I'm baaaack....

Well it seems like a while since I was here, and I had a very prolific December sewing wise.  However after a fantastic holiday at Lake Rotoiti (in the Nelson Lakes district) for a family reunion (which included a visit to the World Of Wearable Art museum in Nelson, which was fantastic!) we returned home to a dead computer.  Blue screen of death, etc etc.  Fortunately we have a couple of IT experts in the family, and while one lot were (and still are) rescuing the un-backed-up (YES I KNOW!) contents of our old one (three or so years of photos most importantly) my SIL was able to procure a machine for us, due to be recycled, hence free!  While not the latest and flashest, it is a decent step up from our old one, and got us back online. We're currently working out how to use windows 8, which those of our acquaintance who do programming and such Do Not Like.  Since none of us do, we're quite happy with it.

The only annoyances for me are that it does not have spider solitaire on it, and our camera software is not compatible, meaning I have to get something else to edit photos.  Since mostly I just crop and rotate them that isn't a big deal, and I did these in Paint!

Right, onto a small sampling of what I've been sewing!


This dress is for the daughter of a friend of my dear friend J.  She gave me this fabric, which was big enough for two dresses - one for Isabella, and one for F.  In exchange for F's dress, I get the rest for Isabella.

Isabella is remarkably willing to model a dress which isn't for her.  This is a size 122 drafted from Aldrich.
Isabella is around 110cm tall, so this fits much as I expected, although it isn't as long as I would expect.

This dress IS for her.  She was very very willing to model it for me and this ended up being the best shot.  Given camera/computer dramas I'm not enthusiastic about another photo shoot.  It's the first thing I've made from one of the Enid Gilchrist books I received from a lovely reader quite a while ago.  I absolutely loved the books, and had plans for several things - either garments or details, but life seemed to get in the way rather a lot.  This is described as a school dress, and I assume is what school uniforms looked like in Australia in the 60s.  It's a size 6, which is great on my tall 4 1/2 year old.  The dots are stenciled on with freezer paper.

For myself I made this top from Pattern Magic 2.  It's called flip turn because of the way one of the pieces flips over the other to create the drape effect.  The drafting was pretty straight forward, and since I'd toiled the block when I first got the books I didn't have to start by doing that.  This is my second version.  After making my first (which I also wear happily) I skimmed in the sides and added a couple of cm to the length.  I've seen other peoples versions of this which are a snugger fit, and I'm thinking I might sneak a little more width off the front, which is wider than the back.

(I know cropped pants are not the most flattering look, but they are very comfy when you don't know whether the weather will be hot or cold.)

And last of all, this shrug.  It's McCalls 5398, now OOP.  This was another garment courtesy of J - I made one for her and one for me from a piece of fabric of hers. We've joked for a while that we're twins separated at birth because of our similarity of taste, and we now have several matching garments.  We'll have totally matching wardrobes before long.

I love shrugs - just enough warmth when it gets chilly, and they don't cover up the details on a pretty dress or top.

So there you go, a brief look at what I've been up to.  When kids return to school and kindy and I have a better idea of what I am doing computer wise I should be able to do a little better with photos.  The mojo seems to be in full swing, so there might even be some MORE SEWING!