Smooth Sewing

 Sewed a quilt with my 201K last week - sews through the layers just perfectly! But I was getting a bit annoyed with the scratchy timber case, most of the lacquer  has worn off & it is rough in patches. Decided to do something about it today.

Gave the timber a light sand to remove the last bits of lacquer, then mixed up some ” cleaner/ restoration mixture” ( recipe from the Hand Tool Preservation Assoctiation, seen at the Lost Trades Fair. My son has used this mix to restore some hand tools found in Grandpa’s shed.)

Super impressed with how good the base looks now, and it feels soooo smooth (smells good too!)

Random Round Up featuring a dog, a bear, and a fish.

Hmm where have the last few weeks gone?heck where did March go?

So anyway, in the last few weeks - and in totally random order although I did select the photos in order, blogger has kindly mixed them all up… this is what I have been up to…

Wished The Dog a happy 3rd birthday yesterday!

Caught up with a crafty friend for a sewing challenge - draft a pattern & make  a graduation hood for her daughter’s Uni graduation next week. 3 hours & lots of laughs later we got there! One very weird shape, but came up great after she iron the bejeebers out of it! ( The bear was purchased fully dressed, but no hood)

The Dog, again.

Designed & sewed a quilt for a special retirement gift. Nearly done, just the binding to go now. Sewn up on the vintage Singer 201k

Graduation Bear, again. Hmm when I said he came fully dressed, of course that does not at all imply that he is wearing pants! 

 I drew a fish! Not a flower for a change - a brown trout, from a photo my H took of a fish he caught a while ago ( catch & release, but I’m sure some of them must have been big enough to eat …). Drawn for his birthday recently. Think I might try drawing some more fish, looks good on the brown paper.

 

Caped Crusaders

I finally got around to sorting through the big box of dress ups we have had for a LONG time, the boys having long grown out of them (and of course the eldest having moved on to Cosplay!) .  I checked in with a family member to ask if their 3 and 5 year olds would like some dress ups. The answer was yes - and particularly if there were any superhero capes. 

There was one cape - which I had put in the “ special things to keep box” because it was so very well loved and used. There was also this kid sized black one, printed with “ consumer power” & made from cheap thin stretch fabric; bought from a long gone local op shop many years ago. It was such a simple design I decided to copy it and make the kids a brand new super hero cape each. 

A quick detour on the way home from work to the fabric store in Glenroy yielded a couple of metres of  nice shiney lining fabric in some super hero shades! ( try saying that fast 3 times in a row!) 

I made one in reversible red and gold, and the second in reversible red and blue. 

We delivered them to the kids yesterday and they were quite a hit! 

 

Zinnia

 I saw some gorgeous flower photos on Kate’s lovely blog  Foxs Lane  recently. This one is called Queen Red Lime. Here is my version  compared to the original photo.

Not super happy with it, but I do enjoy the process of adding different colours and waiting for them to dry and see how it looks! Trying to improve my backgrounds - not leaving them white, adding some colour in there but still hoping for the flower to “ pop” . Played around with adding some detail & highlights with white and green gel pens, and a grey super fine liner. 

Paint box colours

I bought a few more markers recently, some from Art Shed online ( they had ale on Jo Sonja acrylic paint & I needed to replace a couple of tubes that were nearly empty, so I figured since I was already paying postage anyway…) . And I also got a couple more from an online seller. 

But more colours meant that my colour chart and marker storage needed an update!

I drew up & stamped a new chart last night, it is a bit crowded to fit onto the one sheet now! Realised too late I should have used 2 sheets of better quality paper, taped together. Oh well. And yes I got ahead of myself writing out the names & numbers in the second row and I missed one & had to white it all out! Dang it!

For storage I have the original 36 box and the lid, plus a clear box with 3 dividers I found in a $2 shop. Looking for marker storage inspiration online, I realised that I just needed to cut more dividers - and make some taller- and there would be plenty of room for all the markers plus my black & highlighting pens. I cut up an ice cream container to make the dividers, and found a basket that is the perfect size to hold all 3 boxes, yay!

I also found a Touch New printable colour chart, which I played around with to make it bigger ( 4 pages taped together nice I don’t have an A3 printer. I like that the colours are in families on this one. I can use my home made chart to check the names & numbers, all in number order; then the Touch New chart  to look for a particular shade more easily. Now I just need to get onto some more drawing!

 

another "special birthday" quilt

Finished another “ special birthday” quilt just before Christmas, finally got to hand it over a few weeks ago after hot weather and COVID got in the way!

Disappearing 9 patch with a bit of extra length added, super happy with the colours! 

Sewed the whole thing on my vintage Singer, handled the quilt layers sooo well, plus the extra room in the throat makes it so much easier to feed through the machine, I don’t have to roll it up in a bundle like I do with a Janome, that is a bit of a tight squeeze at times!

  I have another one in progress that I must get a move on with!

January catch up

 It’s school holidays, so I should have got a lot of sewing done…but it has been just soooo hot, I get about 15 minutes or so out in my sewing shed - with 2 portable fans on- but then have to call defeat and come back inside the house! No air con inside either, just bigger fans & insulation, which my shed does not have!

I did manage to make 2 dresses - one was cut out last year & not sewn. When I did sew it up, mostly on my vintage singer, such a dream machine to sew with!- I realised that cotton sateen is great for a skirt, but not so much for a dress. Well not this pattern anyway. A bit too stiff, too much fabric in the back. But otherwise I like the pattern & the sleeves work well. I plan to use the pattern again, just with a more drapey fabric next time.

I compared it to an op shop scuba fabric type dress I have, which I added some darts to & shaped the sides a bit; drew sone lines on & added a bit of shaping. It does look better now ( I do like the print!) but I have not worn it again yet to get a photo. Bit annoyed I cut the front out in 2 pieces - it was supposed to have a centre split at the neckline, but I decided not to include it.At least the pattern is busy enough the front centre seam is not too  noticeable.

It fits over my head with a wiggle, and the classic tip ( leant from my Mum & Nana) to put a silk scarf over your head to cover your hair & make up before putting a dress on over your head! 

The second dress is my favourite basic A- line - I may have about 4 or 5 of these now! 

Can’t remember if the fabric was an op shop find, or maybe from Super Cheap fabrics just before they closed the Brunswick store. Has a nice 60’s vintage vibe, hence I added patch pockets instead of my usual side pockets. The fabric has a tendency to fray, so I overlocker all the edges first before sewing it together; this allowed me to simply turn the overlocker edges in & stitch them down for a super quick neck and arm finish. Tempted to add a white PeterPan collar, but that might be just too much! Have not worn this yet as I only finished the pockets yesterday, will be wearing it tomorrow.