Sew For Victory Outfit

I am so excited to finally be able to share my Sew For Victory outfit with you all.  I finished this outfit at the start of last week but every time Corey was home to take pictures for me the rain would come back.  But finally here we are.


When this sew-a-long first popped up I jumped straight on the bandwagon.  I am trying participate in a bit more around the blogosphere this year and I thought this was the perfect place to start.  I already had a 1940's reproduction pattern (simplicity 3688) in my stash that I knew I could use and after seeing Tasha's pinafore skirt I knew exactly what I wanted to make.  I did a little google search for some inspiration and came across this pinafore skirt by NudeeDudee which I used as my starting point.  Instead of a pastel I decided to go with a forest green cavalier garbadine that I picked up from Spotlight.  The straps are not actually functional.  The buttons are just sewn on top for decoration.


Originally I was just going to take photos of this skirt with a blouse I have in my wardrobe.  However, it isn't 1940's at all and I thought to myself if I was going to join in a sew-a-long I needed to do it properly.  So I went on a search for a blouse pattern to make and came across this wrap blouse by Mrs Depew's Vintage.  I didn't want to buy anymore fabric so grabbed this cream & yellow spotted seersucker from my stash.  The only alteration I made to this pattern was to make a pleat in the sleeves instead of gathering them.


And this is how the blouse looks without the skirt.  It is a wrap blouse so for the skirt I just pinned the wrap pieces across to the sides.  I really like this blouse, however, if I was to make it again I think I would need to try and lower the v seam in the front so it actually sits below my bust.  I am so glad I decided to take part in this sew-a-long.  It was so much fun!  I have another sew-a-long planned for this year and hopefully I will get to take part in many more.  A massive thank you to Rochelle for organising this sew-a-long.  I have had a lot of fun!

Lemon Print Gathered Skirt

The problem with working on multiple projects at once like I do is that sometimes you can get overwhelmed by all the WIP's and no FO's.  Last week I was getting a bit annoyed with all the WIP's so I decided to make a quick skirt to satisfy my FO urge.

Gathered skirts are the quickest easiest thing to make and they are so easy to wear as well.  I could never have too many gathered skirts in my wardrobe I don't think.  There are a million tutorials on the internet if you want to make your own.  They are basically one rectangle for the waistband and one rectangle for the skirt.  The large rectangle I made 2 times my waist measurement because I wanted lots of gathering.  You could easily make this fuller or smaller just by altering this measurement.

As you can tell these photos were taken on a rare sunny day on the GC.  I am hoping for another sunny afternoon this week as I have since finished some other projects and I am hoping to get Corey to take pics for me when he gets home from work.  Fingers crossed it can happen soon.

Watermelon Surprise Ensemble

 

I am so freaking excited to finally be able to share this outfit with you guys.  I got the idea for this outfit a few days before Christmas.  I bought the watermelon fabric from Spotlight a while ago and was always planning to turn it into a skirt but when I was going through my pattern stash before Christmas I decided to do something more.  This project is not, as you might assume, a skirt a top.  No my friends!  It is a skirt.................and a jumpsuit!!!

Oh yeah! Isn't that the most awesome thing ever.  When I was going through my pattern stash before Christmas I came across this pattern and I realised that this watermelon fabric had to be paired with a green jumpsuit.  I was so excited to make it that I made Corey take me to Spotlight straight away so I could grab the green linen.  I cut into it as soon as I got home and started sewing.  Obviously, the sewing got put aside for Christmas day and while we went to Melbourne.  But as soon as I got home I picked it up again.  I finally got around to finishing it all last week and had planned to get Corey to take photos on the weekend.  But as I am sure you would have seen on the news we were hit by an horrendous amount of rain and gloom so I couldn't get any till this afternoon.


This watermelon print is just too much fun!  It might possibly be a little too kiddish but I love it anyway.  And so what if I am a grown woman wearing a bright pink watermelon print skirt.  I love it!  I used green buttons for a bit of contrast.  I love the green/pink combo.  I actually saw a really cool crochet blanket in green & pink the other day that I want to recreate.  But that is getting a bit off topic.  I also used the leftover green linen to make the pockets for another pop of colour.

The jumpsuit is just as cute by itself as it is with the skirt.  I actually think I will get more wear out of this by itself rather than with the skirt.  It is just so summery and fun and I can't go past a good jumpsuit.  Plus I don't really love how it gets all bunchy at the top when paired with the skirt.  But that is the only downside to this outfit.  Everything else I love so I can deal with that!

A Nearly Identical Skirt

The Facts

⁃ Fabric - black and white check cotton from the stash.

⁃ Pattern: Tilly & The Buttons Picnic Blanket Skirt Tutorial

⁃ Year: 2012

⁃ Notions: 8 yellow flower buttons - $8.

⁃ Time to complete: 2 hours

⁃ First worn: Yesterday for photos

⁃ Wear again? Definitely!

⁃ Total price: $8

Yay! I am so glad I managed to get another Sew Weekly challenge in before the end of the year.  When I saw that the challenge for this week was black and white I knew I had a few fabrics in the stash that I could use for this.  I finally settled on the black and white check and decided to make myself a simple skirt to wear.  I have hardly any clothes I fit into at the moment (still trying to lose the baby weight) so a new skirt is much needed.

When I was trying to decide what skirt to make I kept thinking about Tilly & The Buttons picnic blanket skirt.  I just couldn't get it out of my head so I decided to use her tutorial to make my skirt.  The minute I started I realised why I kept thinking about it.  Tilly used pretty much the exact same fabric for her picnic blanket skirt.  So I have made a pretty much identical version of the skirt.  Hers is probably a bit better executed then mine is!

When I went to buy buttons (the only thing I bought for this project) I just couldn't go past these yellow flower buttons.  They were just so cheery and happy looking and I thought they would pop really well against the black and white.  I am so happy with how this skirt turned out and I think it will get a lot of wear.  And I don't think it should be too hard to take in once I lose a bit of weight so I can continue to wear it.

A Little Bit of Sewing

A couple of weeks ago my Aunty asked me to help her out by making a skirt for my cousin to wear in her dance concert in a few weeks.  It had to be a 50s style skirt so my mind instantly thought circle skirt. Perfect for dancing!  I had a look through my stash and found some great red & white cherry material to fit the theme perfectly.

As this was for dancing I decided to make it elastic waisted to help with quick costume changes.  I simply measured Taylor's waist and hips and used her hip measurement to find the circumference of the inner circle.  I then gathered this circle into an elastic waistband.

This was a great little project that let me get a little bit of sewing done.  I'm still trying to find my motivation to sew something for myself or something a bit bigger but I think I might need a few more small projects first.  I might need to do some knitting and crochet first.

Sew Weekly - Red

I just managed to get my post up in time for the red challenge on Sew Weekly last week.  If you would like to check out more details on the skirt I made then pop on over here.

I have been a bit slack on the blogging and commenting front lately.  I got hit with a bug and have been a bit sick and have been finding it hard to get my motivation back.  This sketchy posting may continue for a little while while I try and get my mojo back.

Sew Weekly - Accessorize

I don't think I have mentioned it on here yet but this year I decided to take part in the Sew Weekly challenge.  Basically, the lovely Mena from The Sew Weekly invited everyone to sign up if they would like to take part in trying to sew 1 item a week for 2012.  Challenges/Themes are posted at the start of each week and you have until Sunday evening to have something sewn up and posted to the Sew Weekly blog.

The first challenge was called accessorize and you had to choose an accessory as the inspiration for your garment.  I chose these heels which Corey bought me for Christmas 2 years ago.  The problem is I never wear them because they are so amazing and I just could never find the outfit that was special enough for them.  Corey has been nagging me about wearing them for ages so I knew as soon as this challenge came up they would be my inspiration.

I knew I want to make a nice lace pencil skirt to go with them but at first I envisioned it in a nice grey.  Fate intervened while I was perusing my local Spotlight when this lovely navy lace jumped out at me.  I realised then that navy would compliment the light purple of my shoes perfectly.

Here are the nitty gritty details in case you haven't been reading the Sew Weekly blog lately.

Fabric – 1m of Blue Cotton Poplin from Spotlight = $5.99
- 1.5m of Blue Romance Rose Lace from Spotlight = $19.95
Pattern: Simplicity 2605
Year: 2009
Notions: 7″ zipper, thread & 1 hook & eye = $0.99
Time to complete: 3.75 hours
First worn: Sunday, 8th January 2012.
Wear again? Definitely! I am saving this for our next date night to wear out to dinner. (I actually ended up wearing this to work the other day)
Total price: $26.93

A New Skirt & An Outing

This morning I woke up and decided to whip up a skirt with some material I purchased not that long ago. It is a simple self drafted pattern for a pleated a-line skirt. It was super quick and easy to make and the perfect start to a lovely day.

Corey and I spent the day with my parents at a la carte in the park which is a part of the Surfers Paradise Festival which has been running for the past few weeks. A la carte in the park is a food festival where all the local restaurants have stalls and there are cooking demonstrations and live music. It is a lovely way to spend a Saturday afternoon. We ate some amazing food, played board games and listened to music. It was lovely and relaxing and we were lucky enough to get a break in the rain so it was the perfect day. Here are some photos from our day...

a la carte in the park

jenga

guess who

giant vegetable samosas

fairy floss ice cream

the always handsome Corey (aka the fiance)

perfect "winter" day on the Gold Coast

souvenir polaroids

I hope your Saturday was just as enjoyable as mine was! And I hope the rest of your weekend is even better.