The Pickled Weasel

It's not you, it's me....

2011-02-19T17:39:00.000Z

Byeeee!

Good news - I have a pretty new netbook. Bad news - I don't think I want to blog any more.

While I was laptopless I thought at lot about why I blog, and whether it was worth continuing. I don't really feel like I'm contributing anything to the greater good by waffling on about what I'm sewing. I don't really have any technical insights to share, and I can't remember the last time I did a tutorial. I love being part of a crafty community, but I think I can do that without blogging. I love showing off what I've made, but I can do that via Flickr, or Pattern Review. I have limited spare time, and composing and editing blog posts doesn't come top of my priorities list, so I end up feel guilty that I haven't blogged, or guilty that I've spent 2 hours writing a post and taking pictures of it. This is not how it should be.

So this is my last post. It's been fun, and I've met some lovely people along the way. If you want to you can add me to your contacts in Flickr (just search for smallandfurry) or if you're really brave you can email me (pickledweasel at btopenworld.com) and we can facebook each other til it hurts :)

Lots of love,

Pickled Weasel and Munchkin x x x

I am still here, honest.

2011-01-31T17:14:00.002Z

But my laptop isn't, it's at the laptop hospital being fixed. Although the man said it would take 4-5 days and it's been a week....
So here I am logged onto a public access PC at work. That's how much I love you :)

I have been sewing lots, because I haven't had the interwebs to suck away my time into a big etsy / facebook / pattern review / folksy / generally random searches on Google wormhole.

Munchkin now has two new skirts and a wrap-around top, cut down from a dress I made her a while ago but that she never wore because it looked a bit like a dressing gown. I mended a shirt of mr PW's that had a hole in it, turned one of my dresses into a top and sewed a whole host of buttons back on to various garments.

And I made munchkin a winter coat, cried because the armholes were ridiculously small, cut it up, cried again, went back to the drawing board and am now in the process of making her a button through dress from the redundant coat outer, and drafting a new bigger armholed version using the lining as a template. Sorry there are no pictures, you'll just have to imagine all this :)

Hopefully, I'll be back soon, but now I must leave you and return to my cuppa soup and the remaining 7 minutes of my work break. Laters!

Scandi Skirt

2011-01-07T21:38:00.000Z

I've actually made a wearable piece of clothing for myself, which looking through my past posts I don't think I've done before, except maybe a neck warmer.

I made clothes for myself when I was doing my stuuuupid college course (I'm never going to mention it again, it was that stupid. I have a certificate saying I passed it but I never learnt how to sew a buttonhole. I may have mentioned this before...), but I wouldn't call them wearable :) For my final project I made an A-line under skirt with an apron over skirt, and this skirt was made using the pattern I drafted for the under skirt.

It's just a basic A-line block from Winifred Aldrich's Metric Pattern Cutting for Women's Wear, and although I drew it up using my measurements in May last year I'm pleased it still fits around my post-Christmas podge :)

I look a little crazy - I can't tell if it's because of the recently blow-dried hair or the overuse of blusher...

The fit isn't perfect, as the darts could sit a little smoother at the back, but I think that's my sewing rather than the pattern. I did take a few photos of it without the cardi on, but blimey my middle has thickened over the last few months, so I'll not be sharing them with you. Because the waistline is quite low it sits on the widest part of my middle, and so definitely needs a long top over it or some sort of cardi to break it up. On the other hand it is remarkably comfy to wear :)

You might remember I made Munchkin a tunic using another version of the fabric, and this has been sitting in my stash waiting for my to gather up the courage to cut it since then. I lined it with some bog standard black polyestery type stuff, which was a bugger to sew but does the job. I've called it the Scandi skirt because the fabric makes me want to go to Stockholm and drink strong coffee and look at art :)

I'm very pleased with my zip skillz - inserted using the method that is in the Sew U book (sew side seam up to where zip will start, change stitch to long stitch and tack all way to waistline. Tape zip to wrong side of seam, topstitch using zipper foot, remove tape and tacking). I sewed the zip just into the outer fabric, and then I made the lining up separately. On the seam where the zip would be, I sewed up to where the zip would start then tacked the rest of the way up. I ironed the seam flat and unpicked the tacking. I then attached the lining to the skirt right sides together, flipped them, topstitched around the waist, and then carefully pinned the lining around the zip and re-topstitched where I had sewn the zip into the outer.

And I've found a brilliant new way to avoid failure when attempting new sewing projects - don't do blog posts announcing to the world what you're going to achieve over the next month / year / decade. Then if you don't finish them / they go horribly wrong / you never even start them, no-one will ever know! Success guaranteed :)

So all you're getting from me is the following statement:
I will be sewing things over the next 12 months. I will tell you about them when I have finished them :D

Nose Balloons: The Next Big Thing.

2011-01-02T20:20:00.005Z

I swear, by March everyone will have them.
Normal balloons are just so 2010.
Even those long balloons that make a big weeeeeeeeee noise when you let them go, they're really last season. Munchkin knows it - just look at the disappointment on her face.

I've managed to get hold of a hot-off-the-press photo of the latest trend. The quality isn't great because ~~Mr pickledweasel was laughing so much he couldn't hold the camera still~~ it was at a top secret location, and they were taken using a hidden camera, they're that exclusive.

I know you're dying to get your hands on one, so I'll let you into a little secret. You can buy them online from net-a-porter, or if you're lucky enough you'll be diagnosed with glue ear (a condition so exclusive it's normally reserved for children under the age of 9), and you'll get them on prescription. Remember, you heard it here first!

Christmas is coming, the pickledweasel's getting fat...

2010-12-24T14:40:00.000Z

I need to stop eating honeyed salted cashew nuts, or I'll not fit into my nice new Christmas skirt tomorrow :( Things are Christmas a-go-go here in the pickledweasel household, despite me having a throat infection and munchkin getting over a stinking cold. We've been making Christmas decorations:

And cards:

And hair slides for Christmas parties:

And the icing on the cake, a man-bag for mr pickledweasel:

We decided to just spend £10 on each other this year (excluding presents for munchkin), as we're a bit short after the loft conversion. The bag came in at about £7.50, although that's kind of cheating because I calculated the cost based on the material used, so the whole yard of the amaaaaaaazing coffee cup fabric cost £6.60, but I've calculated it as £3.30 because I used half a yard. And I'm not including the £8.00 postage because it came from America :D Any ideas what I can make from the leftover half yard?

The denim was an offcut from Abakhan. The slider and the d-ring were actually a bargain - I've yet to find reasonably priced ones online, especially sliders, does anyone have a secret magic website that does bag making haberdashery at sensible prices? Anyway, I found this bag for £1.25 from our local Winners:

And cannibalised it. I'll use the zips and the canvas for a pouch I'm making for my sister-in-law, so it won't have died in vain :) I've not done much more Christmas making, just a hat and snood set for my neice - photos of her modelling it to follow - and I've made a mountain of gingerbread to give to friends and family using this recipe.

So here's wishing you all a very happy Christmas, and hoping you have a lovely day with family and friends. I'll just be on this big comfy chair over here, with a scarf round my neck, a hot toddy and this family sized bag of cashews :) x x x

Trousers of ginormous warmth.

2010-12-19T22:48:00.000Z

It's bloomin cold here. It's barely getting above freezing most days, and yesterday morning I opened the curtains to be greeted with the sight of another good few inches of snow. The novelty of winter has definitely worn off, and I'm wishing for rain, which is most unlike me.

Whilst trying to cope with the icicles and the snow flurries, I've realised how few warm 'bottom half' clothes Munchkin has. She has jumpers and tunics a-plenty, all of which can be layered, but all of her trousers and skirts seem alarmingly thin. With this in mind, a few weeks ago I set about making some lined trousers with the brushed cotton I used for her latest tunic.

I bought this pattern last month, with the intention of using it as a stash-buster. I am still a bit scared of commercial patterns, but when I was looking at the back of the envelope I could see that there wouldn't be any techniques involved that I haven't already mastered, and it would just be a case of reading the instructions carefully. I just seem to get my head in a bit of a tizz whenever I sit down with that big piece of paper and read all those technical sewing terms. And then I fold it all back up again and put it back in the packet :)

But this pattern was fine. I made the trousers up with a few alterations - I essentially made two pairs of trousers, one from denim and one from brushed cotton, and then attached them right sides together at the waistband, flipped them wrong sides together, and then topstitched. They came up quite big, but that means they'll probably last until she's about 5 :) I did a pattern review here, so you can read more about it if you want to.

They look a little bit mid-90's, but they're warm and they match lots of nice red tops that Munchkin already has in her wardrobe. I suppose in theory they're reversible, but I imagine someone would report me to social services if I made her wear them with the brushed cotton on the outside :)

Best laid plans...

2010-12-10T11:13:00.001Z

This morning I am learning all sorts of interesting things. Like, I didn't know that Squiglet is actually a boy (I thought he was a girl). And Mr Tumble has a hamster called Harry.

I am sat in front of CBeebies because Munchkin is poorly. She was sick (all over our new carpet) earlier this morning, and is currently sat on the sofa looking peaky, although she is managing to eat a cracker (update: during the writing of those post the cracker has re-emerged, all over the sofa). Despite her insistence that she is not going to be sick again, and can we go to Run Amok now, I'm not so sure.

Which is a shame, because tonight was possibly going to be the poshest and most exciting night of the last three years. Maybe even the poshest and most exciting night of my life. Mr Pickledweasel and I were due to go to Gibbon Bridge, for a champagne reception, dinner in a private dining room*, and bed and breakfast. In a suite. All for free, courtesy of Mr Pickledweasel's work.

Grandma pickledweasel was due to babysit, but I can't leave her with a poorly child who'll ask for me all night. So instead of amuse bouches, Moet and a uninterrupted nights sleep with a lie-in guaranteed, I'm facing a night on my own with a vomiting child. The cheery pictures that accompany this post are Munchkin modelling her new snowman snood made using Kitschy Coo's tutorial, just to try and lift the mood a bit. No, those aren't tears in my eyes. They're just bits of melting snow.

* I'm imagining it'd be like that scene at the end of Layer Cake, where they all have cigars. Only without the guns and shooting.

A little winter warmer

2010-11-28T21:07:00.004Z

Tis frosty cold out there, and although we've escaped most of the snow, we've just come back from a weekend at my sister-in-laws where there was plenty of it. It was almost touch and go as to whether we'd make it back, but it was fine once we got west of Leeds.

I picked up some snuggly brushed cotton at Abakhan last week, and I loved the colours so much I bought 2m so I could make Munchkin a few things from it - the first being a Kitschy Coo tunic. I was a bit concerned the neckline wouldn't sit right as the fabric's a bit heavier weight than I would normally use, but it turned out fine. I used a scrap to make a matching hair clip, which both I and Munchkin love. It's a little bit of a girly touch, but I like it :)

Munchkin was very warm in it, and needed to be with the snowy exploits her and her cousin Juliet got up to. She's still making good use of her snowman hat, and Juliet was very admiring of it*, so I'll make her one for Christmas. Next May there'll be a terrible trio of cousins, as my other sister-in-law is 16 weeks pregnant :) I don't know if the world is ready for such levels of cuteness...

*stole it repeatedly from Munchkin's head :)

Stairway to Heaven

2010-11-26T14:55:00.000Z

I am deliriously happy to report that myself and mr pickledweasel are now sleeping in the neverending loft conversion. In a bed, and with carpet and everything!

We finished painting the woodwork on the landing on Monday, and the carpet fitters came the next day. The carpet in the hall makes such a huge difference :) We still have to decorate our old bedroom, which will become Munchkin's new bedroom, but for now we're just keeping the door closed and ignoring it.

There is just literally a bed in our new bedroom, not because we're going for the minimalist look, but because we've only bought one chest of drawers so far and we haven't put it together yet. I don't care though, I'd keep it that way if I could. It's so calming waking up in a room that's full of light and space...the rest of the house looks like some sort of slum in comparison. I'm hoping the contrast will shock me into trying to get everywhere else as clean and junk free, but I think in reality I'll just spend more time in the new room :)

In amongst all the excitement I managed to get to the Abakhan sale preview and bagged myself some bargains. The elephants and the apples are for Munchkin, but I'm undecided on the skulls yet. As it's cuddlefleece I think it's probably more suited to 'loungewear', so I'm thinking I might make a pull-on hoodie for me to wear in the mornings. I'd love to do Munchkin something with it, but I fear it's too pyjama-y to be worn outside.

Munchkin's woodland nap quilt is coming along nicely, and I'm now ready to machine quilt it before I back and bind it. Hurray for all things bed-related!

I'm moving to Japan.

2010-11-14T13:53:00.007Z

It must be the best place to live in the world, if their standard of sewing books is anything to go by :)

Buoyed by the success of the mushroom skirt (I'm still sorting the bow out, pictures when it's done), I started on the little bloomer / pantaloons, which looked equally as simple.

And they were! I remembered the seam allowance this time, so no hiccups. The fit on Munchkin is perfect. They're made from a bog-standard denim from the magic fabric shop, and they'd suit any other medium to heavy weight fabric. I have some nice red cord that I think I'll use for another pair.

Me and Munchkin had an outing to Skipton last week with Grandma pickledweasel, and we went to The Fent Shop to have a browse. I picked up a few bargains, including a lovely piece of babycord that was just crying out to be made into a top to go with the new pantaloons :)

I couldn't quite get munchkin to replicate the poses in the book :)

There were faults on the fabric, so I had to cut the pattern pieces carefully, but it looks pretty good. This pattern was slightly more advanced, and I did spend a long time staring at the diagrams for the sleeves before my little brain was able to make sense of how they go together. I made a size larger, as I wanted it to last til next summer, but the fit is still pretty good. It would maybe be better sewn in a fabric with a bit more stretch, as the chest is a bit tight when munchkin pulls it on over her arms / shoulders.

Three garments in two weeks is pretty good going for me, so you can tell how easy the patterns are :) I'm going to give it a rest for a while now and start on my quilt, but I'll definitely be making more from it. It goes up to 130cm (roughly age 8), so Munchkin can have a new pair of pantaloons each year for the next six years :) I bet Japan is so cool that pantaloons are standard issue school uniform.

All Things Bright and Quiltiful

2010-11-12T14:17:00.005Z

I've been wanting to make this quilt from Two Little Banshees for a while, and have spent many an hour trawling through Etsy to find the perfect fat quarter combination at the perfect price (I swear I could sew munchkin a wardrobe a week if I didn't use the internet. My ridiculous pledge went out the window months ago). But a couple of fabrics in my stash caught my eye, and I've ended up only buying 3 fat quarters, which has saved me a lot of money.

I have never made a quilt before, but I think this will be a good one to start with as it seems really simple and the instructions are well written. I will have grandma pickledweasel on hand to help as she has made several, so I'm hoping she'll show me the best binding techniques.

I'm not sure about my fabric combos though. Three of the FQs are quite subdued and muted:

and three are a bit louder:

It'll be bound and backed with this leafy print, which has been in my stash for a while.

The finished item will be a nap quilt for Munchkin, and the woodlandy / brown theme is to fit with her treehouse wallpaper. Do you think it will work? Or should I make two quilts, one quiet one and one loud one?

The tale of the bow and the big belly

2010-11-07T14:06:00.012Z

A very lovely friend went to Japan earlier this year, and was nice enough to do a bit of shopping on my behalf. I was quite sensible as a) I didn't want to spend squillions of pounds and b) I didn't want her to have to leave half her clothes in Japan so she could fit all my goodies in her suitcase, so I asked for 2 sewing books and 2m of a girlish print and 2m of a boyish print. She doesn't sew at all, so I sent her some links to Japanese fabric and sewing books that I liked on Etsy.

Needless to say, she did a sterling job :) And here is the first thing I've made with the things she bought. It comes from this book, which according to Babelfish is called 'Foppish Clothes of Girl', although I'm sure the title's much snappier in Japanese.

The mushroom fabric is Alexander Henry, so not Japanese at all, although it cost about £5.00 a metre in Tokyo. How I wish I lived in Tokyo.

The brown contrasting fabric was from the magic fabric shop, and has a lovely nap to it.

Despite the entire book being in Japanese, the diagrams were brilliant and I managed to sew it up quite easily. Admittedly it is one of the easier patterns, but it was a good one to start with and it's given me the confidence to try some of the others, like these little short bloomers which are next on my list.

I did mess up on the seam allowance (I forgot to include any when I was cutting my pieces out), hence the extra band of fabric where the brown ties are, but that was my fault for not looking carefully enough at the instructions, as it was clearly marked.

As you can see from the photos, the skirt looks lovely on the floor, but doesn't quite work on the Munchkin. The two ties pull the side seams forward so it sags, meaning it doesn't hang properly. This might not happen so much if the ties weren't so skinny because of my lack of seam allowance, but I still think it would be a problem. And then there's the matter of the dysentery style tummy:

Munchkin has always had problems with poohs, and usually only goes every other day, which results in ridiculous amounts of bloating. She's managed toilet training really well and is now dry 99% of the time, but is still really reluctant to go for a pooh until she can't possibly wait any longer. Which means she normally looks like she's 6 months pregnant :O

She doesn't wear very many skirts, and when I asked her to try this one on I realised why. Never mind, she can wear it on days where she's managed to go before breakfast :) So, what to do about the ties? My initial thought is to take them off and then use one of them to make a big bow to sew on the front of the skirt. Anyone else have any thoughts?

And if you're looking at this thinking you can't live another week without getting some Japanese sewing books, try M is For Make. Kate has a really nice selection, some of which are in the sale, and they all come with a sheet of translated sewing terms.

Just one more, and then I'll stop. Promise.

2010-11-05T20:03:00.004Z

I am a bit addicted to this pattern. After the last lot of shenanigans with the seams and turning through, this one sewed up like a dream. But I'm still not going to make them to sell, i value my sanity :) If anyone else is though, use recycled jeans, they work really well!

This one was made on a rainy Lancashire day, but it's being shipped off to sunny Australia, so I thought the tropical blue flowers were quite appropriate. It's going to a very lovely friend who emigrated there about 5 years ago, and who is sorely missed. She has two beautiful boys who I last saw 6 months ago - the octopus messenger bag was made for Ben, her eldest.

I would dearly love to make the trip out to see her one day. Maybe after the neverending loft fund has been repaid. My only worry would be that we wouldn't want to come back...

Show me the money.

2010-10-29T22:46:00.002+01:00

This year is turning out to be pretty expensive. Along with the twenty squillion pounds we paid for the neverending loft conversion, we have had to repair the washing machine, then replace the washing machine, replace the hoover, replace the iron, and now the central heating is broken. Not broken in a major way, but it'll still cost about £150 to fix it.

Add to that the extra bill we have from our builder for changing the stair spindles in the loft (they were twirly, and they just weren't right. Now they're straight and they're lovely. Yes it was important and worth the money. Now be quiet) and using better quality wood on the cupboard doors (we're staining it rather than painting), and we're a bit strapped for cash.

I'm still finding things to put on eBay, and we're selling nearly all of our dvds on Music Magpie, but we need more moolah. So one of the obvious solutions is for me to try and sew up a bit of cash. My mum, the lovely grandma pickledweasel, has a little business making and selling glass jewellery and art. She does lots of farmer's markets, and always takes along a little selection of wooden brooches on my behalf. When I started making bags we talked about selling some on her stall, so I thought I'd finally crack on and make up some stock for her. I've been buying bits and bobs of fabric in preparation, and have quite a few patterns that can be used to make items to sell. My aim was 10 bags using this pattern in 7 days. If they sold, I would try a few more different styles out. Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

Er, no. Despite this being the fourth time I've used this pattern, the bag pictured took me around 4 hours to make and ~~is unsellable~~ ~~unsaleable~~ ~~unsellible~~ no-one would buy it. The outer is faux suede and the lining is a bit of vintage soft cotton I found in a charity shop. Both fabrics are quite lightweight so I thought I would use fusible interfacing on the floral cotton to give the bag a bit more structure. Only when I came to turn it through it had obviously added a bit too much structure, because it was like bloody childbirth. The stitches on the strap split, and tore the lovely old cotton. I had to unpick and re-sew the join at the tops of the straps so many times to get the two sides the right length so they would sandwich together properly that there is a whole new pattern of little holes in the faux suede. It just doesn't cut the mustard.

I have to accept that I don't have the speed or the skill to make it worthwile financially. In fact, I'd probably make more money if I stopped buying fabric and bag patterns :) I would love love love to make money out of sewing, but I just don't think it's feasible for someone who works part time and has a two and a half year old the rest of the time. Selling online is slightly easier, as you can make things as they're ordered, but you still need time to promote your business and find patterns that work for you and that you can use to make things comercially (or design your own). I've got rid of my little Coriandr shop, which was rapidly going nowhere due to a lack of promotion on my part. No matter how badly I want it, or believe it's my destiny (in an X-Factor styley), making money from stitching stuff isn't going to happen right now.

So it's back to eBaying the contents of my wardrobe and shopping in bulk at Approved Food in an effort to save money. If anyone has any 100% proven get rich quick schemes, or interesting recipes for tortillas or cous cous please comment below :)

I have cake, and someone has won the giveaway

2010-10-17T20:43:00.007+01:00

And the winner is......

Kitschy Cooooooooo! Lucky girl :)

I too am a winner, as I've had a cracking birthday. Me and mr pickledweasel ran away to Llandudno yesterday for a whole child-free 24 hours. Although we'd been there only a couple of years ago, I had somehow re-invented Llandudno in my head as a sophisticated wine bar and Michelin starred restaurant filled coastal resort with balmy nights and 4 star hotels on every corner, so was a little surprised to find it was a freezing cold slightly run down welsh town full of cheap B&Bs and, bizarrely enough, the Cambrian Rally.

We lived it up. I had a tea while we waited for the film to start.

So rather than wear the satin slash neck dress and purple suede wedge pumps I was planning to stun the north Welsh coast with, I just stuck with my jeans and jumper and we had dinner early at a Mediterranean restaurant, and then went to the cinema to see The Other Guys (which is an hilarious film). We stayed in a crappy hotel where the bathroom smelt of swimming pool and got woken up at 1am by drunk rally drivers, and then this morning we went to a greasy spoon overlooking the sea and had a huuuge fry up, and then did a leisurely promenade walk.

And mr p had a coffee.

Back in time for tea with Munchkin and Grandma Pickledweasel, and just as I was thinking I wasn't getting a birthday cake and I'd have to stuff my face with the jelly munchkin had helped grandma make, mr pickledweasel unveiled this beauty:

Isn't it a thing of skill and beauty? I love the foot :) AND it's all different cakes inside - the top is walnut cake, the side is angel cake and the bottom is Madeira. It makes turning 35 just about bearable :)

Giveaway extended!!1! (Because I am tired)

2010-10-15T22:35:00.004+01:00

...after doing a twelve hour journey from Kent to Lancashire :-S

Plus a pitiful number of people have entered (the people aren't pitiful, just the number of them), either because a) the things I am giving away aren't exciting enough, or b) not many people read my blog. I am thinking it is a sad combination of the two.

So I will draw a winner on Sunday the 17th, which happens to be my birthday, in the hope that my popularity has suddenly risen dramatically :) You can enter by leaving a comment on this post. In the mean time please enjoy these photos of Munchkin making some new Kentish friends.

Giveaway in a bits and bobs de-stash celebratory past halfway neverending loft conversion styley!

2010-10-11T21:09:00.008+01:00

I know, it' such a snappy title :)

So, I've listed ~~a tiny percentage~~ half my fabric stash on eBay, and should you wish to get your grubby little mitts on it, you can look at it here. I was going to put it on Etsy, but I had no idea what price to put on things, so instead everything's starting at 99p and it'll all get sold. All profits go to the Pickled Weasel New Bedroom Furniture Fund.

But if you haven't got any pennies, and you want some of the loveliness that's listed, read on. You can win all the pretty things pictured in this post. The fabric is just bits and bobs, things that wouldn't really sell on eBay but that people with crafty skillz could use, and then there's a few other random things thrown in for good measure. I hope you like them :)

All you need to do is leave a comment telling me about your favourite tutorial on the interwebs, and a link to it if you can work out how to in the comments box (I often can't, being a bear of little brain, so I don't expect you to).

We're cracking on with all the painting (mr pickledweasel even has roller-related blisters), and I can see light at the end of the loft conversion tunnel, so I'm starting to think about all the craftings I can do when I no longer have a paintbrush surgically attached to my hand. I need new things to covet and drool over and stick on my never ending to-do list.

International bods are more than welcome to enter, and I will draw a winner at random on Friday the 15th of October. As an added weaselly bonus, if you enter the giveaway and happen to win one of the things listed on eBay, I'll give you first class postage for the price of second class. Not much, I know, but better than nowt. Good luck!

Spoonflower. Not really about spoons. Or flowers.

2010-09-30T21:01:00.008+01:00

I am trying to sort out my ~~cupboard under the stairs~~ sewing storage room as it will shortly be moving to the...wait for it...UTILITY ROOM!!!1! Yes, I know, How lucky am I. Because of the recent neverending loft conversion project we have a bit more storage space, which means I can have an actual real room to sew in, as opposed to putting my sewing machine on the dining room table and then leaving it there for three months whilst fabric and pattern pieces gather round it in some sort of modern art installation styley, until someone comes for dinner and I have to stuff it all back under the stairs again.

Birdies Galore by cabinpressstudio

If all goes according to plan I will have a workbench, a fold up chair, shelving and drawers. I will still have to share the space with the tumble dryer and washing machine, but at least I'll have a permanent space for my machine and the accoutrement's that come with it. Happy days :)

Love Fiesta by sammyk

I'm a long way off from that yet. First we have to finish the decorating. I am on the third coat of paint in the hall. The third coat, people. Which means there will need to be three coats on the stairs, and the landing. *cries*

Medium Elephants by katharinahirsch

But I have made a start on my new sewing nest by having a little bit of a de-stash. As we have officially run out of neverending loft fund loan money, and the electrician's bill came in £700 more than expected, we are slowly putting the entire contents of our house on eBay. This way we get to pay bills and really make the most of all that new storage space, as there won't be any crap left to fill it with. I'll list some of my fabric next week, and will be running a de-stash celebratory giveaway to mark the occasion. It's nice fabric, not just manky bits that I want to throw away :)

Monsieur Wonder Kat by malien00

Which leads me to the pictures that illustrate this post. How can a girl possibly keep on top of her fabric stash when there are beauties such as these available to buy from Spoonflower? The design talent out there just blows me away. Just a shame all the monies in my paypal account will be paying for sockets and switches :(

Bunions and the life-evaulating questions they raise.

2010-09-19T22:47:00.000+01:00

Bye bye lovely shoes

I has a bunion. Apparently its proper name is hallux valgus which sounds just as grim as 'bunion' but in a latiny way. Mine isn't very big yet, but looking at my mum's feet and remembering what my grandma's feet looked like, it has the potential to get pretty toe-deformingly large.

I've had pain in my big toe for about a year, but it was one of those niggly things that wasn't really bad enough to go to the doctors with, so I ignored it. It wasn't until a rare sunny day a couple of weeks ago when I was wearing flip flops and happened to glance down at my feet that I noticed the knuckle joint at the base of my left big toe (do toes have knuckles?) was considerably larger than the one on my right toe. Ewwwww.

Off I hobbled to the doctors, to be given an information sheet and told to 'wear sensible shoes'. I went home and looked at my shoes. All 26 pairs. Then I tried them all on. And sent half of them to a charity shop and put the rest on eBay. And then spent the next two weeks looking in every shoe shop in Lancashire for sensible shoes that didn't make me want to poke my eyes out with a stilletoe heel.

Hello sensibleness. Don't worry, I didn't buy these.

I have found two pairs that fit the bill - enough room to wiggle toes, no heel, no pointyness. Some lovely boots from good old M&S, and some boring but 'they'll do for work' black shoes from Tesco, of all places. I'm really struggling with the no heel rule. I'm no willowy thing, more like a little shrub, and I am currently trying to work out how to wear a mid-length skirt and flat shoes without looking like a complete frump. Because if I can't do this, then half my work wardrobe will join the shoes on eBay :(

But what's more unsettling is the deep and probing questions about my life that the discovery of the bunion has prompted. In my mind, no heels = no nights out. This shouldn't really be a massive burden to bear - I last went 'out' properly in May for my sister-in-law's hen do, so it's not exactly a weekly occurence. But then I started thinking about going out, and how I miss it, and how I would love a big girly night out with heels and gin and tunes and a bit of sparkle and maybe an illicit fag at 2am and dancing and lipgloss and giggling.

I used to have nights like that, but there haven't been any since Munchkin arrived. Partly it's because I don't have the same circle of friends any more - we moved up north shortly before Munchkin was born, so all the friends I have here I know within the context of motherhood, rather than from uni or school or work. But should that make any difference? None of my fellow mother friends seem to be off into Manchester every weekend to drink dodgy cocktails and wear tottery shoes. Should I have grown out of wanting nights like that by now? (I'm 34 and three quarters). Mr pickledweasel was never really one for nights out anyway, so I'm hardly likely to be able to drag him away from crappy tv and early bed in an attempt to find out.

I have an uneasy feeling that if I did manage a night out I'd feel a) old b) guilty about spending money on cinzano and lemonade and taxis c) clueless about where to go, but it would be nice to give it a try. Unfortunately I doubt I'll find a partner in crime to accompany me or any shoes that are comfortable enough - maybe it's finally time to give up the idea and give in to the bunion :)

It's curtains for me.

2010-08-27T20:55:00.010+01:00

I am no longer in a grump, you'll be glad to know. I don't know what brought it on, but it lingered for a couple of days and was hard to shift. I am very grump-prone, as my mum and husband will testify, and I've never grown out of them, despite now being in my ~~mid~~ early thirties. Munchkin is currently tantrum-prone, but hasn't mastered the art of the grump. I think maybe that comes with teenage years?

Aaaaanyway. Enough of my emotional well being. I have made curtains! That hang straight and everything! The little bedroom is now liveable in, and is temporarily housing Munchkin whilst we decorate everything else so she can move into her new bedroom (our old bedroom) and we move into the attic. The little bedroom will then be vacant for the next munchkin, although me and mr pickledweasel don't currently have the energy to conduct a coherent conversation, let alone create new life. We seem to spend every waking moment stripping wallpaper or trying to fill huge cracks with polyfiller in the hope that the wall doesn't fall apart when we paint it.

But I managed to take a break from DIY duties and make these slightly boring, yet perfectly acceptable curtains. I didn't want them to be too jazzy as the wallpaper is pretty busy already, and didn't need any competition. The fabric was £1 a metre from the magic fabric shop, and is backed with a sort of rubber backing. I don't know if this is a special curtain backing, or whether it's for upholstery purposes, but it means the curtains block out most of the light. I lined them, just for appearances sake, but only bought the cheapest lining fabric as I didn't need blackout quality.

They weren't the easiest things to sew, but I've learnt a lot and I'm sure my next pair will be better. I failed miserably on mitring corners, despite it being one of the very few things I learnt on my rubbish college course, but I'll have a look on Youtube and have a go again with a few scraps of fabric.

I used a book my mum swears by, Soft Furnishings: Ideas and Fabrics by Designers Guild, which was published in 1980, but curtain construction doesn't really change much, does it? There are loads of diagrams to accompany the instructions, and the book includes cushions, lampshades, blinds, upholstery and loose covers as well. You can get it second hand on Amazon here or here.

The neverending loft conversion is nearly nearly nearly finished, and is looking like a real room. The plaster looks a bit funny because it wasn't dry when I took the picture, and yes, I know the arch is wonky :). I'm trying very hard not to get overexcited and start sewing cushions and wall hangings and duvet covers for it, as I still have a floor cushion to make for the little bedroom, and then it's on to soft furnishings for Munchkin's new room, which include two pairs of curtains and a loose cover for a 1970's child's armchair. Does anyone fancy a loose cover sew-along? No? No-one? What do you mean 'it doesn't sound very exciting'? I can feel a grump coming on...

Yeah, whatever.

2010-08-19T12:51:00.008+01:00

I am in a foul mood today, so this post will not be genial, or courteous, or even polite. I really can't be arsed with small talk, so you'll get what you're given.

Here's a bag I made.

It's made of my favourite jeans, which I had to sacrifice because they had a big hole in the knee. The lining is made from some other fabric. I can't be bothered to tell you where it was from.

It holds things, and it was easy to make. I made another one before, but this one is better, because.... well, just because.

If you want me, I'll be on the sofa with my bottom lip stuck out and my arms folded. Now go away! >:-p

Mmmmm, stitches....drool

2010-08-05T22:04:00.005+01:00

I did some sewing :) I managed to make Very Purple Person's reversible tote, which is a blinding simple and nifty pattern that everyone should download immediately if they haven't already done so. Mine isn't strictly reversible. Well, it is, but I used the same fabric inside and out :) I haven't got anything that goes with this slightly bizarre aqua monkey head fabric,* so I thought I'd better use it for outer and lining rather than trying to carry off some kind of 'it clashes so crazily it matches!!1!' combo. I love the shape of the bag and the size. Munchkin and I test drove it today, and it comfortably carried baby wipes, 4 nappies, my stupidly huge purse, my mobile, a snack bar and a beaker of water. I'm planning to make it again using denim from an old pair of jeans and lining it with something bright and flowery.

I am still planning to draft my own bag pattern, and you'll be relieved to know I've found my set square and my french curve. Now I just have to find the time to sketch it all out and go through the millions of revisions needed before I ~~throw it in the bin and cry~~ create the perfect bag. I'll keep you posted :)

In never-ending loft fund news, we have windows! Four of them, letting lots of lovely light in. And one of them has a very nice view, if you stick your head out far enough.

I found some non-gender specific wallpaper for Munchkin's old room. At least, I think it's non-gender specific, everyone else who's passed comment on it says it's for boys, but what do they know. It was beautifully hung by grandma pickledweasel, and I did the painting. It's not finished yet - the walls need another coat and the woodwork needs doing, but we've bought carpet, and it should be habitable in a couple of weeks. The plan is to move Munchkin back in there (she's curently sleeping in our room), and then start decorating the hall stairs and landing. And then our current bedroom. And then our new bedroom. By which time we will have no money left for food, but we will be so high on paint fumes and turps we won't care :)

* The selvedge says the design is called 'candy' so I'm guessing they were going for boiled sweets rather than monkey heads, but I prefer to see them as monkey heads.

Sewing is my crystal meth.

2010-07-24T20:07:00.009+01:00

I'm getting the shakes - we're back in our building site of a house, and I haven't really been able to sew because I'm meant to be doing wallpaper stripping, polyfillering, painting and other dull, soul-destroying, non-sewing related activities.

Last night I was going to take the evening off and do a bit of stitching, just to try and slow my heart rate and stop the cramps, but I ended up spending three hours looking for children's wallpaper that was a) non-gender specific, b) didn't make me want to vomit, and c) didn't cost more than a week's wages.

I sort of classed that as 'work' even though it didn't involve paintbrushes or masking tape, and so decided to move my night off to tonight. I'm making a bag based on one I already own, and was hoping to finish drafting the pattern and actually put thread to cloth. Only my set square is still at grandma pickledweasel's. As is my french curve. And I thought I could improvise with a bog standard steel rule, but I can't find that either. The only straight thing I can find is a Transformers board game, which unfortunately isn't marked out in inches and cms :(

I'm seriously strung out - I may have to do some cross stitch just to tide me over until I can get my hands on some proper gear again. In the meantime I'm trying to keep my mind busy with plans of future projects. I've chosen colour schemes for Munchkin's new room (our old bedroom) and our new room (the shiny new loft room) based on a throw and a lamp. Sounds crazy, I know (maybe it's just the cross stitch talking), but I read an article on interior design that said it was the best way to start putting a room together, just to take an item and build everything around it.

The throw is single bed sized, and I love the colours in it, although I'm struggling to find other fabrics to complement it. It has a slightly 70's feel floral pattern on one side, and stripes on the other. The lamp is from Next, and although they do a whole range to match (bedding, curtains, rug etc.) I think I'll just stick to a couple of lamps and a light shade, rather than go overboard. I've found a deep red quilted bedspread that matches perfectly, and I think the rest of the room will be fawns and greys with touches of red. It's all sounding very grown up :)

Hopefully by my next post I'll have managed to sew something. If you don't hear from me for a couple of weeks, it'll be one of two things. I'll either have got desperate and be trying to complete my mother's heirloom hexagonal patchwork quilt, which was started circa 1971, or mr pickledweasel will have arranged some sort of intervention, and I'll have had all my copies of Sew Hip confiscated and have been sent away to rehab.

Conversations with my daughter.

2010-07-16T20:51:00.001+01:00

Munchkin wears cloth nappies and has waterproof pants that fasten over the top. They're Motherease Airflo ones, and they come in a variety of different prints. This conversation took place during a nappy change this week.

Mommy: Right, lets put some pants on.

(roots around in nappy sack and pulls out a pair)

Mommy: Oooh, look, the ones with safari animals on.

Munchkin: No mommy, not.

Mommy: Not those ones?

Munchkin: No, fishy one.

Mommy: Why don't you want the safari ones?

Munchkin: A bit noisy. Lions a bit noisy.

Mommy: Oh, I see. What sort of noisy?

Munchkin: Hoovering.

Mommy: The lions are hoovering?

Munchkin: Yes.

Munchkin has mixed feelings about the loft conversion, although seems to like the new stairs. She has also warmed to Russell, the joiner who's doing all the work, and often asks where he is or what he's doing. The following exchange took place during tea this week.

Munchkin, holding aloft a pea: Look mommy, Russell!

Mommy: Sorry, what sweetheart?

Munchkin, still waving pea around: This Russell.

Mommy: Oh, ok. What's he doing?

Munchkin gallops Russell / pea around edge of plate.

Munchkin: Look, eat him! Nom nom nom nom!

She is a delight at the minute :) I've whipped up another tunic for her from Kitschy Coo's pattern, this time with some applique on the front. I've had this applique idea in my head for a while, and I'm pleased with the way it's turned out - it's a development on something I did ages ago. I wanted it to have a slight seventies feel to it, and I think the denim is perfect for it.

pops in

2010-07-03T22:38:00.000+01:00

Helloooo! Still at my mum's, still have no ceilings or bathroom at our house. Never mind, we're making the most of the sunny weather and enjoying grandma pickledweasel's garden.

I have spent a pitiful amount of time crafting since we moved in, even pitifullier considering my mum has a craft room in her attic and a fancy computery sewing machine. However, I have managed to whip up a tunic from Kitschy Coo's tunic pattern, and a yard of fabric that I bought in her 'I'm going to America and need more room in my fabric cupboard so I can bring back yards and yards of textile loveliness with me' sale.

It took hardly any time at all, and I'd have finished it in a couple of evenings, had there not been an elastic shortage in the grandma pickledweasel household. It's a little bit too big for Munchkin, but she seems to be growing at an alarming rate so it should fit nicely in a couple of months.

In other news, the pickledweasels had a lovely time at mr pickledweasel's brother's wedding a couple of weeks ago. Munchkin was a flower girl, and was on her very best behaviour all day. Admittedly she had very few duties, namely a) walk down the aisle holding her aunty Jade's hand and b) look cute for the rest of the day. Mission accomplished :)

Work In Progress

2010-06-14T22:22:00.000+01:00

We have stairs!

But they only lead to the top of our semi-demolished wardrobes :(

Hopefully in three weeks we should have some ceilings for our existing bedrooms and a floor for our new attic bedroom.

Oh, and a bathroom :)

We are having fun at grandma pickledweasel's, although a week's holiday to Shropshire was a welcome break for us (and her. and her washing machine, which has been on none-stop since we arrived), and we have another week away planned in bonnie Scotland at the start of July. Which is very fortunate, as the builder has just told us it's going to take about three weeks longer than he thought before we can move back in again :(

No-one is available to take your call right now.

2010-05-26T22:54:00.004+01:00

We're very busy doing this

and this

and some of this

over at grandma pickledweasel's while we're having a magic new bedroom made in our loft. This involves a lot of mess and the removal of ceilings and our bathroom, so we'll be staying at grandmas for about a month. It's great fun, but there's not much time to blog, so I apologise in advance for the lack of posts.

If you'd like to leave a message, please speak after the tone.

*Blleeeeeeep*

I am a bag lady.

2010-05-18T22:02:00.001+01:00

I really like making bags, they're so satisfying. They're functional, relatively easy (once you work out how to decifer the pattern, and choose fabric that doesn't run in the rain), and you can put your own stamp on them.

Here's two more I've made in the last couple of weeks. Folklore Bag No. ~~326~~ 3, a present for a friend.

And a bag from the latest issue of Sew Hip.

My brother got me a subscription to the magazine for my birthday, and although I really love reading it I very rarely make any of the free patterns. I would love to do one of the quilts they've featured in the last few issues, but it just seems a bit of a big scary project. Anyway, this bag is a present for a five year old - what five year old doesn't like ruffles?

I scaled down the pattern by a third, and put pleats in instead of gathering my ruffles, as they're backed with denim and were too stiff to gather. In the magazine they sewed a row of buttons along the top ruffle to hide the seam, but I didn't have enough buttons that matched. I made a flower using this tutorial instead, and mounted it on felt and put a brooch back on so it's detachable.

In other news, Munchkin also has bag lady aspirations. Why else would she have taken off her sleepsuit and her nappy and intentionally wee-ed all over her cot two nights running?

Sitting on top of the world

2010-05-12T21:38:00.006+01:00

Today Munchkin is a whole two years old. She doesn't quite understand the concept of it all, but she has got the hang of presents and cards and cake :)

I was all set to make her a squillion presents, but I thought about it for a while, and I figured I was probably doing it for me rather than her and I didn't have the time anyway. So I thought about what she would really like, and made that instead. I bought this fabric about a month ago, not knowing what I was going to do with it but at the same time knowing that it would definitely be used and not just sit in my stash. When I brought it home Munchkin took it out of the carrier bag and lay on it, looking at all the different countries, so the obvious choice was to make a floor cushion out of it.

There is a guy down the road from us who makes cushions and curtains and has a shop where he sells upholstery fabric on the cheap. He made the inner for me for £4.50! I told him he should be charging more, I was expecting to pay at least a tenner :)

Munchkin loves it, and I'm hoping it'll be a favourite lounging spot for years to come.

Easy peasy lemon squeezy foam stamp tutorial

2010-05-05T12:05:00.001+01:00

This is such an easy thing to do, it probably doesn't even warrant the word 'tutorial' in the title, but I've bumphed it out with some other bits and bobs about using stamps with fabric paint, so hopefully you'll learn something :)

You will need:

Foam stickers or shapes (if you want to know where to get them from, have a look in the hints bit at the end of the tute).

Foam board, 3mm or 5mm (again, hints on where to buy at the end)

Ruler and pencil

Scissors or craft knife

Glue (if you have foam shapes, you won't need it if you have foam stickers).

Fabric paint

Paintbrush

Fabric to test on

A new t-shirt / bag / tea towel / cushion cover for your final design

Choose the foam shape or shapes that you want to use for your stamp. Check the surface of your shape for any bumps or dips - this flower was a bit wiggly on one side, so I made sure I glued that side rather than printed with it, as even small blips can show up when you print.

Work out what size piece of foam board you need to cut. Try and have as little white space as possible around your foam shape, that way you'll know exactly where you will be stamping - if you have a weeny shape in the middle of a huge piece of foam board it'll be hard to know exactly where to place your stamp.

Cut your piece of foam board with a craft knife or scissors, and stick your shape on. Make sure you use a decent glue so the stamp will last longer.

Ta daaaaaa! That's it. But if you want to get the best out of your lovely new stamp, please read on.

This bit is important: Test your stamp. Find an old t-shirt or vest and play around with your stamp first. Try out different fabric paints with it, work out which way round is the best, etc etc. You'll find that your stamp comes out differently depending what fabric you're stamping on to. So if you want to print on a t-shirt, use a scrap piece of jersey to test with, if you want to print on a pillowcase, find some cotton. You get the idea :)

Prepare your surface for stamping. Wash your vest / tea towel / pillowcase before you stamp on it. A lot of fabrics are finished with chemicals that can reduce fabirc paint absorption, so make sure your fabirc is clean first. Iron, iron, iron. Any little wrinkles can cause blips in your stamping, and you don't want that. Use guides if you want to do things in straight lines - I ironed munchkin's top down the middle and then centred my flower over the ironed line, and for lettering I use masking tape as a guide.

Make sure your stamp is totally covered with fabric paint. The easiest way to tell if you've done this is to hold the stamp up to the light:

Always clean around your stamp before you print with it. See that bit of red on the foam board in the picture below? See the teeny red splodge next to the flower on the t-shirt? I ~~completely cocked up~~ did that on purpose to show you what happens if you're sloppy with your paint. The best way to clean is by using a baby wipe. The same goes for cleaning your stamp when you've finished using it, or want to change colours.

And while we're on the subject of ~~cocking up~~ intentional mistakes, mind where you're wafting your paintbrush :(

Make sure you follow the instructions for fixing your fabric paint. If it says iron for five minutes, then iron for five minutes (yes, I know it's really boring ironing the same small patch of t-shirt for five minutes, but it's worth it). If you've made a mistake, for example by waving your paintbrush around and catching the arm of your t-shirt with a big splodge of red paint, then I'd suggest it might be best to start again on a clean t-shirt. I've tried all sorts of things to get fabric paint out (even if it hasn't been heat sealed with an iron), and it's bloomin difficult.

Where to buy: Foam shapes seem to be everywhere - most craft shops stock them, and I've found lots of different ones in Tesco, mainly seasonal (Easter, Christmas etc.). I've even picked some up in pound shops in the children's art bit. Remember lettering will come out in reverse, so foam alphabet stickers aren't great unless you like mirror writing.

Foam board can be a bit harder to come by. eBay is probably the easiest way to buy it, although not the cheapest. If you're buying in bulk then Paperstone, Discount Graphic, and Art Discount all sell it by the box. Rymans sell it too, although it might be worth giving your local stor a ring first to see if it's in stock.

A final word on fabric paint. It's worth investing in decent stuff, because it can have a huge effect on your end print. I like Colourcraft paints (although their website isn't great), and I love Stewart Gill paints, especially the True Colour range.

There you go, pretty much everything I know about making and using foam shape stamps, in a blog post. Easy peasy lemon squeezy!

A Little Bit of Kiwi Sunshine

2010-05-01T07:12:00.004+01:00

Isn't this little tyke a cutie? This is Pepi, and she lives in New Zealand with her ex-pat mum and dad.

OOooh, look what a cute little tunic she has on, I wonder who made that for her? Hmmm, that fabric looks familiar...

Her mum saw the tunic on my blog and emailed me to ask if I'd make one for her to buy. I feel a bit funny about making clothes to sell, as I still don't think my sewing skills are up to scratch to produce garments that are of high enough quality. So I said I'd be happy to make her one and she could just cover postage and fabric costs.

In the end there were no wonky seams or holes under the arms or anything, so I think if on the off chance that anyone else asks for a custom item I'd be confident in charging them proper prices. And now the little tunic is happily living in the New Zealand sunshine, spending its days going to the park and generally having fun :) You can read all about Pepi and her family's experiences of living in NZ on her mum's blog. But just to warn you, you might get a bit jealous when you read about the free swimming pools and the beautiful beaches...

Appearances can be deceptive...

2010-04-25T21:43:00.011+01:00

Here is Munchkin in a new top I've made - the Ofelia pattern from Patterns by Figgy's. It was quick and easy to sew, and as it's made from a cotton lawn I was fancy and did French seams (ooh la la!) because it's such fine fabric. I *heart* the trim very much, and it goes perfectly with the print on the fabric. The pattern also includes bloomers, which I'll make up some time next week in some soft denim I've bought. The other pictures are of a top I've made for a friend's little girl as a present - I know it looks teeny, but that's just the elastic bunching up round the neck!

Munchkin looks pretty harmless in these pictures, right? A little gormless maybe, and not very well dressed, but fairly innocent. Wrong. The only way I could take photos of her in the top was to turn the TV on, hence the spaced out expressions as she stands rapt in front of Fifi and the Flowertots.

She has begun reciting a list of demands before getting into her cot each night, which has turned into some sort of 'Rider' - tissue, Pinkie / teletubbie / dolly (basically whichever teddy bear or soft toy is downstairs under a big pile of things which means you have to look for it for five minutes), daddy, hug, sat down hug (a hug whilst sitting on the futon sofa in her room), music (wind up mobile over her cot), and the ultimate demand usually shouted in desperation as I'm leaving the room: eyes (wipe her eyes with a tissue, although I still haven't worked out the purpose of this, other than to delay bed time).

She is becoming very bossy, with Mr Gizmo the cat usually on the receiving end - 'Geemo, tie-et!' (Gizmo, quiet), although mr pickledweasel was targeted yesterday when we were driving through an area where there had been muck spreading and the air was a little whiffy. She said, very sternly, 'Daddy! Bottom pooey!'

We have recently had spates of foot stamping, screaming till she's red in the face, writhing on the floor in anguish, and the classic rigid body pose that means you can't physically put her in a car seat / pushchair. So why all the bad behaviour? She's obviously practicing - it's her 2nd birthday in two and a half weeks :)

The revised Thirty Minute But Not on Sundays Pledge

2010-04-18T21:39:00.004+01:00

As you can tell from the title of this post, my thirty minute pledge doesn't quite work. I agree with the idea in principle, and I did get a lot of things accomplished in the time I reclaimed from the life-eating interwebs:

Monday - I watched Doctor Who. Which sounds like another waste of time, but pre-pledge I would have watched it with the laptop on my lap, not really concentrated, and then annoyed mr pickledweasel by asking questions about the plot because I didn't know what was going on. I also did some work on my pattern draft for my final project for college.

Tuesday - This was a bit of a write-off as I was at work til 9pm, so by the time I got home and had a catch up with mr pickled weasel and a cup of tea, it was time for bed.

Wednesday - I finished sewing a project from One Yard Wonders that I'd started the day before during Munchkin's nap time. It was an apron that folded into a bag, and it's not really worth blogging about because a) I was making it for a five year old, but it's come out far too small and b) It was plagued with the usual lack of diagrams and difficult to decipher instructions that have been a feature of all my other One Yard Wonders projects, and I'm fed up with moaning about that book. So it's gone to grandma pickled weasel's as a craft apron for Munchkin.

Thursday - I started sewing a top for Munchkin using the Ofelia pattern from Patterns By Figgys. After the neck-facing stress I'd had, they very kindly sent me this pattern for free, and I'm slowly working my way through it. It has the french seam option, like the hoodie, and as I'm using a really fine Liberty lawn for the top, I thought I'd do it properly.

Friday - I ran around like a headless chicken getting ready for some friends to come and stay for the weekend.

Saturday - Went up a castle, drank wine, played a 1970's stock exchange based board game.*

Sunday - Walked round a bit of a reservoir, had pie, drank tea.*

I had completely forgotten that I usually spend about 30 minutes on the internet when munchkin has her daytime nap, so I cut that out as well and found another extra bit of time in the day for sewing / housework.

I found the whole week quite difficult, which makes me sound like a bit of an addict. Remaining focused and not wandering down a path of links from one site to another required a lot of concentration. Thirty minutes might sound like a reasonable amount of time, but it's really not very long at all. And some days I felt quite isolated - the internet time I had when Munchkin was napping was usually spent doing sociable things like chatting on Facebook, posting on forums or replying to emails from friends. On the days where munchkin and I spent much of our time on our own, with no play group or visits to grandma pickledweasel's house, I missed that contact, even if it was virtual.

There were also two internet based 'tasks' that I just couldn't fit into my 30 minutes. Surveys - I'm signed up to a number of market research companies, and do online surveys. Yes, yes, I know it sounds very sad, but surveys mean points, and points mean Amazon vouchers. My most recent voucher paid for Sigh No More by Mumford & Sons, and Design-It-Yourself Clothes by Cal Patch. So there. And job hunting. I have eleven different websites I check on an ad hoc basis for potential job opportunities, and it's just not possible to search them all in 30 minutes.

So my new revised pledge is to allow myself 30 minutes internet per day, apart from Sundays, which are 'free days'. Mr pickledweasel has to get up at 5am on Mondays, so goes to bed by about 9pm on Sunday nights. Mr pickledweasel in bed = no sewing with my noisy old sewing machine, so I may as well do my surveys and job searches then. Bon Salamander! Everyone's a winner. Is anyone else inspired by my internet detox, or are you still all in denial?

* Ok, so these aren't things that I did because I wasn't on the internet, but they make my life sound a bit more interesting :)

The Thirty Minute Pledge.

2010-04-11T20:46:00.007+01:00

The interweb is eating my life. Look, here he is, chewing on my arm.

I can easily waste an evening jumping from Facebook to a blog to a fabric shop to another blog to icanhascheezburger to eBay to another blog to Burdastyle to another blog to Etsy to Amazon to another blog to net-a-porter and back to Facebook again. And then it's time for bed, and I haven't really achieved anything apart from bookmark another 32 projects to add to my ridiculous 'to do' list and made myself sad because I can't afford any fabric / books / patterns / designer handbags.

As from tomorrow this will no longer happen, as I'm taking a 30 minute pledge. I will be allowed 30 minutes internet time per day. Hopefully this will let me reclaim at least an hour of time per evening that I can use for sewing or pattern drafting, which means I'll get an extra 7 hours crafting time per week. That's like having a whole nother day!

I figure 30 minutes is enough to check emails, have a quick scan of my favourite blogs, and get anything else important done. As for writing blog posts, I'll be drafting them on paper initially, and then typing them up when they're finished. I know, it's very retro-chic, n'est ce pas? As I only blog once or twice a week it should be quite easy to do. If I'm short of time I might just scan the draft and post it as a picture :)

Does anyone fancy joining me in my thirty minute pledge? Just to show you how productive it can be, for the first week I'm going to log all the things I do with my reclaimed 7 hours. But for now, I'm off to enjoy my last evening of unlimited interweb access. If you need me, I'll be playing Bejewelled.

Pinafore mania

2010-04-05T19:55:00.000+01:00

I am in love (again, I'm always in love with something or other, whether it's fabric or mr pickled weasel) with this little pinafore.

I went to Sewing for Pleasure at the NEC last Sunday and found a stall selling Australian craft magazines. I was chatting to the nice man and flicking through one called Homepsun, and saw this project for a pinafore dress with a Matryoshka applique on the front and back. It was pretty late in the day and I had been looking for a pattern to buy but hadn't found one, so splashed out just over a fiver on the magazine instead.

Earlier in the day I had very conveniently bought a metre of this fab Michael Miller fabric with the words, 'Ooooh, I'll make a dress for Munchkin with this!'. It was obviously destiny. It's lined with the last of my pink heavy weight slightly stretchy embroidered cotton - the remnant I bought cost 90p and has been used as lining for three tunic tops as well as this dress, so has been completely bargainous.

Brilliantly the pattern was in three sizes, 0-1, 2-3 and 4-5, and was very easy to follow with lovely straightforward instructions. I am intending to make the Matryoshka version, I'm just waiting for a trip to the magic fabric shop so I can get some cord, and I think I'll be sewing a couple as presents as well.

And yes, dear reader, I have done buttonholes. BUTTON-FLIPPIN-HOLES!!!!1!1!!! We still haven't done them at college (don't get me started), but amongst the other bits and bats I bought at the NEC was a book entitled 'How to Make Buttonholes and Pockets' published in 1960, and that, along with my sewing machine manual, helped me master them. There's no stopping me now folks! There'll be buttons on everything, mark my words :)

Sorry you can't see the dress very well, munchkin was having a bit of a supermodel tantrum, and I only managed to get these photos with the assistance of the lovely grandma pickledweasel who you can see in the background.

Happy Easter Peeps!

2010-04-04T08:59:00.002+01:00

Hope you're having fun whatever you're doing, and remember, no chocolate before 11 am :)

Beach Bum Hoodie - Patterns by Figgy's

2010-04-02T11:37:00.011+01:00

I have been looking for a decent boys pattern for a while. I'm not quite advanced enough to start drafting things myself, but while I work at getting to that level I wanted to make some clothes as presents for little fellas that I know. I found this pattern slightly randomly - Shelly from Patterns by Figgys was taking the same one day online class from Craftypod as me, and I started having a browse around her blog and then her shop.

The pattern came really quickly, considering it was from the States, and was beautifully packaged. The pattern and instruction booklet were in an envelope, which in turn was in a sturdy plastic bag with a resealable top, which meant when I had traced the pattern pieces off onto greaseproof paper I could keep them safely with the pattern in the plastic bag. Hurrah!

I got on OK tracing the pattern off, although I think there were some blips in the printing, as some of the patterned lines for the different sizes were wrong. I wanted to do a dummy run first, so I decided to make a hoodie for Munchkin out of some cotton / linen blend I'd had sitting in a drawer. Although it's marketed as a boy pattern, it works just as well for girls.

It took me a while to put together, and there was a bit of seam ripping and re-pinning going on. This was partly due to my lack of experience (it's rated three and a half thimbles, which would make it intermediate), and also partly because of a lack of diagrams in the instructions. Although I must admit, I am a diagrammy person, and ideally I like photos of each individual step so I know that what I'm doing looks right, so I think for a slightly more experienced sewer the instructions would be fine.

I really struggled with the facing on the neck, and had to email Patterns by Figgys for help (and Karen and Shelly replied very promptly, thank you!) and eventually I got grandma pickledweasel to show me what to do. I got there, but the end result looks terrible on the inside. I'm going to do a practice sample of the neck again before I make it as a present so that I can get it right. Fortunately Munchkin is not remotely bothered about neck facings and their neatness, so I've got away with it :)

The USP of the pattern is the seams. Karen, who helped create the pattern with Shelly, has a super-sensitive son who doesn't like scratchy clothing, so all of the seams are enclosed in some way. I found that this made for some pretty bulky sewing at times, especially when hemming the sleeves and main body of the hoodie, as the arms and sides have french seams. It does look very neat though. I especially liked the yokes on the shoulders - you sew the shoulder seams wrong sides facing and then top stitch the yokes on, which keeps everything smooth. Definitely a technique I'd use again.

I think I'll make a few adjustments when I next use the pattern. The sizing isn't very generous - I made the 2/3 for Munchkin, and I'd say she'll only get one summer's wear out of it, even though she's only 23 months (and an average 23 months at that, she's no giant). One way round that would be to have basic seams instead of french ones. That way you'd gain a bit more room across the chest and on the arms. I'd like it longer in the body too. I'm going to unpick the bottom hem and sew on an extra band of fabric just so it comes to below Munchkin's crotch. The hood is mahoooosive! It really is huge, and I think it makes the rest of the hoodie look out of proportion, especially with it being a bit short in the body. I'll do a bit of a Frankenstein and use the hood from Heidiandfinns' pattern instead, which is still quite generous, but much more in proportion.

Obviously Munchkin's little photo shoot isn't really representative of the context it's meant to be worn in.... you'll have to imagine her running round a beach with a spade in her hand and the sun shining rather than standing on a windowsill with a woolly polo neck underneath :)

Who says romance is dead?

2010-03-29T15:12:00.003+01:00

I've just picked up my sewing stuff to carry on with a summer hoodie I'm making for munchkin (from this pattern - I'll do a full review when it's finished), and this is what I saw on my pincushion.

No, I'm not crying, I've just got a bit of sewing machine fluff in my eye :) I proposed to mr pickledweasel at Easter nine years ago, and luckily he said yes after he'd picked his jaw up off the floor. Happy days :)

Hemming a-go-go

2010-03-21T22:08:00.005Z

I've finished my skirt for Kitschy Coo's sew-along, a little bit late, but I had the pleasure of this lovely little lady's company for the weekend, along with her parents and grandma, so I was a bit short on time.

Once I'd finished oohing and aahing over my lovely niece, I took your advice and kept the length to match my boots, and finished the hem with blind stitch. I've got a special blind stitch foot for my sewing machine, and it was delightfully easy to use. It took a bit of concentration, and I don't think I would attempt after a glass of wine, but I'll definitely use it for any other skirts I make, it looks really good.

I'm pretty amazed I've made a piece of clothing I'd actually *wear*. Mr pickledweasel was also impressed, and has decided this means I never have to buy any clothes ever again.

Apologies for the crappy photos - it was late, our bedroom's a mess, and mr pickledweasel is no Mario Testino. I look bizarrely lumpy, but I'm blaming mr pickledweasel's lens angle, rather than my svelte form. And the facing is peeking above the waistband because I haven't tacked it into place yet, naughty me.

I'm going to buy the Cal Patch book next payday, so hopefully I should be able to do any future sew-alongs properly, rather than some sort of market stall rip off version :) Although saying that, I am liking Sew U and am going to make the skirt again. Grown up clothes are exciting!

Scrapes, Skirts, and Stickers

2010-03-18T21:34:00.008Z

The sneaky Derryth guessed the mystery object correctly, although she cheated because she'd read my Facebook status earlier in the week :) It is, in fact, part of my car. And it should go there, in that picture above, where that rusty bit is.

Only it fell off (along with a lot of paint) when I somehow drove very very close to a big stone pillar thing. The pillar thing is on a corner on my road, and every time I get in my car I have to drive past it. Only it was about 9pm, and I had the radio on loud, and there were lots of cars parked in awkward places on the corner, and I was tired, and I didn't hear the crunching noise until it was too late. Mr pickledweasel reckons it can be fixed quite easily, but that didn't stop me sobbing like a 2 year old.

I'm having a bit of a bad week really - right now I should be in the pub with some friends, but mr pickledweasel's family descends tomorrow for a long weekend, and as I'll be at work all day the cleaning / food shopping / meal planning / sleeping arrangements had to be finished by tonight. By about lunchtime it was very clear that this would not be happening, as I had drastically underestimated the dirt levels in my house. Everytime I moved anything to clean it I found more things to clean. Munchkin was her usual well-meaning helpful self, but learning how to open the box of dry cat food and adding the word 'why' to her vocabulary on the same day was not great timing.

I've still found time to finish my skirt though, in between dried-on weetabix removal and researching how to spray paint wheel arches. Although I've realised that the Sew U book is very different to the Design Your Own Clothes book. Mine is kind of like having someone hold your hand while you use a commercial pattern for the first time, and has more emphasis on style rather than fit. So all that's left is the hem, and here's where I need your help. Long? Short? Middling? I'm undecided. For reference I have provided two alternative footwear choices - a boot, and a sandly wedge which makes me look like I have fat legs. The skirt is kind of medium weight, so could be worn with tights and boots now, or ~~fat~~bare-legged in the summer.

My original intention was to have bias binding as a finishing, but as things went on I decided this was a bit advanced. Instead I used the contrasting fabric as a facing and inside the pockets. I'm thinking of trying to do a blind stitched hem, as I have recently discovered a special blind stitch foot for my machine, but I might practice a bit first.

In terms of fit, it would appear I am a 'Large' in Wendy Mullin's world. I was secretly hoping it would turn out huge, and that I'd have to drop a couple of sizes, but it's not so, unless I'm missing the point and it's not supposed to sit so low on the hips. It is a bit big on the bum though, although I don't know how I'd rectify this. Any ideas?

And so to the stickers. As I seem to have spent the whole day cleaning, Munchkin has had to entertain herself quite a bit. She has one Peppa Pig magazine (purchased during a christmas shopping trip - a moment of weakness on mr pickledweasel's part) and it has a sheet of stickers with it. I went into the kitchen to do the washing up, returned about 15 minutes later to find her fully embellished:

Almost as creative as her 'Paint Your Own Mug' mother's day present, which survived its baking in the oven, much to my surprise :)

Guess the mystery object competition

2010-03-17T12:29:00.003Z

Any ideas what this is?

I'll be back tomorrow with the answer, along with some pictures of my new skirt, the mug that munchkin painted for me, and a REALLY important* question that you can help me answer.

* I use this term loosely. I appreciate that what might be important to some (the length of a skirt, for example), might not be important to others :)

I've popped my cherry

2010-03-14T22:06:00.008Z

At long last. I have sewn in a ZIP!!1! I did it all by myself, with the help of two books and a big cup of tea. And maybe some biscuits.

I don't know what I was so frightened of, it seems quite straightforward really. It's part of the skirt I'm making for Kitschy Coo's Sew-along, although I'm doing the poor relations version as I haven't got the book she's using. I've got Sew U instead, which I think is pretty much along the same lines.

It's all going ok so far, and I'm being a good girl and following the instructions properly and not cutting any corners. Although it started off quite badly when I read the size chart for the patterns in the book and discovered I come under 'Large'. I am a British size 10 / 12. That is not large. Had I been a size 14 I would have had to stick the book on eBay, because the patterns don't go up that 'big'. Quite frankly, I find that slightly ridiculous. Who made that decision? I checked out the author's off the peg range, and it would appear a similar ~~fascism~~ policy is applied, as clothes only go up to a 'Large' - is a 37" bust, 29.5" waist and 40" hips large? I think not.

Anyway, I'm beginning to rant, and that's not healthy on a Sunday night. So far I have cut out my pattern pieces, sewn my back seam and sewn in my zip. I'm doing pockets tomorrow, although I have to wait for the loan of grandma pickledweasel's bias binding tool maker thingy for that. The book has three basic patterns - skirt, shirt and trousers - and construction instructions for each, and then suggests some design variations. I'm making a slightly shorter skirt with patch pockets, which is finished with bias binding rather than facings.

I was able to get quite a bit done today as it's Mothering Sunday, and the lovely mr pickledweasel a) let me have a lie-in b) cooked a massive roast dinner while me and grandma pickled weasel and munchkin went to a farmer's market c) entertained munchkin in the afternoon so could get some sewing done. Munchkin gave me 'poft' (post), which was an envelope containing a little rhyme about mommy's, which she had lovingly decorated with Waybuloo stickers. She also bought me a paint-it-yourself mug which we had much fun decorating together. I shall provide you with photographic evidence of its artistic genius after I have baked it in the oven tomorrow :)

Tentacletastic

2010-03-09T22:10:00.005Z

I think this is the best thing I have made. Ever. It is a present for a 4 year old who lives in Australia, but we'll get to see him in May when he and his lovely mom and dad and shiny new baby brother are over in Blighty.

I don't know him that well as he's done most of his living in Oz, so I had to email his mom to find out what he likes - owls, octopuses, kangaroos and penguins are some of his favourite things, apparently.

The bag is the messenger bag from One Yard Wonders (I swear I should be sponsored by them by now, the number of bloody bags I've blogged about), and the octopus is made of orange fleece. I traced his outline from a library book of munchkins (Counting in the Sea, 1, 2, 3! It's very good :), although I had to do a bit of photocopy reducing first as he was quite big. I thought it would look better if he had some tentacles up front and some behind rather than being one flat piece, so I did two tentacley pieces first, and then overlayed the body piece after.

I marked his eyes on with marker and then satin stitched over the top. The bag is lined with some stripy cotton that was a remnant from somewhere.

I took my time with it, and I think that really helped. I'm often tempted to cut corners in order to finish stuff quickly, but I was very slow and steady, and as a consequence the bag is well made and my applique is neat. Huzzah!

Are you feeling lucky, Punk?

2010-03-07T23:16:00.000Z

Are ya? I am :)

I watched that programme about how we're fecked if we carry on overfishing, and I thought about how lucky I am to have a roof over my head, food in my tummy, a wonderful mr pickledweasel, a beautiful munchkin, and a fantastic mom 10 minutes drive away.

I'm feeling even luckier today -the sun shone, me and munchkin had a lovely day outside, and I've nearly finished another bag. Yes another bag, but this one hasn't involved any hair pulling and hopefully won't run in the rain. I just need to work out what length strap to make, and then it'll be done.

AND I have a whole new load of fabric and stitchy related stuff to drool over. I had to go to the magic fabric shop (no, really, I had to, I had no choice) to get something to make a skirt from - I am sort of doing Kitschy Coo's Sew-Along, but I don't have the Cal Patch book she's using. I'm a bit strapped for cash this month and my library doesn't have it, so I'm using Sew U, which I bought with some Christmas money. It has basic patterns that you can adapt, like the Cal Patch book, so I thought I could use Kitschy Coos deadlines as motivation. A skirt by the 20th of March? I'll need some fabric then :)

And there were just too many nice prints, I couldn't resist... and I had to buy some florally things to compensate for the tres boring grey fabric I bought to make my skirt from. The heart print is for munchkin, and the pink rose and blue flower print is for me. The stripyesque tribal type stuff is for me - I'm thinking halterneck summer dress.

And (I promise this is the last sentence I'll start with 'And') I am now the proud owner of an adjustable dress maker's dummy. A friend very kindly gave it to me - she's 94 and although she used to sew a lot her eyesight is quite bad, so she said she'd like to see someone get some use out of it. I need to fiddle around with the screwy bits so it's my measurements, but isn't it fab? I'm so pleased. It has pride of place in the dining room, next to the stuffed insects.

Life is good :)

(Success + Fail) x vomiting child = Cadbury's creme egg

2010-03-03T21:41:00.019Z

I am having an 'awkward' sewing phase, a bit like some sort of stitchy adolescence. One week it's all finding out I've gone up a cup size and getting a nice smile of that boy in the lower 6th and the next it's a zit in the middle of my forehead and falling over with my dinner tray in the middle of the refectory.*

My glowy success was being asked by Kitschy Coo to test a pattern for her (which is an honour in itself), and finding that not only was it quite an easy pattern to follow, but that I did a good job of it, it looks great, and Munchkin asked to keep it on after we had finished our 'photoshoot'. This does not normally happen. Earlier this week I had laid out her clothes for the day and she was picking each thing up, and saying, 'yes' after looking at each one - tights 'yes', vest 'yes', t-shirt 'yes', dress that mommy made 'no no no no noooooooo'.

Anyways, these are the pics of Munchkin in her new cowl neck tunic. The pattern isn't quite ready for buying yet, KC's doing a few last minute tweaks, but you may as well go and buy all the rest of her patterns in the meantime, as they're all equally as fabulous.

My fail was my very own pattern number two. Buoyed by the success of pattern number one, I got straight down to a second one, this time a little cardigan for munchkin. As much as I love knitting, I don't have the patience, skills, or time to do full on garments, so I thought it would be nifty if I could make a little fleece cardigan to pop over dresses when it's a bit nippy. I called it 'Big Button Cardi', and knew exactly what it would look like - round necked, open fronted but fastened with one button at the top, so you could see the pretty dress underneath, and it would be made of fleece but lined with a nice cotton print.

Only I'm on draft number three and I'm losing the will to live, as well as running out of scrap fabric to make rubbishy toiles with. My sleeves are too tight, but I can't seem to make them wider without changing my body block, and when I came to make the last toile up my fleece exterior sewed up beautifully, whereas my cotton interior had sleeve tops that didn't fit armholes, yet I used the same pattern pieces for both.

I've not taken any photos of the resulting monstrosities, because they're proper Frankenstein affairs and I want to present you with lovely pictures of the finished garment in all its perfect glory, not terrible crimes against pattern cutting. So you'll just have to wait. You might be waiting for a while...

To top everything off Munchkin has been poorly with a really tricksy 'one minute I'm fine and playing with my Duplo and the next minute I'm throwing up and crying' illness. I thought she would be better today, but she's eaten very little and has been flopping about on the sofa for most of the day, bless her. Unfortunately illness didn't seem to have any effect on her getting up routine - 6am as per usual. And I'm stupidly tired as I was up til all hours trying to make arms wider and necklines curve properly.

Which leads me to the Cadbury's creme egg. Not everyone's cup of tea, I know, but I love them. I sent a text to mr pickledweasel asking if he could get me one on his way home from work, and he gave me a big hug when he got home because he said he knew things were bad if I had to send an emergency creme egg request :) I've just eaten it, and the world seems a much better place.

* This actually happened to me. Only I didn't just fall, I sort of tripped and landed on my knees and then did a knee skid for about 5 metres.

Folklore Bag: Round Two

2010-03-01T21:14:00.008Z

After my wrangling with unweildy top bands before, I was determined to make the Folklore Bag again from One Yard Wonders, because I wanted to contribute a non-wonky version to Finny's sew-along I and thought if I could iron out the problems with the pattern, it would actually be a really nice bag.

And it was :) It was a lot easier once I followed the corrections on the publishers website - although the top band pattern pieces are now too long, so you need to do a bit of fiddling to get them right. The fabric I used is a lot lighter than the one I used first time, which made it easier to sew, but means the bag is a bit floppier. If I did it again I would use interfacing on the straps as well as the body of the bag.

I'm guessing you're wondering about the fabric...it's from a well known londony textile company, let's call them, errrrmm, Biberty. Except it's not officially from Biberty, because it was £1 a metre from a magic fabric shop. There's another Biberty print on the other side of the fabric, a brown floraly print- the magic fabric shop man said that when they've finished one print run and are due to start another print run with a different pattern, they take some fabric that's scrap and run it through the machine to clean the inks, hence pattern on both sides.

I thought Biberty fabric for £1 a metre was a bit too good to be true, and it was. Proudly parading my lovely new bag at Centre Parcs last week, I noticed the fabric went a bit darker when rain drops hit it. And it didn't get lighter when it dried. In fact, it was brown and splodgy. Because the ink from the floral print on the other side was bleeding through :( It now looks like somone's liberally sprinkled soy sauce all over it. I might just put it in the washing machine to see what happens, it couldn't get much worse.

Shall I make the bag again? Will it be third time lucky? Or should I just sack it all off and get one from Primark?

And the winner is...

2010-02-27T20:23:00.007Z

The Random Number Generator has spoken, and it said the winner is: Comment number 4!

Bean Mum said... 'This is a lovely bag! Well done, i'm usless at doing anything without diagrams so fair play to you!'

Thanks to everyone who commented :)

Fambily Pickled Weasel have just returned from a very relaxing week at Centre Parcs. It did feel a little bit like living in a shopping centre in the middle of some woods (do they really need 3 Starbucks?) but we had fun none the less. I did Pilates and some sort of evil torture called Flexi-Ball, and have become very aware of my 'core' muscles. They still hurt when I cough.

Munchkin learnt lots of new words, figured out how to use a straw, and jumped in muddy puddles a la Peppa Pig. We went to the Pancake House too many times. Happy days :)

Big Little Bag Giveaway

2010-02-19T22:24:00.013Z

Yet another bag. And yes, it's from One Yard Wonders. How did you guess? :)

This is the Petite Diaper Tote, and it's not quite what I was expecting. Mainly because there's only one photo of it in the book, and it's pictured with the change mat unfolded, so you don't really get to see what the bag itself looks like.

Even worse, there are very few diagrams to accompany the instructions, so it was a bit of a pig to put together. They're currently looking for contributors to the next edition, and I seriously hope they improve the format, cause it's made me tear at my already thinning hair with every project I've completed.

Anyhoo, this was meant to be a present for a friend, and although it's turned out beautifully, because it isn't quite the animal I thought it was I've decided to make her something else. I thought the change pad folded up into the bag, rather than outside of it, and I thought there was a flap to go over the top rather than it being open with a tab to close it. Where I got these ideas from, I don't know :)

So I'm giving it away to one of you lovely lovely people. It'd be a great little bag to pop in the bottom of your pushchair or leave in the boot of the car for nappy emergencies. It'll comfortably fit a packet of baby wipes, a couple of disposable nappies (or one cloth one) and a snack and a beaker. It's the sort of thing that you should aim for when you're going through that 'I want to get back to using a normal handbag but I still need to carry a bit of baby gubbins around' transitional stage. I'm happy to send it anywhere in the world, so international peeps are welcome to enter.

All you need to do is post a comment below telling me... well, telling me anything really. I don't mind what you say, as long as it's not too rude :) Just say hello if you're not feeling very prosey. Or just put 'I want your bag please'. Whatevs. And I know it can be a bit of a pain to comment in Blogger sometimes, so if you want to enter by email you can, just drop a line to pickledweasel@btinternet.com.

You've got ages to enter because I'm away next week, so I'll draw a winner on Saturday the 27th of February. Good luck!

Sweet Dreams

2010-02-15T21:06:00.000Z

Sleep. Mmmmmmmm, sleeeeeeeep...... I don't get nearly enough of it. And it's not Munchkin's fault, she normally sleeps through from 7.30pm to round about 6.30am, although she does sometimes wake once in the wee hours. But I can't bring myself to go to bed at 10pm like I know I should. Sleep just feels like wasted craft time :)

I resent sleeping when I could be sewing. So I end up going to bed around 11.30 ish, normally closer to 12, and 6 hours sleep really isn't enough for me. The consequences? For the past few weeks I've craving sugar and fat big time. I think my energy reserves are so low my body just keeps putting in requests for emergency power supplies so I don't fall over. The results aren't yet visible on my hips, but I'm sure it's only a matter of time :(

So I'm trying to go to bed earlier in an effort to feel a bit healthier and stop stuffing my face with junk. I think it would help if someone made me a blanket like this. It's for my niece, who's nearly 6 months old (doesn't time fly?). The blanket was from a bargain shop that sells offcuts of fabric and household lineny things - towels, sheets, that sort of thing. It was only £1.50, but it's quite good quality, nice and soft and snuggly. I raided my scraps bag and found some bits of pink for applique, and then printed off the letters to use as a template. I used the font Franklin Gothic Heavy, which is perfect as it's nice and blocky and has no fiddly bits to sew around :)

We're seeing some of the pickledweasel clan next week for four lovely days of relaxation at Centre Parcs, so I'll be able to give it to Juliet then. Munchkin is very much looking forward to it, although the last time she saw her cousin she spent rather a large amount of time determinedly trying to take Juliet's tights off, so I hope she'll find a better way of interacting with her :)

P.S. Apologies for the grim green back yard in the top photos. As it's always raining in Lancashire our paving stones develop a lovely slimey texture, and despite scrubbing with a bristly broom I can't seem to get them back to grey again. But frankly, there are more important things in life to care about, and I'm too tired to do anything about it anyway :)

Faffy Folklore Bag

2010-02-10T12:50:00.000Z

This is my second project from One Yard Wonders, and it's a birthday present for my brother's girlfriend. The fabric was from Ikea, and it was 99p a metre, like the stuff I used for the messenger bag. The print on it is huuuuge, and I wasted quite a lot of fabric because I wanted specific bits of the pattern for the front and back, and just plain cream for the bands at the top of the bag, but at 99p a metre I really don't care :)

(warning - this is a long faffy explanation. For the short version, skip down to the sentence marked *) Things were going fine until I came to join the top band to the lining - you sew the exterior panels together and attach a top band, and then you sew the lining panels together and attach a top band, and then sew them altogether with the straps sandwiched in between, if that makes sense. The lining pattern piece was slightly smaller than the exterior pattern piece, but you used the same top band pattern piece for inside and out. So when I came to join the lining to the top band, the band was too big. So I had to make it smaller. But then when I came to join the inside to the outside, the bands didn't match. So I had to put an ugly great pleat in the band on each side of the bag :( Pah!

I've since found out there are corrections to the pattern on the publisher's website. The pleats on the exterior have been widened, so that presumably when you sew them they make the inside and outside the same width. Although this would mean the top bands would still be too big, but at least you could make them smaller and then everything would be the same size. Confused? All you really need to know is:

*It went wrong but now I know how to fix it the next time I make it. And I will make it again, it's a lovely bag. I stuffed it full of organic chocolate and a cute purse I bought from Spunky, and posted it a couple of days ago, so the birthday girl should have it by now :) And I've posted my pics up on Finny and AfricanKelli's One Yard Wonders Sew Along group on Flickr - the bag is their project for Feb. Right, on to the next project! I have no idea what's wrong with me this month, I have been ridiculously productive...

Crafting for mr pickledweasel

2010-02-07T21:52:00.007Z

I don't get many opportunities to craft for my man. He let me knit him a hat for Christmas (using this pattern, which was nice and easy and helped me lose my double pointed needle virginity. Oo-er), and he even wears it! But I haven't been able to make anything else for him.

Until the other day, when he put in a custom order. Do you know what this is?

No, it's not a 70's replica denim and sheepskin wallet. No, it's not a covered note-book to write down brilliant ideas that will revolutionise the world and end our financial woes (which he has on a regular basis. The last one was something about putting algae in the sea to end global warming, and the one before that was to open a chocolatiers. Fortunately they are never pursued :)

It's a fly wallet, of course! He's still tying flies to catch fishies with, and this is a little wallet he can store them in when he goes out fishing. The inside is fleece, although really it should be sheepskin but my budget doesn't quite stretch that far :) The outside is recycled denim jacket backed with interfacing to make it nice and sturdy. My sewing machine cried a bit when it had to sew through the seams with lots of layers, but I promised I'd only sew using quilting weight cotton for the next week and it forgave me.

I really had to resist the impulse to applique / stamp / embroider the front :)

Crafting with Munchkins - Scrappy be-jewelled trinket box

2010-02-04T22:14:00.001Z

This is something me and Munchkin did when we were stuck at home in the snow. Munchkin has about a squillion hairclips, and the little tin I used to keep them in was getting a bit full. We bought her some new shoes in between Christmas and new year, and the box they came in was a perfect size for decorating. The rest of the stuff was things I already had - fabric from my scraps bag, some felt and some cabochon jewelly things that I didn't really know what to do with.

You will need:

A box with a lid

Scraps of fabric, long enough to go over the top of your box

Scissors

Glue - pva is probably best

Felt

A marker pen

A sparkly jewel

A munchkin

Cut your fabric into long strips so that they will go across the width of your box lid. Mine were about an inch wide, and I used pinking shears to make them look a bit prettier :) If your munchkin is big enough they can do this themselves, but I pre-cut mine.

Stick your strips across your lid. Munchkin chose which ones she liked and then we stuck them on together but if ~~you're a control freak~~ if you'd like your box to be very tasteful you could just give your munchkin a selection of nicely co-ordinated strips and let them chose what order to stick them in.

Trim the sides of the box lid so that the strips are all neat.

Stick some strips on the two short ends of the lid so the whole lid is covered. At this point you could leave it as a nice, tasteful box. OR you could bling it up a bit :)

Put your Munchkin's hand on some felt and draw around it with a marker pen. This was the most difficult part of the whole thing, and as you can see from the photo, it took several attempts :)

Cut out the hand shape, and stick it on to your lid.

Stick your jewel on to a felt finger. You're done! Fill the box with hairclips / treasure / tiaras / priceless plastic jewellery.

Fake sheep and buckley things

2010-01-31T22:56:00.001Z

This is the second waistcoat I've made from my pattern, and it's for Munchkin's friend Harry, who was two this week. The outside is an old pair of trousers of mine that I had been saving to turn into something else, and the inside is fake sheep :) The buckley thing (that's the technical term) on the back was originally on the back of the trouser waistband - I just shortened it a little so it was scaled down to fit a two year old. I cut the back piece using the side seam of the trouser leg as the fold line. Nifty, huh?

I had yet more problems with construction on this one, and ended up nearly crying over the shoulders (don't ask), but I got there in the end, albeit in a slightly wonky manner. My lack of knowledge on how to put things together is slightly annoying, but I'm trying to remedy it by reading a few books and making more toiles. It just seems to be a bit of a steep learning curve...

I've had a slow craft week for one reason and another, but I'm back to normal next week so am hoping to crack on with a few projects. Including putting together a tutorial for a little activity me and Munchkin did when we were snow bound :)

I'm going to make you cry.

2010-01-26T22:26:00.002Z

Properly cry. Wobbly lip big sigh snotty nosed crying.
Read my friend Kat's post and try not to well up.

My very first pattern :)

2010-01-24T11:39:00.011Z

It's not revolutionary, but I designed it from scratch and I am ridiculously proud of it. Mr pickledweasel bought me Metric Pattern Cutting for Children's Wear and Babywear for Christmas, and by Boxing Day I'd drawn up a basic body block for Munchkin :)

I then drew up a sleeveless body block and started working on a waistcoat pattern. After I'd done my first draft I made a toile (although mine was made from spare sheeting, not linen like Chanel do). And realised I'd sewed all the way around the armholes on the wrong side, so it wouldn't turn the right way out :D

I also realised The scalloped edge I'd put at the bottom really wouldn't work, so I went back to basics and started again. I made another toile, and did a fitting with mademoiselle munchkin. I was happy with the fit but added an extra half cm everywhere as I wanted to allow a little bit of growth room and the fabric I would be making the waistcoat from was a fluffy sort of towelling and babycord, so I had to allow for extra bulk.

I'm really happy with the finished product, although my construction method was slightly haphazard - I ended up leaving the armholes open to turn the garment through and then found it very difficult to sew them together - lesson learnt.

I'm making another one for a lovely little boy whose birthday is on Sunday, using fake sheepskin for the lining and a pair of my old trousers for the shell - it's better than it sounds, honestly :) My next job is to make a trouser block for Munchkin, and then draft up a trouser pattern with added room in the bum for cloth nappies, which is my biggest gripe with shop bought trousers. Then on to grading so I can do bigger sizes. It's all very basic, but I'm learning so much, and it feels brilliant!

And this is what happens if you ask Munchkin to smile for the camera :)

Poppy Seed Head Messenger Bag

2010-01-18T22:09:00.009Z

Grandma Pickledweasel very kindly bought me One Yard Wonders for Christmas, and last week I finished my first project from it. In the book it's a child's messenger bag, but I wanted to make an adult version as a present for a friend. She has two munchkins and is always running around here there and everywhere, so I thought it would be great as a 'Right, we're off to the shops' bag that she could bung her keys, wallet, tissues and a box of raisins in if she was just popping down the road.

I didn't change the size of the body of the bag, I just made the strap a bit longer. Actually, a lot longer - so long that you'd have to be fiddling around near your knees to get the bag open :D So I did a cunning thing and looped the strap inside the bag and stitched it. I'm going to get a D ring (is that the right word?) to hook on to the loop, and then give her a little clippy key ring to go with the bag. She can put the clippy key ring on her keys, and then whenever she uses the bag she can just clip the key ring to the D ring, and she won't have to root around at the bottom of her bag for her keys.

The fabric was from Ikea, and I used half a metre, which was the princely sum of 50p in the sale. It was the last piece in the shop, and I'm gutted there wasn't more. I did get some more fabric from the same range but with a different print - much larger and more abstract, but not as good as the poppy seed heads. I just about managed to squeeze the pattern pieces for the outside of the bag on to the fabric I had, so I line it with something else, and I used a linen chambray that you might recognise from Munchkin's Liberty wrap dress.

The project was pretty easy to follow, although I could have done with a few more diagrams and a bit less text, but that's just the way my brain works. I did have to completely reposition the velcro though, even though I followed the instructions on where to place it to a tee.

Only problem now is that I like it so much I don't want to give it away!

Going Green - Losing my Bottle

2010-01-17T21:50:00.000Z

If you're wondering why I haven't posted for a week, it's because I've misplaced my camera. I say misplaced (rather than lost) as it turned up this evening in the laptop bag. What a ridiculous place to put a digital camera! Far more sensible to store it, for example, in Munchkin's bedroom under the futon, or in the cat food cupboard. Which were among the many, many places I looked for it before I found it in the laptop bag :) So although I have had a very crafty week, including drafting my very first pattern for Munchkin and sewing a fully working , non-wonky garment from it, I haven't taken any photos :( So I thought I'd let you know how my green resolutions were going instead, and illustrate them with rather random photos that I've found in the depths of my pc.

Because of the snow, our bins haven't been emptied since before Christmas, and as I went to try and squish one more yoghurt pot into the recycling bin I was horrified by the amount of plastic our household gets through. We do recycle it (or at least the bits we're allowed to, there seems to be a very complicated coding system when it comes to plastic, and the tub you're looking at invariably is PET 74.5 rather than one with a swirly arrow symbol and a number 1), but it's much better not to have it in the first place.

Milk is the biggest culprit in our house, as we go through litres of the stuff and it all comes in big plastic bottles. My mission this week is to try and find out who our local milkman is, as this must be miles more environmentally friendly than buying milk from a big supermarket. Primarily because when ~~your milk bottles dance home behind the milkman~~ you send your glass milk bottles back they get washed and then can be used again, rather than going through all the energy-heavy processes plastic needs to be turned into something new. Dairy Crest offer an online service where you can place orders and your local milkman will then deliver them (so much more sophisticated than notes in bottles :).

The other thing I've been doing - and I loved this one because it involved shopping - was de-plasticifying the shower. No, not taking out our plastic shower tray and replacing it with one made of hemp or anything, but aiming to have a plastic free shower routine. It was easy enough to stop buying shower gel as I have 4 lovely bars of soap that I have received as presents over the last year, and until last week they were languishing in my underwear drawer acting as drawer fresheners. Now one's in the shower and ones on the side of the sink - bye bye liquid hand soap!

Shampoo was a bit more difficult, as I'd seen shampoo bars for sale on Etsy, but as they all seemed to be from the States it seemed silly to buy a product that needed flying halfway across the world in order to be a bit more environmentally friendly :) Lush seemed to be the only high street retailer who sold shampoo bars, so I pootled along to my local shop. I bought New Shampoo Bar and Jungle conditioner. I am a complete and utter convert. I will never go back to a bottle again! The shampoo bar is meant to stimulate hair growth, and as mine is weak, wibbly and falling out a bit, I thought it would be the best one for me. I haven't noticed masses of new hairs sprouting from my noggin, but my hair seems stronger. The conditioner leaves it lovely and silky, and I've stopped using the multitude of de-frizz products I used to slap on my hair after a shower, and just blow-dry and leave it. My hair smells lovely and looks very shiny.

I thought I'd give bottle free moisturising a go as well, and bought a Therapy Massage Bar. The woman in the shop said although it was called a massage bar it worked well as a body moisturiser as well. It is made mainly of cocoa butter, and so when you rub it on your skin it melts just a little bit and is absorbed. I only shower every other day, and I've noticed that my skin still feels smooth and soft the day after I've used it. It has a really velvety scent, and even mr pickledweasel has commented on how nice it smells. I don't think it'll last very long though, so it might work out to be a bit pricey, but it's worth it! I've started alternating it with body lotion I got for Christmas so I can make it last until pay day :)

So, in summary - I'm getting a milkman, have softer hair, and smell nice. This green malarkey is pretty easy, n'est ce pas?

Grandma - my favourite photo

2010-01-10T11:40:00.004Z

The lovely Kym from Sugarmouse has tagged me to show my favourite photo. I have a squillion favourites, of Munhkin, and of me and mr pickledweasel, and some of my brother when he was diddy, but I plumped for this one to share with you.

This is my grandma on my mum's side, in her back garden in Wolverhampton. Her name was Winifred, although everyone called her Rose, which was her middle name. I think this was taken in the seventies, although it's hard to tell - she had a 'save for best' policy with clothes and very rarely wore anything new, so was still wearing polyester slacks 20 years after they'd gone out of fashion :)

My uncle Mick took the picture, and he's captured her perfectly. I think she's probably saying something along the lines of 'Day be daft, purrit away!'*. She kept a meticulous house, and was about to sweep the yard or do some weeding or something. I love that she has curlers in her hair.

She died when I was 23, and I miss her very much. I would have loved her to have met my daughter, I'm sure they would have got on famously.

*If you can't understand a word of this, have a look at this BBC site or try this translation service :)

Indian Midnight Dress

2010-01-07T13:24:00.010Z

A poncy name for it, I know, but I really think it fits with the fabric. This is the stuff I bought from Abakhans a couple of weeks ago, and it was such a small piece I was really worried I wouldn't have enough to make a dress, but I did!

The pattern is Heidiandfinn's Ruffle Jumper Dress (but without the ruffles). Dead easy to sew, simple instructions, and I like the fit too. Although I think next time I'll make it longer. The lining is made from an old black jersey top of mine, and softens it a bit as the material is quite stiff, almost like a canvas.

Munchkin hates it. I put it on her this morning, with some pale pink tights and then a pair of black leggings over the top of the tights (it is -5 here today), and she screamed like a banshee and clawed at it like it was made of nettles or something. After about 20 minutes of tears and writhing on the floor, I took it off her. She made me take the leggings off as well.

Then she chose this sugary confection to wear instead (careful with the comments people, it was a present from a relative...). This is her telling me all about the kitty on the front of the dress.

We're still snowed in. You may think this is the photo I took just before Christmas, but no, it's the same road but it was taken yesterday. My car is stuck and can't go anywhere, and to make matters worse Munchkin's pushchair is in the boot, which is frozen solid. I went down to the car today to try and defrost it with a hot water bottle, but Munchkin has decided she is allergic to snow and wouldn't stand on the floor. I couldn't even get the door open so I could sit her in her seat while I chipped away at 3" of ice! Normally we would just wrap up warm and trek off to the library or the market, but we're well and truly housebound. I have a craft organised for this afternoon, and lots of Peppa Pig and the Wotwots recorded that we can watch later, so we should just survive :) Anyone else suffering with snow-induced boredom?

Going Green. And Grey.

2010-01-02T21:43:00.001Z

Happy New Year! Hope you all had fun on NYE. Me and mr pickledweasel watched The Turn of The Screw, shared a bottle of red, and were in bed by 11pm :) We've never been much into NYE, it's always seemed a bit of an anticlimax. The new year had still arrived when we woke up the next morning, so I'm guessing we didn't miss much.

On New Year's Day we went to watch the Whitworth Duck Race in stupidly cold weather. We didn't stay until the bitter end because it was just too cold, but we saw the winner cross the line. 800 plastic ducks floating down a weir is truly a sight to behold. Here's Munchkin and mr pickledweasel in the hats I made them for Christmas, trying not to look like they've lost the feeling in their faces because it's -1.

So on to the inevitable resolutions. I'm always really wary of making a big long list of things because I'm often unrealistic about what I can achieve and end up feeling despondent by November because I haven't done have the stuff I wanted to do.

So I've decided on a theme - green. I'm going to try and do my bit for the environment, because I've seen far too many tv programmes in the last month about how we're messing up the world and it scares the bejeezus out of me. They're tiny little resolutions, but hopefully they'll add up to making a bit of a difference. I'm not going to bore you by listing them all here, but I might write the odd post about how my efforts are going as the year progresses.

The other thing I'm going to work at is me. Not as in some massive personality overhaul or extreme diet or anything, but just at being more comfortable with myself. And confident! Gah, if only you could buy confidence in a bottle. Staying at home with Munchkin is good fun, but it has properly wibbled my sense of self. I'm still not really sure who I am any more, whereas I had quite a strong sense of identity before popping a puppy.

So there are little things I'm going to do to try and help. It's not about getting the old me back, because I'm not that 'me' anymore, but it's about relaxing a little and accepting who I am now. The first thing is to stop dyeing my hair. After munchkin was born I had a colour put through it to help me feel a bit more glam, and then as the colour grew out I noticed how much grey I had and so I started to dye it on a regular basis. But it's a faff, and it's very bad for my hair (which has become horribly thin and weak - oh the joys of motherhood!), and it's lots of nasty chemicals too. I'm going to grow grey gracefully :)

Munchkin is going through the lovely imitation phase of play, where she copies everything I do. As I was standing in front of my mirror a couple of weeks ago, slapping on a full face of make-up after having straightened my hair, I could see her watching me as she was sitting on the bed. I started to think about the example I'm setting her. I don't want her to grow up thinking that this is what women have to do every day before the leave the house in the morning. I don't want her to see grey hair as something to be disguised. It's normal! It's just society that says it's not. So here's my beautiful grey roots in all their glory. I'm hoping I won't end up like my Dad, who had a full head of white hair by the time he was 40...

Abakhan, how I love thee.

2009-12-30T13:06:00.013Z

Let me count the ways.

1. You have a shiny new shop in Preston which is twice the size of the old one.

2. Your shiny new shop currently has a shedload of Indian-ish cotton prints which are just beeeautiful.

3. You stocked the perfect ribbon for the ties on Munchkin's new hoodie.

4. You also had a multitude of shiny satin fabrics to make nighties out of, including this kerrazy print that grandma pickledweasel chose for her belated Christmas Making present. (scissors included in picture to illustrate ridiculously loud scale of pattern).

5. You sell plain fleece in a squillion different colours.

6. You currently have a sale on, including this very lightweight babycord at half price.

7. Even if things aren't in the sale there's 10% off everything.

8. You make me want to buy fabric just for the sake of it, even if I have no clue whatsoever what to do with it. (although mr pickledweasel did suggest cutting out 2 of each doll, sewing them and stuffing them, which is a blimmin brilliant idea)

9. You are ridiculously cheap, despite your amazingness - total shopping bill was £20.53, including all the fabrics in the photos above (apart from Munchkin's hoodie), 2m of ribbon, 2m of 5mm button elastic and 2m of cream fleece.

10. All of your shop assistants were nice to Munchkin, even though she was in a bit of a strop because I wouldn't let her out of her pushchair.

Sorry for the crumpled photos - if I get the iron out I might have to do some of the pre-christmas clothes ironing pile, and I'm in denial :)

Happy Chrimblemas!

2009-12-24T22:07:00.003Z

The pheasant is in the fridge, the beer is bought, the presents are wrapped, munchkin has had a bath and is tucked up in bed completely unaware of the present-fest that will occur tomorrow, mr pickledweasel's beanie isn't finished but I've wrapped it up anyway needles and all, we're watching Elf on dvd, and the trifle is in the utility room because there's no space left in the fridge.

All that's left for me to do is give you this cheesy festive picture of me and munchkin and wish you a very happy christmas - I hope that you're spending it with people you love and who love you xxx

Last minute Christmas Making

2009-12-22T22:46:00.001Z

I'm in the final week of Christmas Making, and everything's getting a bit frantic. I am meant to be sewing a nightdress for grandma pickledweasel, but my plans have been severely scuppered by this:

It may look pretty, but it's meant I haven't been able to go and buy fabric. Or get to work to do extra hours for a few more pennies in January's pay packet :( Munchkin and I ventured down to the bus stop this morning with the hope of at least going to the supermarket and back, but after 15 minutes of waiting in blizzard conditions we gave up and came home.

We have been going a bit stir crazy, and I've had to be very inventive with activities so munchkin doesn't ask for her Peppa Pig DVD every 5 minutes and I don't spend the day pulling out my greying hair. We have practiced knitting:

And made some biscuits:

Can you guess which ones were Munchkin's?

And I managed to rustle up Munchkin a fleecy hat as a last minute Christmas present from Kitschy Coo's tutorial (pictures of her wearing it when she's opened it, promise), and finish her lovely Liberty dress. Although when I asked her to try it on she ran away shouting, "No no no no!", so chances of her wearing it before she grows out of it are slim. It was another Heidiandfinn pattern, and was nice and easy to sew.

My last bit of Christmas making is mr pickledweasel's hat, and despite it being a simple k3 p2 pattern I still managed to cock it up. I started it earlier this week and I'd knitted about 3" when I realised my ribbing was out of sync, and as I tried to unravel it to find out where I'd gone wrong, Munchkin started to shout at me about something and I just went a bit mental and frogged it all in a fit of temper. I have started again, and fortunately he's working earlies this week, so goes to bed at 9pm - plenty of time for secret knitting!

Finally, a lovely bit of Christmas making that was sent to munchkin as a present. A beautiful little crocheted angel tree ornament, courtesy of Great Auntie Diane. Isn't it pretty? I am in awe of her skillz. Right, back to the circular needles - k3 p2, k3 p2, k3 p2...

Can you marry a fabric?

2009-12-17T21:37:00.006Z

Is it legal? Or is it a bit of a grey area, like if you want to marry your cousin? I might look into the legalities of it all, because if I can, I'd like to buy the whole roll of this brushed cotton and get it down the registry office RIGHT NOW. And then come home and just wrap it round and round and round me and sit there. Sorry, TMI :)

This was originally going to be a Christmas present for Munchkin, but I was too excited about it and wanted to see what it looked like on her. The fabric was from New Magic Fabric Shop, and I think it was £2.20 a metre. I bought a couple of metres in black as well, only strangely the black version is a sort of linen blend, rather than brushed cotton. But it's just as lush, and I think I'll make a skirt out of it for me. The applique runs either side of the fabric along the selvedge, so will be great as a border at the bottom of a wrap skirt.

I'm making a replacement Christmas present for Munchkin - a little reversible wrap dress in a grey linen chambray with a fantastic Liberty print on the inside. It's such pretty fabric I may have to become a polygamist...

Christmas Making - Round up

2009-12-15T21:32:00.000Z

I've not done much Christmas Making recently, mainly because I've reached a stumbling block - what on earth do you make for men?! Women and girls are so easy to hand make for. But boys.... and there are so few patterns out there for them. A quick search of Etsy for the words 'man' and 'pattern' brought up loads of felt gingerbread man ornament patterns, but very little else.

I have seen some projects that would be suitable for little boys, but unfortunately the blokes I buy for are all over 20. Hmmmmm. So I figured the next best thing would be to buy handmade. Not as thrifty, but at least it's getting into the spirit of Christmas Making.

My purchases so far:

This lovely bird made from London clay, by D H Painter. She still has some for sale in her Folksy shop, but they're going like hot cakes, so if you want one get it now! It's for my brother, who lives in London and a) likes stylish things b) will love the idea that there was once a warm tropical sea that covered London and left behind a load of clay.

I've also bought two pairs of these:

Both my brother and mr pickledweasel love cufflinks, and were legoheads in their youth, so they're perfect. I also bought a little lego gift box to put them in. It came flat pack and I had to build it, which was fun :)

I have found one project I can do - I'm about to start knitting this beanie for mr pickledweasel, I'm just waiting for my circular needles to arrive from eBay. The wool I've bought is a really dark slate grey with little flecks of lighter grey in it, and should look great. If I don't manage to arse it all up at the end when I need to transfer to double pointed needles. And that's all I'm doing for chaps, which is a bit pants really. Anyone have any suitably macho crafty gift ideas they'd like to recommend?

Hoodie Love

2009-12-06T14:24:00.000Z

I am very much in love with the pattern for this hoodie from Heidiandfinn. I saw it about 3 weeks ago but was very restrained and held out til pay day on Monday before I bought it :) At about £3.70 it hardly breaks the bank, but it was a treat rather than necessity.

It's a fantastically easy pattern. It was sent as a pdf which you then print out and cut and stick the pattern pieces together. There were really detailed instructions too. It took me an afternoon and evening to make, but that included printing off the pattern and tracing and cutting the pattern pieces.

My fabric choice probably wasn't the easiest option - a medium weight baby blue fleece and a chenille stripe stretch jersey - but I found it surprisingly co-operative when I was sewing. Ok, ok, I broke a needle sewing the hood to the body, but after I put in a chunkier needle I found it surprisingly co-operative when I was sewing :) Lesson learnt.

It is super soft and snuggly, and will do a good job of keeping Munchkin warm around the house. I'm trying to ration the central heating after our recent gas bill :/ We're off to the magic fabric shop tomorrow to try and find some other fabrics to make it in.

I have this fabulous grey stretch fabric that looks like knitted cable, and I want something bright pink to go on the reverse. Incidentally, the top seems entirely reversible, but for some reason this isn't mentioned anywhere in the Etsy listing or the pattern instructions. Maybe I sewed it wrong!

I had added the rest of Heidiandfinns patterns to my Christmas list, and if Father Christmas didn't come up with the goods then I was going to buy one every pay day. But then I went to leave feedback today and saw that they had a special weekend sale on - buy 2 and get one free. And my hand just slipped and I pressed some buttons and oops I've bought three more patterns :)

Cardigan heartification and a mini giveaway

2009-12-03T23:21:00.000Z

Munchkin is still growing, despite developing a recent fussy attitude to food (oh the joys of toddlerhood), and so I decided to customise the other cheapy cardigan I bought when our local Ethel Austin was closing down (the other smaller one is here).

As the stamped applique flowers worked so well last time, I thought I'd try some more using the same technique. I chose hearts, because the stamps were about the right size, and the spotty one is my favourite. I rooted around in my scraps bag and found some t-shirt sleeves that I cut off in a fit of cutomization - the colour was perfect.

I love the results :) I had lots of t-shirt sleeve left over, so I made a whole load more applique patches. One set is in my Coriandr shop, and the other set could be yours, all yours! To get your grubby little mitts on four patches (two stripy hearts and two spotty hearts) just leave a comment at the end of this post telling me how you'd use them if you won them. I'll select a winner at random on Monday. International peeps, you can enter too.

They come with Bondaweb already on the back, so you can iron them on to whatever you want to, or iron then sew them on if they're going on a piece of clothing. They're washable at 40 degrees. Perfect for all sorts of things!

What I are not lerning

2009-11-30T22:11:00.006Z

The few of you who read my blog regularly might wonder where my college course updates have disappeared to. They haven't been written for a variety of reasons - one week was an assesment week where we re-organised our folders for submission (booooooring), one week was half term, and last week I missed because of some evil cold flu virus thing which currently is making me feel like someone has stuffed a whole packet of cotton wool in my ears before submerging my head in a goldfish bowl.

But the main reason I haven't posted about my course is that I'm really not feelin' the love for it. It is not what I thought it would be AT ALL. We do lots of sketchbook work. We have to look at architecture. We have to choose an artist to research. We have to do mood boards every bloomin' week. Which is great, if that's the sort of thing you want to learn about, but not so great if you still don't know how to do button holes. Or cuffs. Or place a sleeve. Or do a placket, whatever one of those is.

I'm not going to drop out, as I paid a lot of money to enrol (a lot for me, anyway), and so I want to see it through to the end. But there's really no point me writing any more updates on it because I don't feel there's anything useful to pass on to you peeps. I might post some photos of the jacket we're currently making (which involves no real technical skills - we're given the pattern to use, it's open fronted, so no fastenings, and it has no collar or cuffs). And our final project is turning a design of our own into a pattern, which I'm hoping I'll be able to develop and test and eventually maybe even *gasp* sell, so there will hopefully be a few updates on how that's going.

The one thing I have learnt is that I want to make my own patterns. By the end of my course I should have the basic skills to be able to do this, which is great. Although they'll have to be patterns for garments without fastenings, cuffs or collars of any sort :)

Elephant Impressions and Buttonhole Trauma

2009-11-23T20:57:00.000Z

Back in March I won a pattern for a lovely asymmetrical jacket in a giveaway on Kitschy Coo's blog. It came in size 18m - 2T and 3T - 4T, and as at the time Munchkin was 8 months old, I thought I had plenty of time to do it. A couple of months ago I bought the fabric for it - some elephant print cotton and some brown denim, and mentally made a note to start it soon.

And then last week Munchkin was officially 18 months old! And I had not sewn a single seam :( So I started it the very next day, and it didn't take long to do - one child-free afternoon and a couple of evenings and it was complete apart from the button holes. I am frightened of buttonholes. They appear to require a level of sewing skill that is beyond me (and we STILL haven't done them at college). So grandma pickledweasel volunteered her fancy computerised shiny new sewing machine and its automatic buttonhole maker. This was the result:

For some reason it got stuck twice when it was sewing, and the thread bunched up. Which meant when it came to cutting the hole it was nigh on impossible to avoid cutting some thread as well, and it all came unravelled. And then to add insult to injury the hole wasn't big enough for the bloody button in the first place, despite me and grandma pickledweasel having taken measurements twice.

I nearly cried. I swore a lot. The whole experience up til then had been such a pleasure (I find 'home grown' patterns so much easier than commercially produced ones. They make sense!). Grandma pickledweasel suggested smaller buttons, but that still wouldn't solve the problem of the rapidly unravelling buttonhole. I eventually decided to stitch the buttonhole together and leave a small gap in the middle, push the shank of the button through the gap and sew it on the other side. So it looks like the coat has buttons and button holes. Then I sewed press studs on the other side so the coat will fasten.

It means the coat isn't reversible, which I am gutted about, but it does make it wearable. Massive lesson learnt - never ever ever make anything that requires button holes ever again ;) Munchkin likes the coat, and whenever 'elephant coat' is mentioned she does her elephant impression, which involves a sort of trumpety noise accompanied by a flailing arm, which is meant to be a trunk. The arm action is very similar to that of her washing machine impression. I may put her in for Britain's Got Talent next year. Obviously she will wear the coat to her audition :D

Knitting and Stitching Show Part One

2009-11-22T21:43:00.000Z

I am not feeling well - you know when you get that cotton wool head feeling just before a cold / flu? I was going to write up a report of my visit to the Knitting and Stitching Show in Harrogate yesterday, but I'm tired and my legs feel like they're going to fall off and it wouldn't make much sense, so you'll have to make do with pretty pictures of all the things I bought instead...

Too many magazines and patterns :)

This for my sister-in-law for Christmas - she loved the Bimble I made for Juliet, and said she might use the idea with her GCSE textiles students, so I thought she might like the book.

Two vintage knitting / stitching magazines, one for the fantastic 'evening jumper' pattern, and one for a lovely 'Noah's Ark Workbox' which apparently is perfect to 'hold all the nursery mending things' :)

One fat quarter and a little bundle of scraps, which included some Beatrix Potter bits. And a little pack of vintage bits and bobs that made me think of the forties - I might try and do a collage with it.

And I went to a workshop where I made this jazzy hand print applique bag and got a load of gubbins free! The jewel bits aren't stuck to the bag, they were part of the goodies. Although I might stick down one of the big cabachons so it looks like a ring.

Hopefully when I'm feeling a bit better I'll post about the wonderful textile art I saw, which was amaaaaazing. Til then, back to bed...

Crafting with Munchkins - Wallpaper Flowers tutorial

2009-11-18T15:25:00.000Z

I'm making these pretty wallpaper flowers for my storytime craft at work in a couple of weeks. We're a bit short on cash due to some budget cuts, so I'm having to scrabble around in the craft cupboard to try and use existing resources, and scrounge materials where ever I can. I contacted a local independent painting and decorating shop to see if they had any old wallpaper sample books they no longer needed, and a very friendly shopkeeper was only too happy to offload 5 huuuuge books, and had lots more in the back office but I couldn't carry them all :)

Wallpaper has endless possibilities for crafting - it's durable, has cool patterns and textures, and can withstand copious amounts of glue. I thought I'd be better off asking a little local shop for old sample books rather than a big DIY chain, but I guess there's no harm in ringing up your local B&Q and seeing if they can help.

You will need:

Wallpaper with a flowery pattern, or failing that, coloured / textured wallpaper you can cut into flower shapes.
Sturdy cardboard, preferably corrugated (I used a cat food box, the sort that has those foil pouches in)
Glue
Scissors
Straws (If they're bendy, cut the bendy bit off)
Tape

Start by cutting out your flowers. If your munchkin is too small to manage scissors, get them to choose the flowers and you can do the cutting. I tried to get a photo of Munchkin choosing a flower, but she was in a major strop this morning. But this is the flower she chose, honest!

Now cut some discs of sturdy cardboard to mount your flowers on.

Stick your flowers to your discs.

Stick your straws to your flowers with tape.

You're done! And now find the best way to display them. I used a jam jar and filled it with those little glass nuggets, and then pushed the straws in. I cut the straws to different lengths so you could see all of the flowers. If you haven't got glass nuggets you could always use that pile of pebbles that your munchkin collected from your last visit to the seaside that's gathering dust in the bathroom :)

Now I just need some stories about flowers to go with my craft activity for storytime. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Crafting with munchkins - some inspiration

2009-11-15T21:56:00.001Z

Kitschy Coo recently had a very interesting discussion on her blog about crafting with kids, and the perils that lie therein. She kind of stole my thunder *shakey fist*, because I had been all set to write a hilarious post about the joys of gluey fingers and marker pen on the coffee table, but she did it a lot better than I ever could :) For my views on the subject, scroll down the post and have a look at the comments.

So instead I'll try and give you so many amaaaazing websites about crafting with little ones that you'll run out RIGHT NOW and buy some stickers and glue and glitter and poster paint. Go on, there's bound to be a 24 hour Tescos not too far away :)

The Crafty Crow is a brilliant source of craft ideas, and is very conveniently organised by age group, from 18 months up to 12 years. The halloween section this year was fantastic, and gave me loads of simple stuff to do with my storytime group. The blog doesn't feature the tutorials in full, but has an image of the end product with a link to the site it came from. Saves you trawling through Google looking for 'Homemade Bathtub Paint' :)

Bloesem Kids: Bookhou Crafts is the kids crafts section of Irene Hoofs' pretty blog. It's so beautifully designed and calming to look at, you might even forget the glue on the sofa :) There are four contributors (all with fantastic blogs of their own), each taking it in turns to post a project. The photography is lovely, the projects are delightful, and there's not a glitter encrusted child in sight. As well as crafts for children, there are crafts for you too, like new ways to display the endless streams of paintings from nursery, and a brilliant book of textures for little sticky hands to explore.

This next one's in French, but the photographs for each project are so simple and self explanatory, that it doesn't matter if the only French you know is, 'Ou est la gare s'il vous plait?'. Julie Adore Dimanche is the crafting adventures of Julie and her cute-enough-to-eat 2 year old daughter. I am loving Monsieur Enlacet, who can help a child learn how to tie shoes, and the Mer Salee is very pretty.

Finally, Kids Craft Weekly is a fab little newsletter sent by email, full of stuff for you and your munchkins to get stuck in to. You can sign up here, or view back issues here. Each newsletter has a theme, which you could easily tie in with other stuff you do that week - so for example along with making some rockets and aliens from the space themed newsletter, you could also visit a science museum, find some books about space in the library (Aliens Love Underpants is one of my favourites), and watch Wall E on dvd.

So what are you waiting for? Clear the furniture, make sure the cat's in a safe place, and have the industrial strength cleaner and bottle of gin on hand for later. My best tip for a stress free session is oilcloth. The biggest piece you can afford. You can spread it out on the floor or drape it over your table, it's waterproof, wipe clean, and if you buy the heavy duty stuff it should last for a long time. Happy crafting!

P.s. The artwork in this post, 'Quality Street Wrapper on Fire', 'Aggression with Crayons' and 'Glitter Glue versus Biro' are originals from the new autumn exhibition by Munchkin, and have been reproduced with the artist's permission.

Christmas Making: Tea towel apron tutorial

2009-11-11T00:16:00.001Z

Here's a quick and easy tutorial for a quick and easy apron that would make a lovely gift. You just need two pretty tea towels and some twill tape or ribbon, and a spare hour (probably less if you're a better crafter than me :). I wanted to make an apron for my mother-in-law (she cut the ties off the last one she had in order to tie up a Christmas tree. Don't ask), and I'd bought some cheap oilcloth but wasn't happy with it. I was thinking about making the tea towel apron from Amy Karol's Bend-the-Rules Sewing, but wanted a bib bit at the top. So I played around with my tea towels, and hey presto! As I was putting this tutorial together I thought I might be re-inventing the wheel, and a quick Google showed that Martha Stewart beat me to it, but my version has a gathered top to save on sewing time. Plus it makes it look nicer!

You will need:

Two tea towels. Mine were from Home Bargains as part of a set of three, and were £1.49.

Twill tape or ribbon. I used tape that was half an inch wide because that was what I had in my stash, but I think 1" wide would be better.

Matching thread - you might need 2 different colours if your tea towels are different colours.

A sewing machine (optional, you could do all of the sewing by hand if you don't have a machine).

A ready-made apron to help with your measurements.

Start by laying out your ready-made apron, using it as a guide, and placing your tea towels on top. You need to take into account how long you want your apron to be, and how deep you want your pockets to be. The top of your vertical tea towel will be folded over to make a casing for your neck strap, so leave enough space for this (about an inch or two).

When you're happy with your layout, pin your tea towels together, and stitch along the lines in the diagram below.

WARNING: You'll need to take into account the wonkiness of your tea towels. They're not known for their straight edges, especially cheap ones, so be careful as you're sewing the two together. I didn't take account of wonkiness, and you can see the wonky results below :) It shouldn't matter too much if you're using a thread that's well matched to the colour of your tea towel.

Next you'll sew a line down the middle of your bottom tea towel to make the pockets. Fold your apron in half to make sure you centre the line.

You're halfway there! Next you need to make the casing for your neck tie. Fold the top of your apron over, using your tape / ribbon as a guide. You need to make sure it will fit through comfortably and won't get twisted. Now sew your casing. As the edge of your tea towel is already hemmed you don't have to faff about turning it under to neaten it :)

Attach a safety pin to the end of your tape and thread it through your casing. You'll need enough tape to fit comfortably round your neck - I cut a piece about 40" to start with, and adjusted it to the right length later.

Runkle up your casing until you're happy with the gathers, and then pin your tape either side. Make sure you have an even amount of tape either side of the apron top.

Now sew the ends of your casing in place where you've pinned it.

Next you have two options. You can leave the ends of the tape free, which will mean you will have to tie the apron at the neck and the waist when you put it on. I recommend you do this if you're making the apron as a present for someone, unless you know their exact height / shoulder width / neck girth etc. :)

Or you can join the two ends together, making a loop that you pull over your head when you put the apron on. If the apron is for you then this is the best option. Put the apron on and put the tape around the back of your neck. Make sure you have enough tape to be able to pull the apron on and off over your head, and pin the tape together.

Cut the excess tape off, and join the two ends together. I folded each one over and then sewed them on top of one another, if that makes sense.

Next you need to add the ties for the back of the apron. Take your tape / ribbon and measure out enough to go all the way around your waist and tie comfortably at the front. I used about 55". Cut your tape in half, and attach each piece to the sides of your apron, where the two uppermost corners of the bottom tea towel are. Make sure you sew the tape on well.

Now neaten the ends of your tape by folding over twice and sewing. If you're in a rush (or are fed up with sewing fiddly little bits of tape) you could tie a big knot in the end instead.

Finished! Sit back and admire your handywork :)

No, I haven't suddenly got a lovely new big kitchen, the photoshoot took place at grandma pickledweasel's, with munchkin as assistant (she sat in an armchair eating raisins and shouting encouraging things).

Guilty as charged

2009-11-02T22:38:00.006Z

If there's one thing I'm good at, it's guilt. I feel guilty 80% of the time. And the other 20% I'm asleep. Is it a female thing? I asked mr pickledweasel whether he feels guilty about things and he just looked at me strangely and asked if I'd been on a major fabric buying spree and was trying to confess :)

I feel guilty for crafting. Because the living room is messy / the bathroom needs cleaning / there's a huge pile of ironing / I haven't read any grown-up books for ages / I don't watch the news any more. I feel guilty for doing housework because it's time not spent with Munchkin. I feel guilty for spending time with Munchkin because I never do any housework.

I feel guilty for taking my college course, because it costs £150 and I don't have much money. I feel guilty for not doing my college course homework because the course cost £150.

I feel guilty for not buying Munchkin annoying electronic 'educational' toys when I see how much she enjoys playing with them in hospital waiting rooms. I feel guilty for going out and buying Munchkin an annoying electronic 'educational' toy because it is plastic and uses batteries. I buy a second hand one from a charity shop and it eases the guilt somewhat :)

I feel guilty for blogging. Because it takes up time. Because I'll often sack off doing other (more important?) things and write a blog post instead. Because deep down I know I only do it for attention. I like it when people comment. When they 'follow' me. I want people to say, 'Ooooh, look what you made / said aren't you clever / funny!' And that makes me feel guilty, because I think that maybe I shouldn't need to seek validation from random strangers on the interweb.

So I'm making a few changes. I won't blog every day. I'll try and focus on quality rather than quantity - two posts a week at most. That way I can do a few tutorials, book reviews, give you hints and tips from my college course, rather than just post pictures of Munchkin and wait for the compliments to flood in. I was getting bogged down by trying to blog frequently, and not thinking about whether my posts offered any value to my 'readership' (*waves* hello readership!).

Hopefully you'll notice an improvement in my photography skills as well - I'm trying to take well lit photographs so that my blog looks 'proper' (although a lot of things I need to do this are on my Christmas list, so it might be January before you notice an improvement :). If I'm going to blog (and still feel guilty about it) then I'd better do it well :D

All this thinking and changing and trying not to feel so guilty has been brought about by a fabulous online course I signed up to about blogging, run by the amazingly wonderful Sister Diane, she of CraftyPod fame. It's really made me think about what my blog is for, and changed my perspectives a lot.

In the meantime I'm sure I'll find something else to feel guilty about in the place of blogging. Biscuits, not replying to emails straight away, forgetting birthdays, buying new moisturiser before I've finished the old one, wanting shoes, not exercising.... the list is endless :)

Floaty Ghosts - tutorial for munchkins

2009-10-30T22:44:00.009Z

Happy halloweeeeen! I'm a bit halloweened out, as on Thursday I did halloween crafts with 60 children. Yes, that's right, SIXTY. Not all at once, although it felt like it. We ran a session for under 7's and a session for 7's and over, and did three different craft activities for each. One of the advantages of working in a public library is that you have access to as many craft related books as you can shake a stick at, and so most of the stuff I did was from Usborne Activity books. However, I did have an original idea of my own (gasp!). Here's a quick and easy tute on how to make a Floaty Ghost.

You will need:
An egg box
A pencil/pen for bodging a hole
White tissue paper / crepe paper / kitchen roll torn into strips
Glue (the runny stuff, pritt stick isn't strong enough)
Little round stickers (or a black marker pen)
A big needle
Elastic - I used shirring elastic
Tape

1. Cut a 'bobble' of egg box out

2. Bodge a hole in the top of the bobble with your pencil.

3. Smother your bobble in glue.

4. Stick strips of your white paper to your bobble, making sure you cover it completely. Add more glue on top and stick another layer if necessary.

5. Wait for it to dry a bit (distract your munchkin with a toffee apple or something).

6. Stick on your eyes. I ~~stole these stickers from work~~ found these white stickers and coloured them black with a marker, but you could just use marker if you haven't got stickers.

7. Thread your elastic onto your big needle, and poke your needle through the hole you made in the top of the egg box bobble (go from underneath the bobble and out through the top)

8. Secure your elastic to the underside of your bobble with some tape.

9. You've made your floaty ghost!

These are so easy to make, and they were a great hit on thursday with the little munchkins and the big ones. Hope everyone has a spooktacular weekend planned. We're meant to be going to a bonfire party tomorrow night (i have no idea why they're having a bonfire party instead of a halloween one, but hey, there'll be booze and I'm going to wear sparkly things, so I don't care), but Munchkin is scuppering our plans somewhat by being sick. Three times :( I'm hoping she makes a miraculous recovery by tomorrow, as I can't really ask grandma pickledweasel to babysit a poorly child. Fingers crossed...

What I are Lerning - weeks 5 & 6

2009-10-25T22:12:00.000Z

I've decided to summarise two weeks classes in one post, as it helps with time management (anyone know where I can buy an extra 24 hours a week?!?) and it seems we're alternating between exciting weeks and boring but necessary weeks, so it makes for more interesting reading :)

Last week we still didn't get round to buttonholes. We did buttons though. I never thought there could be so much to learn about sewing on a button :) The best tip was to use a cocktail stick for spacing.

When you sew a button on, you need to leave some slack thread so that the fabric with the buttonhole in will fit nicely when the button is fastened, and the thread won't be stretched.

This week we started to draw up a basic pattern. There was maths, there were set squares, and there were pieces of paper so big I had to work on the floor because they wouldn't fit on the table. It was all a bit scary to begin with, but it started to make sense towards the end of the lesson. Next week is half term, so no college, but I have plenty of homework to be getting on with. I've also started to make another boob tube dress, with the idea that I'll wear it to my works Christmas do.

The fabric is a lovely stretchy cotton with grey, pink and green stripes. Unfortunately it's not quite stretchy enough, and so I've had to make the top bigger to accommodate my boobs, which leaves a bit of bagginess around the waist area. I'm thinking some kind of ribbony lacing at the back might work to help shape it up, but I'm not sure about all the technicalities.... I'll let you know how it turns out :)

Custom knitted wristwarmers

2009-10-19T12:55:00.005+01:00

Remember this lovely purpley wool?

Well, I thought a bit more about embarking on a double pointed needle journey, and decided it would be a bad move and end up in an unfinished project. And that would be sad because the wool is so nice it deserves to be worn, not languish in a cupboard somewhere.

So I thought I would find someone who could do some knitting for me. And I found Lottie Lodge on Coraindr. She's ace. Look at what she made me!

I'm so pleased with them, they're exactly what I wanted. She was very specific in the information she asked for, and I had to draw round my hand (which was fun :) and provide measurements so they're the perfect fit. And all for the bargain price of £10!

I'm wearing them now, as it's bloomin freezing, and I really can't bring myself to have the central heating on during the day until it's at least November :) If you want something knitted but don't have the skills Lottie's service is perfect. She'll provide you with a quote before you commit to buy, and you can either send her some wool you already have, or she can find yarn for you. Or maybe even buy some from Woolworks or Tomato Tea and have it sent to Lottie!

Tweet-tastic

2009-10-15T22:08:00.011+01:00

Hellooo! Just popping in and out again, as things are tres busy in the world of the pickledweasels. We've been away for a few days to see the lovely baby Juliet, and we have weekend plans too as it's my birthday on Saturday.

But I thought I'd just blow my own trumpet a bit. Looooook! My birdy flower brooch has been featured on the Coriandr Blog :) And it's on the Coriandr Front Page (scroll down a bit to the bottom of the page). I'm well chuffed.

And I've just added a new brooch to my shop, a little rainbow cat on a wooden heart. This has been my bestseller at craft fairs (Grandma pickledweasel very kindly takes a board of my jewellery along with her when she has a stall anywhere), so I'm hoping they'll prove as popular online :)

Covered pin board tutorial

2009-10-10T21:07:00.000+01:00

Ta daaaaaa! Here is my very first tutorial, and it's not about clothes for Munchkin, which surprised even me :)

I had the idea for these pin boards when I was looking at the ridiculously ineffective one I bought for £2 from Tesco. It's not attractive or functional in the slightest, and I thought how cool it would be if I could do a little personalised pin board for everyone in the pickledweasel family. Grandma pickledweasel had some cork pot stands from Ikea that she didn't need any more - she'd bought them thinking she could display jewellery on them at craft fairs, but they just didn't work. So I nabbed them and had a play around. This would be a great housewarming present :)

Here's what you'll need:

A sturdy cork board of some description, preferably round. I don't know how much the Ikea ones were, but I'd imagine they were cheap.

Fabric to cover your board with. You'll need a 2" border, so make sure the piece you choose is big enough.

Embroidery thread that co-ordinates with your chosen fabric.

Sewing thread.

Felt to back your board with. Doesn't have to be matching as no-one's going to see it, but if it's a present for someone you might want to make it co-ordinating.

Tailors chalk if your felt is a dark colour, pencil if it's a light colour.

Co-ordinating ribbon or ric rac to hang your board up with. I used 11 inches.

Fabric scissors.

Glue.

Marker pen, string and a drawing pin.

Optional: A sewing machine, an iron-on transfer letter.

First you need to draw out a circle on the fabric you're using to cover your board. I used string pinned to the middle of the board with a marker pen tied to the end, and I made the string 2" longer than the radius of the board. When you've marked your circle, cut it out with the fabric scissors.

Now you need to cut your felt circle. For this I just drew around my board with tailors chalk, and then cut out a circle slightly smaller than the one marked. You need a circle that's about 2cm smaller in diameter than your board.

Now sew on your ribbon or ric rac to your felt circle. It needs to be pretty secure, as it'll be holding your board up. I sewed mine using a machine, but a couple of rows of sturdy hand sewing would be fine.

Next you need to work out where to put your letter. Lay your fabric over the cork board so that the border is even all the way round. If you're arty and have the skillz you can draw your letter straight on to the fabric, but I'm a bit pants at that sort of thing, so I used a transfer letter from this book. Either way, you need to make sure your letter is central at the top of the board. If you're using a transfer, iron it on.

Now embroider it! I'm normally lazy and don't use an embroidery hoop, but I did this time as I didn't want the fabric to pull or runckle when I covered the board.

When you've embroidered, iron the fabric so it's nice an crease-free. Place your fabric face down and put the cork board on top, making sure your letter is in the right place.

Now turn it over.

Apply a border of glue to the back of your board - cork is quite absorbent and you might find your glue disappears quickly, so you'll need to re-apply if necessary.

Starting with the top of the board where your letter is, fold your fabric over the back of the board, pulling it tight as you go. You'll need to put more glue onto the fabric you've already folded to help stick down new folds. Don't worry if it gets all messy, it's going to be covered with felt. Just make sure your fabric is nice and tight.

Finally, you need to glue your felt circle to the back. Makes sure you put lots of glue on, and maybe squish it with a big thick book for a bit as it dries.

And then it's done! I've made one for Munchkin (J) and one for mr pickledweasel (D), but haven't got round to mine yet. I love the idea of a whole co-ordinated family of personalised pin boards :)

Leave a comment if you make one with a link to your blog / photos :)

What I are Lerning - weeks 3 & 4

2009-10-07T10:30:00.000+01:00

I've combined this week and last week for a couple of reasons - because I was ill I missed my class on Monday and went along on Wednesday instead, so I haven't really had time to do a post about it, and it was a bit of a boring (but necessarily so) class.

My excitement about buttonholes and pockets was short lived, as our tutor has slowed things down a bit and we did seams. Yawn. We have been promised buttonholes next week. I think because there's 15 of us it's taking a lot longer to cover topics, and some people are complete beginners, so the pace has been adjusted accordingly.

I did learn things about seams though. The first thing was if you don't have an overlocker and you want to neaten seams but you're a bit lazy and don't want to zigzag everything, use pinking shears. The second thing was I need to buy some pinking shears. The third thing was I really want an overlocker.

This week was far more exciting. We made a dress! From jersey!! Which up til now has been my most feared fabric. Yet I have conquered it :) It's a very simple dress - rectangular boob tube up top, rectangle skirt below. Mine is all shiny because my theme is around Ndidi Ekubia's work, and she works in metal. You can wear it loads of different ways - I've decided to fold the boob tube bit double, so the skirt is shorter and more tunicy. Here's the dress with the boob tube at its full length:

I don't think it looks as nice this way, it's a bit too eighties, although that may just be the fabric (£1 a metre from the old magic fabric shop). Plus it makes me look short :) Here it is with the top doubled over. See, much taller!

I managed to get the whole thing sewn in class, although when I got home I looked at it closely and really wasn't happy with the gathers along the skirt, so I unpicked it all and redid it. We'd loosely pinned the skirt on to the top at 8 different points, and our tutor suggested we make the gathers up as we go along, pulling the top tight and runckling the skirt fabric as we sewed. My runckles weren't small enough and so looked very patchy. Instead I pinned little rough pleats and then sewed so it's a bit more uniform.

It's not quite finished, as I want to make a belt to go under the bust line with some of the leftover fabric. Grandma pickledweasel's given me some interfacing, so I think I'll do a broad shaped band with some sort of stitching on the front, but I need to give it a bit more thought. This dress is our first assignment, so we have to reflect and evaluate the whole process, as well as provide sketches. Eeeek. Drawing. Help! Our homework for next week is to do four still life sketches. I won't embarrass either you or myself by sharing my feeble efforts.

I'm not planning on wearing this sparkly affair by the way, it's just for my assignment. And apologies for the 'I don't know what to do with my hands' modelling poses :)

Cord tunic

2009-10-06T13:02:00.007+01:00

This is the second tunic I've made, and it's a slightly heavier weight so that Munchkin can wear it now. The original one was in summery fabric, and size 2T - this one's 18 months and a perfect fit. One side is in a really soft cord from Abakhan, and the other side is some embroidered cotton twill that was a remnant in the new magic fabric shop. I love the colour combination - I think baby Juliet will get a diddy version as a Christmas present.

Apologies for the out of focus photos / messy house / unkempt child model. I need a new house so I can a) have a studio to work in, rather than have to do my craft stuff on the dining room table, and then worry about munchkin eating pins I've dropped on the floor, and b) have a small photographic studio with a variety of backdrops including an immaculate child's bedroom, a sophisticated bar (for when I want to take photos of me in stuff I've made, seeing as how I never actually go out), and an 'outdoors' backdrop, because it's always raining in the real outdoors.

Christmas Making - Neckwarmer no. 2

2009-10-05T10:09:00.002+01:00

This one's for my mum, and is in a lovely soft maroon wool. She recently had a big wardrobe clearout, and the button is salvaged from a cardigan she got rid of. Bit cheeky, giving her back her own button, but it went so well I couldn't resist :)

When I was at the shop choosing the maroon wool I saw this lovely purpley-blue and couldn't resist as it was in the bargain basket. But what to knit with it? I really want some wrist warmers, but looking at all the patterns it seems I'll need to use double pointed needles, and I think they're a bit beyond my skills at the minute.

Even though in this video, the lady demonstrating at the end says, 'It's that simple!' It really doesn't look it. It looks like it could end in tears and possibly some eye gouging with the spare needle. I'll just have to put wrist warmers on my Christmas list :)

These are a few of my favourite things.

2009-10-01T21:24:00.004+01:00

Kittens, and string, and small children in cooking pots, and ...other stuff. Or whatever Julie Andrews goes on about. I've actually never seen Sound of Music. Am I missing out?

Anyhoo, this week has morphed into some sort of Seven Days of Hell test the pickled weasels to the limits and then pooh on them from a great height scenario. As a consequence I have been quite busy. No time for crafting - just going to work, trying to cook 3 days worth of meals in one go at 10pm, arranging childcare, re-arranging childcare, re-arranging childcare, and trying to rid the house of the smell of vomit.

So, no time for craft means no interesting things to blog about. So you'll have to make do with this ~~hastily cobbled together filler post~~ lovely collection of interesting things.

1. Emmy the Great - listen and love. I can't stop playing her album :)

2. Get a £5 gift voucher from Ikea in exchange for donating 5 books to Unicef - details here (scroll down the page a bit)

3. Possibly the coolest competition ever. I reeeeally want to enter but I don't think I have enough time to put together a decent entry what with college / work / clearing up vomit.

4. Fantastic Very Hungry Caterpillar fabric. Is it me, or is this crazily cheap? They do a Brown Bear Brown Bear range as well. I'm seriously tempted...

5. Parasol Craft - fab new online magazine, that's the bargain price of $2.50 (about £1.58), and is full of lovely things. I'm hooked :)

I'll see you on the other side of the weekend xx

Autumn days when the grass is jewelled...

2009-09-29T12:12:00.006+01:00

.....And the silk inside a chestnut shell
Jet planes meeting in the air to be refuelled
All these things I love so well

That was my all time favourite hymn ever in the world at primary school. You can watch a slightly naff photo montage piano version of it here with the full lyrics. *sigh* happy days :)

So it's autumn. I'm out of denial. It's not going to be summer again until next year (allegedly). It's long sleeved vest time again, and as Munchkin seems to have grown quite a bit (why do children insist on doing that?), I've had to buy some new ones. I chose plain white ones because they're cheaper, and can be customised, of course!

I've kept it nice and simple with a bit of stamping, as applique on a vest is a pain in the bum and I can't be faffed with it. Plus I have a squillion things to do, including putting together my very first tutorial. Yes, a tutorial! It's all very exciting. Whether anyone will actually bother following it or not is another matter, but it's the ~~blood, sweat, tears and mental exhaustion~~ thought that counts, right?

Bleeeeee.

2009-09-28T12:24:00.000+01:00

I am feeling rough today, because I picked up a bug from Munchkin. Grandma pickledweasel babysat for us on Fri night so we could go to a community meeting about wheelie bins*, and while we were out Munchkin was sick all over herself and her unfortunate baby sitter :( I'm guessing it's something she's got from nursery, which considering she only goes for one afternoon a week is quite impressive.

I foolishly went to The Trafford Centre yesterday to look for something to go with the ridiculously flimsy purple dress I've bought for a wedding in October. And I had to take Munchkin with me because everything's gone pete tong at mr pickledweasel's work and he had to spend the afternoon looking at spreadsheets. I managed not to throw up, despite having to drive round for half an hour looking for a parking space, battle my way through hoards of people, and sit in the longest traffic jam ever on the way home. Bleeee. I'm nearly back to normal today, although mr pickledweasel can't hold anything down. I am making him sip flat lucozade to try and keep his liquids up.

However, this little reversible tunic I made is cheering me up no end. I bought the pattern from someone on Etsy, and in her listing she included the glorious words, "It is just fine to sell the completed pinafore to whomever you'd like." So in theory I could do custom orders through my Coriandr shop if I decide to.

It was all going swimmingly until I had to cut notches under the armpit seams to reduce bulk - I went a bit too far with the scissors :( I've sort of darned the hole back together again, but as it's under the armpit I'm hoping no-one will notice. Lesson learnt!

Sorry for the model-free photos, Munchkin was still feeling a bit off colour when I finished it, and although she did try it on for me, she really wasn't in the mood for a photo-shoot. This is a size 2T, and is meant for next summer, hence the lightweight cotton. Next task is to make a winter version with some baby cord.

* This is a whole other post, but I probably can't write about it because it's a bit sensitive - basically wheelie bins that are left in the back alley have had their lids removed, paint poured on them, dog pooh put on top of them, and set on fire. Coincidentally, someone who lives in our street has been saying quite vehemently that they don't think people should leave their wheelie bins in the back alley, they should keep them in their yards. Hmmmmm.

What I are lerning

2009-09-24T22:12:00.003+01:00

I started a college course a couple of weeks ago, and I thought it would be a good idea to do a little post about what I've learnt each week. It's a 30 week course entitled, 'Developing Sewing Skills for Fashion', and it's exactly what I have been looking for for about the last five years. It covers a little bit of arty farty stuff - aspects of design, how to develop ideas, that kind of thing, and then the rest is practical skills - button holes, cuffs, pleats, overlocking, waistbands etc.

I haven't done a post for the first week as we covered things like what to do if the fire alarm goes off, what equipment we need, and who they should contact in an emergency (like if we sew our finger to the table or something), and that's all very important but not very interesting.

This week we made our first mood board, which involved lots of sticking and cutting and felt very primary schoolish, but actually looked quite good. Mine was based around the two photos of metal objects, which are part of an exhibition at Manchester Art Gallery. They're by an artist called Ndidi Ekubia, who was born in Manchester but now works in London.

On the practical side of things we got to grips with the industrial sewing machines (eeek!), and learnt about pleats. In class we just ironed fabric into pleats to get the idea, but I thought it would be best if I tried to put them into context just to see them work properly. So here is a version of the ruffle sleeve top from Sparkle Power's blog with an inverted pleat in the front:

It took me a while to work out the alterations I needed to do to incorporate the pleat, and I did about 20 squillion more things than I needed to do to make the band across the front, but I like the way it turned out.

It's dress length at the moment, but I really don't think it will be warm enough for winter, even with tights underneath. So once it starts getting properly cold I'll shorten it to a tunic top length.

I also had a bit of an epiphany moment - just before I added the ruffly straps, I looked at the dress and thought, 'I've completely unintentionally made a really cool skirt for a small child!'. So I'm thinking I'll keep it when munchkin grows out of it, whip off the straps, and use it as a skirt.
I have no idea about sizes for bigger kids though - does anyone know what age child has a 20" waist?

Next week - button holes and pockets, woohoo!

Web Trackers

2009-09-22T13:34:00.005+01:00

Don'tcha just luv 'em? How else could you find out that someone in Bucharest, Romania, was looking at your blog at 3 in the morning? It's the sort of information you can't live without.

I love finding out how people arrived at my blog. Mostly it's from a comment that I made on someone else's blog, sometimes it's via my Coriandr shop, and quite often it's through some random Googling. Some people search for really weird things. Especially to do with pickles and weasels. Here are some of my favourites:

1. Valentine Warner's pickled peaches

2. Weasel cufflinks

3. Slut Rossendale (this one is slightly worrying)

4. Pickled weasels and where to buy them (this is also worrying, but in an 'awww' way)

5.Weasel sewing pattern

6. Goblin craft

Looking at my stats, it seems most googlers land on me via looking for stuff about Valentine Warner. So, just to try and increase my traffic a bit, repeat after me: Valentine Warner is a stud muffin, Valentine Warner is a stud muffin, Valentine Warner is a stud muffin, Valentine Warner is a stud muffin, Valentine Warner is a stud muffin...

P.s. If you have no idea what a web tracker is, take a look at statcounter, which is the one I use.