Look!

Look at what is sitting out my window here at work right now!
Hehehe... I chuckled when I walked back from the printer and saw it. Sooo groovy.

And while I have dropped off the sewing radar a bit, although I have cut out a jumper and finished little miss's dress, I had one of those isn't-life-great moments on the weekend while we were spending some lovely relaxing time with friends down in Lorne. It was at this moment:

Nothing like eggs on the bbq after a good night by the seaside to make you go "ahhhhhh...."

I promise I will have something to show you sewing wise tomorrow.

xx j.

P.S I am super excited by how wonderful Miss V Darling is going in her challenge! I reckon she will get to 31 dresses!

updates

Just a few updates for you and a picture of a rainbow I saw on my way home from work. I swear it was the brightest, thickest rainbow I have ever seen. Very pretty. I'm making a dress for my niece and I am having trouble with the concept of her being so small, she's like 2 but her legs are only 40cms long (or should I say short?) so small, so all my judgement is out on this one. I should finish it tonight and get onto the jeans. Don't hate me for cutting the pattern out on the right sides, I know it's wrong but sometimes I forget. And I needed to share with you the fact that I am now the proud owner of the complete collection of Rohl Dahl books. Wow-o I can't wait for a lazy weekend.

xx j.

(sorry didn't realise these photos were so dodgy... oops)

Oh yes she did finish her dress!

I finished the Navy Dress, it took me some time but I got there in the end. I even ended up overlocking all the seams, which reminded me I defiantly need to get more acquainted with Ms Overlocker, she was a little stroppy at me!

But then I must have knocked something because she then starting overlocking like this:hmmmm...

Anywho - the dress! The one thing I thought was going to happen was that I was going to run out of bias binding tape (and we all know that took me yonkers to make) but I had the perfect amount! About 2inches to spare even! Ha!

And I think it turned out pretty darn good... I may never go back to store brought bias binding again!
And finally, I present to you, the Navy Dress - finished!

It's stretchy so it didn't need a zip, I added the front 'toggles' (as mum called them) for something different and it feels great. The only problem with it is my body's jiggly bits! Nothing like a spare tyre to ruin a good dress, but I'm gonna wear it anyways.

Lessons Learned

1. Ironing is my bestie.

2. One must iron.

3. How good do things look ironed?!

4. Homemade bias binding - doesn't matter what it looks like on the inside it's the awesome way it looks finished that's important.

Note: Practice stitching in the ditch.

aaah.... feels good to be finished, now to find a nice chiffon dress to copy for some awesome fabric I brought.

xx j.

More lush spring time outdoor loveliness

I did sew on the weekend but it was squished between washing the clothes, going for a hike in the Grampians, having a delightful Sunday arvo bbq with guests that drove a long way especially to see us (oh yes we were very lucky little Vegemite's) and getting upset that the worlds worst show in all of time - i.e. Jonathan Creek - has taken over from possibly the best Sunday night telly - i.e. Midsommer Murders - ever! I have some lush, spring, outdoorsy photos for you and check out Mr Sunflower I am growing on my desk I think he's about to come out and say 'hi'!


Canola crop taller than me.

Hollow Mountain walk in the Grampians.
Apparently you don't see Black Boys flowering very often (I dunno! This could be a lie, sorry if it is!) but it was covered in ants so I stayed my distance...

- jess says 'hello little fella, can't wait to see your flower.' (umm... that's not meant to be dirty either...)

More sewing updates tomorrow!

xxj.

Bias Binding - Learning.

I used a method I found on the net somewhere ages ago and a brought bias binding tape maker thingy and it was a little traumatising, but we got there in the end. We started with our strips on the bias, I cut tonnes of them but only used about 15 max.

I sewed them together and got worried about, how should I say, 'dog's breakfasty' they looked. But I trimmed them down so they were a uniformed 1 inch wide. Oh, yes, 1 inch is small...Next up the tool that was meant to solve all my problems, make my sewing a delightful experience and boost my efficiency and creativity. Yep, you guessed it, it was difficult, I thought I was doing it all wrong and it took me aaggggeeees.... (see how it's not coming out right? see how it's not folding nice - it looks frightening!)
This was what I ended up with and I blame the fabric for not holding the way I was telling it to!

So I rolled it all up and it's sitting there waiting for me tonight to sew it onto the dress...

Wish me luck!

xx j.

A dress for Frocktober.

OK so for the very good reason of simply doing Sewtober instead of Frocktober is that I am notorious for running out of fairly crucial things when I'm at critical points in my sewing, like thread for example. Yep, Jess making things hard for herself since 1984...

Anywho, I started the Navy Dress and chickened out on the hacking and used an old dress pattern I had, which will be nice except that vertical stripes and pleats = wide, so tonight I am unpicking and resewing with out the pleats so that hopefully it makes the dress more elegant. My learning for this navy number will be finally getting around to homemade bias binding. I've had a squiz on the net and found a few ways of doing it so hopefully I don't end up with hundreds of tiny bits of unusable fabric and I end up with bias binding. That would be nice.

On another note I'm loving the Cue Jackets with their strong shoulders... but you'll have to go check them out cos I can't get a good photo for you.

xx j.

Sewtober - it still counts if I'm drafting patterns, right?

So last night I didn't actually get to the sewing machine, but I was crazy all over the floor trying to draft and cut out a dress to make tonight. I've got some stretchy navy fabric which should be great but I'm a little scared about drafting my own pattern and I'm a little worried that the neckline will expose my nipples, or something suitably horrible! So I've been to burdastyle and found this Drafting a Princess line Dress... which lead me to this 1942 Modern Pattern Design and decided that it's all a little difficult to learn in an evening so I'm just going to cut and sew and see what I come up with. Ha. We'll see who's laughing tomorrow (I'm sorry Miss Navy Fabric in advance if I massacre you.)

Oh and I can't get Diane Kruger's black dress that she wears in Inglorious Basterds out of my head - it fit her so lovely and nice and she looked amazing. Good movie too, that Tarrantino doesn't like traitors does he...

Well better get to hacking!

And for a little challenge encouragement: Go Miss Veronica Darling! Go!

I wanted to show you guys a picture of the crops that I drive past everyday, so when we were out on sat Mr JPB showed me a the 'ducks guts' of crops right near the Grampians. Isn't it so lush and green?

While we were out in our new Outback (Oh yes we did just buy a suburban soccer mum car!) we met this little guy, we liked him, he didn't like us very much -

couldn't possibly have anything to do with us prodding and poking him...

Good fun though tearing through the FWD track in the Outback with our mates on dirt bikes.

Now to the 'Sewtober' update! Miss Veronica Darling is doing 'Frocktober' where she makes a dress a day for October, yes yes that is 31 dresses! She is far braver than me and loves a challenge that girl! I on the other hand are well and truly copping out and supporting her efforts by doing a 'Sewtober' where I will sew every single day of October and blog about it until you all wish for me to stop. So here is my efforts for the first 4 days:

The Jacket that used to be a Curtain...

I used the Burda Style Eva Jacket pattern and the instructions were pretty crappy and I ended up with left over bits at the end, which could be my fault cos I get going and then kinda make it up a bit and then get lost and go back to the pattern and then realise that I've done about 7 steps wrong and there is no turning back now and have to make up the whole thing! But it's my first collar and I think that the collar is possibly the only thing saving this jacket. The material was wrong, it doesn't sit nice and is a bit plastic-y. But it's shinny and this jacket will be worn to a music festival, because music festivals need a little something special but something that you don't mind wrecking! So what do you think?

Might I add they never mentioned shoulder pads anywhere until the last line which says something like 'put in shoulder pads' and I was caught out - no shoulder pads! So I had to had some ruffle to the shoulders. But this is all about learning!

Lessons Learned from Eva:

1. Collars are easy and just need facing to look pro.

2. Make facing so you can sew it into the side seams and it's not flapping every where.

3. Ironing is your friend.

4. Read the whole pattern before sewing!

5. Use appropriate material, doesn't matter if you like the print, if it's not appropriate it will only disappoint you.

It was fun though and not a complete disaster, it will be my Meredith jacket!

xx j.