now have a chest of drawers to hold all (most!) of my crafting supplies. Here’s a pic of it. (Usually that bag of yarn would be in it as well, I just needed to get at my crochet hooks!)

The top drawer is misc and cross stitch, the other two drawers hold knitting yarn. Not all of it though, as you can see of what’s storied outside of the drawers! No more yarn for me for a while I think!

Not that that’s going to be too much of a problem, as I’ve started making my own! Meet John, my first drop spindle.

I’m completely loving spinning, although it makes my right arm ache if I do too much in one go! And of course, I’ve bought some fabric to make a cover for it! Even if I can’t use my mum’s sewing machine, so I’ll have to do it by hand! I’m thinking a simple bag made out of the blue fabric on top

I’ve also been knitting socks, and have 2 more finished pairs to show off, another pair of jaywalkers

and some rainbow socks I’m calling ‘Pooling, thy name is wtf’

I’ve also started a scrap blanket to use up all my sock yarn scraps from socks. Can you recognise the yarns used so far?

I’ve done more work on my knitted cardigan, but that totally deserves a post of its own, so that’ll come along later on! Another thing I can’t share just yet are Christmas plans- I’ve changed my mind about what I’m doing again, now it involves sewing. But I think that one of my friends is planning on reading this soon, and she’s getting a Christmas present, so that’ll need to be hush-hush until Christmas!

Although, speaking of Christmas, I have started sewing some Christmassy juggling balls, so here’s one ready to be stuffed!

Friday Flurry of Finishes

The first is just my sister’s graduation card, finally put onto a card!

I’ve also finished socks

and more socks!

I also knitted myself a cover for my earphones

That was very annoying, and I hope that I don’t break these earphones any time soon!

And finally, a set of pyjamas ready for Winter. They’ll be living in Salisbury, and so next time I’ll be going home is for Christmas, so I needed to finish them. Ta-da!

Since these pyjamas are a big thing, I’ll be continuing my habit of discussing what I learnt from this project.

• Sewing machines don’t like sewing over 4 layers of fleece!
• If something doesn’t seem to be running right, stop and figure it out. Don’t keep going until it becomes a big problem!
• Gathers aren’t so bad. Sewing them is a right pain, however!
• If a gather seems rather large, stick a finger in the middle of it and scrunch it down into a few smaller ones
• Fleece doesn’t fray. Which is wonderful when the machine decides it’s tasty and makes a hole 😦
• Mums are magic! I can’t remember what mine fixed for me this time around, but still, it’s always worth mentioning!
• Pins don’t hurt, so stop moaning about it!
• Don’t sew Winter clothes in the Summer, when it’s a right pain trying them on!

I think that’s everything this time!

What I’ve been up to whilst at home

With my mum’s sewing machine!

I’ve managed to sew the main pieces of a dressmakers dummy pin-cushion. It doesn’t really look right, but I’ll chalk it up to experience and maybe make a better one next year. And the year after…I might start a trend here!

This pattern comes from here. It’s a video tutorial, which I found a little annoying, but it’s well explained and the printable is a pdf directly underneath. Now I’ve made it, and brought it back up North to stuff, it needs to do South again so I can borrow the glue gun to finish it! Talk about long-winded!

I also sewed two triangles together, and then hand sewed it into a little container. This is going to be an ort container, and I have some buttons to sew onto the fold over bits.

This pattern comes from here, and I’m really tempted to make myself one as well! They’re just so cute!

But not everything was completed with the machine. I hand sewed the last of the blue jugging balls. Now they’re just awaiting stuffing, and then practise with more than 3! I can’t wait 🙂

I keep forgetting to mention, so I’ll stick it here. There’s a pdf with a load of different juggling ball designs, here. So far I’ve only made the 4 and 8 panel shapes, but after stitching all these, I may try some of the others. They’re excellent palate cleansers, between larger projects.

I also cut out some of my butterfly and orange fabric, to make 7 balls, They’ll get sewn up after my small Christmassy ones, but that is probably going to wait until I’ve finished my mum’s birthday bits. I’ve still got lots to go 🙂

Before I went home, I knitted up another pair of toe-up matching jaywalkers 🙂 This time they even fit! (Not like my zombie ones!)

Making them matchy-matchy was a challenge, but great fun 🙂 I’ve got this yarn in a darker shade (it’s heart and sole) to do a pair in the same way- toe-up matching jaywalkers, but first I needed a break from matching, so I’ve started another completely different pair. One of them matches one I’ve already knitted, so I’ll get a pair and an odd sock out of this 🙂 I picked up the other yarn when I was in town…I have no idea how the yarn is patterned, which makes it great fun and a lovely surprise as I knit. No doubt sooner or later I’ll get a repeat, which will spoil it somewhat, but hey ho!

I also started knitting a cover for my ear-buds. I’m using cotton sport-weight, and my 1.5mm Karbonz. Yes, I am slightly insane 🙂 It’s taking way longer than I thought it would (big surprise 😛 ) but I’ll get there. I’m loving the colour repeats on it, so it’s all good!

So what have you all been up to over Easter? Any tips for getting back into working mode after the holidays?

FO Friday- finally I manage it!

So for once I actually manage to both have something finished and post about it on Friday!

I finished my juggling balls!!!

Yes, I can juggle. No, you’re not going to get a video of me juggling on here. Yes, those are some Karbonz knitting needles in the top corner. Yes, they will be showing up later, along with some other lovelies 😀

I am pretty darn impressed with my balls:) Some of the corners are pretty damn good, even if I do say so myself

but some leave something to be desired. Ahh well, I clearly need lots more practice!!

Lots and lots more practice! So, naturally I’m already digging through my limited fabric stash for some more to make some awesome juggling balls with. I’ve got some gorgeous Christmassy fabric I think will be used next 🙂

But that’s something for another post. I’m off to do some juggling 🙂

A flurry of finishes (but still no knitting!)

So, what does everyone think of ‘flurry’ being the collective noun of finishes? I think it suits really well 🙂

I finished the cat, and it’s absolutely gorgeous!

I want to make loads of these now, with different cat styles. They’d be great stash busters 🙂 And then I remembered how much confetti/backstitching there is, particularly in the flowers, and decided I needed to lie down until I stopped wanting to do that!

Then, while high on endorphins for finishing something, I decided that I didn’t really need to press my juggling ball, so got on and finished that (one juggling ball totally counts as a finish, right?) Getting my corners to line up proved to be impossible, but maybe with the next two I’ll improve 🙂

It’s partially filled with rice, to give it it’s weight. I’d better get a move on with the other two, I want to start juggling with it already 🙂

I’ve also been doing more on my ‘love is’ piece- it’s now got their faces! I’m not enjoying all the backstitching for their hands, but it’s so totally worth it 🙂

Hopefully that’ll be finished soon! So quite a few finishes from me, really 🙂 And just a few days ago I also finished the cross stitch for my Mothers Day card. I went to Hobbycraft to get a quilling kit, so here it is in all it’s finished glory 🙂 I loved making the hearts, but I’m certain I need more practice! Lots and lots of practice! The book in the kit I got also has some really cool projects to make, so at some point I’ll have a go at them 🙂

Now I’m off to spend the rest of the day on my butterfly…I wonder how far I’ll get 🙂

 

Hello November!

So, this morning I received the next part of the OUAT sampler, so that’s what I’ll be working on this weekend!

After giving out too many clues last month, this month I’m going to be a lot stingier! Don’t worry, it’s a well known fairy tale!

It was written by a French man, and it was included in the Grimn brothers fairy tale collection (not surprising given the level of violence in it!).

Over the years it has been re-written, and watered down many times. The most notable ‘sanitising’ changes the fate and behaviour of the main bad guy.  In the original version, he ate the main character, and was later cut open (thereby releasing the main character) and stuffed full of rocks, which killed him (but y’know, the cutting open? Totally fine!), but later versions has him merely lock the main character in a wardrobe or some such thing, and then get chased off by a supporting character!

Let’s see what you make of that, and next week hopefully I’ll have finished the cross stitching which will probably give the game away a little!

The other day I was in town, and I found this absolute gem of a book. I had to look online at when it was published (1947!). It’s a general book on embroidery, knitting, crochet, dress making and home upholstery! It’s lovely to look through, especially when it says things like ‘Tweezers […] Buy the ordinary small toilet kind from the sixpenny stores.’!

I’ve also done a couple of lines of stitching on my juggling balls- not very much, but there’s no rush!

So now I can sew these bits together, and I’ll have half a juggling ball! Which is probably going to have to wait until December, because of the jumper! I might have slightly cheated and started it yesterday… but who really minds? I’m not going to be working on it this weekend because of OUAT, so it all works out :).

Speaking of which, I want to get started on that! See you all next week