Great British Sewing Bee - Tea Dress

I really loved watching The Great British Sewing Bee earlier this year, and when my Mum asked if I'd like a copy of the book they brought out, I jumped at the chance to get hold of some new patterns to try (Thanks Mum!). It's a lovely book, and has step by step instructions for a number of techniques, from the most basic like sewing straight seams, to more advanced such as fitting invisible zips, buttonholes, attaching bias binding, and using boning (amongst others).

The projects in the book are a range of really nice, simple, classic items, and I am planning to make at least 4 of them. I decided to start with the Tea Dress, which is labelled as a level 2 pattern, so for someone like me who has made a few things before, should be fairly straightforward. One teeny drawback is that the patterns need to be either blown up on a photocopier by 500% or downloaded and printed from the website. This particular pattern printed 34 pages, all of which have margins to cut out. Bit of a tip here (which I only discovered with 5 sheets to go when my boyfriend suggested it) - don't cut all the margins off. Use the margin to lay the next square onto, and cut the side margin of the next square which will lay on top of the margin, and can be used to line the squares up. I know I'm not explaining this well though, so just go with whatever you find easy!

A few weeks ago I had experimented with a Full Bust Adjustment on a pattern, but due to illness I was unable to complete the project, and then had no need of that particular garment, so this seemed the ideal opportunity to put my new skill to the test. A Full Bust Adjustment (or FBA), is a useful technique for any lady whose bust is larger than a B cup, which is the cup size most patterns are designed for. I followed the technique shown on Lazy Stitching because I found that I could do it from the pictures alone. To do this on my dress, I made a horizontal cut across the waistline, and then once I'd done the adjustment I taped the pieces back together and drew a diagonal line from the underarm point to the original waistline point. It might look very odd at this point, but trust me, it works!

I used the instruction sections of the book to help with insertion of the invisible zip, and although the first attempt was a bit bodged (I was rushing as dinner was late and I had a hungry boyfriend to feed), the second attempt was almost perfect, and certainly the best attempt I've ever done.

I spent two evenings prepping, and an afternoon and evening stitching, and I have to say I'm rather pleased with the end result. 

Me in my lovely new dress, squinting into the Manchester sunshine!

Oh, and the gorgeous fabric is from B&M Fabrics on Leeds Kirkgate Market.Gorgeous pink with tiny white bows, and beautiful grey and turquoise hummingbirds. An absolute bargain (as is all the fabric here) at a total cost of £13.50!

5 things for 2013

I have borrowed the idea for this post from my friend Helen, who's blog you can read here. Helen has been writing some blogs recently about the 5 good things that have happened to her recently, and this format really inspired me. Rather than copy it directly, I thought I'd use it here to look forward to 2013 and log some of my *whisper it* "resolutions". 

I know some people are not really big fans of resolutions, or using the New Year to re-evaluate what's going on, so if this is you, you might not want to read on. Personally I think that any time of year is great to do this, but a new calendar year just feels like a good excuse to do it. It also gives you a fixed timeframe to look back on to see how you got on.

So. What do I intend to refresh or start this year? Well...

1. Get healthier.

Yeah, yeah, I know. This is pretty standard, and probably the one I will fail at the most. But hey, I felt I should give it a go at least. I have put weight on this year. Quite a bit of weight. This I realised when I saw this photo of myself taken at Andy's graduation. Not good. 

Me and Andy. Absolutely horrified by this pic so it's my inspiration shot for this weightloss attempt. 

Plan is: carry on cooking yummy things from BBC Good Food Magazine, cut out "little treats", and try new things from Nadia Sawalha's new book Greedy Girls Diet ; exercise more. (Oh and Andy's doing it too, so I have some moral support). Wish me luck.

2. Crafting

I love craft. In particular I love sewing, and more recently knitting and crochet. So my crafty resolution(s) is/are to carry on with more. I need to get back to sewing clothes (not done any since July); knit some more including learning how to knit cables, finish my knitted waistcoat, and knit a gorgeous jumper I found in this months Let's Knit! magazine. I also have some baby stuff to do for this years crop of new little people; and I need to carry on my crochet blanket. I've only got 10% done so far, and I need this to be more by the end of the year or I'll lose the will to finish it!

My knitted waistcoat so far! 

3. Baking

I have been running a small business doing cakes for the last 18 months or so. It's been fun, but it's not really bringing in enough money to make it worth my while. So, my business will close at the end of this month. I will still happily do cakes for people, but it just won't be through my business (if you know me and need a cake/cupcakes then please do ask!). One day when I have more time to spare at weekends, or if I'm ever lucky enough to be able to try it full time I will come back to it, so it's "au revoir" rather than goodbye!

I'm doing cakes for my lovely friends Linzi and Steve for their wedding in May, and very much looking forward to these as there'll be several different batches with more natural decorations than usual.

I'm also hoping to continue with my cake decorating classes at Trafford College in April to develop my skills further. I'm looking forward to learning to make flowers and frills and lots of other things which I can use in the future.

And I'd like to make more bread. Tying in with resolution 1, I'd like to make a good rye or pumpernickel bread, and there is a lovely looking recipe in the latest Great British Bake Off book which I'm going to try, and after I'm happy with the results from resolution 1, then maybe the doughnuts too!

4. Read more

Since I got (addicted to) my iPhone a few years ago, I have gained the habit of reading facebook, twitter, pinterest, and BBC news before I go to bed. Which has totally taken over my traditional reading time. So this year, the book is going to claim back this half hour. I've got a few books I'd like to read to begin with so I'm going to read/reread:

• The Hobbit (started already)
• A book about how sewing helped the war effort in World War II I've borrowed off Mum (can't remember the title right now)
• Something Poirot or other Agatha Christie
• Some more Philippa Gregory. Not sure where I'm up to in her chronological series' but I'll work it out. 

5. Professional development

I need to get my revalidation for Chartered status done. This is a particularly dull one I know, but I need it to be here. I've started it, but too much of resolution 2, 3, and 4 always get in the way. So I think this is a good one to end my resolution list with. 

So there it is. My plan for 2013. Oh, apart from a sneaky 5a) blog more! I have really enjoyed my blogging so far, so will carry on as much as possible this year. Hope to see you along the way!

Sewing fun from May to August

I've let the blogging slip a bit recently, but now I have a day at home I thought I'd catch up with telling you about the sewing I've done in recent months.


May: Simplicity 2599

Whenever I complete a sewing project I always upload a review of the pattern to PatternReview.com. I love this website as it's a really useful place for getting tips on patterns you're already using, or for finding the perfect pattern in the first place. 


One of the things they do as well as publishing reviews for people, is run contests throughout the year. By pure chance, this May they ran a contest at the same time as I intended to make a couple of tops from a pattern which was eligible for the contest. This was because the pattern I use the most for tops to wear to work has previously been voted a top ten pattern of the year.


Anyway, I decided to enter one of my tops, so I did. The top I entered was the one below, featuring a beautiful bird print cotton-silk mix fabric I bought (well, went halves with Mum on) at Cloth House, Soho, London. 

You can see more pictures on my project in the flickr album for the project available here. You can view the full review for this project on PatternReview.com here.


I was very proud of my efforts, and ecstatic to get 8 votes in the contest! I will definitely be entering more contests soon. Watch this space... 


The other top I made from this pattern was a slight variation on the pattern. I used the base pattern, this time with the sleeves, but instead of the ruffle front I added a pair of guipure lace collars I bought on eBay. This top is probably one of the biggest bargains of my home sewn collection - lilac polycotton £2.50, collars £3! I wear both these tops to work, and the picture below shows my lilac top taken by my friend Shareen during the lovely British heatwave back in May.

 You can read a copy of the review for this top here.


































July/August: BurdaStyle Magazine 07-2012


I didn't do any sewing in June, as I was busy crocheting (as you will know from my previous posts), but in the last two weeks I've made up for that by making a top and a dress.

The top in this photo was made especially to wear to my trip to the Olympics last weekend. (We went to women's Gymnastics and Judo, but I'll save that for another blog post...) 


The pattern was in BurdaStyle Magazine for July which was a fabulous coincidence as I'd already planned to make a top out of the official Team GB scarf from Next. I added a blue, red and white gingham sourced from the ever reliable eBay for the back and an extension to the front. 


As ever, I posted a review to PatternReview.com, which you can read here. I also have a flickr album for this top, showing some of the detail of construction.

And finally for July (and a bit of August!) I made this lovely dress:

This was made for my lovely friend Gwen's "End of the '20s" themed 30th birthday party, held at a lovely cocktail bar in Manchester last night. I searching for a long time for a pattern for a dress, and by pure fate BurdaStyle July issue had a selection of 1920s inspired dresses to choose from. I picked the godet dress, and made it over the course of the last week whilst watching the Olympics on TV.


If you want to read my review of the pattern you can find it here.

Burda Style Magazine 2011/08/112 Cape

I am a keen dressmaker, and try and make something every few months or so. My main problem is laziness and procrastination, so I find that it often takes me a few months to get going on something. Particularly with Burda Style magazine patterns.

I buy Burda Style magazine every month, unless there's nothing in there that I fancy making (it's happened once in the last year), and there are usually a few things in each issue I like. The major drawback is that these patterns need tracing, and it's such a pain to crawl around on the floor finding the right line (there are hundreds - I'll post a picture some time to show you), tracing the right line, then cutting out, pinning to fabric, cutting out the fabric etc. It's a right pain in the knees I can tell you! (Perhaps I need to invest in some knee pads...)

Anyway, this particular pattern was in the August 2011 issue, for a cape which looked gorgeous in the magazine in a lovely boucle fabric. When Mum kindly bought me my new sewing machine, we went to Leon's Fabric in Chorlton and I found a gorgeous pink and black houndstooth wool, which I thought would be perfect. I cut the pieces out in September (while watching Downton Abbey on a Sunday evening - perfect sewing time I find), but had said I would make 16 jackets for our Pom Dance team's competition in November, so had to have a break to make those. They were finished in November, and then of course it was Christmas, so I only just got time to finish my cape this weekend!

The Burda Style magazine pattern was claimed to be "Easy" and highlighted as one of the easier patterns in the magazine. However, as with many Burda Style magazine patterns this was far from true! The first part, to stich the main sections, was easy, and I got this done in no time at all. The main seams are long simple seams, with only the front two with the gap for the arm holes being any more tricky. I even managed the vent without any problems, which was a suprise as I was quite daunted by this at first.

First challenge was to work out which facing piece was the "right" side facing. The easiest way to do this was to put the cape on, and hold the facing up against the cape as it would be. I had marked the buttonholes on both pieces so either way would have been just as easy. Having identified the correct side, I stitched the four buttonholes in - dead easy as my sewing maching has an automatic buttonhole setting.

Next step - neck facing. This was a nightmare. I stitched the centre back and side back pieces together no problem, and from the picture in the magazine instructions was fairly confident that I'd got it right. However, the side pieces were nowhere near as clear, and I had to unpick these twice. It only became clear which way round the pieces should go on closer inspection of the illustration, and when I came to try and fit the neck facing to the neck. Anyway, once I worked that out it was a bit of a lightbulb moment, and I was able to attach the neck facing to the front facing, and then to the top edge of the cape (having first attached the front facings to the front edges).

From there it was a simple task to hem the cape, topstitch the facings (although wider than the 5 cm the pattern instructs due to buttonhole width - adjust as appropriate!), and stitch on the buttons.

It turns out the fabric is not actually as thick as I thought it would be, so I might try and line the cape at some point for a bit of extra wind protection, but otherwise it might be just the thing for spring/summer.

I might be tempted to do another cape out of some thicker fabric, although given the bulk of the interfaced facing pieces this might not work. Alternatively, I'll take this as a good first effort at outerwear, and move on to something a little more challenging.