Things that made me smile this month

Ever find that you've entered a new taste phase without quite noticing? As an antidote to chilly noses and icy fingers, I thought I'd share a little post about things that have been making me feel warm and cosy inside.

Looking at what has drawn my eye this month, it seems I've entered a new era of kitsch! Not my usual style, but there's clearly nothing for it but to embrace the cute woodland creature within. (It's a chipmunk.) 

Happy Easter everyone!

Vintage greetings card - complete with awesome pun and happy puppies!

Charity shop find: 'The Happy Forest' 1968 story book with music by Eric Winstone (band leader, composer, journalist, television and radio personality), illustrated by Susan Aspey

Popcorn box, from Tuesday's visit to the circus - hurrah!

 Vintage style baby deer decoration

The 'strike a pose' dress

This has never happened before: I asked Freya to let me take a photo in the new frock I made, and instead of carrying about her normal 3 and a half year old business while I merrily snapped away, she started striking poses. Some were dramatic - a few power punches, a couple of Tree Foo Tom moments - some gymnastic  - arabesque, headstand - and some alarmingly fashion forward - she has the 'London Look' to a T. All highly amusing, but detracting somewhat from the dress!

Anyway, after much coaxing of the temperamental model, here are the tamer shots of my latest creation:

The shape is based on a mexican folk dress that she'd grown out of. The style is very basic but I like it's boxy smock-ness - perfect for a knock-about dress. I used a charity shop doilly for the neck trim and some broiderie anglaise and ribbon for the hem decoration. The main fabric is a 30s revival print and the yoke is a tangerine orange.

I roughly increased the size of the original dress by adding 5mm to the width on each side of the yoke and increasing the length. Overall I'm pretty pleased - it's not the most 'finessed' of garments, but I think it's got rustic charm! I was however, marked down a few points by my model for a lack of "twirliness". I must remember that twirls are very important these days - maybe that would have got me less of the "London look" and more "happy pre-schooler"!

Work in progress

Question: What has more pockets than a person has fingers...

a fancy-smancy zip...

and a curve or two....?

Answer: My protoype for the Made by Loulabelle knitting bag pattern!

It's not quite ready for the full on reveal yet, but keep 'em peeled!

ps.. yes, this is the same fabric as the baby sleeping bag! Those bedspreads go a long way you know!

Baby's got a brand new bag

Little E was looking somewhat squished in her sleeping bag last week. It occured to me it might have something to do with the 0-6 month old label- baaad mummy!

Once the guilt subsided, I was quite glad for the excuse to make a new one, as all the shop bought bags we have are creamy, beigy blah blah colour or adorned with irritating smug bunnies. So, out came a 70s bed spread, a flannel sheet and a bit of bias binding.

I used this great pattern from Small Dream Factory as my template and then worked out how to fit it all together as I went along.

Esther is now snug as a bug which-is-cosy-but-has-lots-of-room in its cocoon, and  wakes up to look at her purple and pink toes with glee. Gooood mummy!

When Santa came to town...

Okay, so Christmas is now just a fuzzy memory pushed to the back of our brains by snow, January detox diets and the whiff of spring.  But the Santa's elves who looked after our house have finally been discharged from their Christmas re-hab centre and want to show you some of the things they made for the Loulabelle little ones this year...

First they went to town with the Princess and the pea project  from the very clever Manda Gregory of Treefall Design, as published in Mollie Makes Issue 15.

15 quilts, a pillow, 3 fimo peas and a crown later, they decided at 1am one December night that they must also make a bag to keep everything in - oh, and of course, the peas needed their own little pea-sack....

The next "it'll only take an evening" project, was the mice family of 3 - also from Mollie Makes (issue 11). Santa's elves went a bit cross-eyed with this one and will NOT be sewing mouse clothes again, EVER, but were quite pleased with the outcome - even if it did take a week and not 3 hours.

The last thing that the elves wish to share with you for now are these textured bean sacks and their special pom pom  festooned home. The elfs got a little giddy with festive spirit, red wine and dark chocolate, and what was supposed to be 3 little bags for one little baby, became 10 sacks and a draw-string bag to keep them in. Each bag has a different filling - rice, lentils, dried peas. The outsides are made from textured fabrics - fake leather, cord, barkcloth - and there are ribbon tags and pom poms thrown in for good measure! This project was one of my (sorry, the elves) own, so I thought I might share a how-to in the next couple of weeks - as long as the elves give me permission of course.

I seem to be acquiring bargain vintage dresses at quite a rate this year. I fell in love with the print of this dress and decided it was worth the £4 asking price, but the odd polo shirt collar thingy was definitely pushing the granny look to it's limits (see... just look at that sad face!).

Twenty short minutes of pinning, snipping and stitching later... bye bye weird collar, hello happy scoop neck!

So, in the interests of spreading a bit of self-pride and happiness around, I thought I'd share my technique, using a dress that I love as my neckline template and applying a bias binding facing.

You will need:

• Double fold bias binding tape - enough to go round your new neckline plus around 5 cm extra.
• Pins, tape measure, scissors, thread and sewing machine.
• A dress or top with a neckline you like.

Step 1:  Unpick the collar seam so that you are able to work out your new neckline without weird Mr Bad Collar getting in the way. I didn't need to unpick the whole collar, just the section where my revised neckline would be coinciding with the original.   (Of course, if your garment is collarless you can skip this bit - lucky you!)

Step 2:  Take a dress or top with a neckline that you love and place the garment you are altering inside it, aligning shoulder seams and centre fronts.

Step 3: Using your favourite dress/top as a template, mark out the new neckline with pins.

Step 4: Remove your dress/top template and check that the pin markers are aligned nicely. Make sure that your revised neckline is symmetrical and even. My dress had a centred zip in the back so I tried not to alter the back neckline too much in order to avoid the need to lower the zip.  I  needed to adjust my pins around the shoulder slightly so that the curve of the new neckline at the front faded in nicely to the original back neckline.

Step 5: This is the scary bit! As the fabric of my dress had a slight stretch, I ummed and ah-ed about whether to cut the new neckline or stitch the bias on first. In the end I took the plunge and very carefully cut the new neckline shape before applying my bias binding.
   
Important: Be aware that the pins are marking your finished neckline, so you need to add a seam allowance to create your cutting line. Your seam allowance should be half the width of your bias binding tape. I took the slightly risky approach of doing this by eye as I was cutting, but if you have a very special dress or if it cost more than a posh sandwich, I would suggest you draw or mark your cutting line- including the seam allowance - first.  Remember to add the seam allowance to the neck side of your sewing line, not the body side  (otherwise you may end up with a very plunging neckline!).

Step 6: Open up one side of your bias binding, place the right side of your bias tape onto the right side of the dress and pin in place along the fold of the tape, making sure that the edge of your bias tape and the edge of the neckline are aligned. If you have a fastener at some point along the neckline, as I did, extend the ends of the bias tape about 2.5cm on either side of the opening.  If your neckline is solid, without an opening, then fold one of the ends of the bias tape to the inside and overlap your tape to create a neat finish.

Step 7: Carefully stitch all the way around your neckline along the fold of the bias tape, making sure you reinforce the beginning and end of your stitching.

Step 8: Clip into your seam allowance as necessary, then fold the bias tape over to the wrong side of the dress and press.

Step 9: If you have a fastening to contend with, fold the ends of your bias tape under and slip stitch in position. Now, top-stitch all around the neckline, close to the edge, in order to keep the tape folded under. For extra security, you could also add a couple of whip stitches to attached the bias facing to the shoulder seams.

Step 10: Give your wonderful new neckline a final press, then try on your dress and strike a pose!

First make of the year

Drum roll please for the first completed sewing project of 2013.... ta dah!

It's certainly very ummm... paisley isn't it! Actually, I'm pretty pleased with this little number for a variety of reasons.

First, the pattern and fabric come from a batch of vintage goodies that a lovely colleague donated to me after clearing out the house of a beloved family member. My love of vintage is partly all about the continuation of something with a bit of history, and that sense of linearity is all the more special when there is a personal connection involved.

Second, the original 70s pattern (Style 3756) was sized for a 32" bust and needed some alteration to fit. I used the cut and spread method to add 1/2" width and height to the yoke and this also involved fiddling about with the sleeve heads (eek!). So, I was both slightly astonished and immensely pleased when it all worked perfectly first time without any extra adjustments needed. Result!

Third, I decided to line the dress to add some body and swing. This decision just happened to coincide with a silk sale at Oxford's favourite haberdashery. So, guess what, my paisley 70s smock is lined with the finest silk for a little bit of extra glamour (okay, so the glamour effect is slightly taken away by the woolly tights and legwarmer combo, but I know it's there!). I've not worked with silk before, and try to avoid light fabric if I can  (I'm a wimp that way), but was pleasantly surprised at how nice it was to work with - top tip though: a lovely sharp shiny new needle in your machine makes a world of difference!

Fourth and lastly, I added the bow as a little bit of contrast to all the swirly whirly stuff going on and made a last minute decision to stitch the bow bit of the bow (must be a proper name for that... loopy parts maybe??  No, that really doesn't work does it!) in place. I think it worked out okay.

So, despite the fact that the reaction from Mr Loulabelle to my 70s smock dress was a rather ungratifying "yes, it's rather smocky isn't it", I am pretty pleased with the number 1 make of the year and shall put myself at the top of the class!

PS: Apologies for the poor photo quality- the light has been pretty shoddy recently. I had to resort to an outdoor shoot and what you can't see out of shot in the first pic, is the piles of snow! Brrr, it was cold and clearly getting a good focus slipped my chilly mind!