I'll sew you

A few posts back I promised you pictures of my new fabric. 'New' is maybe not the correct word as some of them are already a few months in my posession. So here goes. (click on the pictures to get a closer look at the fabric) Online shopping at "De Stoffenstunter". I was very, very pleasantly surprised when I opened my package. You can never tell for sure what you are gonna receive with online shopping but this was GOOD! 1. Blue pinstripe for a narrow skirt 2. Gorgeous velvet-jersey for a top  (is it possible to be in love with a fabric?) 3. Plain simple black jeans for a skirt 1.                                                                 2.   3. Fabric Market near my home. At a certain point I remembered I also had planned to go to the fabric market in Nieuwegein, and stopped buying. Or else..... 1. Lovely velvet-jersey which I plan to use for a wrap-dress (to my surprise this fabric is used in the     KnipMode January 2012) 2. Sof

Merry Christmas everyone

Done!! It felt like it took forever to finish this blouse. I'm glad it's finished so I can start on something new. But I'm very happy with the end-result. The pattern is from KnipMode 10/2006. It's quite a simple, basic blouse, but the pleats just below the collar are a great feature. It is not close-fitting but it's not too loose also. It's just right. I can wear it just like this, tucked in or with a belt.  The fabric was a remnant I picked up from the market. I bought 3 pieces for the price of € 5. You do the maths! I love the fact that it's not a see-through fabric. It's hard to find great fabric for a white blouse but this one fits the bill just right. A closer look at the pleats and collar with stand: I planned to use 3 smaller buttons to close the cuffs. But the only buttons I could find this week (during the only opportunity I had this week to go shopping) came in one size only, so I had to change my plan and decided to use 2 butt

And there was me fearing this dress, made last summer, might be somewhat out of fashion:                                    Better think again, 'cause this is what I                                     found on Pinterest:                                                                                                         A girl with impeccable taste, our Keira! Gr. Lilian

It has been a whole month since I blogged the last time and that's not something I'm happy with. Having time to blog means (in my book) that there's a good balance between work and 'play'. November has been a month so busy that it's been insane. Not all bad though. On the contrary! I've joined a lovely meeting with fellow-sewists in the weekend of 12/13 November. Sigrid  was so nice to invite me for a weekend full of un and I was happy to join in on sunday. The group had a great weekend with visits to a fashion-exhibition at The Hague and a visit to Amsterdam on saturday. On sunday a trip to the fabric-market at Nieuwegein was planned. And that's where I joined in. (Try to keep me away from a place that sells fabric...duh.) It has been so much fun and we had a great laugh. And of course we bought fabulous fabric! Thank you Sigrid, Margaret, Joana, Hilde, Sheila, Samira, Marta , Valerie , Valerie and Clare, for a lovely day. It's been so great me

Sunday I finished the pencilskirt. From the front it looks absolutely fine: From the back, with the right lighting, it does look fine too: From an angle, I almost have a 'sexy booty'. Almost. Then why, oh why, does it look like this from the side: Problem: just at the point where the zipper ends (in the back) there's a ditch. I can't figure out why this is occurring. When placing the zipper I basted the hell out of it, just to make sure it wouldn't look messy. I even sewed the point at the bottom by hand to make sure it looked neat. And it worked. The zipper is sewed in to my liking. The fabric is not pulling at that point. I made sure the fit of this skirt was comfortable (and it is!!).  When you look back at the second picture and you take a closer look at the bottom of the zipper, you see an horizontal line that's not supposed to be there. And just below that line there's that wretched ditch!  It may not look all that terrible to you, but belie

Hi all, For those wondering: I'm still here. Sewing has been superslow lately. My mojo goes up and down like a ferris-wheel, but it's more down than up I'm afraid. However, yesterday I picked up a new project, a pencil skirt. It's not very interesting. Just a simple skirt. Plan is to finish it today. Pictures promised. But telling you this is actually not the main reason why I decided to blog today. No, it's a movie I saw on television: 'Down with love', with Renée Zellweger and Ewan McGregor. It was a gorgeous movie. If it was not for the actors or the feel-good factor of the movie, than it was because of the great, great 60's fashion that is displayed throughout. They really make a fashion-stand in that movie. Wow!! And much to my surprise, Renée is wearing this in the opening-scene: Why to my surprise? Because in the big pile of fabrics I got from someone recently, there's this fabric (tape-measure is in centimeters): Ha!! If that isn

I don't mean to make you all jealous or anything....but.....well, how shall I put this..... LOOK WHAT I GOT!! Ain't this fantastic?! I'm so glad this friend of a friend knew of my sewing or else this would all have ended up in the paperbin. 19 magazines I can add to my already extensive collection of sewingmagazines. There are 17 Burda's (one I read outside and I forgot to bring it in for the picture), 1 Sandra Mode and 1 Easy Fashion. All of them are from the last decade and most are from 2005 to 2010.  And that's not all: A huge amount of fabric came home with me too. I don't want to keep all of it. Some I really like and already have plans for. Some I don't like or the pieces are just too little to do anything with them. A few of them look nice but have a very rough surface. The camel in the right picture is perfect for a coat but I'm not sure about the colour. It's just off from the camel you see a lot for this fall

What do you do when you're desperate to blog about something but have nothing to blog about? You dig into your memory if there's nothing you left out that's still worth mentioning. I did and I came up with this top (on the left). I had totally forgotten to show it to you. Probably because it's not really very special. However, I do like it very much and that's the main point right? This is made from the same, and very much loved, fabric as the blue vest of my previous post. I think it is fun to show them next to each other. (In fact I always think about them as a pair, don't know why that is). The only thing that can be said about the purple one is that it has an interesting neckline. It's hard to tell in this picture but the line from the leftshoulder (left when worn) goes all the way to the sleeveseam. In fact, the right shoulder is just a little piece that's sewed on top of that line. It's a nice feature but as I said, it's the only fea

(oops...forgot to press the hems of the arms before taking pics)                                                (Linedrawing)                                           (Real colour, but this picture doesn't show                                                                               the details as well as the above picture) It's not often I brag about things but this time I think I'm allowed an exception. This little vest came out só much better than I had hoped for. The fabric is a pleasure to work with. It contains lycra which helps a lot to keep the fabric in shape. Even topstitching gave no hassle at all, which is rather unusual for a knit. Sewing the facings at the collar and the midfront/bottom (all the way around) was a step I was not looking forward to. I kept thinking: "What if everything gets wonky? Will my project, so far successful, end there?" But it didn't.  Phew!! I'm also glad that everything turned out right at the first t

As promised, here is a sneak preview of my upcoming plans. Yep, this is fall-sewing. I'm totally done with summer. Sewing, that is. Skirt Pattern - KnipMode, August 2004, nr. 6 Fabric - Beige ribcord with a bit of stretch,  creamy-soft texture! I love the topstitching on this skirt, and of course the A-line style which suits my bodytype very well. Sweater Pattern - KnipMode, August 2004, nr. 8b Fabric - Soft knit, polyester with spandex (the same fabric as for the vest) This sweater has an interesting neckline which I like very much.  Vest Pattern - KnipMode, January 2010, nr.11 Fabric - Soft knit, polyester with spandex I'll make the sweater before I start on this vest, just to get the feel of the fabric and find out wether it's an easy or difficult fabric to work with. Best to practice on something not too difficult. I think I'll start with the sweater. I'm anxious to find out how to handle this lovely fabric. There's one week of holiday lef

When I took these pictures I considered this dress finished. After looking at the pictures I think I might have to squeeze in one more bit of sewing. More about that later. First pictures. It's too dressy to call it casual. It's probably best worn in the office. But that's just fine. The pattern is quite old, it's from KnipMode April 1996. Would you call this vintage? How old should a pattern be before you can call it vintage? Well, vintage or not, I like this one quite a lot. It's a timeless design and it was very easy to make. The fabric is from my stash. I think it's a blend of linen and cotton, but I'm not sure. Anyway, it was a joy to sew with and it's a joy to wear, so it must be something good. Below, the picture in the magazine. While going through my old KnipModes over the years, this picture always caught my attention. There's no particular reason why I didn't make this dress sooner but I'm glad I finally got round to it. (

Yesterday I started on this project: It's a rendez-vous (Burda Febr 2009 / 123) as I made it before, you can see that in this link  (scroll down to the bottom of that post for a nice picture). Piece of cake, I thought. Not! The thing is that the fabric is behaving very badly. On top of that my serger is behaving even more badly, if that's possible. And as for me? I was being far too hasty and impatient, thinking I could do this one with my eyes closed, so I made a few mistakes. I said to myself that nothing would get me down and I would finish this in a good way. But there's only so much one can take. At a certain point I decided that enough is enough. And I took a step back, looked at it and decided I was not going to let this ruin my happy-holiday-sewing-mood and this blouse just wasn't for now. Maybe I'll pick it up again at one time but now I'm gonna concentrate on (sewing)things that make me happy. This picture of the right frontpiece (the small cu

Lately I feel a growing urge to sew something more complicated, like a jacket or a blouse with special details. But until now I haven't been able to bring myself to actually start such a project. To fill in the sewing-gap I sticked to simple sewing. And what is more simple than a plain t-shirt? When I took a trip to Antwerp last spring, I bought a few pieces of knits with the intention to make t-shirts out of them. So it was just the right time to cut them up. (Freaky! I seem to have posed EXACTLY the same for these two pictures. Just look at my hands..even the plant behind my back sticks out exactly the same!..) I've used this TNT-pattern  quite a lot and made it with short and 3/4 length arms. The only thing I've changed recently is using a binding to finish the neckline instead of facings. I once read somewhere: "Once you use a binding to finish edges, you never look back". This might be very true. It's such a neat finish and quite easy to do. I don

Again, a very quick project. Let's call this the 'blue patchworkdress'. This knitdress was very simple to sew. It was the first time I tried a pattern from Diana Mode  and it does not disappoint at all. I used my normal alterations and it fits perfectly. The fabric looks like patchwork but is actually printed that way. I needed a simple pattern to let the fabric speak for itself and somewhat straight lines on the sides to match with the vertical lines in the pattern. I think this one just ticks all the boxes. I'm gonna wear this with a narrow blue belt (which I still have to buy..) as I want to emphasize the waist a bit more and break the vertical lines which probably make me look longer than I already am. I made sure the prints matched at the sideseams. As the sideseams are not completely straight it is unavoidable to have a wedge-like part there. But this way it doesn't bother me.                      The neckline drapes beautifully:    Yep..I

The title says it all, doesn't it?  This afternoon I experienced the (almost) ultimate disaster you can have while sewing: cutting a hole in your fabric where it shouldn't be. What happened was: I just finished the first armscye of my knit dress with a binding and was very happy with the result. I wanted to cut of the pieces of thread but I guess in my excitement I didn't pay attention and cut of/out more than I had planned. What you see in this picture is the situation after I repaired my little accident.(Click twice on the picture to take a closer look). It is little, really, as it's about 1cm by 0,5cm.  But it's still a hole. This is what I did (no pictures of the process unfortunately, I forgot to make them): I sewed two little pieces of fusable interfacing against each other, with the fusable sides on the outside, using a few rows of stitches to make sure they were firmly attached and cut out a hole of the same size as the one in the fabric. Then placed

Dear o dear, this spring/summer has been not very productive for me sewing-wise. Neither have I been a 'good' blogger lately. The fact is that I've had quite a busy and not so pleasant time at work (thank God that is slowing down lately/getting better) Combine that with the fact that I am an emo-eater, et voilá, you gain a lot of kilo's before you know it. In fact, a few weeks ago I was at the heaviest weight I have EVER been in my life. Time to take action I thought and now I'm trying to eat healthier and less. But it's a slóóów proces. All this of course has effect on the fitting of your clothes. I'm sad to say that about 75% of my summerclothes has become too small. And that's very annoying, I can tell you. All the lovely skirts I made last year, and some of the blouses, almost all my trousers: TOO SMALL! And that's where the sewing-mojo-killer comes in: I don't feel like making anything because I feel it doesn't look good on me. My wa

At least, that's what I think. I loved the pattern from the first time I saw it. I found a very nice fabric for it, Swiss cotton, as the lady in the shop called it. I like the print (African inspired?) and the feel of the fabric very much. I didn't feel like modelling today (sorry) but to give you an idea of the length: the hem just hits my knees. Now, let the pictures do the talking: and here's the linedrawing, which shows all the cute details. I like the little buttons, the way that the pockets are partly hidden behind the outer pleats, the wide waistband, the flare of the skirt and the way it shouts 'summer!'. I didn't make buttonholes but sewed the buttons on through the two layers of the waistband so the two pieces are connected. Other than that, ánd being decorative of course, they have no function. Here are some detail-pics: This was, again, a real quick project. This evening I cut out a t-shirt from a TNT-pattern. No work for another day,