I was hoping to post lots of sewing adventures this weekend but yesterday morning I woke up with a stinking head cold, so instead I've spent yesterday and so far today in PJs, feeling slightly sorry for myself.
So instead I will post about a couple of true musical greats that passed away this week.
Sorry both of these aren't videos as such as both tracks were looong before video - or shorties as they were known then - were popular but they are great great music!
First up Johnny Otis, if you don't know about this guy, read up about him, what a guy, he worked with a lot of greats, was a real innovator in music and did some amazing things in his life. He's a real musical hero of mine and my husbands, he just touched so much music that we loved.
Next up and probably better know generally is Etta James. What a gal and what a voice.
I love this song, I actually sang it with my band many years ago, but could never recreate that wild Etta James feel!
I'll be back fighting fit soon, I would have carried on with sewing this weekend but I have so much work on at the moment, I need the energy for that!!
Sunday, 22 January 2012
Saturday, 14 January 2012
Sorting, Cooking and Sewing!
I love January, I find it a real sorting month. It's a month where nothing much happens so you have a little more time than normal to get things sorted, I also like to get things organised in January as it gives me a good start to the year!
This year has been no different, but I'm making some bigger steps in sorting that I hope will be permanent solutions. I bought some little clear bags from ebay, super cheap, and they have revolutionised my sorting!! I bought them to sort my earrings originally. I had them stored horribly and altogether, stones were forever falling out of earrings and getting lost and I knew I had to do something, so now they are all sorted. This is how it all started eeek
Everything now clearly in little bags, and the advantage of this is, if a stone does come lose it does so inside the bag and doesn't get lost YAY!
Back in storage containers but now not all messed up!!
Then I thought hang on this would be great for my buttons too! I do have them in lovely storage jars which look cute but to be honest everytime I look for buttons I have to tip the whole jar out and search for a matching set, so I went through those too! Yes I know they don't look as pretty in the jar now but much easier to find!
I bought these lovely ones the other week, can't bear to remove them from the card yet, well until I use them.
I'd forgotten about these, love them!
Another tip, if you wear vintage clothes, when they drop to bits and are beyond repair, always remove the buttons before disposing of them. These came from a pair of very cute peddle pushers (capris) that would have fallen apart on wear!
If you're looking for novelty type buttons there are some great modern ones around, I bought these intending to make a tropical blouse with Carmen Miranda influence!!
Something else new I'm trying at the moment are some recipes from this book. As you know I'm vegetarian, but I'm not vegan, I don't really have any desire to be vegan but I've heard great things about this book so wanted to give it a try. I'm sharing just in case anyone out there is veggie/vegan and is looking for inspiration.
I highly recommend this, I've made a couple of recipes from this so far and OMG they were both delicious, not to mention healthy and low in fat, in my book that's a winner! Here's one attempt, Black eye peas and greens, with mashed sweet potato, YUM!!!!
And last but certainly not least, I have been saving hard to buy myself an overlocker (serger to my US friends!!) I was so excited when it arrived yesterday, except I didn't have time to set it up or try it until last night. It took me forever to thread it, boy that is complicated and I gave it a test. I'm so excited that my sewing projects will now have a much more professional finish, can't wait to get going. I'm going to play about with it a bit today, I'm brand new to overlocking so I need to learn how to use it properly before I launch into making something, but I'm super excited about it all!!
Right I'm off to play with my overlocker now......
BTW please excuse all my dark pictures, it's so hard to get good pictures in the depths of winter when it's constantly dark!
This year has been no different, but I'm making some bigger steps in sorting that I hope will be permanent solutions. I bought some little clear bags from ebay, super cheap, and they have revolutionised my sorting!! I bought them to sort my earrings originally. I had them stored horribly and altogether, stones were forever falling out of earrings and getting lost and I knew I had to do something, so now they are all sorted. This is how it all started eeek
Everything now clearly in little bags, and the advantage of this is, if a stone does come lose it does so inside the bag and doesn't get lost YAY!
Back in storage containers but now not all messed up!!
Then I thought hang on this would be great for my buttons too! I do have them in lovely storage jars which look cute but to be honest everytime I look for buttons I have to tip the whole jar out and search for a matching set, so I went through those too! Yes I know they don't look as pretty in the jar now but much easier to find!
I bought these lovely ones the other week, can't bear to remove them from the card yet, well until I use them.
I'd forgotten about these, love them!
Another tip, if you wear vintage clothes, when they drop to bits and are beyond repair, always remove the buttons before disposing of them. These came from a pair of very cute peddle pushers (capris) that would have fallen apart on wear!
If you're looking for novelty type buttons there are some great modern ones around, I bought these intending to make a tropical blouse with Carmen Miranda influence!!
Something else new I'm trying at the moment are some recipes from this book. As you know I'm vegetarian, but I'm not vegan, I don't really have any desire to be vegan but I've heard great things about this book so wanted to give it a try. I'm sharing just in case anyone out there is veggie/vegan and is looking for inspiration.
I highly recommend this, I've made a couple of recipes from this so far and OMG they were both delicious, not to mention healthy and low in fat, in my book that's a winner! Here's one attempt, Black eye peas and greens, with mashed sweet potato, YUM!!!!
And last but certainly not least, I have been saving hard to buy myself an overlocker (serger to my US friends!!) I was so excited when it arrived yesterday, except I didn't have time to set it up or try it until last night. It took me forever to thread it, boy that is complicated and I gave it a test. I'm so excited that my sewing projects will now have a much more professional finish, can't wait to get going. I'm going to play about with it a bit today, I'm brand new to overlocking so I need to learn how to use it properly before I launch into making something, but I'm super excited about it all!!
Right I'm off to play with my overlocker now......
BTW please excuse all my dark pictures, it's so hard to get good pictures in the depths of winter when it's constantly dark!
Sunday, 8 January 2012
Weekly Roundup!
Hi all, how's 2012 working out for you so far? It's working how just fine for me, I feel immensely optimistic about this year!
Well as I'm self employed early Jan is inevitably taken up with doing my accounts which should have been done long before now at end of Jan is the deadline, but hey that's how I roll, so that's essentially what I'm up to but I've still got news for you and pictures to share.
First up my resolutions, yes I like resolutions I don't think of them as resolutions I think of them as goals for the year, I also never start the tougher ones on the 1st of Jan, you are so doomed for failure if you do that, well I am I've learnt from experience!!
Now I'm starting to get my dining room back we are going to eat at the table as much as possible, this is something we don't do, mostly as we haven't had the dining room for years as it was the stock room. Here is the table set for New Years Day dinner, we've pretty much eaten all breakfast there and we're having fondue tonight as we have all the ingredients left from over Christmas!
As you can see though it's pretty cramped that's cos this is what the rest of the room still looks like
So not quite a dining room yet but soon. I'm going to be moving all this stuff at some point this month and then stripping of wall paper, re-wallpapering and then painting has to be done. The floor is good. We also found some fab curtains just before Christmas on ebay, we were lucky enough to have a small win on the lottery, well £72 so we bought curtains for the dining room! Here they are I think they look fab with the dinette chair.
We're thinking we might paint the walls grey but we're not sure. We'll see!
One of my other resolutions is to get out and about a bit more and do small things I enjoy, not necessarily things that cost. We had a tough year, personally and financially last year and so this year, although finances are still tight we want to try to just get out of the house sometimes, even if it's just to look around somewhere.
So this weekend we did one of our favourites things. We went rummaging at an Antique market and large antique shop. We didn't find anything in fact the regular antique/craft type fair we go to in Farnham was pretty quiet, I don't blame the traders for not so many being there, after all you're not going to make much in January so it was a little disappointing as we usually find something. Then the church fair that is around the corner where I scored loads of vintage buckles, buttons and material last time wasn't even on! So we decided to visit Bourne Mill Antique centre in Farnham. It's a huge old mill I assume, a really old building packed full of stuff but it is really hard to get around if you're not good on your feet, so Paul went to the cafe for coffee and cake whilst I rummaged. Here are some pics.
It's several floors of real rummaging, I didn't find anything this time, to be honest it's been going downhill a bit lately but in the past we've found some real treasures! It's definitely worth a visit though if you're in the area.
I love the 50s kitchen cabinet and I am in the market for one but I'm not going to pay £265!
I do have other resolutions that I won't share but one that I will is sewing more. I have saved enough to buy myself an overlocker I am busting with joy about this, however as I'm grounded til I get my accounts done I'm not going to buy it til I'm done otherwise it will be shouting at me when I need to be doing my accounts! I'm hoping to get it in time for next weekend as I figure I might finish my accounts tomorrow whoo hoo! The first thing I'm going to sew is not for me. I've gained weight and I need to shed it, I find out about my knee op on Tuesday so fingers crossed that happens quick so I can get back to exercising too. In the meantime I've been promising Paul a number of items so I'm going to get going on those. These are more casual 50s trousers that I'm going to give a go. I also have some great material for a shirt for him. I'll let you see them when I'm done, promise!
Anyway that's what I've been up to. Hope you're all having a great 2012 so far. My accounts phase is not much fun but hey it's got to be done! Once it's done I'll be very happy and crack on with my to do list for 2012!
Well as I'm self employed early Jan is inevitably taken up with doing my accounts which should have been done long before now at end of Jan is the deadline, but hey that's how I roll, so that's essentially what I'm up to but I've still got news for you and pictures to share.
First up my resolutions, yes I like resolutions I don't think of them as resolutions I think of them as goals for the year, I also never start the tougher ones on the 1st of Jan, you are so doomed for failure if you do that, well I am I've learnt from experience!!
Now I'm starting to get my dining room back we are going to eat at the table as much as possible, this is something we don't do, mostly as we haven't had the dining room for years as it was the stock room. Here is the table set for New Years Day dinner, we've pretty much eaten all breakfast there and we're having fondue tonight as we have all the ingredients left from over Christmas!
As you can see though it's pretty cramped that's cos this is what the rest of the room still looks like
So not quite a dining room yet but soon. I'm going to be moving all this stuff at some point this month and then stripping of wall paper, re-wallpapering and then painting has to be done. The floor is good. We also found some fab curtains just before Christmas on ebay, we were lucky enough to have a small win on the lottery, well £72 so we bought curtains for the dining room! Here they are I think they look fab with the dinette chair.
We're thinking we might paint the walls grey but we're not sure. We'll see!
One of my other resolutions is to get out and about a bit more and do small things I enjoy, not necessarily things that cost. We had a tough year, personally and financially last year and so this year, although finances are still tight we want to try to just get out of the house sometimes, even if it's just to look around somewhere.
So this weekend we did one of our favourites things. We went rummaging at an Antique market and large antique shop. We didn't find anything in fact the regular antique/craft type fair we go to in Farnham was pretty quiet, I don't blame the traders for not so many being there, after all you're not going to make much in January so it was a little disappointing as we usually find something. Then the church fair that is around the corner where I scored loads of vintage buckles, buttons and material last time wasn't even on! So we decided to visit Bourne Mill Antique centre in Farnham. It's a huge old mill I assume, a really old building packed full of stuff but it is really hard to get around if you're not good on your feet, so Paul went to the cafe for coffee and cake whilst I rummaged. Here are some pics.
It's several floors of real rummaging, I didn't find anything this time, to be honest it's been going downhill a bit lately but in the past we've found some real treasures! It's definitely worth a visit though if you're in the area.
I love the 50s kitchen cabinet and I am in the market for one but I'm not going to pay £265!
I do have other resolutions that I won't share but one that I will is sewing more. I have saved enough to buy myself an overlocker I am busting with joy about this, however as I'm grounded til I get my accounts done I'm not going to buy it til I'm done otherwise it will be shouting at me when I need to be doing my accounts! I'm hoping to get it in time for next weekend as I figure I might finish my accounts tomorrow whoo hoo! The first thing I'm going to sew is not for me. I've gained weight and I need to shed it, I find out about my knee op on Tuesday so fingers crossed that happens quick so I can get back to exercising too. In the meantime I've been promising Paul a number of items so I'm going to get going on those. These are more casual 50s trousers that I'm going to give a go. I also have some great material for a shirt for him. I'll let you see them when I'm done, promise!
Anyway that's what I've been up to. Hope you're all having a great 2012 so far. My accounts phase is not much fun but hey it's got to be done! Once it's done I'll be very happy and crack on with my to do list for 2012!
Saturday, 31 December 2011
Happy New Year!
I just wanted to wish you all a very Happy New Year!
I've enjoyed reading everyone's yearly run down, I won't be doing one, 2011 wasn't my most fave year ever, hence my not being around much at the end of the year, I guess all the 'stuff' just ground me down and I was tired. Anyway I'll be back louder and stronger very soon, I miss blogging a lot, miss reading peoples blogs, blogging has enhanced my life and I'm sad that I've let it slide lately but sometimes life gets in the way.
Good news is mum is well on the way to recovery and I'm ready to attack 2012 full on!!
Tonight though will be a quiet one, with my famous mushroom risotto, a few glasses of wine, and of course my lovely husband. Not in the mood for a party this NYE but if you're off to one, HAVE FUN!!
See you on the other side.....
Monday, 28 November 2011
I'm ok, I'm here, don't panic he he!
Well I must be the worlds worst blogger, where did this month go?
I'm so sorry I went missing, I seem to be apologising for this a lot lately, life just got stupidly busy and it's the end of the year and I'm tired.....
So what have I been up to, well I made my 2 dresses, yes I promise I will take pictures, but I haven't yet, but I did make this
Out of this! However the complicated neckline looked bloody awful. Really didn't sit right, so I had to work with it, I did ok in the end and got lots of compliments which was nice, I promise I will put full make up on & the jewellery I wore and take a pic, honest!
I then added a black velvet top to the dress made out of this, that didn't fit. The skirt fit so I just adapted it to the new top half. I got lots of compliments in this too, promise I will take pics.
Then of course I went to the Rhythm Riot, did I have fun, yep, did I take pics, nope, I really am the worst type of blogger ever, I do interesting stuff I just get all excited whilst I'm there and well, I forget! Perhaps I should quit blogging, or just get my act together anyway.
I saw some great bands at the Rhythm Riot, including these guys Lil Mo and the Dynaflos who I've never seen before they were fabulous live! One of the best bands of the weekend.
oooh I tell a lie I took a couple of pics on my phone, first up this is in the chalet with my friends, and it was only 5pm on the first day, those glasses had/have huge cocktails in, talk about peaking too soon!
And I got some fabulous new saddle shoes from Rocket Originals, they are gorgeous and a slightly amended style, and I have to confess they are even better than their first ones! Here is a pic in the apartment at Pontins, note the very luxurious carpet ;o)
Just before I went to the Rhythm Riot I finally found out what is up with my knee, remember how well I was doing exercising then I had a pesky knee problem that stopped me in my tracks. Well I thought a bit of physio and all would be good. Sadly not, I need an op, I have torn my cartilage, I guess it explains the pain, but it's blumming annoying well and painful! So now I just have to wait, apparently I shouldn't have to wait to long but still it'll be too long for me I'm sure. The Rhythm Riot didn't help on the knee front, getting drunk and thinking I could dance through the pain is not a good idea, let me tell you now you can't, I nearly didn't make it downstairs it hurt so much, that'll teach me, or will it?!!
Post Rhythm Riot has been recovery, it's true, I used to go to these events, come home and go out that night, now it takes me a good week to recover, it's shameful!
So there you go, I've been up to a lot, just forgot to take photos, shame on me!
I'm so sorry I went missing, I seem to be apologising for this a lot lately, life just got stupidly busy and it's the end of the year and I'm tired.....
So what have I been up to, well I made my 2 dresses, yes I promise I will take pictures, but I haven't yet, but I did make this
Out of this! However the complicated neckline looked bloody awful. Really didn't sit right, so I had to work with it, I did ok in the end and got lots of compliments which was nice, I promise I will put full make up on & the jewellery I wore and take a pic, honest!
I then added a black velvet top to the dress made out of this, that didn't fit. The skirt fit so I just adapted it to the new top half. I got lots of compliments in this too, promise I will take pics.
Then of course I went to the Rhythm Riot, did I have fun, yep, did I take pics, nope, I really am the worst type of blogger ever, I do interesting stuff I just get all excited whilst I'm there and well, I forget! Perhaps I should quit blogging, or just get my act together anyway.
I saw some great bands at the Rhythm Riot, including these guys Lil Mo and the Dynaflos who I've never seen before they were fabulous live! One of the best bands of the weekend.
oooh I tell a lie I took a couple of pics on my phone, first up this is in the chalet with my friends, and it was only 5pm on the first day, those glasses had/have huge cocktails in, talk about peaking too soon!
And I got some fabulous new saddle shoes from Rocket Originals, they are gorgeous and a slightly amended style, and I have to confess they are even better than their first ones! Here is a pic in the apartment at Pontins, note the very luxurious carpet ;o)
Just before I went to the Rhythm Riot I finally found out what is up with my knee, remember how well I was doing exercising then I had a pesky knee problem that stopped me in my tracks. Well I thought a bit of physio and all would be good. Sadly not, I need an op, I have torn my cartilage, I guess it explains the pain, but it's blumming annoying well and painful! So now I just have to wait, apparently I shouldn't have to wait to long but still it'll be too long for me I'm sure. The Rhythm Riot didn't help on the knee front, getting drunk and thinking I could dance through the pain is not a good idea, let me tell you now you can't, I nearly didn't make it downstairs it hurt so much, that'll teach me, or will it?!!
Post Rhythm Riot has been recovery, it's true, I used to go to these events, come home and go out that night, now it takes me a good week to recover, it's shameful!
So there you go, I've been up to a lot, just forgot to take photos, shame on me!
Tuesday, 8 November 2011
Talented Friends!
Ok this is a bragging post, I have very talented friends and I'm going to brag about a couple today I do hope you don't mind! I'm so proud and sometimes you forget if you are surrounded by these people and then sometimes you think, these people are my friends and they are amazing, I need to shout about this!
First up is my very good friend Bloater, or known professionally as Big Boy Bloater , he's just about to embark on tour with Imelda May as her support band, then he kicks off his own tour in Feb.
I love this promo shot of him!
I've known Bloater and Lisa (his wife) FOREVER, we are old, it's true, actually Bloater isn't old, he's the young fella, he's 40 soon, mmm that'll be quite a night ha ha!
They are really good friends who saw us through some of the worst times of our lives, we've had some of the best nights of our lives with them - New Year's Eve 1999 comes to mind, oh dear - and I couldn't think of nicer people this could happen to, oh and they're pretty good next door neighbours too. Bloater is such a talented musician, you just have to look on his website, if you see high praise from people like Jools Holland and Mark Lamarr you know you're pretty good. Anyway things are really taking off for him, and I'm so proud!
If that's not enough Lisa is going out on her own with a 5 piece band as Lil Lisa Jane, I was at her first solo gig and it was marvellous, can't wait to see more! I hasten to add Lisa played Sax for years with Bloater's original band, so she's not a newbie to the stage.
They were also responsible for my worst hangover from hell after my birthday last week, those are friends I like to keep, you can see this woman would mix up some hellish cocktails can't you?
And if that's not enough, my good friend Sue from Pennychoo Cards! I haven't known Sue anything like as long as Bloater and Lisa but I feel like I have, you know one of those people you meet and you just click with, you can have grumpy old people conversations straight away with them, but then roll around laughing the next minute, well that's Sue!
Sue is a very talented designer and I mean big time talented! She's done all sorts of work for many many amazing people. But I wanted to show you some of Pennychoo's christmas card designs, I bought some straight away, I love her work, I don't think I've ever seen anything she does that I don't like in fact, I know sickening isn't it?
So here are some of her Christmas cards, love em all!
So there you have it! I of course have other very talented chums, but I just felt the need to shout about these for now. Sharing the love :o)
First up is my very good friend Bloater, or known professionally as Big Boy Bloater , he's just about to embark on tour with Imelda May as her support band, then he kicks off his own tour in Feb.
I love this promo shot of him!
I've known Bloater and Lisa (his wife) FOREVER, we are old, it's true, actually Bloater isn't old, he's the young fella, he's 40 soon, mmm that'll be quite a night ha ha!
They are really good friends who saw us through some of the worst times of our lives, we've had some of the best nights of our lives with them - New Year's Eve 1999 comes to mind, oh dear - and I couldn't think of nicer people this could happen to, oh and they're pretty good next door neighbours too. Bloater is such a talented musician, you just have to look on his website, if you see high praise from people like Jools Holland and Mark Lamarr you know you're pretty good. Anyway things are really taking off for him, and I'm so proud!
If that's not enough Lisa is going out on her own with a 5 piece band as Lil Lisa Jane, I was at her first solo gig and it was marvellous, can't wait to see more! I hasten to add Lisa played Sax for years with Bloater's original band, so she's not a newbie to the stage.
They were also responsible for my worst hangover from hell after my birthday last week, those are friends I like to keep, you can see this woman would mix up some hellish cocktails can't you?
And if that's not enough, my good friend Sue from Pennychoo Cards! I haven't known Sue anything like as long as Bloater and Lisa but I feel like I have, you know one of those people you meet and you just click with, you can have grumpy old people conversations straight away with them, but then roll around laughing the next minute, well that's Sue!
Sue is a very talented designer and I mean big time talented! She's done all sorts of work for many many amazing people. But I wanted to show you some of Pennychoo's christmas card designs, I bought some straight away, I love her work, I don't think I've ever seen anything she does that I don't like in fact, I know sickening isn't it?
So here are some of her Christmas cards, love em all!
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| From the Boibles range http://www.pennychoo.com/boibles-shop.html |
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| From the Eggnog range! http://www.pennychoo.com/Eggnog.html |
Sunday, 6 November 2011
Birthday Celebrations and Sewing Mayhem!
Hello! How are you all? Well I've had a busy busy week.
Sooo as you know it was my birthday last weekend, I didn't have any plans apart from to watch old movies and drink fancy cocktails, I didn't take many photos but here are a few from Saturday.
This was the first of many cocktails, I always feel very special when I drink from these fabulous 30s cocktail glasses, I've never seen any more like them I would so love to buy more!
As I wasn't going out I thought it was only right to bring 'some' sparkly to the celebrations so apart from sparkly earrings I wore my 50s sparkly slippers!
After a few I tried to take a pictures of myself none of them turned out great, but here is me after a few.
Here is Paul after a few
And here's the state the cocktail cabinet got in! This is after serious cocktail mixing YAY
So all in all I had a great day, I was dancing round the living room to some great tunes and all was good AND I didn't wake up with a hangover on my actual birthday.
However this is where it all went wrong, I intended to have a similar easy day but not go over the top as I had to work on Monday. I knew my mates from next door would pop round and we'd probably have a drink or two. Well it didn't quite work out like that, Lisa took over the cocktail making I don't really remember what happened. What I do know is that I woke up on Monday morning with the worst hangover I've had in years, ouch! I sat in my PJs all day, ate pizza and general felt sorry for myself, mmmm won't be doing that again for some time!!
So the rest of the week I spent catching up on the work I didn't do on Monday.
This weekend I started my sewing projects for the Rhythm Riot in a couple of weeks. I'm afraid I have nothing finished to show you, I've nearly finished one, but I wanted to do the cutting out of the other dress whilst I had a good amount of time this weekend, so I don't have much to show you.
One thing I wanted to show is some of what I'm doing, and one of the things I always have to do is alter my patterns. I'm rather chunky and I have a big bust, I also rarely buy patterns in my size, not only are they hard to come by in larger sizes but if I see something I like I always think well I can alter it to fit. This can be very complicated if the pattern is complicated, but I haven't found anything I can't resize yet!
Here's the bodice of a dress I am altering to fit.
As you can see I've cut it up the middle of the pattern piece and seperate it the amount I need, however by experience and knowing how I'm built I know that I never need to resize the shoulders, I actually have quite small shoulders, so I have increase where the bust is and where the waist is, and I will increase the darts at the waist to resize the waist back down.
Now I have no idea if this is the 'correct' way but it works for me, so if you need to alter a bodice or a blouse this could help you, if you want to make it smaller then fold where I have cut!
This bodice is black velvet and it's going on to a skirt made from this fabric, which was originally a whole dress which no longer fits, so I adapted!
Sooo as you know it was my birthday last weekend, I didn't have any plans apart from to watch old movies and drink fancy cocktails, I didn't take many photos but here are a few from Saturday.
This was the first of many cocktails, I always feel very special when I drink from these fabulous 30s cocktail glasses, I've never seen any more like them I would so love to buy more!
As I wasn't going out I thought it was only right to bring 'some' sparkly to the celebrations so apart from sparkly earrings I wore my 50s sparkly slippers!
After a few I tried to take a pictures of myself none of them turned out great, but here is me after a few.
Here is Paul after a few
And here's the state the cocktail cabinet got in! This is after serious cocktail mixing YAY
So all in all I had a great day, I was dancing round the living room to some great tunes and all was good AND I didn't wake up with a hangover on my actual birthday.
However this is where it all went wrong, I intended to have a similar easy day but not go over the top as I had to work on Monday. I knew my mates from next door would pop round and we'd probably have a drink or two. Well it didn't quite work out like that, Lisa took over the cocktail making I don't really remember what happened. What I do know is that I woke up on Monday morning with the worst hangover I've had in years, ouch! I sat in my PJs all day, ate pizza and general felt sorry for myself, mmmm won't be doing that again for some time!!
So the rest of the week I spent catching up on the work I didn't do on Monday.
This weekend I started my sewing projects for the Rhythm Riot in a couple of weeks. I'm afraid I have nothing finished to show you, I've nearly finished one, but I wanted to do the cutting out of the other dress whilst I had a good amount of time this weekend, so I don't have much to show you.
One thing I wanted to show is some of what I'm doing, and one of the things I always have to do is alter my patterns. I'm rather chunky and I have a big bust, I also rarely buy patterns in my size, not only are they hard to come by in larger sizes but if I see something I like I always think well I can alter it to fit. This can be very complicated if the pattern is complicated, but I haven't found anything I can't resize yet!
Here's the bodice of a dress I am altering to fit.
As you can see I've cut it up the middle of the pattern piece and seperate it the amount I need, however by experience and knowing how I'm built I know that I never need to resize the shoulders, I actually have quite small shoulders, so I have increase where the bust is and where the waist is, and I will increase the darts at the waist to resize the waist back down.
Now I have no idea if this is the 'correct' way but it works for me, so if you need to alter a bodice or a blouse this could help you, if you want to make it smaller then fold where I have cut!
This bodice is black velvet and it's going on to a skirt made from this fabric, which was originally a whole dress which no longer fits, so I adapted!
You can't see very well but it's very sparkly, I do like sparkly!
The next dress I've cut out is this pattern
In this fabric
This again is far more sparkly in person, it's kind of gold/silver lame sparkly, anyway once I'm done I'll let you see!
I just wanted to assure you I AM sewing, I'm just not finished! There are soooo many pieces to the dress above and as it's such a beautiful dress I don't want to rush it, I want to get it right.
So there you go, that is what I have been up to, fun, hangover, work and sewing.....
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