#2018MakeNine

Last year, I put up a wish list of nine things I wanted to either knit or sew during the year, and then completely and utterly forgot about it.  That's what happens when you only put things on Instagram and then stop blogging for months at a time. 

I did actually make 3 and 2 halves of the things on the 2017 list, as you can see from my brilliant photo.

I made a Rosa shirt dress, a pair of black Ultimate trousers and an Audrey in Unst.  I cast on a Corraline, and made an Anna skirt after ripping the zip out of the dress in a temper.  

I didn't make the Elizalex dress or the Dutchess jumper, or the Manu, or the Horses jumper; mostly because I forgot about them, or other things caught my eye.

This year, it will be different.  This year, I have allocated fabric to my make 9 sewing projects and photographed them, and put away all other fabric, so I will have to make the things I said I would.  Also, if I do that, I can get some fabric in LA in August.

These are the sewing things:

That should keep me out of trouble.  

I'm refusing to believe that the holidays are over, and am still drinking gin.  Cheers.

I have either two or four words for you: Drag queen dim sum.

I meant to post more photos from #sewphotohop earlier than this.  Still better late than never.

Day 11 - Bucket List

Turning my husband's office into a sewing room....

Day 12 - Motivation

Have nothing in your life that is not useful or you believe to be useful.

Day 13 - Sewing Space

Tidy, for a change.

Day 14 - Style

Knitted tops, mad prints, spots, stripes and pants with birds on.

Day 15 - Secret Corner of Shame

Nuff said.

Day 16 - Tiny vs Big

Lucy's socks vs Simon's.  

Day 17 - Proudest Achievement

Children, ballet hair, two Elsa dresses, 1 10k, a The Killing jumper, self drafted.

Day 18 - Sewing Resolution

Reduce the stash!

Day 19 - Boldest Fabric

Nuff said.  Again.

Day 20 - Learning and Practising

Invisible zips are my nemesis.

More soon.  Before Christmas anyway.

New Year, New You

Happy New Year and all that.  I was going to do a round up of all the millions of things I made this year before today, but the germs attacked on Boxing Day, and I have been prostrate for days.

Anyway.  I've made 21 things out of wool - knitting or crocheting - which is considerably less than previous years.  Sewing has taken up a lot more time this year, and I've made 8 Coco dresses or tops and at least four others.  This year I want to make things I actually wear, so that will be more jersey dresses and more cardigans.  The wardrobe is full to bursting at the moment, so perhaps some winnowing out of the stuff is called for.

From the top left down in columns: New Year's Day cowl, Spotty Dress (my first dress), Spotty Coco, Stripey Coco dress (most worn thing ever), bird dress, Green and grey Coco.

Idlewood, Boatneck Bluebell sweater, Cherry Coco (my first Coco). red and blue baby cord skirt, Elsa dress.

Fox brooch, Upholstery skirt (too big), fleecy Coco, Myrna cardigan (OAL 2014), Butterfly top, blue and grey sock for Simon.

Puerperium for Nicholas, Green and Grey Coco again, MASSIVE MAN SOCKS FOR SIMON, Charley Harper bird Coco, Sew Dolly Clackett dolly Cambie.

Cat Lady Anna. Flamingo Anna, Boreal, a cowl for a little girl, Lucy's rainbow socks, chicken skirt.

What a lot of terrible photos of me.  That's the worst thing about making your own stuff - looking at pictures of yourself. Urgh.

Busy old year, and that's not all I've made at all.  I thought I'd spare you the rest, although one of my plans is to update the Handmade Wardrobe section of the blog.  At some point.  

Sewing and knitting plans for this year?  Just keep on keeping on and hopefully get the hang of it.  I'd really like to be a size 12 before I'm 38, which should be a bit of a saving on fabric and wool, and I really hope to make some trousers this year.  Hattie needs an Elsa dress too, which should be easy enough to get done in a couple of evenings.

Ah well.  At the moment, my only plan is to get over this cold and get out running again.  Or maybe to go into the front room and watch Mapp and Lucia and knit a new jumper for Hattie.  It's all go here. 

Jellicle Cats have cheerful faces, Jellicle Cats have bright black eyes

In the olden days, pre-children, I sometimes had piano lessons, and my teacher was also a record producer, song writer and general muso.  He would often stay up all night working with singers, when they were all "feeling it" and things just worked.  I didn't get it then, but I do now.

I finished the Cat Lady dress.  It's a thing of beauty, and only took about 5 hours in total.  Unfortunately, 3 of those hours were between 9:30 last night and 12:30  this morning, so I'm a bit tired today, but I couldn't have stopped, even had I wanted to.  The only thing that prevented me from sewing later was that I couldn't find my invisible zip, so had to stop.  But it was mostly done in one evening.

I don't like doing facings, so it has bias binding on the neck and on the armholes, and also around the hem, making it officially beautiful inside too.  I pinked all the seams, and even ironed it as I went along - a thing I never do.  I won't show you the invisible zip.  It's enough to say that it isn't that invisible, I had a hell of a time putting the damn thing in, but guess what?  I don't care!

The next time I make an Anna dress, I might grade it a bit, so that there isn't as much fabric between my bust and my armpit - it sort of gapes there a bit.  The madness of the print distracts the eye from the slightly botched waistline; I'm not sure what happened, but my skirt pieces got out of order, or I'd written the wrong number on them, or something just went awry.  I'm generally very pleased with it, and quite pleased that my photographer has finally managed to take a picture of me where I don't look like a wally. Well, not that much.

Photobombing ratbags.  Cute though. 

Dress: By Hand London Anna

Fabric: Cocoland Coco Cat Daisies from Frumble

Miss Crayola Creepy Cat Lady Sewing Challenge.

Bring on the cats!

The Cat Lady challenge

There was a time when this looked like my most probable future.  Totally mad, surrounded by cats, muttering away to myself.  Well, I don't have any cats yet, and I've mostly replaced muttering with writing the blog, but otherwise it's not quite off the table.  So far, we've managed a hamster and four fish; very low maintenance, slightly dull pets, although the hamster has bags of personality and is a little smasher.

I still would like a cat though, and will get at least one at some point, so to prepare for this momentous occasion, I decided to participate in Miss Crayola Creepy's Cat Lady Sewing Challenge.  Part of me wanted to go full on mental with a dress with massive cats on, but then I remembered that I wouldn't wear, I have three handmade dresses I barely wear, I'm 37 and a UK size 14 and went for something a bit more subtle.

It's not finished yet, but I've only got another skirt panel to cut out, because I had to order more fabric as the Anna dress always takes more fabric than I think it should, then I've got to sew the whole thing together, and that won't take more than two evenings.  It's got to be done by Sunday.  Easy.

Look at the selvedge on this!

Truly, this will be a thing of beauty and grace, and I will look elegant and gorgeous, if just slightly mental.  It's a look I've got to get used to.

They laughed at Louie Armstrong when he said he was going to the moon, and now he's laughing at them from up there.

Some things.

I channelled my friend Jason and made a striped Coco, with shorter sleeves.

It's MEANT to have the stripes on the very slight diagonal.  I love it, and I've been wearing it all day.  It's been a more traditional English summer day today in London.  There's been masses of flooding not very far from us, as in less than 10 miles away, but we've barely had any rain at all, despite a massive thunderstorm this morning. 

The girls are knackered from their busy weekend, so we had a very quiet morning.  They were quite happy playing, stark naked, in the other room, so I decided to try to make a new Anna dress.  It was much too hot in the conservatory, and I cut and sweated and swore for about an hour, only realising that I didn't have enough fabric just that bit too late.  Because the Anna has lots of pieces to the skirt, and this print really relies on direction, I have to have 3 metres rather than 2, so I had to buy some more on ebay as an emergency. It won't come until after our holidays though. I'll have a skirt panel left to cut out, and will have more than enough left to make Lucy a flamingo print dress too, which is pleasing.  Shame about the stupid narrow stupid quilting stupid cotton.

I also felt that I should really at least try to make one of my Mollie Makes kits, so had a bash at this one.  The cherries are easy, but I need to concentrate on the leaves, so I'll leave (leaf) them until later.  This solo parenting lark is a doddle, but does cut into the concentration.

Still, new brooch for our holidays.  

Hattie's cardigan will be finished tonight, which I'm very pleased about.  The sleeves are a bit too long, which I'm not happy about, but she can push them up, and her arms are growing very fast.

I can hear that my angels in human form are still awake, and it is nearly half 8.  Better go and do some growling, then a glass of wine and some knitting feature heavily in my plans for the evening.

People are just people, they shouldn't make you nervous

On Friday, I went to a party.  It was in Peckham, which involved getting a bus, then a train, then a tube, then another tube, then another bus and then a walk.  It is 16 miles from Ealing and felt more.  I used to live in Canada Water, and it's really, really changed.  I don't think I have pictures from back then, but it looks a bit different now around the station.  A quick google shows me that my flat looks the same as it always did, at least from the outside; the next door flat is on sale for a ridiculous amount of money.

My old flat is on the left, second floor.  Super place to live, and I had a lot of fun living there.

Anyway, I got the 381 down to Peckham, and went to the By Hand London Thank You For Giving Us Money Party, in a lovely little studio near the bus station.  Talking with one of the ladies, Victoria, I found out that their new studio will be in North Acton, and I can practically walk there from work, so I am looking forward to their next party.

There were lots and lots of people there; lots of people I recognised from the internet like her, her and her, and I managed to get over myself and chat away to a lot of them.  Roisin is really very nice indeed, and I wish I'd not been so silly and talked to her earlier.

I wore my terrific Anna dress, the one with the raccoons; Hattie pulls a very similar face when she is concentrating on being naughty.

I don't know what's going on with the camera on my phone; that is a terrible picture.  There is a better one here, and do follow the link as there are 10 of us in the same dress, although each one is different.  The joy of handmade.  

I managed to pull my calf muscle again on the way home; it's those sodding shoes, so no more running in Converse.  Stupid things.  I actually NEED to go for a run, but while I'm hobbling around, it's a very bad idea. It's not as bad as it was the first time, but I'm still wincing going up and down stairs, so I'll try to go out tomorrow.

I'm thinking about a Frozen inspired Anna Maxi dress.  The obsession in our house is not getting any less, although I think I'm the worst of the bunch.  I explained the plot to my mum on Saturday evening, and nearly cried at the end.  To be strictly open and honest, I had been drinking mascara thinner all night, so that didn't help.  

Anyway, Dodgeball is on and I have an empty glass that needs filling.  Four days until the holidays.