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Saturday 26 April 2014

Sewing Bee

Over the past few weeks I have been enjoying the second series of The Great British Sewing Bee on BBC 2. I've been meaning to get back behind my sewing machine for a while and watching the programme only made that desire stronger. I even went out and bought the accompanying book to the series and, although books made to capitalise on television series success can generally be a bit cack I've found this one to be marvellous. It is full of projects that I want to make and the full size patterns are a total bonus. They are printed in 5 large sheets, so the patterns need to be traced off but they are easy to find and it's not too onerous a task.

So to ease myself back into sewing I decided to give this tunic a go. It looked fairly simple and flattering, perfect for me when I can only snatch a few minutes here and there to sew. The fabric I'm using is a really cheap crepe lining so I won't feel bad if it all goes horribly wrong and because I always have a vest top or nursing tank on under my top it's no big deal if it ends up a bit too sheer. Rather than a contrasting colour for the yoke I've actually gone for a black satin I had in my scraps pile for a contrasting texture.

This project has provided a couple of firsts for me, making piping and sewing it into a seam. I'm actually really pleased with how well it went and I'm probably going to have to stop myself adding piping to everything I sew now! I still need to add the neck facing and then do them hems at the bottom and on the arms before the moment of truth, when I get to find out if I have created something wearable. Regardless, this has been a really fun project and it feels good to get sewing again.

 

Friday 11 April 2014

Blog Week

Much to my delight this year's Knitting and Crochet Blog Week has been announced for 12-18 May. I love this yearly chance to refresh my blog with new ideas, both from my own take on the topics and from other bloggers that I discover during the week. As someone who is currently up in the night quite a lot finding new interesting blogs is very welcome to help me while away the time as I nurse Felicity. This year's topics can be found here, I will be getting started writing really soon because it will take me a while to cobble all the posts together and because I'm excited to get going.