Dresdan Plate Quilt Topper

I feel like every time I say we don't need any more quilts I take an actual look and then lo and behold I'm like we need another quilt.

I mean technically we don't NEED another quilt but I like making them and when you've done a school run in the rain everyone just wants their own blanket to cuddle up with.....including the dog.

Fun Fact: The dog is currently in possession of 4 small quilts and 1 lap quilt. Shes spoiled I know.

And Lil man has recently informed me that his boat quilt is babyish and he also needs a new one. Maybe something with footballs or Mario. 

I've been getting around my whole "we don't need more quilts thing" by making new quilt patterns. Which means I get to have fun and test my skills!

I've never made a dresdan quilt before and I've admired them for a long time.  

The fabric came from the craft cotton company its from their new geo fat quarter range. I was lucky enough to receive one in each of the colours, blue, purple and pink. 

I kept each plate to a specific colour. I made 2 plates using all the fabrics and two using just two of the fabrics each. 

The centre circles are using the most low volume fabric in the pack, luckily these are all pretty similar in all the colour ways so I;m hoping to also use them for the binding. 

That is when I've found something to back it with and quilted it. I'm waiting for my local home and bargains to start stocking cheap fleece quilts again so I can use those for backing. 

I appliqued each of the plates onto squares of pink from my stash. Technically its dressmaking material but its cotton and its a shade of pink I'd never wear so I might as well use it for this!!! 

Then each of the blocks is bordered with either dark blue or white. I did want to boarder them all in the same colour but I had fabric restrictions sooooo.............. 

I actually really really like how it turned out. Its a bit more girlie than I thought it would be, but its kind of nice to have girlie things in a mainly boy household.

I did struggle with how to place the blocks though. I had wanted it to look random but I don't think I succeeded. Its not bothering me enough to unpick it all though!  

I might add one last big boarder to the whole thing before I quilt it but I need to work out what fabric to use first. 

By the way if you want to try your hand at this I have written a lil tutorial for the craft cotton company you can find it here. 

I actually took these photos on the the last few decent days of summer we had.

In fact I'm really really missing the summer. On Thursday me and lil man had to walk in the torrential rain and it was NOT fun at all. In fact when we got home we dried off and just put our pjs on and I had a massive grump about being cold and wet and grumpy. To be honest this always happens when it gets colder , as much as I love the Christmas and snow the whole being cold every day and having wet feet makes me just a lil bit miserable!

I'm currently looking for suggestions on how to perk myself up! Any ideas?????

Much Love

Frankie

xx 

My Sewing Related Birthday Gifts!

I've just sat down to type this and realised I haven't photographed two of my crafty related presents because I'm a moron. So in the interest of me not going back downstairs my friends Steve and Ellie also got me some wool and a book on embroidered flowers! 

So it was my birthday on Saturday!!!!! Yay I kept it pretty low key this year, we had drinks with friends on Friday and then the Saturday was mainly relaxing and eating pizza. I was planning on seeing my mum and dad on the Monday BUT i woke up feeling really under the weather and cancelled and instead they came this morning! 

Which works well for two reasons 

1. If i felt ill today they could take lil man to school for me,

2. I got to see them!

As it goes I felt a lot better this morning so after we had dropped lil man off, we walked the dog and went for a lil look in our local shopping centre and had tea and cake. I went for chocolate fudge cake and mum chose carrot cake, which I refuse to think of as a cake because it has carrots in so its more of a five a day thing.....

Anyway here's what they got me. Everything is from my previous "gift for sewists post" so I'm not going to put links here because I don't want to be googling how much things cost. 

Scissors! 

Ive already had these out the box and they seem pretty good! Naturally they will be featuring on one of my scissor review blog posts! 

Finally a tshirt to wear with all of my me made skirts!!! Cannot wait to wear this! 

Wrist ruler! I have wanted one of these for absolutely ages!!! I've had it on all day and I can happily report that its comfortable to wear and  the measurements are accurate.

 It is however an absolute pain in the backside to take pictures of your own hand without it looking like a claw! So I ended up holding some scissors! 

Button gauge, I mean an actual freaking button gauge! *Immediately runs to make all the things with buttons!*

I've not really been in the mood for sewing at the moment but getting these gifts has given me some motivation to get stuff done and to start making things again! I mean I can;t leave all that fabric languishing in a cupboard now can I? It'll get lonely and think no one loves it! 

Whats the best sewing gift you've ever received ????

Much Love 

Frankie 

The Origami Dress - New Look K8144 - In linen

I made this ages ago. and by ages I mean I took these pictures on my old camera before my hair was pink. 

so yeah they are old. 

The pattern is K8144 by new look. Its one of those patterns where the cover art is just baffling. 

I dunno maybe its just me but I think the dress is really really bright! 

It originally came free with a copy of sew magazine but I got my copy from my mums friend sue. 

After looking at the pattern drawings I realised that I really like the front pleated section and thought it might be nice to make it up in some of this blue linen I had lying around. 

As it goes I didn't have quite enough of the blue linen so I had to use some left of black for the belt, shoulder sections and the facings. 

I didn't like the belt that came with the pattern so I add some waist ties into the side seams. I made them quite long to create a sort of obi effect. I think it worked really nicely and I much prefer my belt to the one on the pattern.

Fit wise the top half okay but it is a bit tight on the hips. Annoyingly is not so tight that I'll rip open the side seams for more wiggle room. Instead its just tight enough that if I cut out the donuts then it will probably fit better..... I don't want to cut out the donuts though so *shrugs* . [actually thinking about it I made this dress before we even had Polly so at least four months ago and I have been going on a walk twice a day since getting her so I may have slimmed my hips down a bit! I'll have to try it one.] 

The origami bit at the front is created by cutting and folding the fabric. Which took me quite a while to get my head around and made me a bit tense. Well its not very often you cut directly into the front of your dress is it.

Because of the folded detail the entire front is cut flat instead of on the fold. This did mean I had to do a bit of pattern jigsawing to get everything to fit.  

Note to self - linen likes to wrinkle. Which I did know but sweet Jesus it really does like to wrinkle up doesn't it! I have a black dress in linen that I absolutely love but if I'm going somewhere in the car I have to hitch my skirts right up to keep them as flat as possible so I don't look messy when I get to where ever I'm going. [she says like she goes anywhere more interesting than mcdonalds and Lil mans school]

On this picture you can see how tight it is across the hips. I'm hoping this was just because I was full of Easter chocolate. I really really don't want to have to unpick the side seams.  

I like the fact that I can tie it at the front and the back but I think I prefer it with the ties at the front because they shield any muffin top issues I may be having. 

To add them in I just cut four long rectangles, sewed them into tube and then inserted them into the side seams.

I actually don't hate this picture of my bum to be honest. 

So I guess I'm off to try this on to see if I need to let out the side seams and amend my pattern pieces or if I just need to get some spanx! 

Much Love Frankie 

x

My First Sew Over It Cami

It always amazes me how some indie pattern companies because royalty in the sewing world, Tilly and the buttons, grainline studios and of course Sew over it.

And if we are gonna be honest Lisa Comfort of sew over it would be the queen because LOL is their anything that woman can't do?

This is my first ever experience of the sew over it pattern company. As far as I know they don't have any free patterns and as I've said many times before I'm very cheap and don't like to spend money on things that aren't fabric. 

Luckily I was given this pattern during the #greatbigpatternswap I think it came free with one of the sewing magazines so naturally it didn't have any instructions. Luckily for me there was a sew along on the sew over it blog so I used that.

Fit wise I cut a size 12 as my bust size was in between a size 10 and a 12 and I'd rather I cut my pattern too big and altered it from there. For reference my bust size is 36 inches.

Fit wise I think its okay. I like the way its quite modest and doesn't gape when I bend over.

The construction is fairly simple it has an all in one facing and you attach it through the shoulders which to be completely honest is a method I absolutely hate. In future I think I'll just add in a centre back seam and then I can do the facing in my preferred way.

As it goes if i had realised I could have done my usual technique on this one because it has a centre back seam. I ended up putting in a centre back seam because I was running out of fabric and cutting both the front and the back out on the fold just wasn't happening. 

The fabric itself is this awesome skull print cotton by the craft cotton company , realistically its a bit thick for this kind of top but I'm still going to wear it just becuase i love the print. Plus I'm guessing the more I wash it the softer it will become.

I really really like the curved hem, however I am wondering if I should add a bit more length into the body just to make it a bit more flattering? 

All in all I do like the pattern but its just not very exciting is it? I'm sure I'll get a lot of use out of it though when I'm trying to use up all of my fabric scraps. 

In other news!!!

- Little man goes back to school tomorrow. SOBS. I've really enjoyed having him with me all day even if it means I can't sew. It took me back to when he was really little and it was just the two of us all day watching movies and having cuddles. On the plus side It will be nice to sew and he is really looking forward to going back. 

- Bake off is back! I actually really enjoyed the last series on channel four and dislike the last series on bbc. I guess that makes me a traitor but I'm glad its back. 

- My knitting project is nearly done [its a winter blanket for Polly, she sleeps in the kitchen and it gets pretty cold in there at night] after that I'm going to get back on track with my cardigan and then I'm going to give one of my nans vintage patterns a whirl.

And i think that's about it!

Much Love

Frankie