A Passel of Patterns

I come from a family of makers, one of whom is my maternal grandmother. She's wonderful and a great maker. Not only have I been the lucky recipient of several of her knitting and sewing projects over the years but more recently she gifted me a pile of her old sewing patterns. Believe me, I was very excited to receive two boxes full of sewing patterns in a range of styles and sizes, baby to adult.

The hard part of this whole thing is figuring out where to start with all of this goodness! Thankfully, one pattern caught my eye: Simplicity 7449. Simplicity has put out several patterns with this number over the years and I believe that this particular one is from the 1980's.

I admit that part of my reason for choosing this pattern is because I stumbled upon this Sunnyside Twilight Buttercup fabric while shopping for fabric for another project. The Sunnyside fabric immediately jumped into my mind as something that would look lovely for the yoke of a shirt. I, at least, think it turned out well for this.

The top was pretty simple to put together, as it uses Dolman sleeves - meaning sleeves are done with the general shape of the front and back pieces instead of the normal procedure of setting in the sleeves. I also finished the neckline with bias tape which, besides being simple, is quickly becoming a favorite technique for finishing.

I did add a few other special touches to the top including psuedo-flat felled sleeves. I meant to make french seams but got my fabric pieces backwards. Oops. Making the seams look flat felled was the best compromise to this error. The other thing I did was use one of my sewing machine's decorative stitches to add a little heart to the bottom right hem. Between these small details and my mastery of the basics, my sewing is definitely improving and I'm certainly taking more pride in it!

Happily, I finished this project in time to pack it for my summer vacation - a family trip to Germany! It was a wonderful adventure for me, my husband and my in-laws, though I still have SO MANY photos to go through. One of them is this one below. I could not resist taking a photo of my new shirt next to one of Germany's most famous attractions, Neuschwanstein Castle.

So there you have it, a pile of patterns, a new handsewn top, and a family adventure. It's been a very exciting month.

Spin Spin

I'm in the Start All The Things phase of crafting and, in an effort to not get overwhelmed, I'm trying to clear out a bunch of the works in progress hanging around my craft room. One such project was this braid of fiber, half spun up on my spinning wheel.

The fiber comes from Sheepish Creations, whose fiber I've spun up on several previous occasions. It's such a cheery fiber, though not in my normal color palette, so I suspect it will end up as babywear. Any pattern ideas for 140 yards of worsted weight?

Of course, finishing this skein of handspun only makes me want to start spinning more fiber. Not exactly the point of finishing this spinning, but I won't say no to more crafting mojo.

Variations On A Theme

Sewing is continuing apace at casa BrineyDeep, though I'm mostly working on some small items. First on the list was fixing my bucket hat from last month.

I fixed the hat by unpicking the crown-band seam and sewing a new seam with a deeper seam allowance. This took in a lot of the extra depth from the crown, but it also made it so that I was putting a seam into a place that had not been sewn over before. Sewing on "fresh" fabric is really important because even one seam weakens the laminated cotton.

I have about 1/2 yard of this fabric left, but no immediate plans to use it. It's a tricky fabric to work with, so it's just going to wait in my stash until the right project comes along.

In other sewing news, I made another patchwork bag. This one is a little bigger than the previous one, as I used these 3.5" Riley Blake fabric squares instead of a 2.5" Moda mini charm pack. I'm totally fine with the change of size because I adore this fabric, particularly the crown print on the lining.

Thankfully, I have lots of projects on my to-sew list. Otherwise, I could easily become obsessed with sewing charm pack bags. They're just too fun, quick, and adorable!

Monster!

I love making things for other people. The only downside is that I can't blog about them for a while. Which means that you're only now seeing the very first thing I sewed on my new sewing machine: this little monster plush I whipped up for my niece/goddaughter.

I was actually in the middle of making this plushie when I discovered that my old sewing machine died. Not a fun way to make that discovery, when you're full of excitement about making a cute project. But this little guy did turn out nicely on my new machine.

I just love his little monster face and am coming to enjoy the fact that his arms aren't quite level with each other (oops). It gives him some character, right?

All-in-all, not a bad use of some leftover fleece and a stab at pattern drafting. I think I need one to cuddle up with myself.

The Greater Good

I recently asked The Husband what his favorite movie is, to which he replied, "I don't know. Probably Hot Fuzz." This answer excited me - not just because I also love that movie - but because I had an ulterior motive: I wanted to make him one of the cross stitch designs from the Etsy shop weelittlestitches and, happily, the shop has an awesome Hot Fuzz pattern.

After a little secret crafting, Husband now has a cool Hot Fuzz cross stitch hanging out on his computer desk. It's pretty adorable (and definitely makes me want to watch that movie again).

Tutorial: Butterfly Headpiece

It's no secret that I love hats. I often find myself perusing hats on Pinterest and on one of my favorite blogs, the Royal Hats blog. While I'm more of a true hat person, I can't resist the occasional headpiece and a recent offering from this Etsy shop got me hankering to try making a headpiece for myself. The result is this kaleidoscope of butterflies.

All told, the headpiece was easy to make and very inexpensive, costing me roughly $5 and an hour of time. Since it's such a fun piece of headwear, I thought it worth sharing some notes so you can make one yourself.

Here are the supplies you will need to make this butterfly headpiece:
- 6 feather butterflies affixed to wire (Oriental Trading, $4.25 for 6)
- Metal headband (Oriental Trading, $4.25 for 6)
- E-6000 glue
- Needle-nose pliers
- Small wire cutters

To start assembly, we'll set two butterflies "flying" an inch or so above the headband to give the piece dimensionality. These butterflies will be on the side of the headband, about 2-3 inches down from the top of your head with some space in between each butterfly. Use a mirror to be ensure placement is visually appealing.

To affix a butterfly, wrap its wire several times around the headband, leaving about an inch of wire between the butterfly and the wrap to suspend the butterfly above the headband. Once securely wrapped to the headband, wrap the tail of the wire several times around the suspension end of the wire to secure it. Cut with wire cutters and use needle-nose pliers to tamp down any sharp ends. Apply glue to the wraps and use a toothpick or pin to push glue in between the wraps and the headband for a better hold.

Remove the wires from the remaining four butterflies, as we'll affix each butterfly directly to the headband with glue. The butterflies should be crowded together, with variations in orientation and angle. Again, use a mirror to check for visual appeal before gluing the butterfly body (not the wings) directly to the headband. There is no right way to do this, so just go with what looks best.

The glue takes a day or two to dry, after which you'll have a lovely butterfly headpiece to wear out into the world.

I'm really looking forward to wearing mine, especially because it's finally spring in Wisconsin!

Distracted

I may be a wee bit distracted from crafting this week by the arrival of this little guy:

We rescued a 14-week old lab-mix puppy last week. His name is Augustus (aka August, aka Auggie, aka Auggie Doggie). He is just as cute in real life as in these photos.

So not much crafting is going on at the moment, though I did make him the colorful kerchief seen in this photo. Scrap fabric + trying out my new sewing machine's overlocking stitch = win! He might not like having it around his neck, but I think it makes him look even cuter. Hooray for puppies!