Unpicking

Is'nt unpicking just the most dispiriting thing? Yesterday I finally got around to making my bustle skirt, but apparently I made it for someone who is a) much taller and b) much wider than me.
Sigh. Out comes the stitch ripper.

Took me ages to get that zip right, too. 

 This lack of ability does not fill me with confidence for my next project. The pattern assures me its for novices but it does look a bit scary to me, who has difficulty putting in a zip correctly. I'm sure all this would be easier if I had a sewing room....

On the upside, the rugby starts tonight and there will be beers and cheese straws to enjoy while we watch Wales thrash England.  Which they will, obviously. Hopefully.

Mmmmm, cheese straws

Oh, and I'm not Patience Kershaw. Always something to be thankful for. Great song, though.

Happy New Year!

 Oh my goodness it's been a while, hasn't it? I have no real excuse, unless loafing around watching TV and eating mince pies is an excuse...well its has been Christmas after all. But now the New Year is almost here and it's time to pull my socks up and get back to making stuff. Normally I make a few resolutions, but this year there is only one:

1. Sew stuff. Sew one wearable garment/accessory once a month at least. Build a fabric stash and make stuff with it. 

In fairness, the stash building I don't need much help with but the making something wearable I certainly do.  Since I got my sewing machine last Christmas I have made one dress and one skirt, neither of which are much good and which lurk at the back of the wardrobe taunting me with my lack of effort.

No more taunting!

I have been browsing Etsy all day for fabric and have found some winners, I feel. My January Project will be this lovely skirt by Clothkits

Picture brazenly lifted from clothkits.co.uk

This is the skirt I made before, but madly chose gabardine as the outer layer (gabardine?! Why?!) and quilting cotton for the inner. Needless to say there was very little drape, flow, or any kind of movement at all in the final garment. No one can accuse me of not learning from my mistakes so for Bustle Skirt: The Return I'm going to use some lovely wafty gauze cotton, perfect for hot summer days. I think I remember those, just (-23 today...)

Right, I am off to celebrate the evening with The Husband at a lovely little restaurant with eight courses and hopefully champagne...

Chaos Theory

So the very lovely fabric I ordered from Etsy arrived on Friday. Much excitement all around, in which mood I decided to get going on some Christmas gifts (details here). Shortly, my work table looked like this:

There has to be a better way...

To my shame the picture above illustrates my usual working environment, with all my notions and threads in a zip-lock bag and fabric over chairs, etc. At least there is tea, I'm not a savage.
After more tea and some Ginger Nuts my brain started working again and I realised the solution to my problem was staring me in the face (or, more accurately, languishing on a shelf in the basement).

The Ginger Nut: No 6 in my Biscuit Top Ten, above the Custard Cream but below Digestives

Ta Da! I give you, My Work Box!

That's proper Irish mud on there, you know (and yes, I have scrubbed it)

I bought this little work box for 5 euro seven years ago in Lidl, when I was working as an archaeologist in Ireland. It's spent many long, cold, windy and wet hours on various hillsides waiting for something exciting to happen, getting filled with random bits of string, rusty nails and pens jammed with mud.
I like to think I am giving it the cushy retirement it deserves.

Happy to serve once more, alongside my rather natty sewing machine cover.

Stashbusters!

Welcome to my new blog! The other day I realised not a day goes by without me making something, be it bread, a cake or knitted scarf.  I figured a record of all this frenetic creativity would be nice. So here it is.
As Christmas is coming up, and as once again we have very little spare cash I'm doing a Handmade Holiday. I'm also trying to use up as much of my stash material, so am looking for knitting patterns by yarn rather than by desire. One day I will be able to buy yarn again....

Yesterday I finished and posted my sister's birthday present, a lovely soft cowl, using this pattern from New York Miniknit and a skein of Patons Decor I've had for ages. The Ithacowl is such a great pattern, once you get going its very TV-watching friendly, and the result has lots of drape even with a thicker yarn like this one. The Sister is lucky I didn't just keep it for myself...

Ithacowl!

I woke late this morning but extremely motivated, and decided to get on with my mother-in-law's festive gift. She is doing an art degree right now and draws and draws and draws. So this is what I came up with:


 

A pencil roll! I followed this great tutorial and I'm pretty happy with the result.  I'm especially pleased with this as I used an old dress shirt of The Husband's as the lining, and cut up an old flannel sheet as the interfacing.  The outer fabric is Tweet Tweet by Keiki for Moda which I originally bought to make cushion covers, realised it wasn't quite right and promptly hid in the stash box.

Before Christmas I will fill the roll with nice pencils and cover a hardback sketchbook with the Moda fabric.

And finally, I made some bread....mmm, bread.