bound button holes and the border print dress
I’m quite pleased at how the button holes have turned out, especially as I left it practically to the last minute to go with them, note to self ‘don’t do that again’ it is awkward to do the stitching on the bottom button hole.
I do have a confession to make the photo shows the back of the best button holes, two of the others didn’t quite line up properly, but they lined up enough so as not to impair the hole on the front.
I have also stitched some of the neck facing down
All that needs doing now is the rest of the neck facing, waist binding and hemming, I also need to cut out and make the belt.
I also need to find out how to centre the photos when I import them in from Flickr.
purchases this week
I have bought some fabric this week, I had an email from Kaye’s Textiles this week saying that they had some new cotton fabric and it will be on sale for a week.
The fabric i bought in the end was not on sale and i had already see it but here it is
i also have a few new patterns
i’m not sure which one i’m going to make first but it will probably be the last one, Vogue 8781, as you can see I am on a bit of a Vogue kick at the moment but I am trying to cut down on my spending but it doesn’t appear to be happening.
I’m hoping this week to have my rose border print dress finished and the dress with the shoulder pleats so watch this space.
Russell Watson at the Cliffs Pavillion
We went to see Russell Watson, it wasn’t my idea, I though Simon and his Mum were going together and I was staying at home, no such luck.
Ok, I thought, he did the theme song to Enterprise he can’t be all that bad, it was, and worse.
Now I’m not very musically inclined so I can say if I thought it sounded good or not but I can’t say if it was musically good (Simon can, he said the first half wasn’t), the Freddie Mercury song Barcelona sound so much better when Freddie did it, we then had another song this one from Les Miserables, then he disappeared for 10 minutes while we were treated to a Les Miserable medley, as far as I am concerned the only thing worse than a medley is a mash up or a 12 inch remix.
In between song we were treated to a load of drivel, mostly about his good friends Claude-Michel Schönberg and Alain Boublil who have written him his very own song, in my opinion if this is the stuff they come up with now may be they should give up song writing, it sounded as if they had got hold of a rhyming dictionary and stuck to it like glue. nice, ice, rice splice ( I made the last one up 🙂 )
We had 5 songs in the first hour and about the same in the second hour, he did two songs then disappeared for 10 minutes again, this time we were subjected to an array of science fiction theme tunes, to get you thinking he might do Enterprise after all, he didn’t. He wittered on a bit more about his ‘good friends’ sung a song, Simon says was ripped off from Miss Siagon ( I wouldn’t know I haven’t seen it) nessum dorma, and some hymns, abide with me, Jerusalem which is my favourite, which was ruined by the woman behind me who insisted on singing along out of tune and slightly behind Russell.
All in all I think I would have been happier had it been more operatic songs and less Les Miserable and a lot, lot less of him actually talking.
One other thing he was pushing a charity song, it was a good charity for soldiers invalided out of the army with bits missing, the person who wrote would probably have benefited from Russell’s ‘Good Friends’ as any one adding a line ‘London Bridge is falling down’ to their song needs to be taken outside and shot (that could be considered in bad taste because of the charity but to have managed to get so many clichés in one song was poor very poor)
Would I go and see him again, No, No, No
Flubble a memorial
if you are not a big cat fan it is probably best that you skip this post.
Poor Kitty, after staying in at the vets over night to build her up for the anaesthetic so they could check what was causing her breathing/eating problems the Vet discovered she had a large tumour blocking her throat, we had already decided that if the results were bad it would be kinder to let her slip away rather than putting her through the stress of bringing her round only to take her back to the Vets later in the week to have her put to sleep.
only weeks old
with her brothers under the sofa
with mum Kushka and brothers
help I’m a long way up
relaxing on next doors shed with Mum
don’t look at me the camera adds 10lbs
the four musketeers Kushka, Flubble, Gismo and Ginge gone but not forgotten.
bags, boxes I love them all
mother and son time, we like to be not quite together
Ginge looks huge in this photo I think he should go and find a bigger lap so I can have this one…
who says I don’t spend any time with the man of the house?
last photo
border print dress
I though you might like to see some photos of my border print dress, the pattern I’m using is the Vogue 9040 pattern, I have taken about half an inch from each side under the arm
in this photo if you look carefully you can see all the markings used to make the photo above
if you think there are too many dots for the pin tucks, that’s because you put in the darts first then the pin tucks using half of the of the dart markings.
here’s roughly what it will look like, I am going to use pink buttons and part of the border print for the belt
late post
Sorry this post is a little bit late, we have been dealing with a sick pussycat, she is a bit clingy when she is ill and hasn’t allowed us to do anything much, I am behind on my reading and on my sewing.
Flubble (fluffy bubble) has what looks like a head cold, i don’t know if cats get head colds but that is what it looks like. She is at the vets at the moment waiting to go under the anaesthetic tomorrow to discover what is bunging her up and preventing her from eating.
There is always dangers with a cat of this age (18ish) going under anaesthetic, but we have decided that it is worth the risk, just had the phone call from the vet to say that her kidneys are fine so now it is just a wait and see, hopefully we will be bringing her home in a couple of days
Butterick 6833
I’m going to try to do a slightly more in depth post on this dress.
Pattern envelope
If you look closely at the pattern you should just be able to make out the pattern detail on the shoulders and hip. I thought that the print might have been a bit mistake but from a distance it isn’t too bad. It is just as well it is so busy as I folded the fabric in half which meant that some of the pattern ended up upside down.
The first photo is the front pieces, you need to enforce the front with two sets of stitching round what will become the slash point which you can’t see on this photo, but what you can see is the placket which is used to reinforce what will become a seam.
You then slash up to the dot.
Fold the placket up, then put in the pleats
stitch the placket over the top of the pleats using topstitching, unfortunately the top stitching hasn’t come out well in this photo.
roughly the same process is copied for the front of the skirt.
Border pattern dresses
I’ve just bought some fabric with a large border pattern
I’m hoping to have bought enough fabric to make vogue 9040 with it so I can get a look similar to this
Fabric from ebay, dress photo from etsy.
vogue 9040 part 2
here we have another finish red and white dress, this is the first dress that i have made that looks like the actual picture on the envelope.
I also thought that as the sun was shining I would take the photos outside, of course by the time i had put the dress on and moved the camera downstairs the sun had gone in. Also my shoes weren’t quite up to the muddy grass either.
This is the first vogue dress pattern i had put together and i was surprise at how easy it went together. I wasn’t sure about the buttons but seeing them on now i’m quite happy with them.
![IMG_2910[1]](https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2884/13353637393_01dc97fae8.jpg)
Here’s a not such a good shot but it has the shoes in it.
i’ll definitely be making this dress again.
Half Way Through March
We are half way through march and I have had quite a productive Sunday.
close up of inside collar
My red dress with the white flowers has every thing done but the hand stitching and button, I’ll admit that I cheated a bit, I did the hem on my sewing machine, I started off hand stitching but the fabric is so heavy and so wide that I decided against it.
Pinstripe Skirt, I finished unpicking the zip, put the zip back in attached the lining and waistband. I am now waiting for the inch grosgrain Ribbon to complete the waistband.
Close up of Waistband
skirt
I have also practically finished my second version of New York Gold 444 that just need the buttons and finishing off the hand stitching.
close up of cuff and sleeve
Musings of a Craft Enthusiast 