Super Hero Niece

Once upon another time, in a place that isn’t here, I had quite a collection of frankly daft dresses that I loved. The floorlength grey knitted one, the red fake fur mini dress, the orange and gold crochet one to name but a few. These days, I have neither the figure nor the occasion to have such items in my wardrobe, but I do still have a love for statement clothing and I’m starting to be able to make them too.

Luckily for me I have a niece whose just finished her first year at uni, studying art no less, so it is surely de riguer for her to have something a little wacky in her wardrobe? So when I came across some pop art stylee superhero skiing themed cartoon print jersey online and was instantly smitten yet couldn’t imagine wearing it myself, she sprang to mind. And she was foolish enough to furnish me with her measurements. Mwa ha ha.

Ta Da

So lo and behold the red-jump-suited-skiing-“super hero to succor”-evil-cuthulu-snowboarding-fighting-camino-cap dress was born (and breathe).

topstitching a the shoulder

Yup, I splashed out on a pattern rather than winging a dress from a t shirt pattern as I wanted to do things properly. Based on her measurements I added 4″ to the bodice and 1″ to the skirt, which is less alarming when you realise she’s considerably taller than the 5’5″ the pattern is drafted for.

twin needle hemline

Other than that, my only change to the pattern was to use clear elastic in the shoulder and waist seams to stop it stretching out. (Although I did seriously consider adding pockets).

teal rib binding

I cut into some unused teal knit from my stash for the bindings, it was by far my favourite from the choices available.

barrie briefs

Oh and when I’d finished I squeezed out a pair of matching Barrie Briefs because superhero’s have to have the right pants don’t they?

modelled

I didn’t ask her to model those, but I did have another volunteer!

Patient niece stands in cold for more photo’s for mad aunties blog

Now, teenager’s don’t talk much so I’m taking a verdict of “comfy” on the dress (that was literally, her entire comment) as a good sign. And I heard she wore it out over jeans (Scotland doesn’t always have t shirt dress weather) which is a good sign.

So I’m counting this as a success. And it was so easy to make that if she’s not careful she’ll get another one.

What I’ve been doing on my holidays

Holiday number two part one is nearly complete. Here’s a brief update, with the thin excuse that there are many me made clothes in the photo’s….

Guess where we are

We have made it north of the border to stay with my brother.

“There you go Dobbin”

I have been feeding some horses.

Not advisable

Best not to ride these Kelpies though, as legend says that whilst they appear as friendly wild horses wanting you to ride them, once you’re on their back they gallop off at breakneck speed until they reach the sea and drown you.

my attempt at a different view

up close and personal

We had great fun photographing them whilst my brother distracted the kids.

local wildlife

And we saw lots of interesting things nearby.

interesting landscape architecture

And I indulged my love of taking photo’s of things I find beautiful

shapely infrastructure

which might not be to everyone’s taste

caged flower

I do like the quirky.

now that is a playground

There was plenty for the kids to do too.

More Me Mades in Action

We also visited the Falkirk Wheel, which is a rather impressive rotating boat lift. This time instead of having a ride in a canal boat we went via a nearby Roman fort and then the kids played in the splash pools. (I was too busy knitting to take photo’s, but they were impressive, not every splash pool has a working archimedes screw).

Public Art

Today we were let loose on our own and went to see the Escher exhibition at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art. It was 2 hours well spent, I particularly enjoyed some of the earlier works that I hadn’t seen in print and seeing how the themes developed in his art. There were a few preparatory sketches too and a woodcarving and a lithogrpah plate (both deliverately vandalised so no more unauthorised prints could be made) that were fascinating. The detail was incredible. Well worth a look if you’re in the area. Photo’s weren’t allowed but we did see this impromptu piece of art nearby made up of entrance stickers (photo credit to Mr Man).

Feeding the pony’s

Finally, we found another horse to feed, as the maquette’s of the Kelpie’s are on display in Edinburgh at the moment.

Tomorrow we’re moving on (up), much to the relief of my brother’s family I suspect.

Jayne’s hat

Did I mention I’d been knitting? Well, not the socks I’d planned do be doing. A sort of impromptu knitting challenge.

 

It turns out that a week today is the 10th anniversary of the screening of the Firefly film at the Edinburgh Fringe. Who knew. And the must have accessory for attending the 10 year anniversary screening is apparently a hat like Jayne’s mum knit him.

voila

Luckily I had some scribbled notes on how to knit hats with me, so a quick foray into the local knitting shops later and I had some half way decent supplies and started knitting. And now my niece has a hat to give to her friend when they go to the screening together. Well, it’s missing a pom pom but she should be able to sort that out. I’ve even written out the instructions and given her a lesson (her not having knit int he round before) and she has now started a second one ewith the left over yarn.

update

I have entered the sewing limbo that is everyone at home in between trips away. A little stuff is getting done, so here’s a quick update/sneak peak as I’m feeling the need to procrastinate instead of finish packing getting blogging withdrawal.

tracing error

I started another Ottobre Aztek Skirt, in a lovely burgandy shot needle corduroy I got last summer. It will be much more drapey than number one. This time I wanted to add the pockets as drafted, but then I realised they didn’t match up. Turns out this was a tracing error, I was tracing the second to largest pattern piece but traced the pocket line of the second to smallest pockets for the cut outs on the front. Sigh. So it went in the naughty corner, which is currently a perrilously high pile threatening to topple over and cover my dining room in a layer of textiles. I have since worked out I can just recut the pocket bag piece with the line of the cut out on the skirt, but have yet to find the right time to do it.

birds eye view

I started and finished another skirt from this pattern in some lovely organic cotton I bought on holiday, which is quite a dense stiffish weave. (More items from that shopping trip are planned soon). This time I got the pocket right. But as I sped along making it (I started cutting at 4pm, ready to wear the next day), I decided it didn’t need the lining, even though I’d bought some fabric especially for this purpose. Having worn it I now think it does and will aim to add it when I’m back from my travels. Maybe then I’ll be able to photograph it better.

Here is a photo of the skirt in action that I have stolen from my friends FB feed. She’s sat next to me knitting at a folk festival and generously treated me to a cream tea (I, on the other hand, am inventing imaginary aeroplanes for us to look up at to minimise our chins. But she wouldn’t play).. I unilaterally decided she should take part in Challenge Anya and gave her the offcuts from both this skirt and one I made the girl a while ago, as she’d been muttering about making herself a couple of corduroy skirts and liked the patch pockets on my mushroom one. Hopefully one of them will be the right shade for some stylish patch pockets for her.

apparently the fold is meant to be there, but to me it looks wrong

I also have a Dimpsy T shirt sitting in the naughty corner. There wasn’t enough suitable woven fabric in my stash, so this is pieced and the green stuff is a bit too stiff really, so don’t hold that against the pattern. (The blue stuff is a better fit for the pattern). I like it, but I think I’d be better off with a size smaller and an FBA, unfortunately doing one on this type of dart is beyond my skills! So I think I may try and adjust for my slopey shoulders and sway back.

dimpsy back

I spied the green fabric in the remnants bin and loved the batik effect chickens, before realising it said “Peace” and “Love”. So I guess they’re meant to be doves? But I love the idea of peace chickens. Also, my main aim in pattern placement was to avoid Madonnaesque boob enhacing chicken medallions. So I’m amused that this also resulted in a faux peter pan collar (which you can’t really see here), as I’d left the collar off as it’s not my thing. I didn’t have enough fabric to play with for any sort of pattern matching on the back.

work in progress

Finally, this is my latest project, back to rectangles, no fitting required. Squarely in my comfort zone.

Hope you’re enjoying your August.

Mending and Camping

The campsite

This week I am easing myself back into real life and sorting out all the camping stuff after spending a weeks holiday in Wales with Friends. While the weather was more what I expected than what I’d hoped for, we all had a great time. We took the bare minimum electronic equipment with us, one phone (as I mislaid mine when it was time to pack), hubby’s kindle and his camera. Which he took some great photo’s with.

I did take some hand sewing, but pretty much the only making I actually did was knitting. I finished the pair to my first ever sock, so now I have knitted a whole pair of socks! And I still think the Kitchener bind off thing is magic. No photo’s though (I haven’t unpacked them yet from the piles of stuff) so you’ll just have to take my word for it that the sock looks a lot like its brother (I even managed to start the yarn in almost exactly the same place in the colour pattern). I’m now half way down sock number three, in an interesting colourway that Regia seem to call snowflake, that is mainly grey and black. Hmm. This time I’m trying a variation I spied at a knitting group and I’m halfway from the cuff to the heeel.

defunct camping chair

I did manage some last minute sewing the day we left as one of my beloved Ergolife roll up chairs was well and truly broken.

all better

Having seen some examples of Japanese visible mending on the Make do and Mend group I decided to do a modern take inspired by this (i.e. I was in a hurry and feeling lazy so I used a machine!). It held up pretty well, but now the chair has broken elsewhere and I need to find some heavy duty staples to fix it. (In case you’re wondering, I think the chairs are 8 years old, so whilst they’re not in constant use, I think this counts as wear and tear rather than poor quality construction).

Rivet gun action – “You’ll be wanting a photo of that for your make do group”

Finally, inspired by a conversation with a couple of other women about how we find camping tends to bring out gender stereotypes in our relationships, when our barbeque broke, I went out and bought a rivet gun and fixed it. OK, I confess, I had no idea rivet guns existed until I saw one in the shop and realised it was just what I needed. (Well done Twywn for having not one, but 2 shops selling useful hardware). I was also a bit gentle using it at first and had to be told to squeeze harder so that the rivets pop properly. But it did feel good to fix our old (10 years?) barbeque and the kids were certainly pleased at the opportunity for more chocolate bananas and marshmallows. And I think that counts as making do as even though I had to buy the rivet gun, it certainly has a lot less material in it than the barbeque it fixed. Now I have my eyes peeled for more things that could be fixed with rivets!

proof the sun shone one day

So now I’m trying to be good and pack some of the chaos away before making more mess by getting out my sewing. (It’s ok, I can go a day without it, I don’t need it, really, I don’t, look my hands aren’t even shaking). And I’ve added a simple bag for spikey BBQ tools to my to do list (as they keep breaking plastic bags) as well as a wood pole support that I saw in another friends Bell tent (I’ll show you if I manage it, but it would be very complicated to explain). (The friend is going to copy my trick of marking the one slightly longer side of the groundsheet with electrical tape so you know where to put the door when pitching).

What’s your proudest mend?