A change

It’’s very personal, but I don’t like home decoration sewing. When we moved into our house six years ago I said I wouldn’t sew curtains, and I never did, where we wanted them I had them made. But now we are changing our sitting room, there were two chairs that really didn’t match any more. They were never a lucky buy and didn’t fit in very well in the old setting, but I didn’t want to buy other chairs now. So this time I did some home decoration sewing: I made cushion covers. The first chair was last done last weekend, and yesterday the other was finished. I’m glad I did it, the look is so different now and very much as I like them to be. And a great addition to the black couch (can you imagine the original together with black?)

Another layer of paint is necessary, that’s more clear in the pictures than in real life.

 

No other sewing done at all. 

Winners

Thank you all for your congratulations on my 400 post.

I wish I could give you all a pattern, but I had to draw: the winners of the bag patterns are:

Weekender bag: Hilde

Sophia bag: Rose

If you let me know your mailing address (my e-mail address is in the sidebar) I’ll send you the patterns this week.

400 posts

In a little over 3 years I have posted 400 times. Time flies, as it certainly doesn’t feel like 3 years, and 400 posts sounds a lot too.

I still like to blog about my projects and have comments and ideas from the international sewing community. My sewing has evolved a bit during that time too. When I look back at my first posts (or the reviews in my first year on PR) I see garments that are no longer in my closet, either for fit reasons or for style/fabric. When I first found Pattern review and blogs, I certainly got carried away with projects I liked, and bought and made patterns that really were not my style. Gradually I have been sewing more things that I really like and actually wear. Of course it still happens, buying a fabric or pattern on an impulse and regretting it later, but not very much any more.

Give away! (not possible to enter any more)

One of the things I tried during these 3 years is making bags, but I found out this is really not for me. I still have a beautiful piece of dark red leather in my collection and keep one pattern specifically for that, but I will give away my two Amy Butler bag patterns: the Sophia bag and the Weekender bag. Leave a comment on this post if you would one of these indicating which one you would like (note: the weekender bag is difficult to make and needs a lot of fabric/interfacing etc. I never made the Sophia bag but it looks less complicated).

One little caveat: you must have left a comment on my blog in the past year or be a follower of my blog to participate in the draw.

Fitting pants

My last pair of pants were a bit high waisted, and in general felt a bit too wide. Could be the linen, as that fabric tends to get bigger, but I was not completely satisfied and convinced that I had the right pattern.

I had spent a lot of time and muslins (didn’t blog about those this time) and still the end result was not quite what I wanted. Then I realized I have one pair of linen pants that I continue to wear in summer, it’s wearing/washing/wearing and I just feel very comfortable in them. It’s a pair I copied from RTW a few years ago. I put it on and evaluated it more critical: fit was good, fabric still in good shape, so not to be taken apart, only the back was perhaps a bit too high in the waist (which does not keep me from wearing it). The back in general seemed allright, with no strange wrinkles.

Conclusion: time to make a copy again. Unfortunately I had thrown the pattern away in a cleaning frenzy, so I had to make a pattern of the pants itself.

I started this before my little vacation, and finished it today. Think it’s one of the best I made. The first picture shows the color the best. It’s a linen too, a fabric I simply love in summer, the wrinkling is just a part of it.

For the waistband I used Petersham that received from Veronica: a big thank you again!

I didn’t interface the front side of the waistband, it’s not very firm, but just the right thing for these pants.

Before inserting it I put it into hot water to make sure it wouldn’t shrink any more and then pressed it in shape, as described by Sandra Betzina in her book Power sewing. A great way to finish the waistband.

Random prize

Such nice news on returning home: I won the random prize in the formal wear contest on pattern review.  I did not expect to win the contest, there were far more beautiful entries, but it’s nice to win the random prize.

You will remember the dress:

A room with a view

It’s very quiet at my blog, nothing to tell sewing-wise: I’m not sewing, but enjoying a few wonderful days in the UK. After quite a stressful year DD thought it a good idea that DH and I would go away together for a few days. My mother is “taking care” of our children. Not much to take care of at their age, but just a bit too young to be on their own.

Now DH is enjoying one of the games at the football (soccer) World Cup tournament, a good time for me to write a post and share a few pictures (I’ll resume the usual sewing topics next time).

Our bedroom in the little cottage we have has this view, I would like to have it at my place.

We’re enjoying walks and gardens (there will be a few more plants in my garden next week). A few impressions, and back to sewing next time.

New walking shoes were bought today, after a lot of kilometers and many years this is was happened yesterday, the last half of the walk wasn’t very comfortable, but a bit of the sole was left.

I simply love to walk here and see these views and those lovely gardens (and of course have a cup of tea with homemade scones in a tearoom afterwards).

 

 

 

 

 

 

Burda, this is what I’m looking for

Ann-Marie posted a comment with a link this morning, that I want to share with you. Thank you so much Ann-Marie, I didn’t know this one.
Someone called “Peacock couture” has made a Flickr photoalbum with just what I would like to see (and probably many more of you) on the Burda website as shown in my last post on this subject. Peacock couture has already done something similar. It does not contain all issues, but this is a wonderful link:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/peacockcouture/collections/

The flickr album is no longer available, just before I went on holiday, I understood from Ann-Marie that Burda sent a legal notice to remove the pictures! I am so sorry to hear that, it was such a wonderful resource. Though I somehow can see Burda’s point not wanting this, I would suggest them to make an accessible, user friendly site themselves. Then they wouldn’t have to bother so much about this (my personal opinion of course) and get more positive attention for their own site.

You can click on a specific issue to see pictures and linedrawings, but also search on tags that are added to the photos.
When searching this collection for the words “top knit” you get a screen with all pictures with these tags. A small screenshot:

When you click one of the pictures, the “this photo belongs to” tells you from which issue it is.
Whoever she/he is, Peacock couture made exactly what I was thinking about. I even considered making something similar, but dismissed the idea as being too much work.