Scrap Happy: Dribble Bibs

One from the vault! A project I made, photographed and wrote about over a year ago, but never published. I shall leave my “written in the past” text as is…

I have managed to find a super fun, quick and ridiculously satisfying baby sewing project, which I’ve managed to find time for in half hour segments over the past week or so. All of my little girl’s bibs are looking a bit tatty now, and lots are a bit small as most of them we have been using since she was born! However, I seriously resent paying a lot of money for a couple of triangles of fabric. So I made a template from a bib she had that was adequately sized and got going. I used up loads of scrap fabrics from other projects for the fronts of the bibs, and bought a metre of cotton terry cloth from eBay for the reverse side, and I was away.

The terry cloth I bought is lovely and thick, it’s really nice quality. I’ve got loads left so am also making some wash cloths for the little one, and probably some gift bibs for friends babies.

For Christmas (2017) I had finally got my hands on one of these bad boys:

Yesssss! Poppers galore and a popper tool to set them! Yippee! It’s so easy (and FUN) to put poppers on. I don’t know why it’s so fun, but it is. Of course choosing a popper colour is part of the fun too. I’m already coveting a set of metal ones too. I feel I need all the popper options. I’m planning what else I can make with poppers… 

Back to the riveting tale of the bibs (I am so sorry it’s such a dull make! I can feel eyes glazing over!). There are 11 of these and they are such happy prints, they bring me joy. They are not my neatest work AT ALL but hey, they are literally going to be drenched in baby dribble, so I think I can accept that.

Do you know, lately I have come to accept all sorts of shoddy standards with my sewing, purely because I have so little time to do it in. I used to take blooming ages over the details, unpick bits that weren’t perfect, spend ages over the pattern placement, pretty much just umm and arrr over every little thing. Now I basically just steam ahead and hope for the best. In some ways this gung-ho style of sewing is limiting, since I can’t imagine myself sitting down to cut out a silk dress or make toile after toile of a new pattern at the moment. However, in a funny way it is also strangely quite freeing. One of my faults is to spend too much time thinking and not enough doing, so this has definitely helped me to do more actual sewing, and achieve results faster. And while I say it’s not the neatest, it’s still pretty neat if I’m honest. The quality hasn’t suffered a huge amount. So when I DO find more time to dedicate to sewing (ha! In ten years maybe!) perhaps I can take some of these lessons with me, speeding through when I can and focusing intently when it’s needed. 

I am really falling back in love with sewing lately. My imagination is off, skyrocketing. Ideas of things I would like to sew come thick and fast, and I find myself gleefully planning when I can next get in the sewing room. I always feel this way as Spring approaches. It must be something to do with the coming of a fresh start, with new life and brightness, that gives me a great urge to make things. All very philosophical for a post about bibs.

In conclusion:

The bibs are great.

Poppers are great.

Time to sew is great.

Speeding through is great. 

Patience is great but all used up on the baby.

Life is great.

Spring is great and it’s coming soon.

Bye everyone! 

x

Brindille & Twig Harem Rompers

Today I would like to show you my new favourite pattern, the incredibly cute and quick Harem Romper from Brindille & Twig. I mean, I have fallen in love with their whole pattern catalogue, and definitely had to rein myself in to avoid spending all my non-existent money buying all of their patterns. I managed to stop at just one, and what a good one it is. 

I am never buying a new baby gift again. These are so quick, easy and fun to sew up. And look how cute!

This one was a gift for some friends of mine and their new baby. I get so emotional when friends have babies, and I love giving them something handmade. I made size 0-3months as I know how quickly they grow out of newborn size!

The pattern is great, I love how it includes little details like a pointer to sew a line of stitching down the top of the side seam to keep the lining in place. I did make a silly error which ended up with exposed reinforcing pieces (they should be between the outer and lining layers), but it’s not THAT bad so I just left it.

This lovely fabric is from Maud’s Fabric Finds. I bought it in the sale ages ago along with some other awesome lengths of jersey which have since become more baby clothes (coming to the blog soon). 

They are all top quality and just lovely to work with. I was so sad to hear that Maud’s Fabric Finds was closing. I did check out their closing down sale but I think I was a bit late, all the things I loved had gone.

I also made one with leftovers from my Gooseducks Maternity Top for my littlest niece, also in size 0-3months. Love this one too. There’s something about this print! 

I later got round to making a bigger one for my little tyke! 

Said tyke is now sleeping through the night! Now that I am getting a full night’s sleep I feel like a different person. A human person! So I have more energy to sew in the evenings and at nap times, which is a very welcome thing.

Coco Loco: Three / Five Coco Tops

I loved sewing up a very quick lady skater dress from this gingham ponte so much that I immediately cut out a Tilly and the Buttons Coco from my leftover fabric. I am a chronic overbuyer of fabric, so usually have big enough offcuts that I can make something "proper" out of them. I still have more even after this top is finished! Perhaps enough for a baby pinafore dress. Wouldn't THAT be cute?! 

I was a bit worried the gingham would look weird as a top. I’m still not sure to be honest, but it has proved very useful as a warm, practical, easy to look after kind of garment. My only gripe is that this fabric bobbles terribly. In these pictures the top is about 3 months old, so has been worn and washed a bit, but not a huge amount. I don’t know if you can see but it is very very bobbly. I’m a bit disappointed but I know now I should invest in better quality ponte di Roma. This ponte also didn’t have the same type of stretch or the weight of ponte I have used before. It’s rather odd. As soon as I looked at these pictures I threw the thing away. The gingham is way too stretched out over the bust, so that coupled with the bobbling made the decision easy. It’s not a good look.

Library Card Top (Tilly & the Buttons Coco pattern)

I made my lovely sister a pair of Coco tops for Christmas, in solid magenta and a navy and white Breton stripe. I liked the idea so much I made myself a matching pair! The Coco is such a great, quick sew, and a very practical item of clothing for my life right now. I can see why the Breton tee and jeans is such a mum uniform. It just works! The same with short hair! I seem to be conforming to stereotype here but again, it just works! Haha.

HTO Top 

For All the Family Top. Camera could not capture the magenta colour!

The navy and white stripes are my favourite. I am not sure what is going on with the Coco sleeves. I often have this problem as I am an apple shape (thin arms and legs, all my extra padding in the middle), so the sleeves here just look a bit baggy. Must fix.

For Christmas I got a twin needle - finally! - and was so excited to try it on my pink Coco which was still not finished. Imagine my disappointment when I discovered that my machine doesn’t do the kind of twin needle finish I was hoping for! This is the only stitch on my machine that looks remotely like what I was after, and that produces these stitches:

It looks ALMOST how I had imagined, but because it’s a stretch stitch it is not just straight lines of stitching. Is this normal? Does anyone else have a Janome 525s and know how to get it to look like two lines of normal stitching?

To add insult to injury, just when I had decided it didn’t look that bad and I’d just go for it on the neckline, sleeve hems and hem, disaster. I had got all the way round the front of the neckline when the needles jammed going over the thick shoulder seam. Drat. By the time I had freed it all, the twin needle was bent beyond usefulness. It would have hit the throat plate if I had used it. Well, I wanted to get the top finished so I just finished the rest with zig zag. At least I had done the whole of the front neckline with the twin needle before it got bent. Design choice. Ahem.

ANYWAY I am not in love with these tops, but they are simple, and that’s exactly what I was after. 

They got worn lots but now, months on, the navy striped one is bobbling horribly too. This fabric wasn’t even that cheap (though it was from an eBay shop I hadn’t used before), so I am a bit annoyed about that. 

The quest for the perfect Breton top continues!

Baby Sewing - Drew Leggings

During my last little stretch of maternity leave I made a couple of things for my baby.

I have had the Drew leggings pattern from Spit Up & Stilletos saved for yonks, so I thought I'd use up some jersey leftovers and sew some leggings for the baby. It's a great easy pattern, and very quick to sew up. The only downside is that putting in the elastic waistband is a bit fiddly, and so neither of mine were very neat. I think I need some elastic that's not quite as firm.

I made a red pair and a goose/ducks pair out of jersey offcuts, both in size 0-3months. The sizing comes up pretty small so I'd actually say they're more Newborn size.

Here they are on our little girl at 2 weeks old. Look how little she is. You think you won't forget but you do.

I also made a floral pair in size 12-18 months, our little one's current size. These have ended up super long, longer than her RTW 12-18months clothes. I'm confused about the sizing but I do still love these leggings. For now she is wearing them with the cuffs turned up. The cuffs are from an old T-shirt I was throwing away about a year ago. By "throwing away" I mean "cutting off the best bits of and adding them to my jersey stash for just this kind of thing."

We love a print clash!

Well, I should go and immediately cut out ten pairs of leggings in various sizes and production-line sew them. I SHOULD. I will add it to the ever growing list!

The Red Wren - from Pregnancy to Breastfeeding

Having read about how successful Zoe's Colette Wren dresses were both for pregnancy and for breastfeeding, and of course seeing how gorgeous and effortlessly stylish they looked, I had my heart set on making one for myself.

I bought this red lightweight jersey from Minerva with my birthday money in February, cut it out in March but only finished this dress in early May when I was 38 weeks pregnant. So rather than attach the skirt to the bodice a few inches higher up to make it a Maternity hack like Zoe did, I decided to make it up as normal so that when (if!) I got my waist back after having the baby, the dress would have a more flattering line. I really didn't want to make anything that I couldn't wear after baby was born at this point! It seemed like such a waste, especially since the last few weeks of pregnancy saw me mainly mooching around the house and the park, not really needing any special clothes.

Er, sorry about the dodgy mirror selfies. They're all I have of this dress! These pictures were taken the day before I went into labour. It was SO HOT, and every day I would go for a stride round the park to try and bring on labour. It worked!

Anyway, the dress worked out perfectly. While still pregnant I just hoiked the waistline up to above my bump, and afterwards it worked really nicely as a comfy but smart-ish nursing dress. Zoe was right, this style really is perfect for breastfeeding. I know the red makes me look a bit like the Special K lady but I'm embracing it. She always looks pretty happy!

Things I changed / would change when making this pattern again:

• I cut the skirt length to the largest size (XXL). I did this so I'd have good bump coverage for when pregnant but I actually quite like this length anyway.
• I cut the skirt back on the fold since I had enough fabric.
• I used ordinary elastic to shirr the waist of the skirt rather than clear elastic. It's such terrible advice in the pattern instructions to use clear elastic for the waistline shirring - it just is not stretchy enough. I knew this really when I cut it but doubted my instincts and went with the instructions anyway. I should have trusted myself, as I ended up ripping that clear elastic out and using much stretchier ordinary elastic instead.
• the sleeves were massive on me. I've left them as is for this version but will definitely make them much smaller next time.
• next time I think I will make the neckband pieces doubled over rather than have to turn and stitch the hems
• I don't have a twin needle so I used zig zag stitch on all the hems. I'd like to try a twin needle next time as I think it looks much neater.

This is 6 days postpartum in the dress, on our way for baby's check-up, our first trip out with the pram! I was operating on another plain entirely of course but I remember thinking it would be a good picture for this blog post, whenever I finished it. So there we have it! Blog post finally published only 10 months after making the blooming dress! Haha. Better late than never! These babies do keep one busy!

A Gingham Lady Skater Dress

Hello hello, if there's anybody out there! It has been such a long time since I posted. Needless to say I have been consumed by motherhood, but now, 6 months in I feel like I'm slowly getting back to myself, and feel ready to sew and blog again.

My incredible daughter is napping upstairs, and after 5 and a half months of refusing to, she is now happy to nap in her cot! I cannot tell you what a difference this makes. I had time to take blog pictures! Not great ones, mind, but I'm not fussy! She is wonderful and she has taught me so much already. I adore her and I feel enormously grateful that I get to be her mama.

Honestly the first two months of her life were a blur. A very happy but crazy blur. I did sew a tiny bit, as one day she napped for ages and I seized the opportunity to whip up a quick pleated skirt (I was sick of having nothing that fit me!), and that felt great, but then we moved house, to the beautiful Cotswolds countryside! That was crazy with a 3 month old, a very timid cat, and in a car that was on the verge of breakdown. Embarrassingly we have been here 3 months now and we are still not fully unpacked!!! Consequently there was a huge sewing drought until about 6 weeks ago.

I decided I needed to carve out some "me" time, and that I would use some of the evenings after our little one had gone to bed to do some crafting and sewing. It felt so SO good! It was only once I began this project that I realised how much my soul had missed it. It felt like coming home. So I whipped up this Lady Skater in a couple of hours flat on my overlocker, and I love it. It's nothing fancy, it's not my neatest work ever and the print at the waist seam doesn't quite match up, but I honestly don't care.

Dimming of the Day dress (Kitschy Coo's Lady Skater pattern in Gingham ponte from Minerva Crafts)

Worn with wellies and a teething necklace for practicality!

There's not much to say about the sewing, I made the same sizing as my Flibbertygibbet dress, as that still fits me (it used to be a bit big), and I sewed everything up on my overlocker. I did a zigzag hem as I still don't have a twin needle.

Told you the print at the waist seam really doesn't match up. Also, check out how wonky our new house is. I love it (except for the creaky floorboards!)

Yep, the print should match on the neckband too, and this one DOES bother me (just not enough to unpick overlocker stitching to redo it)

Zig zag hem

I love this dress, and the reasons are fivefold:
1. It is stretchy and practical for mama duties and for countryside walks
2. It's made of lovely snuggly warm ponte
3. It's suitable for all seasons with the right accessories!
4. It's a forgiving cut on my mum tum
5. The print is fun and it makes me feel more like me

That's a belt, not my bare midriff

Full disclosure: I actually never wear this with a belt. It gets in the way when wrangling a wriggly 6 month old baby. But it does look better with one so I put one on for the pictures.

None of my lovely handmade dresses fit anymore, bar a couple of jersey or ponte ones, but I'm hopeful that by the summer they'll fit again. In the meantime I will have to get sewing a new wardrobe! Every cloud has a silver lining, eh?!

I still have a couple of things to blog that I made towards the end of my pregnancy, so I will be back with those soon. I am also going to make a blind for the nursery, some more practical clothes for me, a Christmas stocking and of course a few Christmas gifts. As usual I have too many ideas and not enough time! Wish me luck!

Tees for Two

Hello, sewing friends! It has been a while since I blogged, which really was unintentional. I made these two Cara tops MONTHS ago, and photographed them shortly after, and then promptly forgot to ever blog them. How embarrassing. Anyway, here they are!

Arrows Tee (Megan Neilsen's Cara maternity top pattern)

After my first edition of the Cara top, my old, inherited overlocker well and truly broke down. It was very iffy during the making of that floral Cara tee, and by the time I had finished I had to admit there was something badly wrong with it.

So, I made my second Cara on my normal sewing machine using a zigzag stitch, my walking foot and a ballpoint needle, and it was absolutely fine! So if you want to make jersey clothing and you don't have an overlocker, do not fear! It is not only possible but very easy and stress-free to sew jersey on a normal sewing machine.

This arrows jersey was from Sew Over It, and I bought it yonks ago, but I think they still have stock of it. It's a really lovely quality & weight, and it sewed up like a dream with no rolling at the edges. Thumbs up from me. It's a 4 way stretch and I wanted the arrows to run horizontally so I cut it on the cross-grain.

Here I am with my body double at the Knitting & Stitching Show a few months ago!

At the Knitting & Stitching show I also bought some lovely duck-print jersey for another tee (or is it goose-print? Not sure), and a new overlocker! Hoorah! I tried LOADS of overlockers out, and as my budget was rather squeezed (our impending arrival is making me more spend-sensible!), I went with the Janome 8002DX. I really couldn't spot any difference in sewing on this one or the next price bracket up, and after all, overlockers all do the same thing, so I snapped it up for around £200.

I have to say I am really chuffed with it. It's such a smooth sew, absolutely no complaints whatsoever.

Anyway, for my next Cara I went with 3/4 length sleeves for the changing weather, and I love this one too. This jersey does roll though so the hem is always rolling up which is a bit annoying.

Goose ducks tee 

These pictures were taken when I was 30 weeks pregnant, and I'm happy to report that there's still plenty of room in them now at 38 weeks! If anything they look better as I've filled them out more. I really have lived in my maternity jeans and Cara tees, so if anyone out there is expecting and wondering which sewing patterns would be useful, I would definitely say the Cara is top of the list!

I'm on maternity leave now, and while I wait for baby to make his or her entrance, I am hoping to get some last bits of sewing done. We shall see!