The Great British Sewing Bee!

 

 

I brought my Ipad to work the other day and started watching The Great British Sewing Bee on my lunch break in the staff room (I do have friends I swear). I managed to convert a few non sewers into watching it and I'm sure that by the end of my break, they were as gripped to see whose prom dress was going to turn out the best as I was. (Okay I say gripped, they may have said interested)

 

I love this series! Apart from the actual sewing, I love the friendliness of all the contestants involved. It's not very often that contestants in a TV show have no arguments, help each other and actually seem to want each other to do well. Even the lovely judges are never horrible to anyone!

 

I think my favourite contestant this year is Chinelo. I just love the way she makes clothes, using no patterns, but still makes everything fit perfectly. I really want one of her velvet wrap dresses she made the other week. I recently found out that she has a blog where she shows us how to make similar garments to the ones she makes on the show. She also gives away some of her secrets for free hand cutting and making your own patterns! I really want to try the wrap jersey tutorial; I may have about 10 wrap over skirts already but ah well.

 

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03w7wln/profiles/chinelo

 

I do love Heather though too. There is a soft spot for her and her pin dog in my heart, haha. I can't wait to see who wins, but my money is on Chinelo, Tamara and Lynda in the final. 

Back to clothes!

I have been working on a few projects recently that are a bit of a change from all the accessories and homey things I have making over Christmas. I love the fact that you get to see results so fast with smaller projects, (I can be a very impatient sewer) but its good to have a change and mix it up a bit. 

So I'm back onto garments for a while, including a dressing gown/robe for my Mom. She has been obsessing over a kimono style robe with massive sleeves that she saw Skyla wearing in breaking bad. Kind of like this I guess.

No luck finding one of those anywhere so she asked me to make her one. The pattern we found is a Vogue one and also comes with patterns for slips pants and camisoles, which I can't wait to try!

I made the robe slightly larger than the pattern as I knew Mom wanted to have more fabric to wrap around. I also added about 25cm to each sleeve width, to get the more drapey, kimono effect. Obviously this proved a bit of a challenge when attaching the sleeves to the arm hole! I ended up gathering most of the upper part of the sleeve and adding a little pleat at the top of the shoulder. That seemed to sort it out.

 

The fabric is a lovely, drapey, satiny floral type. Love the grey! The pattern itself came together quite well! I used french seams on most of the seams, something I never normally do (I prob should make a bit more effort on the insides now, french seams look so neat! I think I'm converted) One really tricky part of this garment was where the collar joined the rest of the front of the robe (I guess it would be the lapel?) I don't think the instructions were that clear and I had a few strops with it. They aren't perfect, which is annoying, but it's covered when you wrap it over to fasten it, so I suppose it doesn't matter so much.

 

All in all I'm pretty pleased. My mom likes it anyway, so that's the main thing. I'm now working on a little skirt to match a jacket I have just finished, so more on that later! 

Blue String Vintage and Handmade Fair

Well I have had a lovely day at Blue String Vintage and Handmade Fair.

As it was my first ever fair I had no idea what to expect, but I had a great time and it went really well!

It was so fun being able to set up my stall and display my things in fun ways. I decided to have a Christmassy section, with tree decorations, stockings, and Christmas bunting.

I stole a jewellery holder from my mom which did a good job of being a tree and displayed some of my bunting and decorations in pretty dishes.

 

 

 

For my other non-Christmassy items I used an old suitcase which used to belong to a great uncle, opened it up and hung some of my little hearts at the back, with my clutch bags inside.

My door stops went happily on the floor next to my sign. I couldn't decide whether to make a sign, sew one or get one printed, but in the end I decided to use a very old chalk board which was my moms when she was a little girl.

I'm so chuffed with how it went today! I actually made a profit which has made me really happy! Haha. I came away with a few orders for Christmas wreaths too.

Here are a few photos of other items I brought with me.

 

 

Look out for a new tab coming soon to order any products online!

Is it too early for a Christmas post?

Now that I am in the full swing of preparations for Blue String Vintage and Handmade Fair, Christmas is feeling closer and closer.  As it gets nearer to December, people, (well my family anyway) are usually beginning to think about Christmas gifts and decorations, so I knew that at Blue String I definitely wanted to include some Christmassy stock as well as all .

This week I have been very busy making rag wreaths, Christmas bunting, stockings, present tags and tree decorations to sit alongside my other stock and I thought I would share them with you.

I have been trawling through trusty old Pinterest and getting inspiration for my Christmas wreath designs and I decided to make lovely ones made out of strips of fabric and ribbon.

We have a whole load of Christmassy colour themes going on, but here is the traditional red, white and green theme, with a few bits of hessian and gold added in for a change of texture. Oh and some heart beads, because who doesn't want hearts?

There are some smaller wreaths on the go too, in icy blues and whites and pinks and mauves. Hopefully there will be one for every taste, whatever your colour theme. I will be able to do these larger ones to order too! More on this later.

I am really excited to show my tree decorations and bunting as well, which were really popular with my friends and family last year. I will be uploading more pictures of what I will be bringing to Blue String soon and maybe a blog layout update too!

Business cards!

Well now I feel very professional!

I have recently had business cards printed, as I really need some to hand out to people (Customers?!) at Blue String Vintage and Handmade Fair on the 24th of November. I ended up picking these lovely ones from Zazzle.

I wanted a double sided card, as I thought it would be good to have info relating to my blog on one side, with my personal details on the other. I also wanted to make sure that they fitted in with the design of my blog. They didn't have exactly the same font, but it looks pretty close. I love the green chevron too, which I am thinking about adding into my blog background at some point. 

I am really pleased with them and am also really happy with the service I got from Zazzle. They came pretty quickly and offer a money back guarantee if you are not entirely happy, which seems like a win- win to me. They were also fairly reasonably priced at £20 including postage for 100.

On a different note, I have been busy making additions to sell at the fair, including these cute pencil cases.

I decided to get really bright zips to go with the fabric I brought for the clutch bags I have made, aswell as some other patterned fabrics. I am going to sell them with pretty pencils inside covered with vintage papers.

Anyway I had best get cracking with more stock! Its pin cushion mice next! haha.

 

Clutch Bags

Here is my first lot of stock for the up-coming craft fair I'm going to in November!

Do you like my fabrics?!

I love clutch bags, so I knew I wanted to make some to sell, but as I have never made any before I wanted them to look quite simple but cool.

I basically just made a long zip pouch with 2 outer pieces of fabric and 2 lining pieces. I attached them to the zip, sewed the 2 outer and 2 inner pieces together, then turned it all inside out. The bags have a big press stud to hold the flap down.

I love the big chunky metal zips. They were such a bargain too, 10 for a pound from Birmingham's Rag Market! The fabrics I used are from The Fancy Silk Store in Birmingham, my favourite is the bird print. What you cant see is the gorgeous silky linings inside the bags, silver, pink and blue satin :)

Here are some more pictures of the clutches with things in, as they look so much nicer puffed out a bit.

 

 

(By the way, I have made more than three!)

 

I think next on the list is some purses in matching fabric and also pencil cases. I had better get a move on!



First Craft Fair!

I have actually booked myself a stall at my first ever craft fair!
I have been putting it off for a while. I wasn't sure I would have enough time to make anything, or if people would actually end up buying anything. But I decided to stop making excuses and just do it, or I would just talk myself out of it.

The one I am going to is called Blue String and seems kind of a mixture of handmade and vintage stuff. I have never been before, but it looks really nice and I think it is quite new. It's at St James Church in Sutton Coldfield and is on the 24th of November.

The thing is now, what the hell am I gonna make? And also how am I going to be ready in time for the end of November?! I had better get crafting! I am always making something, but this has got to be stuff people will actually want to buy!

I have a couple of things in mind, some cute bags and purses and then a few Christmassy things as well. I have been trawling through Pinterest every chance I can get, trying to get some inspiration on stall displays. Here are some of my favourites on my Pinterest.

So now I have actually got to make the stuff.
I went to buy some materials last weekend and had a lovely time wandering around Birmingham's Rag Market and picked up some amazing fabrics and bits and pieces. You can expect to see some pics soon.

I'm really excited about this, but have no ideas yet about pricing, display or amounts of stock to bring! I am going to be searching so many blogs for tips these next few weeks! If anyone has any hints, or knows any good websites let me know!