My 'made up initiative' pledge

Hi all.  I hope you're all having a very lovely, if wet bank holiday weekend (that is if you're in the UK).  I have been having a lovely time in Newcastle, doing a bit of site seeing in Northumbria, visiting friends and alternately expressing my love for the north and whinging about how cold I am.  I also had my Made Up Initiative dress to model which my lovely friend Ziz agreed to take photos of.

When Karen launched the Made up initiaitve, my first thought was wow, what a great idea!  Yes I, like everyone else, am guilty of spending money thoughtlessly/selfishly on my hobby and I loved the idea of an initiative that promoted not one but two of my great loves.  The details of the initiative are on Karen's blog but basically it's an initiative to support the National Literacy Trust.  Now while I (obviously) love sewing, reading was my first love and hobby and has enabled every other life decision and path.  I was lucky to grow up in a house where reading was valued and promoted and I've never had to worry about my reading ability holding me back, despite having dyslexia, but this is not the case for everyone which is what the National literacy trust tries to combat.  I was happy to donate to the cause anyway but Karen had added an extra level of awesomeness for us sewists-if we made a sewing pledge with our donation and completed by the 10th September, we would be entered into a prize draw of awesomeness.  My pledge was to make a shirt dress, I had the perfect fabric and the desire for a shirt dress had been strong for a while.

I have had the Edith dress/blouse pattern for ages, in fact it was the first Indie pattern I ever made and while that blouse version still gets worn as I love the fabric, there were a lot of alterations I wanted to make for the next version.  I needed to do a SBA which is frustrating as the pattern is sold as separate B and C cup patterns. I bought a C as I have a 4cm difference between my upper and full bust however with this pattern, I didn't need the extra room. I have never had to do a SBA before so I guess at least it's a new technique added to my skill set. I did however need to do a broad back adjustment which is now becoming a fairly regular occurrence in my dressmaking.

The fabric was this really vibrant, crisp cotton that I had bought on one of my Paris trips, it's been in my stash for a while.  I've noticed a few people mentioning recently about how the coupons from Marche St. Pierre tend to be quite narrow fabric, which I had never noticed/had a problem with before but certainly this fabric was very narrow and I had to cut 2 separate back pieces and stitch them together rather than cutting on the fold.   

I really want this pattern to work for me as I love the style of the dress and there are so many lovely versions out there, Heather in particular has knocked up loads of beauties.  However, I still have a number of number of issues with the pattern and it's fit on me.  The Maria Denmark patterns do not have seam allowances included, I read somewhere that this makes them easier to adjust(?) but I find it really, really frustrating.  Also I find that the method of finishing the arm holes a bit shoddy but I had forgotten that irritation until it was too late to change it and use bias binding or something.  Note to self, read own notes on patterns before starting! I hadn't made the dress version before and was surprised to discover that I needed to remove a big chunk out of the back, particularly the lower back. Having cut two separate back pieces, turned out to be a happy accident as I was able to remove the excess from the back rather than trying to take it from the sides. Actually I think I still need to remove some excess all over, I don't know if I cut out a bigger size than last time but the whole dress feels very big.  

The eight buttons down the front are these lovely vintage ones I had in my stash, however, having worn the dress for a bit I feel like the buttons need to extend further down the front.  However I only have eight of these buttons so I think I may cut them off and replace them with some others.

I wore this dress to go out with Ziz for the best brunch ever (where the extra room in the dress was very useful) and for a walk in the park before the rain set in again and I made her take lots of pictures of me.

By the end of it I was laughing really hard and looked like this:

and Ziz looked like this!  She was full of yummy food and wanted to lie on a sofa rather than be a photographer!  Whereas my food coma didn't kick in until much later and I wanted to prance around in my new dress!

Hope you're all getting on well with your made up pledges, for anyone who hasn't yet donated, you can do so here.

A super summery vintage shirt refashion

Hello everyone.  Have you guys been following the Refashioners series hosted by Portia.  If not, stop reading and get over there now as it's awesome!  I have been totally inspired by all these talented ladies and since I love a good refashion and it was one of my Goals for 2015 to do more, I jumped on board.

Like Marie, my refashion is also a refashion and vintage pledge mash-up.  I recently obtained this gorgeous 1976 halter dress pattern.

However, much as I desperately want a dress like this in my life, I don't currently have time to make it, nor does the Great British summer seem to want to commit to the kind of sun that I would need to wear it.  On the other hand I have been having slightly weird obsessive dreams about a stripey halter top, which my wardrobe has never needed before but apparently my subconscious is screaming 'you need this in you life now!'

When I discovered this lovely men's large stripey shirt in my stash, my subconscious could not be contained and so the current refashion was born.  I have no idea how this shirt made it into my stash, it was too trendy/unworn to have belonged to my Dad and too large to have belonged to my boyfriend but it didn't have a price tag on it which means it probably wasn't one of my charity shop finds-mystery!  Thanks to the unknown donor though, it was perfect for my needs, a gorgeous crisp cotton shirt is perfect for a woman's summer top!  Men beware, keep an eye on your wardrobes, we're coming for them!

I cut the bodice pieces of the dress out as usual, just extending the halter pieces by 4cm to accommodate for long torso. In hindsight I should also have lengthened the bodice pieces as the waist seam sits higher than I would like. It felt a little wrong cutting into this shirt which is not a feeling I've had before when refashioning but I guess this shirt felt like something special and I was temporarily ruining it.  I cut the midriff piece across the placket as I still wanted to retain some of the details of the original shirt and I thought it would be a nice feature for the middle of the top.  I was at this point that I discovered that even a men's large shirt does not have enough fabric for a fully lined halter top and had to head back into the stash.  Luckily I had some scraps of another shirt in there, which were left over from a shirt I had 'rescued' last time my boyfriend tried to give some clothes to the charity shop.  They were perfect for the lining pieces, even though my boyfriend is slim and his shirt really don't have the quantity of fabric that larger ones do.

For the bottom of the top I used the skirt pieces as  a guide but I  knew I didn't want a straight peplum top that doing this would have given me so I started to play around with the lengths of the different pieces I had left.  When trying on the top I thought the different lengths looked good and so I headed to the internet who confirmed for me that asymmetrical hems are a 'thing'! So it was time to start working out how to make this a design feature.  What do you think?  Can I pull it off as a design feature or does it just look like I was too lazy to hem it properly?

The pattern suggests using a hook and eye to close the halter but I created a couple of button holes and reused the buttons from the shirt. 

And ta da!  One (and a half) men's shirts into a vintage summery halter top.  Suitable for wearing in the glorious sunshine of the south of France which is where I've been on holiday for the last few days.  Although before you get too jealous, the last day was the only day warm and sunny enough for me to wear this top, we managed to get the only 2 days of rain that they've had in 3 months!  How about you, are you taking part in the refashioners?

A really unseasonal Renfrew

This must be the third or fourth Renfrew that I've made and yet it's the only one that's made it to the blog, in it's own post at least.  However, I kind of wish I wasn't sharing this right now as it was a top I hoped I wouldn't need until Autumn, I know it's almost a national sport here in the UK to whinge about the weather but I'm so over our totally pathetic summer.  I want some sun dammit!  However, in the absence of knowledge on how to make the weather gods smile at me, I guess I'm going to stick with showing you my new long sleeved roll necked Renfrew.

I have very little to say about this that hasn't been said many times elsewhere so I'm just not going to bother.  I made most of it on my new shiny overlocker which was a birthday present from my mother (thanks mummy if you're reading, which actually I don't think she ever does but she is enabling my sewing so I shouldn't complain).  The only snag about having a lovely new (expensive) overlocker is that when I switched back to my sewing machine, I kinda wanted to cry.  It's so much less good, smooth and it's much louder.  However, it has served me faithfully for years and since I can't afford a new one, I should focus on how great it is to have a functioning machine at all and stop dreaming about trading her in for a better model!

Anyway, back to the top, this is actually the first time I've made the roll necked version of this top and I love it.  It's so snuggly and lovely and when I'm done been grumpy about having to wear it in August I'll be really thrilled to have it in my wardrobe.  The fabric is this gorgeous Japanese style blossom print jersey that I found in the remnant bin in Simply fabrics forever ago.  It had a great stripey border too which I really wanted to make more use of in the top but since it ran perpendicular to the stretch, the only bits I could squeeze out of it were the cuffs.  However, I love floral print it's so me and I've had loads of compliments on this top when I've worn it so I can deal with the lack of stripes.

One of the many things I love about this pattern is the length of the sleeves.  I have giant long monkey arms and I like to have my wrists covered in when I'm cold, so usually I have to lengthen the sleeves but the Renfrew sleeves hit at the perfect place for me.

Obviously on the day my sister and I headed out to take these photos the sun came out and I was boiling!  However, its gone back to being cold and grey and miserable again and I am currently snuggled up in it as I type this.  It's starting to make me dream of winter sewing plans and I haven't finished my summer ones yet!

Thanks to my sister for taking all these pictures.  Now I'm off to do a sun dance to see if the gods will smile on me and grant me some sun!

Etsy sale

So today I'm back with something a little bit different.  I recently moved in with my boyfriend (yay!) and my obscene collection of fabric and patterns is taking up space which he feels is not a good use of our now shared space.  So I have set up an etsy store to get rid of some of the beauties which I now no longer have space for.

I have put some yarn, fabric and patterns on the etsy store.  Some of the great pieces that can now be found there are:

 3m of this gorgeous peach cotton.

 1m elephant print fabric

The patterns may be of most interest to those of you taking part in the Vintage Pattern Pledge:

 A McCalls 1940s child's bonnet, coat and leggings pattern.

 This awesome 1960s coat pattern

This 1950s shirtdress pattern.

All available in my etsy store: https://www.etsy.com/shop/almostahippy

This sale has a dual purpose of getting rid of some of my sewing stash and enabling all of you to get some great new additions to your stash!

Vintage rose summer top

Hi guys, Happy Friday!  This week has been a very angry one for me for a number of rubbish reasons but I have made time for a little sewing to cheer myself up, also for a lovely evening out with friends when my friend Dominika kindly took all these photos and bossed me into what she thought were interesting enough poses! 

I've been a little obsessed with the idea of a double tie shoulder top recently and when I thought about it I realised I could hack my Simplicity 9742 pattern that I used to create this top.  This was an especially good idea for my comfort sewing week as it's a really easy pattern to sew.

I used a floral cotton which I had in my stash, it was left over from making this Nicola top which has since been relegated to the charity shop (looking back at the photos I really must give the Nicola top/dress another go, I really like how it looks on me, it's just that the fit was not good, so it was never that comfortable to wear).  Creating this top was was really quick and a real stash buster as I probably used less than a metre of fabric.  The hack was really easy but I was probably breaking all kinds of pattern drafting rules as I simply folded the pattern pieces (there are only 2) in half and cut the tie side out on the fold.  As the ties were going to make the top really annoying to wear with a cardigan or jacket, I decided to make a short sleeved summer version.

I feel like I'm mixing up vintage eras with this top, the pattern is from 1980 and therefore counts as another make towards my Vintage pattern pledge, however the print looks quite 1950s and the whole top is reminding me a bit of some 1950s ones I've seen.

Sorry about all the creases, these photos were taken at the end of a long and clammy day!  While this top has somewhat calmed my tie obsession, I think I would still like a tank top or similar that has tie straps, hmmm... I feel this might be a good refashion idea.   

And just to close here's a photo of me looking like a child in a deckchair! 

Thanks Dominika for the photos. 

Have a lovely weekend and happy sewing everyone! 

Ultimate trousers

A couple of weeks ago I decided to take a sewing class. I've been wanting to make some trousers for ages. I see them as the ultimate reason to sew as I never wear trousers as I can't find a pair that fit properly due to my pear shape. However, until now I didn't really feel my skills were up to it and still I wanted some hand holding, even with what look like a fairly straightforward pair. I signed up to the 'Sew Over It' Ultimate trouser class in Islington.  I live not far from their original Clapham branch but had not visited this one before, needless to say, it's lovely.  They had loads of great samples of their patterns and gorgeous fabrics all round the shop, I really wish I had taken some more pictures, but I was too busy sewing and eating cake!  Instead here's a teaser shot!  

The class was led by Julie who was really lovely and straight forward and really knew her stuff. When we tried on the toiles she could give us really great specific fitting advice. I know that's why we were there and I shouldn't be surprised about this it its always really impressive to talk to someone who knows their stuff inside out. 

Actually I had very few adjustments to make to mine and probably could have managed them at home. It's not the only reason to take a class though and I had a really great time sewing in a group and having a drink afterwards with my cousin Letty who I had persuaded to join me at the class. 

These trousers are actually a really quick make and a real stash buster if you have an appropriate fabric in your stash. I was using this green cotton twill that I had ordered from Minerva crafts and I only used a metre of it. 

I have been wearing these trousers quite a bit and actually I think I have either made them a little bit too big or the fabric relaxes like crazy. I hope this will be resolved once I've washed them again although I will probably grade down a little at the waist though for the next pair. 

I wore these out at the weekend for a walk in Morden Hall Park on my sisters birthday. It was really beautiful and she was happy to act as my photographer. 

See what I mean about a little bit of excess now?  However they are super comfy and definitely the best trousers I have had in years, definitely living up to the 'Ultimate' claim!  If I decide they're a bit too big I actually have enough fabric left over to make another pair, so my legs are definitely staying green.

Usually I prefer trousers/skirts with a waistband but these hit at a really good place and I actually really like the no waistband, sometimes it's nice to have something a bit different.  My sister and I had a bottle green uniform when we were at school and you would think being dressed head to toe in a particular colour for 7 years is enough to put you off for life, however apparently it only put me off for the next 12 years, as these trousers are an almost identical colour to our uniform and I love them.

Morden Hall Park is really pretty National Trust property and has an old snuff mill in the grounds as well as a water wheel and glorious rose garden (and you can get there on the tube!)

A very happy belated birthday to my fantastic little sis and best wishes for the next year. 

Happy Tuesday to the rest of you.

Vintage pattern pledge; where am I at?

Happy Sunny Tuesday.  The sun makes me very happy and so the current blue skies and temperatures in the 30s are making for a good Tuesday.  I hope you are all enjoying your days.  

So last year I signed up to make 4 Vintage patterns as my vintage pattern pledge.  I failed spectacularly and managed just one.  This year I also pledged to make four, so half way through 2015, I thought I'd take stock and see where I'm at.

I find this challenge really inspirational, the sewing community creates some really awesome stuff, I'm so pleased that Kerry and Marie are hosting it.  And clearly I am feeling more inspired/motivated than last year as I've already made 2 items from vintage patterns.

So what do I have planned?

Well these three beauties just fell into my lap (via PopsVintageBoutique, and they sent me a Thank you card with the order, how cute is that).  So I'm thinking that one of them might be a good choice for my next make.  I'm swooning slightly over the halter dress and as the British summer has finally decided to arrive its shot straight to the top of my sewing list. 

I also really like this 1980s shirt dress  that I have in my stash. I even have an African wax print in my stash that I think would be an ideal fabric match. The pattern's quite similar to the one Kerry recently made. Plus I really feel that another 1980s tie top, in a cotton, would be a good addition to my summer wardrobe, maybe with the omission of sleeves. 

If I manage even one or two of those before the end of summer I'll have completed my pledge even before I start planning my winter wardrobe, when I have plans for a coat! 

How are you getting on with your pledges?