Tree Fall

The Isabella Blouse

 

 

 

Bella and I had a big talk yesterday during the drive to see my Mum. We discussed Somalia, Syria, World War 1, Hitler, 'justified' wars, unjustified wars, money and how we all view and judge eachother. You know, the light and easy stuff!

I very much enjoy listening to how she sees the world and how her 7 year old, simplified view really does just cut through all the hyperbole and get straight to the obvious answer. I also appreciate hearing that my years of telling her that how much money we do or do not have, and how small our house may or may not be really doesn't reflect on how lucky we are.

One of the easier discussions that we had was about her clothes and the fact that she doesn't get lots of new clothes bought for her. Bella corrected me when I said this, saying that she gets new clothes all the time and that she's much luckier than her friends because she gets them made just for her and even gets to chose the colours and the fabrics (sometimes!). Then she held up her new top and said that she loves it more than anything she has ever seen in the shops.

And could she have one in yellow too.....

 

 

Poncho

I started off by measuring Bella. Then somewhere between the front room (where I took her measurements) and the kitchen (where I transferred her measurements on to the fabric) I apparently reduced the measurements almost in half.

 

Which was a happy accident for Lily!

After I'd cut the basic shape, I asked Lily to try it on, so that I could check the position of the armholes etc, but she decided that she wanted to keep it in the style of a poncho

 

 

Which is another happy accident, because I've always wanted to make a poncho.

Today though I managed to not totally cock up the measurements and made a new blouse for Bella.

Although she wants a poncho too.

 

Sundays

In an attempt to brighten things up in the inside at least, and to try to ignore the fact that neither Bella or Lily actually believe me when I say that it really is already summertime, I've spent the last week doing bits and pieces around the kitchen.

 

When it's clean and tidy, the kitchen is my favourite place to be (apart from my studio), and especially on a Sunday, when I can spend the day sewing in there without feeling guilty for hiding away from everyone.

Today was one of those days when my studio is almost unworkable and my kitchen was looking all bright and sunny, so bit by bit I moved the studio downstairs. When Lily asked if I was going to have the kitchen too I pointed out to her that once upon a time, I used to have the largest room in the house as my studio. Until of course, my babies insisted on not being babies anymore and demanded actual space to play and sleep and grow in.

Lily being Lily, pointed out that it was very silly of me to have given up so much space and that if I'd kept the big room I wouldn't need to take over the kitchen too.......

....she speaks the truth, Ruth.

Kangeroooooooo!

This year Bella has had a teacher that she's really connected with. He's been very kind to her, especially when she's had wobbles about her skin making her look different and in particular when she's been worrying about her Nana. Having been to 9 different schools myself and having suffered through many a bad teacher, I am distinctly aware of just how important and inspiring a good teacher can be.

Which is why I'm really sad that today Bella has said goodbye to him, to move on up to big (Junior) school. But it's also why I was quite happy to go a little further than normal for the teacher's gift.

 

After much discussion (and at the very last moment, because she's nothing if not my child), Bella decided that she wanted me to make a kangeroo and joey to give to her Australian born teacher. As well as wanting to give him something that reminded him of home, she wanted to give him a present that his baby son would appreciate and loved the idea of the Joey being specifically for the baby to play with.

Because I only had two days to come up with something, I started by looking at an existing pattern that I have in a Japanese craft book. But quickly realised that I didn't like the way it was constructed and the final shape. So I ended up drawing a very basic pattern with a less complicated form and a pouch big enough for the baby kanga.

I used a white and orange linen for most of the construction, and lined the pouch with an organic natural towelling. For the Joey, because I wanted it to be extra cuddly I used the natural chenille.

Next time around I want to simplify it even more (I prefer the shape of the baby Kangeroo to that of the mother) as well as doing a mid sized mother and baby (this one is pretty large). My first attempt at the baby kanga came out too big to fit in the pouch, but is the perfect size for a smaller version of the set.

Both Bella and Lily showed their highest level of praise by demanding a mother and baby Kangaroo for themselves, so although it still needs tweaking, I think it worked out ok.

And hopefully her teacher agreed (and didn't think it was a bloomin' strange present to get!!).

Summer, Summery, Sunny, Sun

 

New colours for the summer. Although I'm fairly sure that the recession has meant that the UK can't afford an actual summer this year! It can be the only explanation for the complete lack of anything that even remotely resembles summer or sun!

Assuming though that the sun is or will shine again, somewhere around the world, I have made some new brightly coloured blouses out of a really beautiful silky checked cotton.

 

 

The orange check has more texture than the blue check, but is just as light and summery (by repeating the words 'summer', 'sun', 'summery' etc I'm hoping I can wish Summer into existence!).

 

 

 

The blouses come in a green check and a pink check too, which are both also very summery!! Summery, summery, summery!!

For those of you not in the UK, who think I'm just being all British about the weather, have a Google at what our weather's been like in the last month - hailstones, tornado's, flash floods, torrential rain. Craziness!

The blouses are here and here.

Space

I spend most of my time in my studio. It's a tiny space, but it's full of things that make me happy, even when it's as messy as it is right now.

I've shown pictures of it before, but mostly when it's organised and tidy. Because it's such a small space, I do try and keep it as sorted as possible, so that I can work effectively without constantly having to move things around. And after every show or workshop I give it a proper tidy and clear out.

The top picture is work ready to be sent to a stockist, along with fabrics that I'm using at the moment. I always end up with huge piles of fabric, balancing on the end of my ironing board. And invariably it ends up toppling over many, many times before I finally put it away or use it up.

 

My desk usually has my sewing machine, my overlocker, my tv and my MacBook on it, as well as all my current paperwork, my notebooks, my order forms and bits of fabric, piping and half finished work.

 

I keep the majority of my fabric in three glass fronted cupboards that run along one wall of the studio. I stack all my quilters cottons and shirtings by colour and then stack all my Liberty lawns together, and my jerseys, flannels and solids all together.

A few times a year I sort through the cupboards and take out prints that I haven't used for a couple of years, or just don't like anymore and either give it away or (and this is much more likely) pack it away and store it in the attic. The sorting of cupboards is usually accompanied by me saying over and over again that my room is too small and it. will. not. all. fit. in!

When I was mainly quilting or making cushions, I rarely prewashed my fabrics, because I always wash and tumble dry a finished quilt and like it to shrink slightly to give it that lovely wrinkled look. But now that I mainly make clothes, I always prewash and tumble dry everything, including all my linen.  This not only helps wash out any sizing, making the fabrics softer, but also preshrinks the fabric, so that I can be confident that when I make a size 2-3 years, it will stay a size 2-3 years (if cared for properly). I always have high hopes of pressing the fabric before I put it away, but rarely actually do it, so it tends to sit on my ironing board (which is permanently up) in a pile until I get round to folding it and putting it away unironed.

I keep new fabrics on the end of my ironing board, partly because I can never find any room to put them away without a major jiggle of my existing collection, and partly because I (and I'm suitably ashamed of this) often forget what I have unless I keep it on view.

 

I'm terrible for letting my desk get out of control and often end up losing important documents, fabrics, scissors, pins and patterns under the piles of fabric scraps, notebooks and unfinished work that is frequently strewn across it. But I love the fact that I can manage to fit everything on to a 1.5 x 1 metre table. If I had more space, I swear I would just end up making more mess!

 

 

It's hard to show how small the room is and how much I manage to fit in (mainly due to the wonder of Ikea!) in these images, but I love how cocooned I feel in here. This is the room that I heard the news about Mum, and this is the room I return to day after day, to relax in as well as work in. It's also the room that both my girls come, to sit on the floor and draw pictures or 'design' quilts, or to steal my chair and watch the Simpsons when they think I'm not looking.

This is very much my space, and I'm very lucky to have somewhere that I don't have to share, that is full (too full) of things that make me happy.

If you have shared pictures of your studio, please leave a link so that I can see that I'm not the only messy worker out there! I'll even look if your studio is tidy, but I'll tut while doing it!

New stuff

 

Jim and I both agree that we love this outfit so much, we're almost tempted to have another little girl! The blouse is made out of a print from Anna Griffin's Pinelope collection and is a lovely combination of gold and silver grey. And the trousers are made from a beautiful grey swiss dot fabric. Annoyingly, I'm finding it impossible to photograph - it's not nearly as dark as it looks here and has beautiful detail with the little raised dots. It feels almost like a cheesecloth and has a lovely drape.

The other blouse is made from a linen that has been dyed to look a little like shibori fabric, although really it just looks like someone's been very careless with an ink pen!

 

I got the gold/grey print from The Fat Quarter Shop and I bought the ink dyed fabric and grey swiss dot from a local shop called Fabworks (my favourite local mill shop that is a real treasure trove).

The blouse and trousers are available in my Etsy shop now. But if you're anywhere near the Winchester Pop Up Shop, I've also just sent down a whole new batch of blouses and trousers in lots of different prints.

Changes

 

The way I buy fabric has changed in the last year. When I first started sewing, I concentrated on patchwork and tended to buy smaller lengths of fabrics, with one yard being my average buy. This meant that I was able to buy lots of different prints, which in turn meant that I kept up to date with all the new collections and designers out there.

 

 

These days because I mainly make childrens clothes, I tend to buy an awful lot more yardage, so that I have enough of one print to make, for example, one blouse in 6 sizes.

As well as the quantity changing, my tastes have changed. Where I used to love all the different heavily patterned fabrics out there, I now tend to be drawn towards much more basic prints. With lots of less identifiable checks, spots and solids.

The downside to this though is that because I no longer buy lots of different prints I'm a lot less in touch with what's out there. Although of course there will always be prints out there that I just can't resist.

 

In this case it's the Quilt Block collection by Ellen Lucket Baker, which is just stunning, especially the hexagon prints. But I still only bought a yard of this, whereas I bought 4 yards each of the checks, because the checks are much more useful for dressmaking and they are fair less identifiable as someone elses print, and much easier to turn in to a design that is identifiable as mine.

We did it!

 

Bella did it! And she was fantastic the whole way around. After a week of chest problems, she managed to run far more of the 5K than I thought she would, and walked the rest at a great pace.

 

 

The best thing was that as soon as we finished (and she managed a sprint across the finishing line) she said that she wants to do it again. And next year she wants to start with the joggers and jog the whole 5k and then the year after she wants to start with the runners and try and win it! 

 

 

I am very proud of Bella and very proud of Lily, who cheered us on and hugged us and clapped until I thought her arms might drop off, even though she wanted to do it with us (next year).

I'm also proud of my Mum, who said she wished she had been able to do it with us. And who obviouly doesn't realise that out of all of us, she made the biggest effort today. But I realise it. I know how much effort it took.

Thank you Mum.  We love you.