Pre-Christmas sewing and post-Christmas packing

Over a month and no posts, tut tut!

I am still taking time out from my HotPatterns muslin - thanks to Carolyn for her comments the other day. Will reconsider when I get back to the UK - more of that later.

In the run-up to Christmas I made the nighties for my other 2 daughters. I used Kwic Sew 3105 again, using age 10 for Middle Daughter and 11-12 for Eldest, only a couple of years over their ages, but plenty of growing room! Having done it before it felt nice and easy, especially by the 3rd time. No lace on these, just ric rac, which was fiddly to attach but looks great. So, Middle daughter's nightie first:Eldest daughter's:

And the girls together: So, our adventure in NZ comes to an end and we are preparing to leave. We can't leave until we pack and we can't pack until we leave! We brought so little with us we are using nearly everything right up until we go. We are shipping some stuff back, as we have different baggage allowances than on the way out. Fortunately, we have duplicates of most stuff back at home so it doesn't matter if the stuff takes a while to ship over.

I hope a good time was had by all over the festive period. We had a picnic on the shore of Lake Tepako, then went to a friend for coffee in the late afternoon. I have cast an envious eye over some peoples sewing related Christmas presents (Tasia, Tilly to name a couple) and hope I can organise a sewing space when we get back to our house.

New Fabric photos

I mentioned recently that we had been fabric shopping when we were in Wellington, and I finally got round to taking some pictures of what we bought. I forgot to take a picture of the first fabric uncut, but you can see it made up in my previous post.

First up is the nightie material for Middle and Eldest daughters:

Secondly, the material Husband chose for his shirt. Not sure which view I'm making yet:

Thirdly, this stripy jersey for a top for me, possibly a BurdaStyle Lydia top, or a HotPatterns top, although I don't think I have enough for that. It is a different colour of one of the samples I discussed on an earlier post:

I am currently almost at the end of making a muslin for a dress, which will be my next post. I am not sure when the above projects are going to be made. My muslin is taking foreverahh, and I am planning a couple of other little projects too!

Night Night sleep tight

Having been home from our Wellington trip for all of a day, Youngest started to ask when her nightie would be ready. I decided to wait for the end of the holiday before getting started - I find that it is very difficult to lay out the fabric, pattern etc with a house full of people.

The girls chose the pattern - Kwik Sew 3105. They all said they would like the shorter version without sleeves. Having taken Youngest measurements, I decided to make a Small, which is for age 6, although she is only 4 and a half.

I traced out the pattern and then cut out the pieces from the fabric. I completely forgot to take any photos of any stage of making it. I made a trip into Timaru for various things, including lace for this nightie and ric-rac for the other two. I discovered that the amount of lace indicated on the pattern envelope was not enough, I could have done with about 10cms more. Fortunately I found this out when trimming the bottom ruffle. I decided just to shorten the ruffle rather than make another trip into Timaru for extra lace. It didn't make much difference to the "frizzly bit".

Youngest was very pleased with her nightie and has worn it at any opportunity. I didn't get a chance to take a picture of it unworn, hence the rather wrinkly appearance!