Summer top finished. Just in time for WInter.

Oh my poor little blog! Seems you are well and truly behind. There has been so much going on here and you are having trouble keeping up, so I thought it was time to help you out a little. There are quite a few projects finished (yes finished!) of late, and there is much catching up to do.

Firstly, I finally finished the cool, flowy summer top. This one was started at the beginning of summer at a Perle 8's Thursday session. Now I finally finished it off (thanks to a bit of motivation from my creative space last week), perfectly timed as our weather has turned to winter these past few days with rain and cold. I did get a half day of wear out of it and it fits beautifully. Perhaps it can be teamed with a long sleeve t for wear in winter?The pattern is Simplicity 2962 and the fabric is cotton voile. Its a bit hard to tell, but there are pleats along the front bodice which give it a nice finish and add to the flowiness. Oh well, I guess I'll have to wait till next summer to really appreciate this one!

And note to self: I really need to get myself some labels made up. This top is screaming out for a made by me label. I saw these great ones Patch Andi got, but I am just not sure I will ever use thousands...

My creative space

My creative space
of the future...

We are moving house later this year. Plans are well underway for an extension and a renovation (that our little family will have the pleasure of living through!) And I am very excited about my new 'creative space' that is in the plans (above pic may be difficult to inperpret, unless you are me and spend A LOT of time staring at this little line drawing - The grey shaded bit in inside the house, you can see the windows opening to the outside. My creative space of the future is really just a length of desk, but imagine the possibilities!).

It will have nice big windows overlooking our backyard. Particularly looking out at an existing White Cedar (scientific name Melia azedarach - Persian Lilac) and the rest of a lush garden (that will be there eventually). But at the moment it just looks like this - a tree (a nice one at that) and some grass. It is amazing the excitment I have for imagining what this little corner of my life will be like. It's a while down the track to reality, but the dreaming is fun!

On a more practical level, this is what I am working on at the moment. Finishing off a cool breezy summer top I started last year (not much of a need for it this time of year, but hopefully I will have finished it before next summer...)

Visit Kootoyoo for more in the present creative spaces...

summer tops

I've added a couple of new tops to the bubba's summer wardrobe. Both were existing plain tops that I added some detail to to jazz them up. The first I started a while ago back here, when I did some dining table screen printing. I finally completed this one the other day by finishing the flower and stitching edges around the petals. Came up rather nicely in the end (particularly because this embellishment was inspired by the need to hide a stain that I couldn't remove.)

The second t shirt was just a plain whitey from target. I unpicked the sleeves from the top at the front and added some gathered fabric leftovers I had lying around. Then restitched the seams. The ruffle edges are raw and there are actually a couple of layers of different fabrics in each ruffle, so now that I have washed it a couple of time, it is starting to fray a little which adds to the look. I think this one is my favourite (although who knows how I am going to manage keeping it white...) as she does look especially cute in it.

Madness, a 1st birthday and blue food dye

Time flies. Christmas is just around the corner. We've had two birthdays, I've started back at work two days a week, trying (very unsuccessfully) to get organised for Christmas. I've had the flu. Not much time left for anything else.

We had our first ever 1st birthday party a week ago. It was a small affair, with plenty of good food, family and laughter. The baby (who is no longer considered a baby anymore!) got a new birthday dress for the day. (Yes, I was up till 11pm the night before finishing it, always leave everything to the last minute...) It did the trick for the beautiful sunny day that we had. The pattern was from the Ottobre Summer 09 magazine, the same Toffee Tunic as the one I made a while ago here. Except I omitted the sleeves (a time saving strategy as whilst they are cute sleeves, they took the longest to make). Here is the tunic in action, featured along with the blue icing smothered mouth and hands, after having devoured the blue layer of her piece of cake..
The cake was decorated in layers of bright coloured icing, to look like a stacking ring toy - the favourite toy at the moment. It was lovingly decorated by Camille, my sister, and received a squeal of delight (and hopefully recognition) when it was brought to the table.

And those layers were brightly coloured! All in all a great day and lots of fun.

The Christmas list has been a bit neglected (ie some projects randomly started, nothing finished), can I get focused and ready in time? Christmas, here we come!

Summer top

Time to take a break from all the baby clothes production and have some me time. I picked up some gorgeous, breezy cotton voile fabric in my wanderings last week and decided to make myself a summer top. I chose Simplicity 9270 as it was probably the simplest pattern I owned and I didn't think I would get it finished if I embarked on anything too complex. So this top was whipped up really quickly, it probably took me about 5 hours to complete (yes, I call that quickly these days...) from cutting out to final hemming, along with the contract distractions of looking after a 10 month old, plus a few other household duties, phone calls etc etc. So maybe I could be rash and say, with dedicated time, this one could be made in an hour.

It is a really simple pattern, just two pieces; a front and a back with a bit of elastic gathering at the front to give it some shape. No zippers, no buttons (no button holes), no darts or easing, no sleeves to fit. Just a few seams and hems and I was wearing it and happy! The pattern did call for a facing on the neckline, but I boycotted that and instead finished it with a matching binding edge which I think came up well.

I am quite happy with it, it is probably not the most flattering top in my wardrobe, however it is light and breezy, the pattern is nice and I think it will be great for summer. Perhaps there might be time for a few more before summer hits? I think this pattern would even work well for cotton jersey.

It did rather nicely matched with a denim skirt at yesterday's Melbourne Cup Day party. Both bubs and I were dressed in homemade creations with bubs wearing this summer tunic with these navy leggings.