My first adult sized dress!

I made this dress over the weekend, I used a pattern from the book Sew Serendipity which was really good, very clear instructions!

Excuse the rubbish photo, I think there may be small finger prints on the lens so it is a bit blurry and I have no idea why I took it at the odd angle!!

My only concern is that I used fabric from an Ikea duvet cover (got it for £3 in their reject section!) and I am worried someone recognises it when I am out and about! I have enough fabric to make at least another dress and a skirt (it is a king sized duvet cover) so it was a very cheap dress to make and I love the pattern. I will definately be keeping  my eyes open for more duvet covers in the reject section of Ikea, as long as no one recognises this one!

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A link to the past

I took my Granny home after church today and, once we had the obligatory cup of tea, she asked me if I would do some wee sewing projects for her. I am home with 2 skirts to take in and up and when I was there I sewed on a button for her (she is basically blind now). She produced a fantastic sewing box that I had never seen before and in it were various treasures including cover your own button buttons from the 60's /70's!

It got me thinking that sewing for me really is a link to the past. My Grandma died 3 and a bit years ago and I am sad I wasn't sewing when she was here as I know she would have been full of fantastic tips! She started sewing as a young girl and by the time she was 14 she was a fantastic seamstress. She loved fashion and frequently told the story of when her street had been bombed during the war she managed to sneak past the police to get in to her house to save the dress and jacket she had just finished for herself (she was only 15 at the time!). She had saved up her rations to get the fabric and was determined to save her new outfit! I don't think I will ever be as good a seamstress as my Grandma (don't have enough patience) and I certainly doubt I will ever risk my life for a project!

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My Baby is 5!

My Baby (Big E) turned 5 on Thursday, am I really old enough to have a 5 year old?!!!

Five years ago he was a teeny tiny bundle: 

Bruises on his wee face were caused by the forceps!

and now he is a very big 5 year old!:

He spent most of Thursday dressed as a astronaut (we gave him the suit and his Great Granny gave him the helmet), he even wore the helmet during our lunch out!

I made the cake he asked for and he loved it! It took hours and is in no way perfect but I was pleased with it (tastes good too!)

His party was yesterday so hopefully next week I can get back to some relaxing crafting rather than slightly crazy birthday organising! The first thing on the list is to finish the fabric baskets that have got as far as being cut out!

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Reducing my fabric mountain!

In an attempt to diminish my rather large stash of material (more than 100 different pieces of material and a suitcase full of clothes to repurpose....Hubby is worrying about the weight in the loft!!) I am using this calender

image from amazon.co.uk

and trying to make at least one of everything I have the supplies for. So far I have made 3 cafetiere cosy's, one Christmas one and 2 everyday ones. The bottom one in the pic is using old felted jumpers as the inner and back so it is not as nice looking as the other two!

and am now making 2 fabric baskets, one to match Big E's curtains and one to match little e's curtains. Hopefully all this making will produce at least some of 2011's Christmas pressies!

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Fabric Headbands

Big E's 5th birthday is fast approaching and I am making headbands for the girls party bags.

Here is how I have done it (to fit age 3-6 yrs approx): 

Cut out 2 strips of fabric, I have used scrap jersey material so they have a bit of stretch:

Headband strip is 35cm x 9cm 
Smaller strip, for the elastic casing, is 24cm x 5.5cm. (forgot to take a pic unfolded!)

Cut one, 12cm, strip of elastic 2cm wide elastic.


Fold the two strips in half length ways, right sides together, and stitch (I used a 0.5cm seam allowance).

Turn right sides out then press seams down the middle and you will end up with:

Attach a safety pin to the elastic and thread it through the smaller tube until it is just at the end.

The safety pin will still be in the tube at this point but first the most important thing is to anchor the elastic at the end of the tube. I had to unpick the first headband twice so decided this step was essential!! I pulled the top of the casing away from the elastic and stitched throught the elastic and one layer of material.

Then fold over the end of the tube ~0.5cm,

gather one end of the larger tube (the pic shows a gathering stitch but in the end I just gathered them by hand),

Stuff the gathered headband piece in to the elastic tube (make sure the seams are both on the underside) then stitch in place. I stitched twice to make sure it was really strong.

Now, pull the elastic to the other end of the tube and repeat the above until you have something like this:

I made the flowers using this tutorial by Little Miss Momma, hopefully you won't burn yourself with the hot glue!!


I have made 8 of these and hopefully the girls at the party will like them!!

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New toy!

A new toy arrived on Wednesday...

Which resulted in some of this

I got to play properly for the first time last night and was super impressed. 

Now I have extra motivation to use some of the huge fabric stash I have in the loft, almost 100 pieces of fabric and a suitcase under the bed of clothes to refashion!

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Weddings Invitations

I am doing the stationary for a wedding in August and the time has come to do some invitation samples! I have done the save the date card already

I was really pleased with them , the bride wants simple elegance with a hint of pink and I think this fits the bill.

Here are pics of the invitation samples I have done:

The bride chose the general design from other samples I have, hopefully she likes them as much in her colour scheme!

Sorry about the photos, taking them quickly while little e is having her TV fix (oh what a bad mother I am!).  Off to clean my camera lens now, can you see the smudges on the photos....nice!

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The First Post

Well, this is it, a blog for all my crafty things, now to take some photos of things I have done!

A photo to go with the weather today!

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