Sunshine and Photos

I hate having my photo taken as you can probably see, but feel after a week of holiday from work and lots of sewing I have to show off my efforts. It has been lovely to have some time off after a hard winter, I work less hours during the summer months, which have now started, so lots more free time for my new hobby.

My denim dress is finally finished and I was so excited to wear it today, it's incredibly comfortable and I am going to live in this during the cooler days of summer.

The tunic I have nearly finished, using my new body pattern for Simplicity 2147, it is a perfect fit now. I am going to make different sizes of the pattern after work this week so I can make a looser version for me and some for my Mum.

Denim Portfolio Tunic

I am completely obsessed with this pattern and just had to make another one. A lovely lady in Australia send me 2.5 Meters of lightweight denim fabric just for this purpose. I set to work on it after Christmas between gaps in working and it has taken me until now to complete it. Mainly because I could not hem it! I asked my mum for advice and she took it home to try, I didn't want to rush her so left it until last weekend to ask for it back. I re-did the hem on Monday using my new machine, I made it a lot wider than intended but I am desperate to wear it so I am leaving it as it is.

 

I chose this seam finish around the arms and shoulder seams to make it even more comfortable.

 

Cozy Corduroy

I finally (nearly) finished making my Red corduroy dress, after lots of broken needles and head aches it is now all done apart from the hem, which I need advice on. I am so pleased with it, perfect for chilly winters, a lovely casual dress, so toasty I don't even need to wear a coat over it. It was very difficult to sew, I had to re-cut the neck pieces 3 times before I finally got it right, I have no idea why as the first two Portfolio dresses weren't that bad.

Once I have hemmed it I will be living in my new dress, I also went and bought a larger size pattern to make one for my Mummy for Christmas we have very similar taste and I think she would look lovely in a black or red corduroy one too. It took hours to make but well worth all the time to get such a gorgeous result. I made the neck band slightly less wide to give it a more casual look too.

Lisette 2245

I love this pattern so much I had to make myself another dress, I decided to make a long sleeved version in preparation to wear to a meal at the Whittlebury Hall Hotel which is to the side of Silverstone race track. The meal was last weekend and I wore my purple Lisette dress with pride and enjoyed the impressed looks as I told people I had sewn it myself.

It is the most comfortable dress ever and with the right accessories looked perfect. I am now a pro at this pattern so will definitely be making more in different colours.

I got the cotton from Cutting edge fabric in Basingstoke and the dress cost less than £15.00 to make.

I put two sparkly buttons on the back to make it look more interesting.

I Love Lisette

After my success at making a bag I wanted to challenge myself further and make a more complex casual dress. I fell in love with a Lisette pattern 2245 and decided it was the dress for me. I love casual dresses with leggins so dashed off to get some fabric. Cutting Edge fabric in Basingstoke have a huge selection, I found a cute black cotton with green and blue spots which I thought would be perfect.

The pattern was very easy to follow until I got to the neck line, this was very tricky as you have to pin the widest edge of the curved neck band to the inside edge of the dress with right sides together, which means starting in the middle and minipulating the fabric round the curved edge. I managed it after four attempts and it looks perfect. I went straight over to my mums to give her and my grandma a preview, they were amazed and gave me some buttons and thread as a reward.

The following day I wore my gorgeous dress out to lunch with friends and they loved it too.