Colette Peony #1!                                                                                                              

The Peony is my favourite Colette dress. I love the boat neck, the a-line skirt, and that it doesn’t use too much fabric! (I’m looking at you, Colette Crepe!) It’s the perfect teaching dress: pretty and professional, but effortless! Nothing is going to show, slide around, or cause a fuss.

In theory, this is a wearable muslin - A practice attempt with a pattern that’s good enough to see the light of day! I did two practice muslins of the bodice using old bedsheets before this, and had to make a heap of changes… shortened the bodice A LOT, took 5cm out of the centre back, and moved the front darts farther out from the centre.        

By some strange quirk of my body (aka. my belly, I think!) the whole bodice tilts backwards on me. It makes the side bust darts tilt up too high, and made the neckline far, far too high! I ended up cutting the front neckline about 15cm lower, but you’d never know it to look at the pictures! At some point I should perhaps try going back to the original pattern and figuring out how to fit it better. In the meantime, I’m happy enough!

I was nervous about cutting into my fabric stash from Japan, so for this wearable muslin I used some polyester that I bough at the second hand shop instead. It’s actually great - doesn’t crease much, hangs well, kinda shiny and interesting but fairly basic! And when I happened to drop yogurt on myself during lunch, it came right off with water and didn’t leave a mark! Hurray!  

The dress isn’t perfect - bra straps tend to show at the corner of the neck, and the facings at the back of the neckline can sit a little funny under a sweater. On the plus side, it’s got POCKETS! And they disappear perfectly into the side seam! I even dispensed with a zipper and just squirm into it instead.

After I finished the whole dress, it just didn’t seem quite finished… so I topstitched on a faux-belt from a beautiful Alexander Henry print. It gives the dress some definition, I think, and helps me figure out what colours to accessorize with! The print has pink, blue, cream, purple, teal and red, so I have lots of choices!    

I’m working on round two right now… but here’s my problem! Having done it once, it’s kinda boring the second time around! I keep trying to dream up exciting and new modifications, when really I should just finish the darn thing and experiment with something new. Someone told me once that as an artist, the first time making something is exciting and the second time through is just boring. Do you find that too? 

My (Not Quite) Meringue Skirt!                                                                                                           

Our first project in the Colette Handbook Sew-Along was the Meringue skirt. It’s a pretty basic A-Line skirt, with the addition of cute scallops at the bottom. Problem is, I’m not the cute scallops kind of girl. Too much trouble to iron, I figure!                                                                                                                                               

My solution was to add jumbo ric-rak at the bottom of my skirt. It keeps it fun, and echoes the original pattern, but makes for a much more practical skirt!                                                                                                                                              

Even though I didn’t faithfully follow the original design, I learned a  lot and feel much more confident. It’s been about 10 years since I made anything using a pattern, so this skirt really helped me get over my fears! I cut a straight size 14, and didn’t really change much after the muslin. It’s my first fully lined garment, AND my first invisible zipper. Hurray!                                                                                                                                              

Other things I learned? We barely have any unadorned, unfurnished walls in our house! This little corner was the closest to a blank canvas that i could find. Also: When my husband takes a picture of me, I look waaay shorter than I do to myself in the mirror! Next time, I guess I should get him to get a lower perspective!                                                                                                                                              

Get Organised: Step 1                                                                                                     

My first step in getting organised is always to spend ages thinking about all the pretty ways I could do it! Lovely notebooks, cute apps, rainbow pens… It’s a dreamy but rather impractical approach. What I really need is something flexible, easy to access and update, and something just pretty enough that I’ll enjoy using it!                                                                                                                                              

Here’s screen cap of my current solution: Use the basic Stickies program that comes with every Mac, but use fonts to make it more fun. It’s free, and that’s good! I started with some basic goal setting, both for myself and for the blog… with a loose time frame and some measurable achievements. Next, some long-range plans… some blog post plans… and a to-do list for current projects! I’m sure I’ll tweak it as I go, but for now, it seems like a good start!                                                                                                                                              

I’m curious how other people plan their blogs… Someone like Tasia from Sewaholic.net always seems to come up with good discussion posts every month or so. Is that a fluke, or planned?                                                                                                                                              

Speaking of planning… it’s an hour before my bedtime, and I still haven’t baked a cake for my Mom’s birthday. Enough blogging - more baking! (As an added bonus, I’m hoping to watch some Downton Abbey while it’s in the oven! ;)                                                                                                                                              

Pattern Weights: Pretty, heavy, and so useful!                                                                  

I’d never even heard of pattern weights until this year - but wow, they make cutting out patterns so easy if you have a rotary cutter and a self-healing mat! Just lay out the fabric, put the pattern on top, and use the pattern weights to hold everything in place as you cut with the blade! I’d always wondered how people traced patterns without making all sorts of mistakes as the tracing paper and pattern tissue slide around… and these are clearly the answer. 

Until recently, I’d been using a collection of nails, jars, rolls of masking tape, and even some silver polish to weight down fabrics… but when my silver polish started leaking onto fabric, I knew it was time to upgrade! 

I’ve seen a few tutorials around, like Elizabeth Hartman’s 50 cent Pattern Weights at Oh Fransson, and these ribbon-wrapped washers at SewWhitney. I decided to go for a hybrid version: Basically, a beanbag filled with 6 heavy washers! I made 6 little beanbags, which seems to be enough to hold most patterns in place.

Better yet, with the help of these little babies, I made my first dress this week! A much altered Colette Peony… Pictures to follow eventually!

Blogging and Planning: Why I'm about to go all A-type on crafting!

As a teacher, I get all kinds of joy out of a well-laid plan, preferably colour-coded and arranged in pretty fonts! I love thinking through a unit or lesson, and figuring out how to make it work. As a crafter though, I’ve always thought that too much planning or organization would take the fun right out of it. Until now…

You see, I listened to a bunch of CraftyPod podcasts today, and “Sister” Diane really turned me around. The problem with blogging without a plan is that every post becomes about immediate things: What you did, what you made. That’s certainly true for me so far! She suggests that a bit of planning can help create a wider range of posts, including interviews, reviews, and tutorials! I think planning ahead would really help me with photography too - I might take pictures in the daytime AND remember to edit post them later! 

I’ve already got a few ideas for big posts over the next few months: 

• reviewing some crafty books I’ve been reading


• making one pattern many ways (Colette Peony, I’m looking at you!)


• highlighting one craft material a month (felt, washi, etc), including an original tutorial


• connecting with local crafters for interviews or discussions about modern crafting

In the mean time, I’ve made myself a monthly blog planning template. I’d love to offer a pdf version of it here, but I just can’t seem to figure out how! In the meantime, here are two versions I made:

 

I think a daily or weekly planner would just overwhelm me right now, so I’m starting simple. If you’d like to use it, please step on over to my flickr page and grab a copy! 

I'm a winner!!!

Today is my lucky day! I’ve never won an online draw before, but today I won a copy of “The Crafter’s Guide to Taking Great Photos” being offered by Canadian Living! It looks like a really great book… perhaps now I’ll have fewer blurry pictures! 

Thanks, Canadian Living!!!

Felt Heart Garland                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

It’s almost Valentines! It’s not really a big holiday for adults these days (though it is the day J and I had our first date!), but it’s huge for Elementary kids and the Japanese! I was looking for an excuse to play with felt the other night, so I cut out this rainbow of heart from my newest felt stash. (Seriously guys, it’s all about the rainbow. !t makes everything better!) My friend’s cat was so fascinated by the felt that I ended up making a felt cat toy too! 

Spring Wreath                                                                                                              

I’ve been dreaming this one up for a while… It’s inspired by this beautiful paper-and-twig arrangement that I pinned a while ago from “Two Girls Being Crafty”, but instead of paper, I used fabric, and instead of branches, I used a grapevine wreath! 

I used a gorgeous bright Echino stripe as the basis for the colour scheme, and mixed in other bits and pieces from my stash. Each leaf is made with two layers of fabric sandwiching a layer of interfacing and a flexible floral wire. Not sure what to do with it now that I’ve made it, but for now it will cheer up my sewing area!

Cowls for me! 

Made these a while ago… decided they are too oddball to sell, so they are for me instead! Perfect for teaching in, because they stay in place all day!

Gifts, both good and bad!                                                                                                                   

Last weekend I was busy sewing gifts - and here they are! For Anne and Dan, a semi-successful set of patchwork placemats, and for Jamie, a collection of totally failed coin purses! 

Somehow this is the only photo I have of the placemats! (Anne, help?) I picked out pale green and blue fabrics from my stash, and had fun trying to channel Japanese Zakka-style (cute but calm handmade) in the piecing. Each placemat is different. Unfortunately, I’d forgotten to prewash three of the 10 fabrics, and lo and behold, they shrank in the wash! The backing is now all bubbly and loose, since it was made out of a well-washed used bedsheet. It stayed big while the front patchwork shrank! Darn. Oh well. I still like the overall look! 

Jamie’s coin purses… oh my. He’d asked if I could revamp or remake his Japanese Astroboy coin purse for his birthday, so one night while he was out, I dutifully tried to figure out how it was made! I knew it would take a few tries, so I started with ugly fabric and garish zippers… but I never thought it would be so hard! After two tries, and much internet tutorial searching, I gave up on recreating his previous coin purse… and moved on to something simpler. It was figuring out how to line everything that really messed me up! Version three was a reasonable mock-up, on my 4th try I made something more usable. He’s trying out the design, and if it works, I might make a sixth and final draft!

I haven’t been posting much lately, but I swear I’ve been sewing most nights! 

Since Christmas, I’ve been trying to wear something handmade almost every day. In an ideal world, that would include perfectly-fitted retro dresses made by me… but in real life, it’s usually necklaces, scarves, pins, and belts! My sister and BIL had a housewarming party last weekend, so I was motivated to whip up some colourful handmade goodies for myself. The beauty of making accessories is that they only take half an hour to finish! 

The belt is black on one side, so that I can wear it with patterned dresses and tops… but the fun side is tis lovely emerald green cotton. I bought 10m (Yes, ten metres!) in Japan for $1/m, thinking we could use it for wedding decorating… so this belt barely made a dint! The necklace uses just a thin strip of lovely lightweight cotton voile, also from Japan. I have enough to make a dress out of, I think… Just not quite sure how it will look as a whole garment!