keelysews... sometimes

The order is in and Jalies will be winging their way to me soon I hope. I succumbed to 6 patterns for me and Judy added 2 of her own. We both ordered the Pleated cardigan and the stretch jeans. I added the Stretch Classic trousers, the Empire Crossover Top, the Scarf Top and the Cami/Tank pattern. Now to just wait for them to arrive.

Since I saw the new Jalie patterns, I've wanted the Pleated cardigan , as well as others. Unfortunately, the cost of postage combined with the exchange rate can inflict some serious damage to the wallet. It can also lead to funny looks as you rush out every day when the postie pulls up, but that's probably a whole 'nother story. After all, why would he be at all curious about the contents of large envelopes after a slightly crazed-looking woman rushes out each morning to watch him, then grabs the envelope before he even puts it in the box....? One day I should really open one and show him the Ottobre/patterns just so he knows it's all legit, lol. But I digress. Where was I? Oh yes, unfortunately... scary costs etc. That leads us to the ' Fortunately' . Fortunately, Patternreview is having a 20% off sale for FOPR members until the end of January. I knew there was a reason I renewed (apart from not losing the catalogue of all my patterns. Believe me, after the t...

Recently my DD1 bought Dolly magazine, despite, or perhaps because of, my insistence that it was a total waste of money. (Amusingly, 2 weeks later she agrees, lol.) As she was leafing through it on the sofa, one page jumped out at me. The details are hard to see from the scanned image, but apparently the "quirky accessories" now involve pins. Snigger. And you can't see it here, but they didn't even bother putting the pin on the RHS on the back of the fabric. What gets me is that they picked this as the best photo and let it go to print?

Finally I have stopped procrastinating and finished DD2's red Ottobre jeans. This is another pair using Ottobre 06-2007 #32. (The first pair I blogged about here .) I think I cut these out about 5 or 6 months ago and in the meantime DD has grown. These are a size 140 width lengthened to 146 and DD is now 144cm (she's grown 2.5 cm in the last 5 weeks!). The length is perfect, the width... let's just say thank goodness it's stretch denim. I think I've finished these just in time if I want DD to get any wear out of them. Strangely, this pair gapes at the centre back. This can be easily fixed with a small dart in the waistband (or a belt), but it is not an issue I noticed with the first pair. I'd also forgotten that I meant to skim in the legs below the knee to make them more 'skinnified'. I used a lightweight stretch denim from Spotlight and topstitched in red. I had huge problems with the topstitching tensions about halfway through the jeans. I changed ne...

With all the kerfuffle of getting DS off on his holiday cricket trip sorted, I was going to tackle another UFO, specifically red Ottobre jeans for DD2. So I made 2 tote bags naturally. :) I figured that, for once, I should be nice to DH and clean up after one project before starting another. This meant packing away the half-dozen boxes I'd pulled out in the hunt for white fabric and thus freeing up some space in the rumpus room. As I relocated items, I came across a piece of denim. I don't know why, but this denim just screamed to be a tote bag. A really impractical tote bag, considering the denim is very, very pale, but hey, it's been there so long I can't remember when and why I bought it, or how much it cost. I'm sure in stash rules that makes it free fabric, right? Lo and behold, there was enough to make 2 bags. No official pattern used - I just used the measurements from an old and decrepit tote bag that has seen many better days. DD's red jeans-to-be are ...

The weather has been atrocious this 'summer'. Perfect for sewing. Also perfect for curling up with a good book, watching dvds, or playing video games with the kids (are they still called video games?) . Despite all the other distractions, I have finished a spare pair of cricket trousers for DS. He's off to sunnier and warmer climes in Brisbane for a few weeks for a cricket tournament and needed a second pair. Reluctant to spend much on what is essentially a back-up pair of trousers, I went a-hunting in the stash and came up with 5 metres of white bengaline. I like bengaline to wear normally, but this is white . What on earth was I thinking when I bought it? Oh yeah, I remember - it was $2m on a clearance sale at Spotlight. :) I haven't sewn trousers for DS in a few years so the next problem was finding a pattern. I settled on Simplicity 5362 . By measurements DS just made it into the adult Small, but I've been burned by the Big-4 patterns and their sizing before so ...