Vintage sewing challenge

I'm going to collect my machine from the sewing machine hospital today. I'm ridiculously excited and have so many things to sew up that the poor machine will probably give up the ghost again just in protest.

Marie from a a stitching Odyssey is hosting a vintage sewing pattern challenge to use some of the vintage patterns in her stash. I've pledged to sew up 4 of mine in 2014. I have a lot of choice in my stash, and I'm really excited about this challenge.

Here are my current top contenders (yes I know I already have more than four here!)

This one almost feels like a cheat as all the pieces of the dress have been cut out since before Christmas and I know once my machine is back in action it will be one of the first things I sew up. 

 I was lucky enough to win this in Winnie, from a Scruffy Badger time,  Kick up the 80s giveaway.  I'm now committed to making this at some point this year and I'm very excited about bring this 80s pattern up to date.

 This outfit is so cute, definitely a winter must for me I think, although I'm praying spring is on its way soon so hopefully I won't need it until winter at the far end of the year.

This skirt was the first pattern I ever used and I wore the resulting maxi-skirt to death.  I currently have plans for a tartan maxi, so watch this space.

I love shirt dresses and feel the need for some of these in my life!

Now as I'm praying that spring/summer will eventually arrive so these next two might be on my summer make list:

I'm so excited to see what everyone else makes in this challenge.  I have a sneaking suspicion that it may lead to me haunting ebay and etsy searching for wonderful patterns from other decades as mine are mainly 70s and 80s patterns. 

Kilt refashion

I inherited this amazing, proper Scottish tartan skirt from my Granny.  She had some of the most amazing quality clothes.  This skirt is warm, made from a wonderful wool and glorious colours.

However I was not going to wear this skirt this length as it just felt so frumpy!

This has been sitting in my refashioning pile for ages but as my sewing machine has been out of action I've been ignoring it.  However, then I got desperate for some new clothes and decided to do this by hand.  I started by hacking off a good 20cm of the skirt.

Then the lining went (although I didn't photograph this stage).  I then hemmed both the kilt and the lining by hand.  Now I never hem stuff by hand, I know, I know, it looks so much better.  But it takes FOREVER and I'm too impatient.  This was a real labour of love!

However, I'm really happy with the result!

And then I got a little silly in my photo taking:

 

(I'm hiking because, you know, that's what you do in a kilt!)

I now have a long length of the off-cut wool, which I'll have to think of a lovely project to use it in.

Happy Valentine's day all and have a lovely weekend.

Lets keep warm with a Rowan snood!

As I currently have not one but two out of order sewing machines, I have been focusing on developing some of my other talents. In this case, specifically knitting. I have become really enamoured of this in the last few months and as I spend A LOT of time commuting I have been progressing at a satisfactory rate.

So the first of my recent makes is this snood I made for my friend Steven. Presentation of said gift happened in bar so these photos probably focus too little on the snood and a bit too much on the cocktails. But what can you do, we were warm and had yummy drinks, how much better does life get? 

The pattern is a Rowan one but I can't be bothered to look up which one and I seriously doubt I'm in breach of copyright when I say the instructions were simply 'cast on 22 stitches, knit until desired length, sew ends together.' Definitely not a complicated make. The wool was a lovely green Rowan big wool. This was my first time knitting with such a chunky wool and 10mm needles, so much fun and for someone as impatient as I am, gratifyingly fast.

Steven confirms that this snood has been keeping him lovely and warm, I'm very jealous.  I have another on the go for my sister and then I am moving on to some selfish knitting, I want to be warm too!