Space dye and dolly duds

I decided that the space dye that I did last week needed to be made up into a tracksuit. I finished it the other night but I ahve been waiting for some good weather to take a photo. Still overcast so I decided to take one anyway. It looks really good made up, so I plan to dye some more. I made up some nappies for Jalisa's dolly this morning. I overlocked the blue one the wrong way, so it is fleecy on the outside and smooth in the middle. Jalisa loves them and I think they would make a great present for a little girl, along with a little nappy bag or something.

Experiments in dyeing

I felt like experimenting with dye this last week, so I made up some dye stock, pulled out my white fabrics and went for it. For whatever reason, I always rush into my dyeing and don't really take the time to make s'ure things are right. Big lesson for me, as I did not get the results I thought I would.

These are my attempts at space dyeing...it looked easy in a book...Top left is fleece dyed red and turquoise. I used a lot of water in the red so I thought it would turn pink, but no. I ended up leaving it sit in a bleach bath to tone down the colours. The right is the red/turquoise combo on cord. Bottom is Turquoise and yellow on fleece. I love how the colours blended, but there is too my white left over for my liking.
I also did some more marble dyeing. I also took notes (a suggestion made by Sara) of my experiments and have lots of ideas for the future. My favourites are the pink and oranges - the orange at the front has a lot more subtle swirly patterns in them that I just can't capture...my miserable attempts this morning managed to capture all the wrinkles of the fabric and blur the dye patterns.Hopefully I will be able to create larger pieces of marble fabric when I get Wayne to build me a dye table - at the moment I am using a lid of a storage container and while it does it's job, I can only do small bits of fabric.

Hopefully other people like this, since I am including some pieces in the snailblazer swap.

A playdate and some fab-ulous patterns

I looked after a little boy for a friend for a couple of hours yesterday. The boys had a lot of fun together.
And this is a couple of the patterns I picked up on my op shop crawl. I especially love the bottom right pattern. I am going to make up the jacket soon I think - it has be most gorgeous lines to it (there is a side panel and the sleeves are set in square).

Thank you to who ever was cleaning out their sewing book collection. I mananged to pick up Kwik Sew Sweatshirts Unlimited, a vintage lingere sewing book, a pattern drafting book, two machine embroidery books...there were other ones there that I had to leave, I had already blown the budget enough.

Very seventies

I took some time to trace, cut a sew some clothes for myself this long weekend. The jumper is made from a lovely sweater knit I picked up at an Op shop. I used Kwik Sew 2900 and drafted the cowl myself. The knit was unravelling very fast so I played with my differential feed and used my overlocker for everything but the hems.

The wool pants are made from my trusty Burda staple pattern. I found this remnant at an op shop too and there was just enough for the pants but I had to cut the yoke facing from a seperate contrasting fabric ( I chose a purple hand dyed piece).

3 little presents

I finished some artist's folder's. Andrea made them some time ago and I added the idea to my list of gift ideas. With a party to attend on Saturday, I thought they would make a good present for all the three and four year old girls in playgroup. Apparently the tute is at CraftApple but I couldn't actually find it. Anyway, I made my own pattern up, using the dimensions of the scrap books I had already purchased.

This is the inside - room for pencils and the scrapbook.

I have another one to make up - I cut a piece wrong (and it has made me not want to sew it up)

Marble magic

Finished up some stuff this morning. These are Jalisa's winter PJs. The top pair I dyed - an experiment gone wrong, so I am glad they are just for bed.
Hooded tracksuit made from french terry and some marble dyed jersey. I mucked up the placement of the pocket (should have been 2cm higher) so it looks out of proportion. Jalisa was not keen on wearing this for a photo, but hopefully she will warm up to it soon. I don't want her to get too picky about her clothes just yet.

Diary cover made from some more marble dyed fabric. I have also been working on some secret sewing (for the Snailblazer swap).

Doggy duds

I used a Robert Kaufman dog print on drill and Ottobre 2/2003 #5 to make these pants. You can't see all the details (panel seams, topstitching, bellows pockets, faux fly) but they make the pants. Still a little long for Scotty, but hopefully he will get lots of use out of them.

Boring, fluffy, last minute

I find it difficult to think of exciting titles...

I snatched a little sewing time Tuesday night and yesterday when the kids were occupying themselves. The tee is the curved raglan sleeved one from Ottobre. I am thinking of adding some marbling in shades of blue and maybe yellow (red comes out pink). The cropped jacket is #5 from Ottobre 1/07. I think I will let Jalisa wear it so I can decide whether it needs a closure or not. I would have like a darker pink ribbing, but I could not find one anywhere. The pink feathers are left over from the coat I made last year (do you remember the houndstooth coat I made for the show).
Since I was seeing Mum, I thought I better get around to making her Mother's Day gift...I had really been putting on making up a pattern for the photo album cover I had decided to make. After being unsucessful in finding a suitable fabric that I thought my Mum would like (that I had enough of) I decided to think of something else to make. Since Mum is travelling to England later on in the year, I thought of maing her some bright luggage tags, to help her identify her suitcases. I found a pattern here .

The pattern is pretty wide, so if I made them again, I would reduce the width. I also have decided to add Mum's details (if she wants) on some white cotton with a permenant pen rather that sew on the plastic pocket like the pattern stated. I also added a snap so that they can be put onto the suitcase with ease. Mum was really delighted at the present and said they were so much better than the pieces of fabric they used to tie around their luggage.

Raglan jackets and dyeing

Wayne was keen on buying Jalisa a warm jacket to wear to the show. I thought I had better get my act together and make her one, as I have the pattern, fabric and the goal to make one.

I used the Raglan jacket from Kwik Sew for Toddlers with the hoodie. The outer fabric is a blue/green feather's knit. The lining is some cotton jersey that I dyed violet. To make the lining, a just cut out the same pattern, but cut at the fold-in line. Not the correct way of doing it but it worked out fine.
This is some of the marble dyeing that I have been experimenting with. The instructions are from Dharma trading but my interest was piqued after reading a thread at Sewing Mamas. I still have a lot of practice to do to get it looking - I still need to get my work space worked out efficiently - but it is addictive. I whipped up this tracksuit yesterday. Same KSFT pattern that I usually use, in a size 3.

Show entries

These are my entries for the show. It category is actually called Cotton Creations and thus garments made for the different classes (daywear, eveningwear, creative, fanasty classes) are to be made from predominately cotton fabric.
This dress is based around pattern #101 from Burda 12/04, with my own adaptions. Firstly, I raised the centre front seam. I added a full skirt rather than the panelled/gored Burda version – as I thought this would save me a lot of time and possibly fabric. I have used a pink cotton sateen with a black and white cotton sateen for the hem band.

I originally bought some mini pom pom trim to add to Jalisa’s clothing, but I thought it could work on this dress. I found it a little tricky sewing onto the curved seams – I think it would be much easier sewing to a fabric on the grain. The outfit went together fairly easily. I had forgotten how easy dresses can be. If I had had more time, I would have added some more detail to the skirt, some type of trim, but I was a little pressed for time.

This outfit has been my most challenging (sewing) task in a long time. The jacket is fully lined, has set-in ¾ sleeves and there are bands at the end of the sleeves and at the back hem. There is also a front band that stretches from the hem up the centre front, with a 90 degree inward cornered seam. The knee length pencil skirt has a shaped waistband and a front band for the buttons.

I have used mother of pearl shell buttons – which were a bargain buy from Ebay. The patterns are #105 and # 118 from Burda 2/05. In the close up you can see my dyeing mistakes, but I have come to accept the freckles and know what to do next time.

Thanks for looking.