It's all about the lace - GBSB lace project

My first properly formal dress ever to share with you here! I love it, and can’t wait to wear it.

Lilypad dress (Vogue 8766 in White Tree Fabrics' lace)

I swear that hem is straight in real life.

This project is part of a White Tree Fabrics blog series linked to the Great British Sewing Bee's new series, which I think most of you will have been watching. I’ve loved it, but the series seems so short! Is it really usually this short? Word has it that the GBSB contestants are going to use a lot of White Tree fabrics in the lace challenge. I'm wondering if I'll spot my lace! There are a group of bloggers making garments with the laces featured on GBSB. I’m looking forward to seeing what everyone else has made! White Tree Fabrics very kindly provided me with this lace and satin for this project, along with the pattern, Vogue 8766. 

I decided to make view C, the strapless, full skirted version. I recently realised I don't have very many fancy frocks in my wardrobe, and this seemed to be the perfect chance to change that!!! 

I do regret that didn't have the time I would have liked to spend on this project. A bit like the GBSB then! Having an actual countdown of hours and minutes must be so stressful. I'd hate that. I'm slow! So, I went ahead and toiled the bodice of V8766. It needed a lot of fitting work. No biggie, most patterns do, but just as I was about to hack into my traced pattern and start adjusting, I realised I had JUST completed a lot of fitting work on an almost identical princess seamed strapless bodice (Butterick 4443). Doh! At least I realised at this point and saved myself a lot of time. So this is my convoluted way of saying that this dress does look exactly like the pattern envelope of V8766, but it is actually the bodice of B4443 with the skirt of V8766 (which is a circle skirt, but I was glad to have the pattern pre-drawn rather than having to do the piece-of-string-tied-round-a-pencil circle drawing). 

There are so many beautiful lace dresses out there. I just adore the feminine, fancy look of lace. I pinned about one hundred lacy ideas here - I would like them all please. 

This particular lace is quite heavy, is corded and has a pretty scalloped edge. It would've been nice to use the scallops on the hem but obviously that's impossible with a circle skirt. I tried using them along the neckline but it looked a bit weird! While we're on the lace, I have to say I was really impressed with the quality. This is £9.25 per metre, which I think is excellent value for money. I'm very tempted to buy some of the red and make a fiery backless number at some point.

I am quite new to working with lace, but you might be seeing a lot more of it here soon (hint). I tried a bit of lace appliqué initially, to hide the princess seams, but I couldn't get it right, and the corded lace is quite thick. So I followed the pattern and sewed the lace and underlining together in the princess seams. I'm not sure Patrick Grant would be happy with my decision but I don't mind! Most RTW lace frocks I've seen are sewn this way, and quite pricey ones at that. 

The underlining is lightweight satin. Both fabrics behaved well, but presented their own challenges. My tips if you’re working with the corded lace:

• thread trace the seam lines of your pattern. It takes a long time but is much more accurate and is really the only effective way of marking this type of fabric!
• the lace will stretch on the bias (quite a lot). I hung my dress overnight before hemming so the circle skirt could drop where it’s on the bias, and didn’t expect the lace to drop very much, but it dropped a lot. 
• be careful with the iron! I burned a hole in my hem trying to press it. Oops.

And the only tip I have for the lightweight satin is to pink everything if possible, even if you’re finishing the seam another way afterwards. It frayed like a good ‘un. 

I moved the zip to the side, and decided to put in a lapped zip. Under normal circumstances I would have liked an invisible zip but that would have been absolutely impossible with the thickness of the corded lace, so I went lapped. It’s a bit bumpy in the end but I’m happy with it.

My underlining hem wouldn’t win any prizes, but it’s the underlining so I’m not losing any sleep over that.  I love a circle skirt but man I hate hemming them. Especially when there are two to do in one dress! I did a (far from perfect) baby hem on the satin by machine, and turned up a 2” hem on the lace and sewed it by hand. I much prefer hemming my hand, even if it does take hours on a circle skirt. The lace has so much give in the open parts of it that it’s easy to ease it in when turning up the hem. 

Anyway, I’ve gabbed enough. Can’t wait to see the GBSB final and see who wins! 

I'll leave you with some more shots of my lovely purple lace dress. I adore it.  Now I just need an occasion to wear it! 

The Arrows Emery

Wow, my first post this year! I actually thought I'd already published this, but the post was sat in my drafts, whoops! The dress itself was also a long time in the coming! I'd had the fabric stashed away for yonks, having bought it as soon as I laid eyes on Sarah of A Million Dresses' version. Then I saw By Gum, By Golly's, and I knew I was right: I had to have an arrows dress in my life. 

All a-quiver dress (Christine Haynes Emery dress in Cotton + Steel fabric

I adore the print (by Melody Miller for Cotton and Steel). In fact I love almost every single Cotton and Steel print I have seen. On top of that, the cotton is of lovely quality and even though it's quilting cotton, is not too stiff for dressmaking in my opinion. 

As you can see it's another Emery. After all that time (I'm talking half a YEAR) in the planning, this dress got sewed up in about three or four little sessions over Christmas. It's hardly been off my back since and I adore it. 

Nothing to report on the Emery pattern as I've done all my adjustments long ago (see previous Emerys here) but I was carrying a little bit of extra Christmas padding when I made this, so I sewed the bodice side seams at 3/8". The padding has now mostly gone, and I have to say I do like the bit of extra wriggle room. May do the same for all future versions.

The hem was a bugger as well. No idea why, but it was soooo far from level. I pinned it up on my new dress form (Christmas pressie from my lovely Liam) measuring from the ground, but it transpires that something in my posture makes hems hang differently when on me than when on the dress form. Great! 

Bless Liam for helping me. He had lots of patience with me turning very slowly and was great at spotting even the slightest of hem discrepancy. I'm glad we took the extra time over it, it would have bugged me something rotten if not. 

I didn't match the pattern per se, but did make sure I had a line of arrows or dots meeting up across all the seams. I just marked where a few lines were on my pattern pieces and lined them up that way pre-cutting. You can see what I mean in the side view above, and also below (this is the matching across the invisible zip).

Not that I'm in it for the compliments, but this dress has received probably the most of any dress I have made. Also the most "oh I didn't think you'd made THAT one"s, which I think might be a good thing?!

Again, it cements what I love about the Emery pattern. A simple shape which allows a great print to do the talking. 

So, if I adore this dress so much and it has hardly been off my back, why is it being modelled by my new dress form rather than by me? Life got in the way, I'm afraid. I had no daylight time available to take pictures with the dress on me (I don't have a remote and tripod yet. Must sort that out soon.) so you shall have to make do with my lady valet as a model, and these two quite crap mirror selfies:

Cardi / no cardi. With Topshop shoes from years ago

As you can see, I've finally succumbed to the wonders of the Hell Bunny Paloma cardigan, after years of coveting Forever Amber and Roisin at Dolly Clackett's Paloma collections. I bought mine from Tiger Milly on eBay, and would be more than happy to recommend this seller and the cardigan alike. The cardi is so so comfy, a lovely fit and just the perfect length to wear over waisted dresses. I may now need to buy the green and black versions as well... 

Well, I'm off for now! On a side note, wedding dress sewing is taking way longer than I thought it would. I'm spending every spare moment on it, and I've still not finished the "rehearsal" dress (the wedding is in June). Better get a wriggle on! 

Thread Drawers

A while back I did a little DIY project which brings me so much joy it’s slightly worrying. I made me some beautiful thread drawers. Yes, that’s right, thread drawers. They’re a thing. And mine are my favourites!

The boring "before"

It began with a set of these little Moppe drawers from IKEA, and of course a snoop around Pinterest to see what other creative folk had done with their Moppes. Then, a little white paint, some little card holding drawer pulls and a few tiny labels later and voila! Behold!

Me beautiful drawers

I used to keep my thread all jumbled together in a massive dented biscuit tin, which was fine I guess but not very practical. The drawers, however, are practical AND pretty. So much joy in such tiny drawers. Of course I arranged the thread by colour, then ordered the colours through a spectrum from white to beige to brown to black to dark green to green to yellow to orange to red to pink to purple to blue. Specialist threads got their own drawer (there’s one little solitary spool of silk thread in there currently).

Organising my rainbow of thread while the drawers dried

Needless to say, I love the finished product! Happy Ree, over and out. x

Top 5 of 2014: Reflections and Goals

Now for my favourite bit, reflections and goals.

My Top Six Reflections

I tried to pick five, but I couldn't whittle it down I'm afraid. 

• I love my ambitiousness. 
• Having this blog and reading other blogs is brilliant and has DEFINITELY been the biggest contributing factor to my improvements in sewing.
• I've got so much better at achieving good fit and finish!
• I'm not that speedy, but that's OK!
• Having more than one project on the go at once stresses me out.
• Sewing has made me buy less Ready To Wear. In fact, I can probably count on both hands the RTW items I've bought this year. WOW. This wasn't even a conscious RTW "fast" or anything, but it's definitely down to my sewing.

My Top Five Goals for 2015

• Restrict the lists! I do sometimes overplan. I have To Sew lists which would stretch me into next year, and that is not really going to do me any good, is it?
• Make an awesome wedding dress!
• Sew some knits.
• Make a big quilt for our home.
• Use my stash. To be honest I don't have a very large fabric stash (each piece has a plan and there aren't even that many pieces). I do have lots of patterns I haven't sewed from yet, so I'm planning to use those before buying new patterns if I can at all help it. Also I seem to have this inability to get rid of scraps, off-cuts and clothes ejected from my wardrobe. I need to use some of this stuff up! 

I thought I'd end with a look at my sewing year in numbers.

I'm pretty pleased with that! In conclusion, 2014 has been a great year, a formative year in my sewing journey, and the year I started this little blog. I feel proud of what I've achieved in my sewing this year, and so excited for 2015. 

Top 5 of 2014: Hits and Misses

As the year comes to an end and we all get reflective and start to set goals for the year to come, I thought I'd join in with the "Top 5 of 2014" series hosted by Gillian at Crafting A Rainbow. I enjoyed reading lots of these posts last year, when this blog was still a twinkle in my eye, and it looks like a good way to take stock and get ready for a fresh start in 2015. 

My Top Five Hits:

Harlo's Quilt

Harlo's quilt

Well, I'm just so proud of it. My first attempt at quilting, and an unbridled success. This was a long project, out of my usual comfort zone and one of my rare bits of unselfish sewing. It turns out unselfish sewing can be just as fun as the selfish kind! I flipping love the finished quilt.

The Lady Luck Dress (By Hand London's Anna)

The Lady Luck Dress 

This is the first dress I'd properly spent time over fitting. I made various Swedish tracing paper toiled, and lots of adjustments. I took my time and fussed over the fit. I still love this dress just as much as when I first made it!

2 x Butterick B4443s (the Rock Around the Clock dress and the Stevie dress)

The Rock Around the Clock dress

The Stevie dress

The shape and fit of the B4443 just suits me down to the ground. These two dresses have been worn A LOT, and every time I wear them I feel super comfy and "me-like" in them. Must make more! 

3 x Emery dresses (Flowers for Jane, Marion and The Sinking Sun dresses)

The Flowers for Jane dress

The Marion dress

The Sinking Sun dress

I adore these three Emery dresses, and they have been worn and loved loads. I always feel nice wearing them. I love the shape, the fit I've achieved and the fabrics I made these three out of. There will definitely be more Emery dresses!

Liam's PJs

Liam's PJs

Another unselfish one! These have been worn and washed loads, and they are still looking great. Best of all, they're loved by Liam, which makes me happy!

My Top Five Misses:

Taking the Michael Skirt

Taking the Michael skirt

Well, this was doomed from the start. Should've made a Miette! It's not all THAT bad of course, but the fact is that this is not a great shape on me, the wrap doesn't wrap over quite enough and it was a poor fabric choice on my part. 

The Jinx Jacket

The Jinx jacket

Again, the trinity of wrong shape, wrong pattern and wrong fabric. I'll chalk this one up to experience and throw this in the bin (read: 'to refashion' pile).

The Late Dress

The Late Dress

Well, clearly I love the Emery so the pattern is not the issue here. I over adjusted this dress resulting in bad fit. It was just flipping uncomfortable. I have more of this fabric, so I COULD whip up a new bodice and reattach the existing skirt, but to be honest the fabric is not great quality anyway so I don't think I will in the end.

The Ancient Mariner Dress

Why I hate the Ancient Mariner dress

A not-very-successful frankenpattern. The skirt shape isn't really suited to the Anna bodice. The main nail in this one's coffin though was the AWFUL fit. I just felt rubbish every time I wore it, so this one got chopped up for parts a long time ago. Side note: I'm not all that sure whether I like the V-neck Anna bodice. I'll definitely make more of the high neckline version but just not sure whether the V-neck is doing it for me.

The Sherlock Skirt

The Sherlock Skirt

Ah, my first blogged make. I do like it but alas the fabric is just too thick really for this style. Plus the waistband has stretched a bit. I do have a fondness for this though, I'm not sure I can throw it out just yet.

Well,  there we have it. It's really nice actually to sit and think about what has worked and what hasn't (and of course, why). I'll be back soon with my reflections on the year's sewing, and my goals for next year. 

Over and out! x

Harlo's Quilt (my first quilt ever!)

Here it is - my pride and joy, my very first quilt.

Harlo's Quilt

I'm so ridiculously proud of this. I must say, I was never that enamoured with the idea of quilting. I don't know what changed, but suddenly I became a bit obsessed with wanting to make one. I kept seeing gorgeous,  amazing, impressive and artsy quilts everywhere online (see my board on Pinterest for a few of my favourites) and also in Sew magazine.  So, I decided to dive straight in with this nautical chevron number for my baby nephew Harlo's joint Christmas and christening gift. He has this amazing nautical bib which really suits him, and I do love a nautical print, so the idea for this quilt was born. You can spot some dress off cuts in there (red spots of my Marion dress and blue waves of my Ancient Mariner dress), but the rest were bought specially. Why oh why didn't I buy more of the pale blue anchor print and the red striped anchor print to make me some dresses out of? Error. 

As you might be able to see, the chevron pattern on this quilt is made of rectangular pieces, not triangles. I thought I'd better stick to the grain line on my first quilt. I used a mixture of "my method" (winging it) and this tutorial from Crazy Mom Quilts. This tutorial was especially helpful with how to sew the blocks together. I honestly would have fudged this up otherwise. 

I do now wish I had made those original little rectangles BIGGER. It took so blooming long to cut them all, sew them all together, lay them out.... You get the idea. But I am so chuffed with the result, that's all forgotten now. 

There were only a few "minor panic" moments during the making of the quilt. And they were these:

1) "Uh oh. What if I've not been accurate enough with my cutting and sewing? My chevrons won't match up!!" I should have more faith in my ability to fudge it and make it work on the fly. I managed with a bit of artful matching and folding to get all the chevrons to line up. Ahhhh.

2) "The quilt top looks so NICE. Am I about to ruin it with my first attempt  at quilting?!" 

3) "I bet I'm committing many cardinal sins of quilting."

4) "I've stabbed myself with a pin and BLED on this new lovely quilt. Well done, Ree."

Worry not, the blood came out. I did fine without a walking foot, and no matter how many cardinal sins of quilting I may have committed, I did end up with a quilt. 

I used a thin 100% cotton wadding by Simply Cotton, which was of lovely quality. I stitched in the ditch of my chevron design. Well, mostly in the ditch. sometimes just next to the ditch. I love the effect it creates on the back. 

Mitred corner!

So, have I been bitten by the quilting bug? Well. Kind of. I do absolutely want to make more, but not yet! I would like to make one for our bed and one for the living room sofa, but they'll be such big projects I think if better wait till after Project Wedding Dress. 

I hope Harlo likes the quilt! 

Christmas Gift Sewing: A Baby Dress and Other Things

Hello all! I can't wait to show you my latest completed projects! *fanfare*

Mylah's dress (pattern from GBSB's Sew Your Own Wardrobe)

I've really missed blogging this month. The odd thing is I've been busier making things than ever before, but I just haven't been able to share any of it with you (yet). There's Project Wedding Dress, of course, and although I'm doing alright with progress, I'm a bit behind on my self imposed schedule. Trying to be cool about it! I'm also making some presents for my two bridesmaids to thank them for all their help, and I'm helping them make their dresses. Then, of course, there are Christmas gifts! I LOVE making Christmas presents, and always have loads of ideas of gifts to make for friends and family. With everything else I've taken on at the moment though, I tried not to take on too much more.

So, here are a few of the pressies I have finished. This is the sweet little dress I made for our baby niece, Mylah. Construction-wise, all was pretty straight forward, and I had a lot of fun making this. The materials were all stuff I already had, so this was zero-spend! Woohoo!

There's not much to explain about this one, except that
1. I could've ironed it before taking these pictures (sorry)
2. I sewed the button holes horizontally instead of vertically. I only realised as I was sewing the last one. "Noooooo!" I cried. Then, "Oh wait, she's a baby, she's probably not going to mind."

Pattern: Baby dress (9-12 months) from Great Bristish Sewing Bee "Sew Your Own Wardrobe" book
Fabric: from the stash! I love how little fabric it took to make this!
Buttons: from the stash
Notions: self-made bias binding (using this continuous bias tape tutorial on the Coletterie)

I'm calling this one a success. My top-stitching is probably not the neatest ever but this was a good project to try and fix that! It's pretty neat for me so I'm pleased with my top-stitching progress!! Unfortunately Mylah lives 200 miles away, so there are just flat garment pictures to show you.


Also, another Scrap Happy make in these little Oyster card wallets. I've sewn a few of these as presents and one for myself, but this is my latest (and most favourite). I made a little template from an existing Oyster card holder, then interfaced all the pieces before stitching it all together. Such a great scrappy project. (And again, top stitching is getting much neater).

My other BIG Chistmas project has been my first ever quilt, for my nephew Harlo. It's not done yet, but it's almost there and is looking pretty good! I'm looking forward to revealing all my hard work on it soon.

I'm feeling decidedly festive and am having huge urges to make Christmas party dresses. Alas, I may not have time, we'll see!

Over and out x