Unicorn Sweatshirt! Fabric by Adam Ross

Its no secret that I LOVE unicorns!! I have mugs and scarves and teddies [Fun Fact: When we first got together Rikki won me a Unicorn on hook a duck at the local fair and I still have it. ]

So when Adam Ross asked me if I'd in doing a fabric review on their website I was like YES! And then when I saw that they had unicorns I did a little happy dance because UNICORNS!!!!! 

The fabric itself is a sweatshirt type fabric in a medium weight. It comes in this charcoal grey with pale pink unicorns and white with pink unicorns. FYI the unicorns are glittery!! 

One thing I really like about the website is that underneath the pictures of the fabric it has a list of fabric properties, a list of sewing suggestions and then a list of suggestions of things to make. I've not seen that sort of level of detail on a fabric website before and I'd imagine it would be really useful to someone who doesn't have a lot of experience with sewing or who might want some ideas of what to make with a fabric they love. 

The fabric is £12.49 a metre which is what I sort of expect to pay for a quality sweatshirt material. But I do like that the fabric is sold by the metre very often now fabrics are sold by the half metre and I always end up getting confused and ordering too little. 

I used a prima pattern to make mine but it's very similar to the linden pattern by grainline studios. I added some piping to the shoulder seams to break up the print a bit but stupidly used a fabric that's a bit too thick so my over locker was struggling. I managed to get it through but knew I'd never be able to pipe the cuffs or collar so I skipped them. I did wonder if it might look a bit weird just having the shoulders piped but my mum said it looks okay. 

Construction wise apart from using my over locker I also used my sharpest pins and made sure to double check the pattern pieces were all lying the right way around before I cut it out. I definitely didn't want any upside down unicorns!!!! 

On the above picture you can sort of see the glitter on the unicorns, which is still there after all the washes its had [about 4/5]. 

I actually made the jumper when we had all the snow because I was starting to run out of warm clothes to wear! And now its my go to snuggle jumper. I just makes me smile so much every time I reach to put it on. The inside is very soft as well so its nice to sit and relax in. 

All in all I really love this jumper. I feel like I'm reaching a point where I'm filling gaps in my wardrobe and I was in need of a cosy jumper. I'm also impressed with how well the fabric has been holding up to the constant washing and wearing, which makes me think, maybe I need one in white as well?????

In other news apparently we are going to get more snow this weekend and you know what they say snow day means sew day! 

Much Love 

Frankie 

xxx

Disclaimer, Adam Ross sent me this fabric for free but all thoughts and views are my own x

Raglan Sweater

I've been seeing Raglan jumpers all over instagram lately. Mainly because of the the #lindenswap which was happening before Christmas. 

Now I don't own the Linden pattern [which is by Grainline studios BTW]  [and I can't justify spending $16.00 on it] But I did still have a hankering for a raglan jumper so I thought it might be worth taking a dig through my patterns and seeing if there was anything I could frankenpattern........

As it goes I have a prima pattern for a raglan jumper and its a pretty good dupe! Now prima isn't every sewers choice yes you have to trace the patterns, yes the styling is quite frankly awful and yes the instructions are about as clear as mud mixed with oil. BUT they have really good bones, The patterns are simple lines and simple styles and they can be used as a great base for makes.

Which is how this came about.

FYI this particular pattern came with the may 2016 issue, so you might be able to track one down I don't know if that's an option on their website [I personally don't subscribe to Prima this was sent to me by lovely pen friend who I believe does!] 

Now I didn't follow the instructions in fact I didn't even look at them, instead I just traced off all the pieces and then used the width of the sleeves and the bottom of the jumper to create my own pattern pieces for the cuffs and bottom band. I knew I wanted the jumper to have cuffs and a bottom band to give it more of a ready to wear vibe.

Now the leaf print fabric is from abakhan and cost me £4.03 and the purple I used is a scrap from this dress and is from sew essential . I also used the purple for the piping in the raglan sleeve detail. piping I hear you say? Oh yeah guys Frankie has only gone and learned herself a new skill! Well I say piping it's more like a piece of fabric folded over and wedged in the seam, so its basically piping but with the rope part, which I guess is essentially the pipe?

Anyway I'm sidetracking, I love the piping on this as I think it helps to break up the busy print. Plus ya know PIPING! And its a lot easier than I thought once I;d worked out the seam allowances! 

Now I sewed the whole thing on my overlocker but I top stitched the seam allowances down using my twin needle on my regular machine. I'm not sure if that was completely necessary because I good iron might have persuaded the overlocked edges to stay tucked away. But I knew this was going to be one of those items that just does not get ironed ever...... So I stitched them down. 

I think the top stitching came out okay anyway so that's a bonus, I did have to use my walking foot though because things were not looking good without! 

These are some close ups of my pretty awesome piping! I actually prefer this to regular piping which sticks out a bit so I think I might add it to more things! 

So the verdict! 

When I first made it I kind of hated it, It was one of those occasions where you love the fabric in the shop but then you sew it up and your like hmmm does this suit me? 

But then it recieved the seal of approval from my mum, our friend and my husband [Who even said he thought it was shop brought] So I decided to give it a whirl! 

And now?

I LOVE IT! Seriously you cannot get a more comfortable jumper for on the school run, the poly knit fabric is thin enough to wear under a coat but thick enough to keep you warm and its just so easy to throw on! I'm not sure if I like it better than my coco hoodie hack but It definitely has the same effortless school morning vibe going on.

So I will definitely be making another one, and another one and another one!!! I want one of these for every day of the week and I'm tempted to try and make a few up with hoods and stuff and of course some more piping!

In other news! 

I've been grumpy as hell today! Which is lovely for everyone, I'm blaming the awful night sleep I've been having , if its not nightmares its waking up every couple of hours so please if you have any remedies for a good nights sleep [aside from down a bottle of jack] please let me know!

I finally brought the fleece to finish my latest baby quilt so hopefully that will be up soon! and it will be the 5th baby quilt I've gifted. I'm really loving the gifting of baby quilts mainly because it gives me a good opportunity to try out new designs and play with fat quarters! So if some people could get knocked up that would be great!

Much Love

Frankie 

xxx