A Christmas Treat

Hello and I hope you are all relaxed and ready for the big day without too much stress.  There seems to be too much stress for my liking around what is supposed to be such a peaceful day Anyway we decided to have a gift for each other ( that is my husband and I) in the form of a day out.  We decided to go and see Chatsworth house all decorated for Christmas on Friday, it was such a lovely day and I am glad we went even though it rained all day long!  We still had a walk in the gardens too with the brolly up.  Here are a few festive images of Chatsworth House for you...

 As we walked around different rooms were decorated for different countries so it is really worth a look if you can get over to Yorkshire over the holidays.

 My husband managed to get much better photos than I did, it was very atmospheric but my camera didn't like that.

We are going to return in the summer to do the gardens only but in fairer weather.

I made a bag to order last week also for a friend, this one will be a gift for her daughter.  I am pretty confident she will have never seen this blog so I am ok to share here.

Not so much recycled with this one as I let her choose what materials she wanted so they were all ordered special.  She seemed very pleased with it so that is positive.

I also did one of my Minerva makes this morning, I have three as they all turned up at once but now I am off work it is the time to get on with things.  I chose this faux leather for bag making but as it is light I made a top instead.

It has a crumpled effect, so it doesn't matter if you don't want to iron.

Well that is all for today, I hope you have a Happy Christmas .

A Christmas Dachshund Poppy Top

That title is quite a mouthful isn't it? Well here is my latest Christmas sewing make, when I was in my local fabric shop last week I saw this gorgeous cotton fabric that is just perfect for Christmas, the shop is Happy Hare and if you are in the Sheffield area I suggest you have a look.  They have a lovely selection of craft fabrics and are really friendly, they also do lots of classes if you are looking to improve your skills.

Now I only bought a metre as I didn't know what I wanted it for but when I got home I saw this Poppy top pattern from Simple Sew that my friend passed on to me a while ago.  It does say it requires more fabric on the  pattern but there is always a way!  For me it was just a case of places my pieces right up to the very edges and making the facings and sleeves shorter.  It was a squeeze but I just managed it.  I am very satisfied with the tiny pieces that are left ;)  here is the finished top and I will talk you through the rest below.

The light in here was not great for photographs but I wanted a festive setting!

I will alternate the shots so that you can see the top better, I really like the pleats on this top and they matched up perfectly.  

It has this keyhole detail at the back and I really like that, as you can see I am wearing a top under it but that is only because it is winter.  If I was to make this top in a different fabric for another season it wouldn't need any layering.

I used a little turquoise button to pick out one of the colours in the dogs little Christmas jumpers.

The only other adjustment I made to the pattern other than shortening the facings to fit it on the fabric was to put a little pleat on the sleeves.  The reason for this was that I used cotton fabric and on the cover image the top is clearly made in a floaty fabric.  So my sleeves stood out rather than falling softly onto my shoulders so to counter this I just nipped them in a bit in a little pleat and topstitched it down.

I am very happy with how this top has turned out, it is true to size, it has basic pieces and instructions and would be a very good pattern for a beginner.  In fact I would say if you are stuck for a last minute present for someone who sews then why not get them this pattern, if you are buying fabric too though please check the back of the pattern  and buy them the correct amount.  I am able to squeeze this out of a metre because I know my size well and I have done this before. Also I only just managed it, so you wouldn't want someone to be disappointed by not having enough fabric.  Disclaimer here, I am not sponsored buy Simple Sew I just really loved the pattern. 

Here is my little roll of fabric...

Here are the pattern pieces squashed onto my little piece of fabric...

Obviously I cut them off at top length as this pattern can also be made as a dress, I will probably do that in future as well as making some long sleeved versions of this blouse.

It was a relaxing and very accurate make, the facings lined up beautifully and I didn't need to take it in as sometimes happens with a new pattern.  The pleats on the front are very easy to do  so don't be put off if you are a beginner.

What Christmas clothes have you all been making? Please let me know in the comments below and also if you have this pattern and what your thoughts were. 

Bye for now, take care. 

December...ing

A little earlier in the month this time but I thought I'd make an early start...

Making a winter dress, I bought this fabric a few months ago when I visited my local fabric shop with a friend.  I have only just made the dress as I wanted to save it for Christmas,  I know that when I make something new I always want to wear it straight away so I have saved this for the season.
The fabric is cosmo, it is Japanese and feels like a linen but I am not certain of that.  It is a good weight.

It is now fully complete but I do not have a daylight picture or one of me in it yet I will try to get one over the coming week. I only just had enough fabric so I used binding for the neck and just squeezed enough fabric for strips for the arm holes.   The lining is a combination of black and white lining, I stitched two pieces together to make a piece big enough as I didn't have enough of either colour.
It has a side zip, front and back darts and a couple of small shaping darts at the neckline to stop any gaping.

Here it is when I cut it out, just a few small pieces of fabric left, I

used another shift dress I made previously from my own pattern as a guide to cut around. Most of the shaping and fitting was done on the mannequin with a few tweaks when trying on.

Listening to some wonderful new music on youtube, I found this gorgeous song the other day after hearing it on UCB radio You came anyway by Ashton Lane it is a Christmas song but a little different  but if you listen to it you will hear the story.  Also Matt Kearney The Air I Breathe is another good one.

Designing more bags, I made this one yesterday and added some applique leaves, the coloured cottons are from a little solids sample pack I received with some fabric a while ago they are only about 5cm square but I have found this little use for them.

Paper crafting a card for a friend, I have not made any cards for a while but I enjoyed making this one. They can be time consuming if you make all the parts yourself and then if people just discard them after so you have to weigh up how much you enjoy the process I suppose.  The thing is with other crafts in fabric or yarn you know your efforts will last for more than a coupe of days.

I found a use for old magazines here as the balloons are fabric image pictures cut up.

Thrifting books from the charity shops, a couple for me and a few for friends. I am collecting the original Jane Austin books for myself, I gave up on the Austin project as I was finding they do not do the originals justice.  I picked up The Miniaturist  as I loved it when I borrowed it from the library.  We picked up a couple last week too when we visited but have not got any images of those to hand. I try to find the ones in the best condition.  Here are todays finds...

Eating probably too much in the way of starch, I am finding I need pasta and potatoes and gravy.  Really filling stuff at the moment, it must be the cold weather.  Today I found these gluten free, vegan friendly mince pies in Holland and Barrett.

 I have tried one and they are quite nice if a little crumbly as all gluten free food generally is.

Looking at sewing magazines on youtube, yes I know this sounds a little strange but the idea was that I wanted to get a feel for a few different magazines before subscribing to one.  I was  interested in Burda and Knipmode.  I have tried in the past to get in touch with Knipmode but they never responded to my email.  I found that Saturday Night Stitch on youtube has done browse throughs on both magazines throughout the year so you can get a  feel for them that way.   This was really useful as I  now know that I do not want to subscribe to either as from what I can see a lot of the pattern styles are repeated with very little changes.  What I like is the ideas, so I will use these as a reference point then make the patterns myself just using the images for inspiration.  Go and have a look it is quite fun to look through the magazines and hear the opinions and preferences of others.

Well that is all for today, have a good week.