The Hello Beautiful Blog

Now that my March New Year's Resolution project is up on the Fiskars website I can share with you the blouse I made. So I'm just scraping in a few days before the end of the month.

It's the Jasmine blouse by Colette Patterns and I sewed it up in this beautiful cotton silk called Freeform arrows in navy, designed by Domesticate.

I was a bit nervous, never having sewn with silk before and this being a very expensive fabric. I quickly realized that I needed a brand new needle (the older one was snagging on the threads) but apart from that, it was an absolute dream to sew with. And it's a great fabric to wear: it just feels very luxurious.

Oh and cutting and matching up the center chevron pattern was a bit of a brainache, but that was bought on by myself. I also spent a surprisingly large amount of time considering whether the chevrons should point upwards or downwards. I went with downwards in the end, but I wonder if there is a rule about such things?

I went for version 1 of the pattern, the one with the longer dangly bits :) though I prefer to leave them hanging loose rather than tying them in a bow at the front like the pattern shows. I like the blouse (mainly because I LOVE the fabric so much) but the sleeves aren't perfect. I'm considering whether to remove the cuffs completely or to redo them and make them about 1/2 the width they are at the moment. There's something not quite right about them at the moment I feel. I think they're a little too billowy. But nothing that can't be fixed once I make a decision about what I'm going to do with them. For now, I'm just wearing a cardigan over the blouse and all likelihood, I'll never get around to doing anything about the cuffs.

Click here to read all about my project and for some tips about sewing this up.

Did you make any new year's resolution plans this year? If so, how are they progressing? Or not?

Ipad sleeve and Spoonflower

I don't know how I got so lucky, but you can find me today writing over on the Spoonflower blog. I am completely addicted to gazing longingly at the wonderful fabric designs created by such talented people ~ it's my new hobby. I'd never have thought I'd be able to design my own fabrics (having the drawing skills of a 10 year old), but Spoonflower is full of so many amazing and inspiring ideas, so I gave it a go and I'm so happy I did. Plus I found a way to do it without having to pick up a pencil and drawing the only thing I know how to draw - a floppy-eared dog (popular in the 80s when I reached my drawing peak).

The first time I designed my own fabric, I used it to make my February dress for my Fiskar's New Years Resolution project, which I love wearing by the way.

This time I wanted to involve my kids' artwork. I don't know if you have kids that grow at an astonishing rate, but I do. They are 7 and 5, and by the end of this summer they will be 8 and 6. This time that they are small is so short and whilst I look forward to seeing them grow into amazing, big people, I just love the way that they are now ~ smallish and funny.

At least I now have some cool fabric immortalizing their childhood artwork to help remind me of these years.

Anyway, if you fancy going on over to my post for Spoonflower click here. I'll tell you about how we made some block print fabric and I have instructions for the Ipad sleeve I made with it.

I bought this lovely little pattern download last week from Wiksten and some pretty spring cottons to make a couple. I've got one finished so far and it's a very quick pattern to sew up. I really love the finished top. It'll be perfect for the SoCal spring and summer. There's also the Tova sewing pattern which looks lovely too. Here's a link to the Flickr pool for the Wiksten sewing patterns for some lovely inspiration.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who is seeing all those cool handwritten canvasses around. Things like this. I'd like to have a go at making one, once I've spent a while perfecting my handwriting....I got in a bit of practice with this little zipper pouch, which I made in a similar vain to the wall art. I LOVE this pouch and I think you can never have too many of them. They prove to have all sorts of uses.

This canvas however, started off life as bright white. Not a good color for someone like me. So I decided to try out a bit of vegetable dyeing. I did this with my mum when I was little, but that was years and years ago and I honestly didn't realize how much fun it would be, otherwise I would have had my kids involved.

I used a couple of website here and here and read a bit of information, then as usual, I just used the things I and on hand, ignored the bits I didn't, then proceeded to do it my own way and see how it turned out.

I cut up the crispy skin of 2 onions with a pair of scissors. FYI, I dyed about 1/4 yard of fabric.

I then placed the cut up skins into a large pan of boiling water. The color appeared almost immediately. It was really interesting and at this point I was wishing my kids were awake and not in bed asleep. I let the skins simmer in boiling water for 1 hour, then I poured it through a strainer too separate the skins. This is the color of the water at this point.

I then poured the water/dye back into the pan, turned on the gas and plunged the white fabric into the pan. I let it simmer for about 45 mins, stirring every now and then to make sure all the fabric was immersed.

After 45mins, I pulled the fabric out and put it under cold water until the water ran clear. I then threw it in the dryer and when dry, I ironed it.

Below is the end result of the color change. The white strip on the side is the original white. Not a dramatic difference (I DID only have two onions) but it's was completely the color I was hoping for. A kind of vintage/linen look to it. I was surprised at how even the color was too. I was expecting something more like when you dye paper with tea bags; discoloration in certain areas and 'vein' marks in the creases. This color is completely even and NO, it didn't smell of onions.

I then sewed up my pouch. I used lyrics from the song 'Blackbird' by the Beatles. It always makes me think of my lovely dad. It's his favorite Beatles song. I wrote of the canvas with a fabric marker and set it with a hot iron. Do you know the song?

I then cut out a small segment of the writing and sewed it as a patch onto one of the sides of the pouch.

I put in a grommet in the corner and a little strap with some rope.

I always think a bright zipper makes anything look cheery.

FYI, this may not be very colorfast because I did not mordant it, but for a zipper pouch I don't think that's very important. It's not going to be washed very often. If you plan to do something similar on fabric you will be washing, I suggest you read up on how to set the dye first.

Have you dyed with fruits and vegetables before? I'm looking forward to doing some experiments with my kids very soon. I know they will love this.

Ho hum readers....I'm sure no-one (at least, those who know me) is under any illusion about the sewing mistakes I sometimes make and this dress is one of them. I'm not afraid of admitting my mistakes however and I can only hope to learn from them.

I used the Colette Peony pattern for this dress. (I LOVE Colette patterns by the way - all the mistakes that occured in the making of this dress are caused by me, and me alone). See how lovely and slimming it is on the model on the Colette website? Notice how they DIDN'T chose to make it in a baby wale pale blue corduroy (that I think looks ALOT like this....)

Being too eager for my own good, I made a broad shoulder adjustment to the bodice, which is probably NOT the thing to do with this kind of slashed neckline. You can see in the photo below that the neckline just sticks up off of my shoulders and into the air.

While I was at it, I also lengthened the bodice by 2" which proved to be far too much. The waist is now down by the top of my hips. Also, the front darts reach up way too high and I may as well applique some arrows on to the ends just to be sure that everyone knows that they are pointing straight at my nipples. Nice.

My thoughts :
Perhaps I cut a size too large? It's a bit loose.
Maybe my shoulders aren't as broad as I think they are? I did make a muslin and it seemed very tight across my shoulders and I did only widen them by 5/8" on each side.
There's no excuse for the very poor fabric choice. Must do better next time.

Have you made this dress? Care to offer any advicce?

Oh dear, I'm going to have to stop writing now. I can't bear to look at these photos any longer.

If you're thinking that these shoes have seen better days, you'd be right. Actually they weren't worn for very long (about 6 weeks), but while I'm talking about them I may as well share that I was really disappointed in these Crocs. I usually love Crocs for my kids, especially the more common slip-on beachy shoes and I had high hopes for these when we bought them. My daughter wears a leg brace which extends from the ends of her toes to under her knee. She can't bend her ankle when she's wearing it and it's pretty bulky. This means that it's pretty hard trying to find shoes that fit her, especially since she only wears a brace on one leg. If they sold shoes with the left foot a size bigger than the right it would make my day!

Anyway, I typically buy her Converse style shoes because the laces start really low down and you can pull the tongue all the way out, open up the shoe and squeeze it on over the brace. It's a tight fit and this means that my daughter's shoes aren't expected to last very long because of the wear and tear. She only has one pair that she wears all the time and everywhere until it's worn out.

But, after a matter of about 2 weeks, these Crocs had already started to fall apart. In fact, the black strip that you see is missing on the right shoe above, fell off on the second day. The fabric has worn through on the sides and the sole of the heel is completely worn smooth. By comparison, the Converse boots I bought her to replace these Crocs have been worn everyday for about 4 months and are only now showing signs of needing to be replaced.

I'll be sticking with Converse shoes for her from now on, but it does annoy me when things you buy are a bit crappy (and the Crocs weren't cheap).

Anyway, we haven't completely thrown the Crocs away and I found them at the bottom of the shoes cubby and we thought they'd be an obliging guinea pig in our glittery experiment. I'm adding this project to my (very slim collection) Plaid Crafts Pinterest Board.

First, we sanded down the toes to make the surface slightly rough and to get off some of that dirt.

I taped along the edge of the toes to mask the cloth.

We (the kids) painted Mod Podge onto the white toes.

And we (I) sprinkled glitter over the glue.

We allowed it to dry for about 15 mins then applied another layer of glue and more glitter. We ended up doing 3 layers to get a nice thick coverage.

Some advice I had read recommended finishing the shoes with a finishing spray so that you don't lose all the glitter as you walk, run and jump. I found this unnecessary. We left to glue to completely dry and it became pretty solid and after shaking off the loose glitter, the rest stuck on nicely.

Here they are being modeled WITHOUT the leg brace. Nice for some fun running around time without the brace for a treat. My husband thinks it looks like her shoes are capped with snow. And he'd be right.

You may not have heard of Plaid Enterprises, but it's the company behind some great products like Mod Podge and FolkArt, and if you are a crafter in the US, chances are you use some of their things. They are running a Pinterest contest for March (in celebration of National Craft Month). If you're interested, you can find all the details of the contest here.

They want to see your crafts that have been made using Plaid products so get crafting, put photos of what you make on a Pinterest board, and email the link to Plaid at paintmeplaid@gmail.com.

They have a great prize for the winning board, so get to it.

Here's some photos of a new spring set of refrigerator magnets I made a couple of days ago using Mod Podge, which are so easy I recommend giving them a go. These are a suped up version of a set I made a while back because these are double duty! I had a set of small clothes pegs (they look the same as the ones you use to hang out your laundry in these photos, but they are MUCH smaller than that).

First find out the size of the flat side of the pegs - do this by measuring or reading the packet! Cut some patterned paper the same size - 2 for each peg. My paper is by Bella Blvd.

I usually use a toothpick to apply Mod Podge to small areas. Put glue on both sides of the peg and adhere the paper. I also painted a coat of Mod Podge over the paper to seal it.

Hang them up to dry.

I then got some flat bottomed glass marbles and cut some pieces of decorative paper which I glued to the bottom. I used my Fiskars Poppy punch which was just the right size to fit behind my marbles. Lastly, I used my glue gun to stick the peg to the front of the glass marble and a tiny but mighty magnet to the back.

Some friends of mine recently bought a person house and got this dollhouse with it. Luckily for me their two sons didn't really want it so they gave it to my 5 yr old! How lucky ~~am I~~ is she?!

I've never had a dollhouse this grand (and I've certainly never had a house this grand) and it's in pretty good shape. She's a real beauty.

There are 3 floors (plus a tiny attic room right at the top).

There are wooden floorboards on the spacious ground floor living area and it has beautifully tasteful wallpaper throughout. (Am I starting to sound like an estate agent?)

I think that with its little nooks and sloping ceilings, the third floor is my favorite and it makes me really wish I was 3 inches tall.

I'm looking forward to giving it some tlc and to bring a little life back into the old place.

Does anyone have any experience with dollhouses? I have found out this it was a kit by Duracraft, this model being the San Franciscan, but from what I can tell, the manufacturer isn't around anymore?!? I guess that if dollhouses are built to scale, I can get parts for it? The poor thing is missing a couple of doors and windows as well as the steps that lead to the front door. I'm also assuming that there were some staircases at one point too.

This thing is definitely going to be played with, so it's not going to have a showhome-type makeover, but it would be lovely to restore a bit of its former glory. And it's funny, but when I'm researching this house, all the images show the front rather than the inside at the back. Sure, the front is beautiful (and if you'd just spent months making the thing, that's what you'd want to be showing off) but for me, it's the inside that is the real treasure. My 10yr old self would have loved to arranged and rearranged the furniture (my husband would point out that I'm still doing that now). My 5yr old is so, so delighted with it.