Introduction to Embroidery, and teaching stuff

So over the past few months I have been hinting at a very exciting something coming up in the future. This is something I've wanted to do for the longest time, and I thought I'd share my feelings on why! But first, details of the course.

Dun dun du-dun dun duuuuh!

 

I will be teaching a hand embroidery class at Fred Aldous in Manchester for the wonderful people at Ministry of Craft.

In a three hour slot you will learn how to make this Russian Doll design on a classy tea towel, and take away two patterns for smaller Russian dolls to complete the set.

You will learn basic embroidery stitches, including backstitch and chain stitch, then progress up to daisy chain, blanket stitch and french knots.

The class costs £35 and you can reserve your place here.






So onto the philosophising! I'll begin at the beginning, when I was at School I decided to be a teacher, probably a secondary school teacher (because teaching teenagers for some reason didn't scare the bejesus out of me) and teach them English, possibly Drama. So I went to uni to do Literary Studies, Classic Civilisations and Drama. This was when the train became derailed slightly. I was put off teaching, I had exhausted my brain. I didn't want to go straight into teacher training, I wanted to do nothing, sit around all day and stare at the TV and not think about the future. This is something I've heard from alot of other people at university, that actually instead of motivating you to go forward you feel demotivated, lacking in energy and generally depressed by the end of it. Is this something you've encountered/ experienced? I'd love to hear your thoughts.

So I decided to take a couple of years off, whats the rush? I said, teaching will always be there, and what with the further study and the hell a lot of work involved when you get the job I just couldn't face it. So I worked, first in a fabric shop, where I learnt loads of new crafting skills, and then got into admin jobs (another thing loads of people from uni are now doing). I attempted to sew and sell stuff for a while, but realised that I don't like doing lots of the same item over and over, I don't have the patience for it. Also, selling to people who have that look in their eye (I could make that) became depressing. Therefore all power to those who manage this! I bow down to your patience and perseverance. If you do this, share your thoughts on how you manage it, I'd love to hear them.

And then I moved to Edinburgh, where I decided now was the time to apply for teacher training, so I became a Scout leader to gain experience. I also joined Granny Greens and started helping out on the workshop evenings, throwing in tidbits of help here and there, which then grew to become leading most of the workshops at the craft group by the time I'd left (bigging myself up here). Now I loved the teaching aspects of these (due to the aforementioned wanting to teach) but they took up a lot of my free time, especially Scouts. And it occurred to me that I enjoyed doing this more than I would teaching. I was doing the things I wanted to do, leading young people (Scouts) and teaching crafts!

So! In conclusion, my dream now is coming true, and I'm going to be teaching a classroom full of people the basic skills needing to embroider. I'm so excited, and can't wait to get started. I can do my day job, which gives me the perfect balance of money, challenge, and going home not thinking about work, and I can do extra projects which fulfil my need to teach. I hope I see some of you at the class.

A very excited Deborah

Jellyfish, moving and a January lull

Apologies (again) for the delay in my post. I've been useless, attempting to get into the swing of things, and not really delving into anything. I think it's down to be a bit of wedding dress fever. As some of you know I'm getting married in November, and I'm going to (try to) make my wedding dress. I have plans, ideas, designs, colour choices et. al all floating around in my mind, but there's nothing I can do yet as I'm waiting for an important piece of the puzzle (can't give too much away). So I feel kind of guilty thinking about any other sewing projects, though I know there's nothing to be done I don't feel I 'should' do anything else!

However, I have joined in the Mathilde giveaway, as I have dreams of a black and large white spot New Look 6128 (I know, I'm obsessed, I also have plans (and fabric) for a black and red tartan one), paired with a black Mathilde blouse with white trimmings.

I got the Gertie book for Christmas, so I'm using my indecisive period to learn about special vintage techniques for my wedding dress, if a job's worth doing and all that.

We've also just moved into a house! A whole house with rooms, and my very own sewing room, so exciting :-) I'm still putting it all together but I'll be sure to let you know how it looks once it's a little bit more sorted. I'm thinking of getting the Expedit desk for sewing on, but not sure about how stable it will be during sewing, anyone had one/ got one/ got some suggestions?

These jellyfish were one of the first things to be put up when we moved in. They are the jellyfish crocheted in Kirsty's Handmade Home, the most recent series. What did everyone think of this series? Of course I love that there is a programme on about crafts, but I've usually found that I haven't ever really wanted to do anything on the programme before. Until now!

They were very easy to make, though you should be aware that in the instructions when it says 'thick' wool, it really means it, super chunky weight (like the light blue one) makes better spirals for the tentacles, and pushes the head into a proper dome, rather than laying flat. I'd love to see if anyone has also tried these jellyfish, and I'll show you some more of the house as we do it up!

Knitting Christmas... whilst moving out!

Bam! and the dirt is gone. I thought I'd share a few pictures of our last weeks of Edinburgh. I finished my job about a week and a half before we moved and I spent the time knitting and cleaning the flat (hence the precarious balancing of a hoover on top of a ladder). 

Also in these pictures is the mustard yellow Tilly and the Buttons picnic skirt I've mentioned a couple of times, and wanted to talk to you about. This was another of those little jobs that needed doing, as I had to take three inches out of the back... taking 2 out when it was made and then another inch or so once I'd worn it a couple of times. I think the weight of the fabric must have stretched out the waistband, as it just seemed to keep growing! I wonder if I could have used a stronger interfacing to stop this happening... what do you think? It fits great now, and I love wearing it with my navy tights, and a navy top.

In the pics you can see my light and dark grey knitting project for my sister. A slouchy hat and mittens, which I decided to make a finger-cap for after I realised my sister is always chilly. I also added sequins to these. Ill have to get a pic of my sister wearing them for the blog... but until then you'll have to imagine their shiny glory! 

Did you do any knitting projects for Christmas pressies? I've seen alot of bloggers discussing giving these presents to people who you know will appreciate them, and I've got lots of Christmas pressie posts to do on what I made. Do you think everyone appreciates a home made gift, or should they be kept for those who appreciate it? Such as those who knit themselves? I'd love to know your opinion.

Progress is being made on exciting things which I hope to post about in the next month or so... watch this space! 

Another New Look 6128 Pencil Skirt... and a Happy New Year!

First things first... Happy New Year everyone!

Apologies for my lengthy hiatus from the blog, after the move away from Edinburgh, and our unsettled-ness (living with parents's) I have failed at putting anything online. First off I want to show you the last couple of projects I did before we moved, and then I'm going to over the next couple of days add some more projects that I did for Christmas pressies, which I haven't been able to publish for obvious reasons!

After the success of my burnt orange pencil skirt, I decided to do the same pattern again, because it fit so well... and because of the novelty of having a straight skirt that doesn't do that tightness around the thighs and bum which I don't like.

And here it is! It's in a dogtooth brown, and what Mr T calls Dragon tooth in brown on the pockets. I love this pattern, it came together really easily, and I haven't stopped wearing it for two months:

Hope you like the pictures, I hope you've all had an amazing festive season, did you manage to get any crafting done? I've mostly been eating chocolate, but it has to be done ey? 

Autumn/Winter Inspiration

It's all happening up in Edinburgh, and in my favourite season too. The big move is well on its way and I'm unemployed once more. Mixed emotions, but I'm looking forward to the future. 

So! I've got a little time on my hands (in between the packing etc). And thought I could do with some improvement on my photo manipulation skills. So here are a few of the pictures I've been taking around Edinburgh. Above is Autumn, and below are some festive colours! I used this collage instruction guide from A Beautiful  Mess. It was really easy to use, and didn't make me swear loudly like most computer based things. 

I've some more projects on the way soon, in the meantime, hope you like the pics. You can see bottom right all the green tomatoes I harvested this year, not sunny enough for red tomatoes this year unfortunately but I'm sure they'll come in handy for a certain festive event in the near future. 

Fix up, look sharp

I have been spending my time before I begin the arduous packing process as an opportunity to do all those sewing jobs which aren't very exciting, but are very important. Like fixing old projects, and sewing clothes that are falling apart back together, so in the next couple of days expect some more pictures of me posing (slightly awkwardly) in lots of skirts!

The first is a skirt that I had made over a year ago (if not longer) it was based on a very similar theory to the Picnic Blanket Skirt, with the original having buttons down the front, and pleats instead of gathers. I stupidly didn't take a picture before I started so unfortunately you'll have to use your imagination.

This material (which I think has some silk in) is super soft, with a floral design which is much greener at the bottom. When I bought it, I was itching to make something with it so I forged ahead without interfacing the waistband or plackets. The skirt looked great for a wee while but eventually the waistband started to crumple and the buttonholes started to stretch (mostly because I did the buttonholes vertically rather than horizontally).

Therefore I decided to do it right this time, and change the skirt to a simple dirndle skirt, to show off the swishy-ness of this material. I used my new favourite (a lapped zipper) up the side, added some more pleats to adjust for the added material not needed for the plackets and added interfacing to the waistband. You can see in the picture the lapped zipper, which worked well apart from for some reason the waistband didn't match once it was sewn in. I have adjusted for this with the button, and think I need a little more work on my lapped zipper.

Have you got any hints and tips to make a lapped zipper easily without this problem? Let me know!

Also, do you put off these renovating jobs? All those finickety jobs that need doing but aren't very exciting? Post them below, and join me in fixing up your wardrobe.

Deborah

Edinburgh Sewing Corner

This is a final opportunity to take pics of my sewing area before we move, and as I love to see other peoples' sewing rooms, I thought I'd share mine too. I tidied ALOT before taking these pictures, as the whole place was covered in tiny bits of threads, bigger bits of material and various cups etc. I'll take a picture of my new sewing area (when I have one) whilst work is in process so you don't get the misleading impression that I am in any way tidy when I sew. Apologies for the quality of the pictures, our flat gets very little light and I took these last night.

I use the dining room table for my sewing machine, which is in the corner of our living room on a little stage. Like most people I don't have the room for a dedicated sewing space at the moment, so most of this stuff has to be packed away if we ever have dinner at the table (which is almost never).

 I use the corner of the space for all my various boxes.  The box on the right is for keeping sewing projects in progress, along with patterns (which I have very few of these days) and interfacing. You can see on the top a skirt that I got in a charity shop a while ago and want to make smaller so it fits on my waist rather than on my hips (watch this space).
The vintage suitcase at the back contains all the materials I used to make my wedding fabric flowers, I'll have to do a post on these at some point, but I'm thinking of changing some of the colours so I'll let you know when I have made up my mind (I'm very bad for changing my mind all the time).

Here is my brilliant sewing box which holds all my tools; scissors, pins, rotary cutter, small fixings etc. It's the perfect size and I've had it for... 6 or 7 years? I got it from Dunelm mill.

I keep all my threads and buttons in a set of jars on top of the sideboard:

I love these old jars, and in fact like (seemingly most) sewers love jars of any kind. If Mr T would let me I would cover every surface with them. As it is I have to make do with these three (and two in the kitchen). The red stand up jar filled with buttons had a rather boring beige lid which I painted with red poster paint. It came out really well to say it was poster paint.

I also have these posters up on the wall from a series of nights we organised in Manchester back when we lived there. Alongside the 'Unquote' posters, a night organised by Mr T's sisters band, The Monkeys In Love. I love these posters as they all go so well together in their black and white, and they really show off the artistic talents of Mr T's family.

I keep all of my materials in the bedroom, on top of the wardrobe (excuse the mess). It does make getting at my material a complete nightmare as I have to get them down from a very high height. But in our tiny flat there really isnt anywhere else for it to go. I went for plastic containers after hearing such great things about being able to see what's in the box. And it works, so far, but with the fabrics seperated into the two biggest boxes, I do forget what I've got in there. Luckily I love looking through them all and just looking at my fabric, do you feel the same, or is this a bit of a chore you'd rather do without?

You can see that the top left box is what's left of my wool collection after giving away half of it at the Swap Shop. This is still a pretty big box though so I need to get knitting! I have a couple ideas of projects, so I'll post about those in the near future. The top left box is for unfinished projects (of which I have a shameful number), I just can't seem to muster up the energy to finish some of them. You can see a fabric dolls feet sticking out at the bottom, I feel particularly guilty about stuffing her in a box, but what could I do?

So I hope you've enjoyed looking through my cupboards (or lack of them), I've enjoyed sewing in this flat but it would be nice to have a space of my own. Fingers crossed for a sewing room! Any ideas for how I should store things in the future? Have you done any brilliant organisations lately? Or if you're looking for organisation inspiration, I'd recommend Sew Many Ways, which has an
                                                           amazing array of craft organisation ideas.

 Deborah