Me-Made-May '14

Well, a little late to the game, but here I am making my pledge:

'I, Tamsin W-P of Pimpmycurtains.blogspot.co.uk, sign up as a participant of Me-Made-May '14. I endeavour to wear me-made or refashioned items for 5 days of each week for the duration of May 2014'

I seem to remember signing up a bit late last year too.  I have signed up to the flickr group this time and the MMM14 pinterest board, so it will be interesting to see everyone elses MMM14's.

I think I will probably do a weekly round up of photos, but to kick the month off here I am in my first MM of the month:

I had just returned from an hour and a half at the allotment planting our brassica seedlings in the rain, and had just worked out that I was actually colder and damper than I realised. I am wearing a stripey Burdastyle Lydia top that I made a couple of years ago.  It is not my favourite top, being too big and a strange fabric, but it is perfect for 'allotment days' or slobbing around.

Me-Made-May round up #5

The last round up of  MMM 2013!

May 28th:

Fleece Renfrew.  Miserable day weatherwise. Top worn all day to include family trip to the cinema. Husband and I saw the new Star Trek film and the girls saw Epic. The afternoon included a fab coffee at South Street Pantry, and a pretty dismal chinese buffet.

May 29th:

Fleece Renfrew (no picture). For the evening I changed into a new un-blogged make to go to a Private View of an exhibition at Mall Galleries.  Thomas' cousin Barley, and his girlfriend Ellie graduated from Wimbledon College of Art last summer, but this is the first exhibition we have manged to see apart from his degree show. It was fantastic to see their work in a proper gallery space. We went armed with a cheque book, but all the ones we liked were already sold! After the gallery we went for dinner at a small tapas place called Andalucia, on Panton Street.  Many (ok, 16) years ago this was the wine bar where Husband and I met!

May 31st

Stripey Lydia top (no picture). In fact I wore the same outfit as May 9th, minus bright red accessories.  Worn to lounge around and relax at my sister-in-law's amazing house on the north Norfolk coast.

 I have no major thoughts on the month really. I realised that I wear my me-mades quite regularly anyway, without out having to think too hard about it. I have made a lot of tops over the last couple of years which has held me in good stead and if the weather had been better there would have been more variety!  I love looking at other peoples pretty dresses, but to be honest for my lifestyle of being a busy SAHM my wardrobe needs to be more on the practical side, and that seems to be what I have made - so far! I stuck to my pledge of 3 items a week - the hardest thing was remembering to take the photos. Thank you Zoe, for organizing these months - it has been great fun and I have enjoyed following your own challenge this time round. How I wish I sewed when I was pregnant!

I also realised that I am very behind in blogging my makes recently - I have at least three if not more items to blog about fully, which I shall endeavour to do in the next couple of weeks.

Me-Made-May round up #2

Here is the second installment of my Me-Made May round ups.  The weather is still pretty inclement and changeable which makes MMM a little tricky.  I realise that so far most of my me-made items are tops that I generally wear with jeans and because of the weather, most of them cannot be seen as I am swathed in cardi's to keep warm...

May 9th: Stripey Lydia top.  This is too big and a bit stretchy. I am am still considering the hack job I mentioned in my post about this top! I started off wearing it with a belt, as you can see in this picture. Unfortunately this made the bottom flare out in a rather unflattering way, so I ditched the belt part way though the day. Worn to have a hair cut, then spent the rest of the day emptying out the PTA cupboard at school, sorting everything out and then putting most of it back in again - but at least we now know what is in there and can get to it!

May 10th: Myimage cowl top.  Worn with my lovely new Fly shoes that give the appearance of being in heels but feel like they are flats - best of both worlds! A general being at home getting everything done kind of day.  I altered this top slightly after I had made my Renfrew last year.  When I made this I wasn't sure how to finish the hems so I just overlocked them. After making the Renfrew with it's hem bands, I thought I could used them to finish this off better. I found just enough jersey off cuts to make narrow bands for this top, which make it look better and stop the hems from rolling up.

May 13th: Autumnal Renfrew: Worn with jeans - again. Worn to my pattern making class and shown here with my daughter-made apron that Eldest made for me for Christmas.

Here's hoping the weather improves - the sun is out, lets hope it warms up too!

FO: Green for Halloween - an Autumnal Renfrew

I have made a Sewaholic Renfrew!

Possibley the last person in the "sewosphere" to tackle it, I bought the pattern some months ago, I think from The Village Haberdashery. There have been many Renfrews around but the ones that I have liked most were by ScruffyBadger, Lladybird, and Marie from A Stitching Odyssey, Karen from Did you make that? was a pattern tester as was Handemade Jane.

I have to say  - I love this top! I love the colour, the length of the sleeves, the neck, and the variations available from the the pattern. I am thinking of making the scoop neck version next, but still with the long sleeves - practical for the winter months.
 



I bought the fabric from Cally Co in Cambridge at the beginning of the year, thinking that I might make a Burdastyle Lydia. It languished in the stash for sometime, then I got to thinking about the Renfrew. I had a brief play with the pattern pieces and layouts and came to the conclusion that I needed more fabric. By this time of course, Cally Co didn't have it anymore (or not on the day I went anyway) so it languished some more!  Quite by chance I went into our new craft shop (1 year old last week) and there was my fabric - hurrah! Of course I couldn't remember how much extra fabric I needed, but knew it was less than a metre so bought 70cms - it is very wide.

As noted by other sewists, it is a quick make.  I think it took me three evenings of not giving it my full attention, which is fast for me.  I'm sure if I knuckled down and stopped reading about other people's sewing, I would be able to make it much quicker. Tasia of Sewaholic puts a lot of effort into sew-alongs and tutorials to accompany her patterns, on her blog, and she is, at the time of writing, doing a series of posts about the Renfrew.  I made it all on my sewing machine with a zigzag stitch to maintain stretch, but when I make this again I will definately try it on my overlocker. It was finished in time for Halloween, so it first outing was at our Haloween Party. 

My friend's Witches hat matched perfectly!

This was the first time we have ever made an effort for Halloween, because it is also our wedding anniversary and Husband and I are normally enjoying a lovely evening out. We all had great fun carving pumpkins and the party was a huge success - phew!

There are a few wrinkles at the top of my bust, something that ScruffyBadger noticed in her first makes.  I'm not sure what to do about this - it may well be something to do with the vest/cami I am wearing underneath.  This may also be the cause of the wrinkles at my lower back, but I know (from my pattern cutting class) that I have a sway back.

wrinkley back

With a neck this big there is great potential for silliness:

FO's: Burda Trousers #105 11/2011 & Burdastyle Lydia top

I have 2 finshed items to show you.  Well, nearly finished... in that the trousers need a hook & eye, and the top may need a complete overhaul, but other than that....

Firstly the trousers.  I started these in the spring term of my sewing class, had major size issues, welt pockets, and invisible zips.  The fabric was super tricky to work with and frayed like crazy.  I think I may have cut down the size too much, certainly in the waist, and because it frayed sooooo much I thinks the legs might be a bit too slim. Also, one leg seems shorter despite my instructor very carefully doing the length for me.

front

side

back

  And now with an attempt at 'styling' them:

These last 2 pictures are the best views I could get. If I could spend all day standing holding on the the door knob, gazing whistfully of the window, I'm sure the trousers would look lovely!

Secondly, the Lydia top from Burdastyle.  I cut this according to my size on the chart, but, (and this I something need to remember for Burda) it is much too big.  It is a sloppy top, as opposed to a tight (form fitting top?), which is not what I was after.  The fabric was £1 a metre from my sewing teacher.  She has been selling off a collegue's stash after the collegue died and raised nearly £1000 for a local hospice.  I don't know the fibre content, but is very stretchy and I didn't really take this into account when I made the top.  I also forgot other sewists comments that it runs big, so should have made it a couple of sizes smaller.  Here it is as it fits at the moment.  I think it is ok to go under something (I wore it under a bright red deliberately oversized cowl sweater the other day) but when I got hot and took the sweater off, I suddenly felt enormous. It will be altered some how in the not too distant future - whether it will be hack-job or a careful reconstruction, I don't know yet!

front view showing strange folds of fabric over my bust

Possible sway back alteration required?

showing width of top

Pulling the top in for a better fit

 
Coming up, two nearly finished projects, both waiting for hems!

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!