VW split screen barn door!

This was one of my commissions over Christmas! 

It was ordered by my mum and comes from a private family joke.

Which obviously I'm now going to share with the entire internet! 

Once upon a time myself and momma and poppa Knitwit were traveling in France. We happened to go to the beach for the day and soon realised that French women in particular quite like wandering around with tops on, or coats, or bras. 

Anyway boobs were swinging merrily in the breeze (not mine or mommas, but other ones) when suddenly my mum noticed my dad's gaze being pulled in one particular direction. She allowed it to continue for a moment (only human after all) then decided it was being drawn too much and threatened to chop his winky off (I actually can't remember what she said so that's fiction but she wasn't happy) 

Anyway bless him my lovely daddy turned round and replied , "what? That's a vw split screen barn door? They are really rare? Of course I'm not looking at her!" And then he finished the whole charde off by tutting and saying " looking at her? She's got nah tits!" 

And since then the sighting of a split screen barn door VW campervan has become quite a big thing in our family! Hence me making this doorstop! 

There's not really much more I can say about this after that cracking tale, it's got a personalised number plate and a "no tits" sign in the window! I sewed the entire thing by hand and had to use a bread knife to cut the foam.

I had great fun making it and I can't wait to start another! 

Much love

And sorry if this was too much information!

Frankie

Xxx

It's time to undeck your halls now!

I'm joking even I don't usually take my decorations down until after new year!

But merry Christmas! It's been! Santas been! It's over! It seemed like four weeks of stressing and organising ended after a lovely 24 hours (more on that in a bit) and then I crashed! 

Yep after two weeks of nursing lil Knitwit through his virus it hit me like a tonne of bricks! (I'm assuming it was the 25th time he sneezed in my face that finally did it) 

So yeah my Boxing Day went like this: 

8:30 - get up with lil Knitwit make breakfast (guzzle paracetomal)

9:30ish - mr knitwits parents and grand parents get up , they take pity and send my back to bed.

12:00 get back out if bed after sleep, guzzle more paracetamol, sit of kitchen floor when the room starts spinning

1:00 second roast! (I had two Yorkshires and a few roasties) help clear table then back to bed! 

4:30 get up (again) paracetamol (again) lie on sofa, and tell everyone I'm dying. 

6:30 bath lil Knitwit, eats a sausage roll and then yeah you guessed it! Back to bed! 

11:00 go downstairs to heat up my wheat bag again then back to bed

12:30 take all bed covers of mr Knitwit, tell him he's horrible not to let me have them all when I'm so cold, he feels my forehead BOOM! Fever!

1:30 wake mr Knitwit up (whilst sobbing hysterically) beg him to take me home. He calms me down and explains that he's had too much to drink and that the roads are still full of accidents from the days snow (apparently that happened when I was in bed!) promises we can go as soon as he wakes up

Next day- get up, packs bags, gets in car, passes out, gets home, takes temp (volcanic) had to phone my mum to say I wouldn't be round for her family day, more sobbing, bed, lil Knitwit sneezed all over bed sheets, strip bed then back to mine ! 

Yeah so fun! I'm over the worst now, just a sore throat and lots of nose blowing to contend with! 

But back to actual Christmas and my presents! 

As always I only really share my crafting related presents and this year I was properly spoiled! 

This was off mummy and daddy! It's a new dressmakers mannequin! (Which me knitwits built for me on the 27th to cheer me up, and positioned at the end of the bed, needless to say after waking up and seeing a looming white figure I thought my fever was back!) momma and poppa knitwit have earned some serious parenting points with this! 

This was from my lovely big sister and her husband! I've started it already and I'm loving it! I've admired Vivienne Westwood for years! Still can't quite believe she met the queen without knickers! I would never do that! Prince Harry maybe, but not the queen! 

I also revived this book from my sister and her hubby! (from mum and dad! forgive me I had flu!) It's full of rather funny newspaper articles about women in the 1930s and some of the photographs are stunning! 

I also got two pretty awesome presents from lil knitwits godfather (he's my friend aswell but we'd never admit it!) 

Yerp that's a vintage singer your looking at! 

Oop but then what's this ? 

Another one! Needless to say lil knitwits godfather is welcome to come round and have a brew whenever he wants! What a gem! (More on this machine later)

I honestly got some awesome presents this year! And it's great to see how well people know me! I got two owl bags! And three microwaveable wheat things, (apparently I'm always cold!) 

And I also got this lil guy 

Meet ronnie! Who's been living in our shed for the past two weeks! 

Isn't he the cutest! 

Anyway I'm going to go and try and shift the last of this cold/flu thing! And then hopefully I'll have the energy to blog about all the cool Christmas commissions I did! 

Much love

A super spoiled 

Frankie

Xxx

Christmas round up!

Okay so I thought is do a round up of my best moments from the past year / when I started blogging!

Kinda like the oscars but the knitwits version! 

Best knitted item!

It has to go to yoda! I still beam with pride whenever I see pictures of this! Especially since I did it without a pattern! 

Proudest Garment!

I made a skirt! An actual functioning skirt! Seriously I'm amazed at myself! 

Best embroidery! 

What can I say, I loved doing it and I love how it turned out! 

Most used item! 

This is a tie between these two items my margot pjs (with pocket) and my kimono! If I'm not wearing one it's usually because I've changed into the other! 

Best Cushion! 

I love this! And I can't wait to do more of these next year! 

Best Artwork!

It's got to be the Michael Schumacher i did for my mum! Another stupidly proud moment! 

Best butterflies in your tummy moment! 

This is also a tie! 

Seeing these albums still makes my heart skip a beat! I can't believe that something I drew is on an album! And that album had been brought by people! And those people now have my work in their homes! MIND BLOWN! 

And 

I didn't think I'd have enough stock, I didn't think anybody would come and I didn't think i'd sell anything! I'm do proud of myself for doing a craft fair and I'm definitely going to do more next year! Even if I have to force myself! 

And finally! 

Best owl!!!!!

I dunno I just think he's a cutie pie!

Anyway I don't know when I'll next write, but I'll definitely be doing some resolutions/planning for the new year! 

 And just think soon it will be my blogs birthday! 

So thank you to everyone who's been reading and commenting! I hope to see you all again next year! 

Much love 

Frankie

Xxx

Thanks a minion!

Okay so it's kind of a vague title!

Basically I was asked to make a minion for a friends niece! Now I've seen the movie despicable me and I've got to say it's not my favourite films in the world! In fact I would say it falls short of most of the films from my childhood, toy story, monsters inc etc. But saying that the minions are darn cute! 

Here's what I came up with! There was a lot if consultation regarding the amount of eyes etc! (Hey it's a tough call!) but I like the little guy! I also opted to put a "c" on the chest as opposed to a "g" as the recipients name starts with a "C". I love being able to do personal touches like that! 

As usual I used no pattern and just knitted from my head, but I can't remember if this ended up as a doorstop or a plushie! 

Anyways back to the title! After it was finished I sent to lady a picture and she said "thanks a million" and I said "don't you mean thanks a minion?!!"

Hahaha! 

Just me? 

Well I thought it was funny! 

Much love 

Frankie

Xxx

Tia the season to be .... Stupidly busy?

Having a small child at Christmas is rather like having a kissing booth manned by Johnny Depp, Brad Pitt and George Clooney.... Everybody wants to visit!

No seriously at the moment we are scheduling on average two to three visits per day! As well as a birthday party yesterday! (I wore my skinny clemence and it went down very nicely indeed) and the delivering and wrapping of our own presents! And usually we finish up the day by crawling into bed! 

But that leaves no room for sewing or knitting! I'm actually going stir crazy! I think the first opportunity I'm going to have to knit something is going to be Christmas Day! (I'll do it , you think I won't but I will! I'll have my turkey and then this lil lady is getting her knit on! )

Anyway this means I have very little to share, (apart from my amusing kissing booth anecdote, which you can borrow by the way!) and this...

This is a small section of my mums christmas tree! And here we have the stocking I made for her, the hoop I made for my dad and a snowflake Lil Knitwit made at nursery! 

I love my mums tree it's so full of memories 

Much love! 

And if I don't blog again 

MERRY CHRISTMAS! 

Frankie

Xxx

A skinny Clemence!

Okay so I should probably start by telling you I'm stupidly proud of this project!

After making a toile of the Megan dress from love at first stitch and realising that the fit is dammed near perfection I decided that I didn't want to invest anymore time into it until I was making it in a beautiful fabric. (I'm hoping Santa might send some pennies my way to help this come true!)

This meant I was left with nothing to sew! YIKES! 

So I moved onto the next pattern in the book , the Clemence skirt! This is the pattern in love at first stitch that you draft yourself, so I carefully took my measurements and made up my pattern! 

Next I needed to choose fabric, and I thought to myself how lovely would it be to use the fabric I won from handmade janes/dragonfly fabrics giveaway yonks ago! 

As you can see it's fairly stunning! It's called "field study" by Anne Marie Horner .However I only had a very very very! Small amount if it! (Due to using most of my winnings on another fabric!)

Anyway I realised fairly quickly that no amount of magic, prayer or ritual sacrifice would make my pattern pieces fit! 

So I sat down with a pencil and paper and worked out the measurements for a "skinny" clemence! 

I decided I'd make the skirt out of this fabric because well for starters it's so darn pretty and secondly it was sat there looking at me! 

Here's my marked pattern pieces according to my technical maths stuff!

And the waistband I cut from a scrap if fabric from a recent (top secret) project! It's actually A dammed good match! 

Sewing French seams! And being that I'm super sad, I say "ooh la lah" after each one! Yes sometimes I even make myself cringe! 

Evenly distributing gathers! 

Waistband on! Now for the zip! 

Insert swearing here! 

Bloody thing went in wonky! Needless to say I ripped it out and re stitched! (Quite proud actually old Frankie would have left it)

And yay a "skinny" clemence! So it doesn't have to beautiful big gathers of Tilly's original but I love it all the same! 

I did three rows of stitching to make a feature hem! 

I had two goes at stitching in the ditch! The first time I might have well be stitching air! 

But I am proud of that zip! My first one using an actual zipper foot (no idea how I coped before!) 

So all in all I love this skirt it's beautiful, it has a crazy print and it's some of my best work to date! I fact I love it that much I'm going to wear it to a birthday party on Saturday! Weather allowing! (Please prepare yourself for photos of me rocking this beauty!)

Now I still can't wait to start my actual proper clemence , but I think I'm going to do mimi blouse first (I have the idea for a lil set in my head!) 

Much love

Frankie

Xxx

P.s if someone wants to send me two metres of this fabric if love to make the full skirted version! 

Hammies!

Okay so I actually made the tailors hams! They are not exactly what I wanted but I'm please with how they turned out! 

First I consulted the pattern I found on Google!

Next I gathered some scrap fabric and started cutting! (Freehand! Ain't nobody got time for actual pattern peices!) 

Until I ended up with two sets of these ! 

Next I stitched and stuffed and stitched again and Voila! 

Two tailors hams (that look a bit more like tailors sausages!) for me and my big sister! Now we should be set for starting to make our coats! After we've both cut the pattern that is! 

A few things about this project:

• if I did them again I'd do them fatter!

• I stuffed them with a mixture of stuffing and scrap fabric, they look a lil lumpy but I'm hoping it will smooth out! 

• I was very carefull to choose fabrics that would be okay when ironed! 

•I hand sewed the bottoms shut

• the floral print is my sisters (I so should have done this as an Xmas present!) and the striped one is mine (I didn't catch the edge properly so this one already needs some TLC

Anybody else made any sewing time savers? 

Much love

Frankie 

Xxx

Alternative decorations!

After the success of the mini Christmas stocking I made for my mum from lil Knitwit, it was politely suggested that maybe grandad needed something to?

Now after doing a whole batch of stockings earlier this month, a stocking was not happening! 

And my dad isn't a huge Christmas person either, so I opted for darth vader! (I don't know if my dad has any particular love for darth but it was a nickname from work that stuck! Something to do with him being evil!) 

Stitch stitch stitch! 

And voila! An embroidery hoop Christmas decoration for grandad from lil Knitwit! 

(And yes dad if your reading it will be with you shortly!)

Much love

Frankie

Xxx

Ham

Now I don't mean ham, ham I mean a tailors ham! 

Like this! Apparently they are super useful for ironing out seams and shoulder heads!

I don't actually have one (sad face) but I've been wondering for a while if I should get one? Well at least I was until I saw this pattern online! 

So I backed away from my amazon account (and my purse let out a sigh of relief) and tried to work out if it would be do able!? 

I should probobly mention my main reason for wanting a tailors ham is becuase me and my sister are making coats and I have a feeling that anything that makes the process easier is worth having ! 

It would also mean I could make us one each (after all what are baby sisters for?) 

Actually I think I might try and accomplish this tommorrow! And who knows after this I might find myself with a need for a tailors sausage! Oh not that kind you filthy animals! Stop laughing! 

Although saying that..... Patrick Grant? 

Much love

Frankie

Xxx

Sleepy owl nearly finished!

Okay so this post is going to be a bit of a mash up! For starters we have this...

I finished the stitching on my owl embroidery, and I kind of like it? I think it needs a little bit of something so I'm going to start adding beads ASAP! 

I also had 50 sheets of tissue paper delivered so I can start tracing the Megan dress from love at first stitch! Now I just need to get my hands on the correct length of zip and I can make a start! 

We made cookies using a recipient from the disney sweets and treats magazine, but we substituted the nuts, raisins and more nuts, for chocolate, chocolate and more chocolate! 

Oddly enough they look just like the cookies my mum makes. 

And I parcelled up some deliveries! 

This pictured doesn't show on of my cushions that I sold on etsy last week. 

Nothing makes me happier than seeing piles of these tissue wrapped orders! 

Much love 

Frankie 

Xxx