Catch up: Joel Dewberry's Meadow Spirit Skirt and Colette's Zinnia

Good Morning! I had a pretty intense weekend sewing (and watching BSG) and didn't actually get round to getting pictures of my new makes. Plus le Baz went out for drinks with his friends at Lunchtime on Saturday and didn't come home until 2 am Sunday morning!! He was a little tipsy and then spent most of Sunday feeling rather sorry for himself. He must have had a great night!!

I mentioned previously that I had gotten my Joel Dewberry skirt out of the UFO box and completed it. Yay for me! The pattern that I used was Joel Dewberry Eclectic modern, Meadow Spirit skirt in Joel's Modern Meadow fabric. Ya I know, not very imaginative considering this is the fabric they used on the envelope. You can also see that I did not add the pleats to the bottom, this just added far to much length for my liking.

I should have really switched that TV off...

This skirt was a bit of a nightmare for me last year. I tweaked and tweaked and couldn't get it to fit. Thus, in an angry rage, the UFO box was born. Back when I started this skirt I hadn't actually had much experience of fit. I'd pick a size off the envelope that looked like my size and hope for the best. I'm a little bit more savvy than that now, or at least I hope I am!

The problem that I had was around the back of the waistband. It was almost as though it was designed for someone was a big juicy butt as I had two baggy bum shaped bumps sticking out. When I returned to the skirt I realised that was down to my lack of hips and all round boy shaped figure. I pinched the fabric round my hips and as if by magic the weird bumps disappeared.

I'm so pleased with the results, however, it's not summer here yet. It's still pouring with rain on a daily basis, so I was a little premature in the making of this one, but I can definitely see me pulling this back out when the rain dries up.

The next make was another Colette Zinnia skirt. You may remember that I made one as a gift for my bestie at Christmas. I liked the pattern so much that I just had to make one for myself. 

Well why not?

The fabric that I used was Moda's Bluebird Park. Unfortunately, you can't really see the detail of the design on the fabric but it kinda looks like a yellow chambray. 

I'm not sure it's possible to have awful fit issues with this pattern as the only measurement you need is your waist. So it's just a case of measuring the waistband in the correct place.

I don't think that this was a particularly good fabric to make the skirt out of. It was a bit of a pain to hem and to me it doesn't look very sharp. It's also a little see through so I'd definitely wear it out with a slip.

Besides all this I think it's a wonderful skirt. Again, it's not really the weather for it yet, but just you wait until it is!

Where has the last week gone?!

Time is just flying over here, so I must be having fun!

The weekend seems like a long time ago now, distant memories of a shooting weekend up in sunny Warcop...

OK, I'm lying. It was actually snowing. At 0800 we were stood outside of the Armory collecting our weapons, gazing at the sky thinking 'I must be crazy'! For those of you who've never been out shooting in the snow, I'll tell you this - it's pretty darn chilly.  Fortunately for us that's where the snow finished for the weekend. I got a little wet, but nothing too bad, but it was definitely chilly. Not only was I wearing waterproof trousers, but also my scarf and gloves. 

Armed with several cups of hot tea I ventured out for the shoot. I was feeling pretty darn confident. A couple of practice shots at the targets and we come to the main shoot. I'm loving it - Ye haw! So I'm about to do this shoot where we stand a few paces back, watch for the target popping up, then have to run to the firing point, throw ourselves on the floor 'belt buckles down' and then fire 5 shots at the target. So I throw myself down for the first shot and clumsily the iron sight hits me right in the shooting eye with the recoil from my first shot. [Swear word] then my eye decides to to leak and I can see nothing! I came out of that with 15 rounds still in my magazine out of 65, but only 1 point worse off than my neighbour who had fired all of his rounds - bonus! But I was still shit. Never mind, I had a great time.

Sunday I got to take part in Clay pigeon shooting. This was by far the best activity of the weekend, but also my worst ha ha! I had 14 cartridges and I hit zero clay pigeons boooooooo... [sad face]. Still had an awesome time and I'm looking forward to more shooting later on in the year.

So I haven't actually done an awful lot of sewing. I've managed to fix a UFO that I started back in July last year. I'm particularly proud of this because I'd been having really awful fit issues and had ended up sacking it off to try something else. That's my Joel Dewberry Meadow Spirit skirt which I originally posted about here. Back then I had little experience of fitting garments, I just picked the nearest size and hoped for the best. So I've finally completed this skirt, but I'm yet to take some pictures for my blog, so I'll probably post that this weekend.

I've also started to make myself a Colette Zinnia skirt. I previously made one for my best friend for Christmas and I've been dying to make myself one ever since. You can find that here. I'm still on with this, doing a little bit here and a little bit there. 

On top of all of this, and possibly for the last few weeks I've had a go at quilting. A friend of mine bought a quilt from the States for her baby to be from Etsy and it took something like 6 months to come. It was such an anti-climax as she's not so fond of it and it cost a fortune. When I saw it myself, apart from the designer fabric that had been used I couldn't see why it took so long to arrive or why it cost so much. So, I thought why not have a go myself?

Unfortunately, I've had a few motivational issues with it and I'd run out of materials to finish it off. But this is how I started:

To save time, I very lazily bought a couple of charm packs from eBay. (I won these at like 99p each woop woop!) I then stitched them together in rows and then stitched the rows together, pressing the seams out as I went.  That is the picture that you can see above. I was pretty happy with the way it turned out.

At this point I should probably mention that I have absolutely no experience in this area, I've not even made a coaster! So I think I've done it a little wrong! So what I did next is sew the batting to the piece of fabric I was using for the underside (An old white Egyptian cotton sheet that I'd cut down). I've since found out that this is not exactly how it should be done! Finished article to be finished soon.

The Elisalex project

It has been an eventful and busy week since I last posted. We now have a beautiful baby niece so we popped round to see the happy couple and our teeny tiny little Ivy. She's just amazing! Then we spent the weekend trying to complete the kitchen, but actually spent more time talking about it and buying the materials than actually finishing it. But it looks somewhere on the way now....

So, I haven't had much time for sewing and the time that I had, I spent making Elisalex muslins. Because everyone loves a frustrating project that never seems to want to fit! No, of course they don't. I almost gave up. In the end I managed to get there and now I'm so pleased. 

This is my happy face!

The first muslin that I made I cut a straight 10. This was a terrible fit, even worse than the cheapest RTW dress that I own. It was super tight around the waist and super baggy everywhere else. The neckline gaped, the back gaped and the bust was a little baggy. This is so odd because I've only just slimmed down to a size 10 and I even put on 5 pounds over Christmas that I'm very slowly shifting. So I pinned it up and re-drafted the bodice pieces. From my new measurements I graded it from a size 8 in the shoulders to a 10 in the bust and a 12 at the waist. I created another Muslin. This attempt was much better, but it still didn't fit well. I had to take more from the shoulders, which I just removed from the front and back center pattern pieces. I also had to remove a little off the shoulder pieces as there was way too much ease, giving me loads of crumply fabric around my armpits, but at the same time I had to add to the rest of the sleeves as they were so tight around my arms that it was pulling at the top of the bodice.

Fed up with all of the adjustments I decided to go ahead and cut my fabric. I knew what adjustments were needed and was pretty certain that this would achieve the required fit. 

This fabric I've had in my stash for at least 6 months. It's part of Joel Dewberry's Modern Meadow collection. I love it so much that I didn't want to use it! Unfortunately the pictures don't do it justice, I think this possibly might have something to do with the Burgers that I grilled last night, they left a sort of haze through the kitchen and sitting room and I think that's why we couldn't get any decent pictures of the fabric. I could have sacked it off and done it today, but I wore the dress yesterday and there's nothing like seeing a dress on an actual person.

As you can see, I didn't go with the original skirt in the pattern. The fabric just wouldn't have been stiff enough. So, instead, I opted for a skirt that I've already used from New Look Pattern 6824. The pattern calls for pleats, but I decided to go with gathers and I think it works quite well. I do like big skirts, I was considering using the skirt pattern from Butterick 9269, but I wanted an every day dress and I feel like the bigger the skirt the more of a special occasion it should be worn at. Plus they carry so much more bulk round the waist that I feel it necessary to wear a belt over it and I don't want to have to. Sometimes it's nice to be free of belts!

I'm very pleased now with the fit, and despite having to re-draft the bodice, I will definitely be making this dress again. 

Silly selfie time!

Loving Bloglovin'

I've seen Bloglovin' all over the place for some time now and I don't know why my curiosity hasn't taken me there sooner. I have bookmarks all over the place, and a list of blogs that I follow in Blogger as well as the odd pin in Pinterest. Now I have it all under one roof, on one page for my extra convenience. Love it! I just wish all of the blogs I follow were on there. So if you are reading this and you aren't on there, please, please, pretty please add your blog!

Anyway, I haven't spent the last couple of Weeks stalking my latest blog crush. I've been slowly getting on with my Joel Dewberry meadow spirit skirt. I must say I should have finished it by now, it's simple enough, but life has been getting in the way, especially since the Sun has graced us with its presence!

I made a little bit of mistake with the skirt. I could have finished it last night, but I had previously thought it would be a good idea to use a stiffer interfacing as I always wish I had and now I know why I shouldn't. It turned my hips into a triangle. So this was me last night un-picking the bias binding I used to finish it off so I could rip the interfacing out...

Joel Dewberry Meadow Spirit Part 1

Despite everything that's going on, tonight I've managed to get a couple of hours sewing in. It's too hot, I'm faffing and I've wasted the first 30 mins creating a new playlist on iTunes!

After trying to measure the pattern pieces for the waistband yoke I couldn't work out which size I wanted, so I picked the 12 from the guidelines on the back. I know I shouldn't use these but I'm not in a great concentration mode tonight. I decided to make a toile of the waistband just to check that my estimations were correct. You'll notice I used the scraps from my wrap skirt to make it! Seems to look good, so hopefully I'll get the rest of the pattern traced tomorrow.

Too impatient

Joel Dewberry's Meadow Spirit Skirt pattern arrived the other day, thanks to Rainbow Silks in Great Missenden, who appear to be the only UK company to sell the pattern. I keep looking at it longingly, I just can't wait to make it, but the fabric that I have bought to make it with hasn't turned up yet. I then keep looking at my stash, trying to envisage it made from what I have, but it's just not happening for me. So I've picked out the Simplicity pattern of the week from last week and some fabric with boats on that was a bit of an impulse buy from Minerva earlier on in the year...