Blog

Welcome to the first of a new series! Each Friday I will be writing about what I’ve done in sewing land over the past week - plus any knitting or other crafts I’ve managed to slot in.

I’m kicking off this new sewing series on a bit of a tangent, with last Friday’s knit club meet-up - our first ever! Ari, Jolynna and I have been knitting online together every Sunday for over a year now - with two of us based in Yorkshire and Jolynna based all the way in Australia. Celebrating Jolynna’s recent move to the grim north of England (welcome!), we consumed a solid number of gins and stouts and got raucous in my favourite local viking pub Valhalla. Throw away all your assumptions about knitters! Although I did have to go home early and then spent a few days in an introvert hangover, so maybe your assumptions aren’t far wrong on my part.

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I made the April dress and Gemma belt by Forget Me Not patterns and I’m absolutely in love!

This pattern was an impulse purchase - I bought it on the day it was released. That’s totally uncharacteristic for me, as I tend to hum and haw about pretty much every purchase I make (“a latte, no a cappuccino, no a latte” is a bit of a running joke in our household!). But this dress pattern sang to me immediately - I’ve never seen a wavy seam line like this one, and I had to try it out.

I picked these two linens to complement the ocean wave design, and it came out exactly as I imagined it (for once!). The fabric is the bio-washed 100% linen from Higgs and Higgs in mint and ice blue.

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I’ve now made two of these floor poufs by Closet Core Patterns - and I love them both!

This pattern has been written about a lot in the sewing community, and is very well-loved. I completely understand why: not only do you end up with a fun and practical pouf (useful as a seat, a footrest, or a majestic throne for a cat) but it also scores very nicely in the sustainability department. It can be made from fabric scraps, and it can be stuffed full of whatever bits of fabric you have lying around - scraps, cutoffs, bits of thread or yarn, retired blankets, ancient towels, the ugly curtains that were hanging in your house when you moved in, ratty old faded knickers (clean ones!), etc. Each pouf holds an inconceivable amount of otherwise purposeless fabric.

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Two dresses in one post!

The other month I sewed a wax print Ankara dress in such a horrendous rush that I ended up stupidly stressed out about it. But I am pretty happy with how it came out:

Despite numerous late nights sewing, and a lot of patience and understanding from my husband (thanks P!), I very nearly didn’t finish it in time for the wedding I was making it for. I was hand stitching at 11pm the night before! And there is a lot of sloppy work on the inside that I’m not totally proud of. So I swore never to sew anything on a deadline ever again.

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Look, I made a thing! A shirt, an actual bona-fide shirt! After not sewing anything for well over a year because there wasn’t space for my sewing machine, I moved house, dusted off the old Janome, made a cheeky Hollyburn skirt to check I still knew how to sew, and then jumped right back in at the deep end with a Granville shirt. And I think this proves I still know how to sew much better than that slightly dodgy Hollyburn skirt did.

But here’s the thing: it took me about 4 months to sew this thing. There were gaps of weeks where I didn’t pick it up at all, because life is busy and I get sleepy. It was a serious test of my resolve to keep going on a project that had long since lost its excitement. I’m usually a real flake with my projects - as soon as something loses its initial sheen I’ll jump ship to the next shiny thing. But I’ve been working on my perseverance. And it turns out perseverence pays off. Who knew.

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I’ve been knitting furiously this week! I’m a bit more than halfway through the diamond scarf from the pattern book I got in Iceland, Simple Knits with Gústa . I’m making it in Mosa Mjúkull, the wool made by the same designer. Every pattern in this book uses three balls of it, which I appreciated as I could just buy the three balls and choose a pattern out of the book later.

Here’s how it’s coming along - most of the way through the second of three stripes:

The diamonds are drastically more obvious in this photo than in real life! Must be the contrast. This Mosa Mjúkull wool is reasonably fuzzy so you don’t get a lot of stitch definition. I found that a little disappointing at first, but I’m sure it will look better after blocking - hopefully more like the picture!

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Hello again! I’m back!

It’s been a little while, and a few things have changed. Mainly: I no longer live in Singapore! I’ve moved back to my homeland, the UK - I now live in Yorkshire, the land of gorgeous landscapes and Yorkshire puddings - and Rowan wool!

Now that time is on my side, I’m really excited about getting on with making things again, sharing what I create, and being part of the online makers community.

I’ll be starting with a knitting project as I just went to Iceland and bought a pattern booklet and some Icelandic wool:

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Hey… that’s not a sewing project!

This wool is for the Outfit-Along which I’ve impulsively decided to take part in. If you’ve not heard of it, this event runs for the months of June and July, and to take part you have to knit one garment and sew one garment to make up a whole outfit. I’m going to be making the official OAL patterns - the Zinone knitted lace top and the Hollyburn skirt - but you don’t have to go with those as long as you make a whole outfit.

I haven’t knitted anything proper in about a year - the last serious knitting project I made was a baby blanket for my niece last June. I’ve been musing about picking up my knitting needles again as I don’t want to lose the skill, so when the OAL popped up on my blog feed the other day, the timing was perfect. Plus, I already mentioned that I have another Hollyburn skirt on my sewing plans. There was no way I couldn’t sign up!

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