I dreamed a dream.....(of sewing magic!)

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This image has nothing to do with anything really, it came up when I googled 'sewing dream' and I HAD to use it because a) amazing image of sewing room and b) IT IS FROM A COMPUTER GAME. 'nuff said. 

This morning, in between about 4:30am (when I woke up with a jump thinking ‘Crap, what time is it? Why hasn’t the alarm gone off??’ – please tell me I’m not the only one this happens to!) and 6:30am, I had a really awesome dream.

Mr Cuckoo and I were offered the most amazing house to rent. It was on one side of a steep, narrow and rocky cove, and had windows the width of all the walls, with panoramic views of the sea to the right and ahead,  and then views of the most amazing abbey ruin on the steep rocky slope to the left. (I spent last weekend driving around the Sutton Bank area in North Yorkshire, where there are 4 abbeys in spitting distance, so it’s not surprising one made it into my dream!) It was the most beautiful area, and the house was large and spacious and airy, and the rent was £100 a month! The only downside was that we would have to houseshare with a girl we know (apparently, even in my wildest dreams, I can’t help but be a little practical!) although we had separate living areas and bathrooms, so it wouldn’t be too much of a hardship. And what was it about this dream that made me so sad when I was rudely awoken by the alarm?? It was the realisation that I did NOT have the stunning backdrops of the sea/cove/ruined abbey to use when taking photographs of my finished me-made items.

I’ve noticed a definite pattern with my sewing/blogging. I get really fired up by a project, find a load of inspiration/an amazing pattern/brilliant fabric, and become all consumed with creating the item, excited about how it will look/fit/how much I’m saving doing it myself. Finish item and put it on IMMEDIATELY and sashay around the house in it, yelling ‘LOOK AT THIS! JUST LOOK AT IT! I MADE THIS HOW COOL IS THAT??’ to Mr Cuckoo (because I still can’t believe that I’m actually making something that can be used in a useful and everyday fashion) and think ‘I can’t wait to put this on the blog!’ Then I generally go to bed because I’m knackered from staying up late, sewing. The next day is either a) crappy weather or b)super busy, and no photos are taken of said item. I think, ‘I’ll do it this weekend!’ Only, we’re either away that weekend, or the weather is still crappy, or I’m too busy, or I’m too lazy. The photos are just not taken, and I don’t really feel like I can write a post saying ‘I made this awesome thing!’ without having any photographic evidence to prove it.

Then I’ll get super inspired to create another item and off we go again… the last finished item then goes into rotation (or not! Depending in how successful/frivolous it is).

See where I’m going with this? Off the top of my head, I have: a Colette Ginger, a Peony, a Sewaholic Renfrew, a burda pattern wraparound cardigan AND the teal lace dress finished, and NONE of them have been blogged about.

Maybe I should get onto that!

Buuuuuut……. I am TOTALLY in the thrall of a new wave of inspiration! (Hahaha! Will the cycle EVER end!?)

The other day, this photograph came up on my Instagram feed:

Snapped from my iphone - photo is from
Elsie Larson's Instagram (aka www.abeautifulmess.com)
Not sure what's going on with the open mouth pose there... one way to catch flies! NOM.

Now, pinafore style dresses (or jumpers, as I think they're called in the US - which always confuses me for a minute, NOT the same thing in the UK) really aren't my thing at all, as they can be uber-cutesy and remind me of little girl outfits! But for some reason I saw this photo and my brain said ‘Ou! Pretty!’ quickly followed by ‘You could make something like this!’ Although, that’s pretty much what I always think!

The skirt of this looks very similar to a Colette Ginger, just with added patch pockets, but I wanted to be able to see the details of the dress a little more clearly, and fortunately Elsie mentions in the comments that it was from Modcloth, so a quick search revealed that it’s the ‘On The Double Dutch Jumper’ and it's more 'skirt with front flap' than dress, but whatever. I WANT. Weirdly, if I'd have seen the Modcloth pictures first, I don't think I'd be anywhere near as interested in it, to me it looks a lot longer and frumpier, and the paler top underneath doesn't work as well for me, but I guess that's the brilliance of sewing your own clothing! You can take what you like and make it better! Well... sometimes. Other times (if you're anything like me) you get too ambitious and end up with another wadder.

So, as far as I can tell, if I made the Colette Ginger up in denim, added patch pockets and drafted a similar front flappy thing (what would you call that??) and two straps w/buttons, then TADA, PINAFORE. Am I missing something obvious here do you reckon? Also, I'm slightly worried that the front flap and straps might end up making the waistband a bit bulky, so I might have to look into that.

I do have some blue denim that I WAS planning on using to make a pair of jean-y Thurlows, but now I'm wondering......

Thank goodness it's Friday, and I'm going to be at home all weekend! It's been at least a month since I've had weekend time at home, and my sewing room is a DISASTER.

PS - I MAY be spending some of the weekend playing on the computer game that the image is from. I need that shit in my life okay??

PPS - I didn't even mention my AWESOME IDEA (read: not particularly awesome, or unusual, but whatever) about crafting myself a really cool chambray shirt. Don't ask. Seriously. My head will just explode.

Teal Lace Dress - One project too far?

Hey-lo!

Do you ever realise that you've challenged yourself to a little TOO MUCH, but you're just not willing to give up on any of it? That's me at the moment, I'm sad to say.

I've been trying really hard to form better habits lately, and to knock bad habits on the head. For instance, I have a terrible TERRIBLE habit of chewing my lips. Not, sexy 'ooh look at me' lip biting, but proper chewing until things start bleeding. So, this month I've challenged myself to break that habit. I've also been working on fixing my diet (not that it's particularly bad or anything, but just looking at my sugar intake, and trying to get it down as much as possible) and when you add that to my current habit of exercising 6 times a week, and also participating in Me Made May, things have been feeling a little.... pressured around here. I hadn't even really noticed that I'd given myself a lot of challenges until my lovely friend Erica pointed it out, and suggested that I not be too hard on myself if things slip a little.

On the sewing front, I've been working on a Negroni shirt for Mr Cuckoo (it was supposed to be a present for his birthday LAST October, but oh well, maybe it'll be ready for his birthday THIS October instead!) but then realised that a wedding that last time I looked was months away, turns out to only be a couple of weeks away now. So, cue mad rush to make a dress in time for the wedding on the first of June! I think 'too many challenges' is the story of my life at the moment!

I already had an idea of the kind of dress I wanted to make for this wedding, and had been pinning dresses like mad:

Dresses 1-3 from shopruche.com and Dress 4 from Modcloth

I knew I wanted something either teal or maybe aqua, although I was ready to go for blue-grey if I couldn't find the right colour. I definitely wanted lace, and decided to have another go at underlining (my first attempt was an unmitigated DISASTER) I browsed through my patterns and decided to go with Simplicity 2444:

I figured that the plain view A was very similar to my inspiration dresses, although I decided I wanted the short sleeves too.

So finally, this weekend I headed into town to see if I could get some lace fabric and something to underline it, although I was getting ready to have to pick a totally different colour if necessary, but I TOTALLY lucked out!

Left: Teal Lace Middle: Linen Right: Lining

I managed to get a lovely teal lace remnant, some linen to underline it with, and some poly lining for £30! WINNER!

I spent most of Saturday working on a muslin, using the lining. Before I cut anything out, I added 1.5" length to the bodice (I should just do this to EVERY pattern automatically. I have a really long body!) and I also decided to cut the skirt front on the fold (I thought having a seam on the skirt front was a bit weird honestly!) Then I cut out the bodice and skirt in the lining and then basted the entire thing together and pinned it on. All the time I was working on the muslin I was really happy with my pattern choice, and wasn't expecting to really have to do very much except some minor tweaking, so when I pinned it on, I was SO DISAPPOINTED. It was just so...... FROOFY. All the pleating in the skirt made it stick out all over the place and (probably as a result of the shiny lining) it looked like a 1980s bridesmaid's dress. YUCK. I'd seen so many gorgeous versions of this dress online, but it was really doing NOTHING for me. I decided to take out all the pleats at the back of the skirt (my backside is big enough without pleating, thankyouverymuch) and to take out the middle pleat in the front and move the other two sets of pleats in slightly so that they matched the bodice darts. After spending AGES on making the changes to the pattern pieces, I unpicked the lining and recut the skirt pieces, and then basted the entire thing back together. It definitely looks much better than it did! Of course, now that I've managed to get the pattern to the point where I'm happy with it, I've totally run out of steam - I've managed to pick up a bad case of tonsillitis which has meant I've spent the last two days at home, but feeling so rough I have had no impetus to sew whatsoever! The worst part is, I won't be able to work on the dress from Friday to Monday evening, because we're off to Wales surfing.... which does NOT give me a lot of time at all to work on the dress!

I can't help but wonder whether I managed to get sick because I've been trying to do too much! I'm still not ready to give up on the dress though, and am hoping that once I get the actual fabrics cut out and baste them together, it shouldn't take too long to sew up........ right????? Please tell me that it'll be super easy and quick!!!!

Finished: Blue Floral Sureau Dress!

So, as I said in my last post, although I have been doing some spring wardrobe sewing in the past month or so, I haven't really been feeling up to documenting it! This weekend however, it's been such lovely weather (finally!!) that I finally decided to bite the bullet and get some photographs taken of at least ONE finished item of spring wardrobe sewing, so here is one of my current favourite makes, the Sureau from Deer&Doe:

It was finally so sunny that I look like I'm
glowing in these photos!

I made this dress from a lovely kind of brushed cotton from a stall at Leicester Market. It feels lovely against your skin and it's lovely and breathable but it wrinkles like a mother if you've worn it for longer than 20 seconds, which is one of my pet hates, I CAN'T STAND WRINKLES! Just putting it out there! Despite having two big tupperware boxes of buttons, I couldn't find the right shade of purple for the buttons, so I went into town JUST to buy the right colour buttons. I don't normally make that kind of effort, since I can be a bit... lazy and just think 'eh, it'll do', but I was so pleased with this make that I felt the extra effort was warranted!

I just made the pattern in a size 40 with no adjustments and am definitely happy with the fit, although I think next time I will make some changes, just to make it fit that much better! I'll definitely extend the bodice by at least an inch or so (to be honest, I should just automatically do that for every pattern!) and add a FBA adjustment to the 38 which will hopefully make it fit even better than this version.

A little aside, do you see how there is some strange wrinkling and pulling on the right hand side of the back bodice? That is because I have some muscle wastage in my right shoulder (as a result of my nerve problems) which means that it is slightly lower than the left. I have decided that I'm not going to attempt to fix any fitting problems coming from my right shoulder, unless it's absolutely necessary, since I'm making a concerted effort to 'bulk up' my right shoulder and trapezius muscles at the suggestion of my pain management specialist, so hopefully this pulling will start fixing itself soon!

The fabric cost me £10 (Stuart knocked £2 off for me, since he had just under the 2m I wanted) and with the zipper and buttons it cost me about £11.50 which isn't bad at all for a dress that I can definitely see being a favourite this year!

Now, as a little bonus have a ridiculous photo of me:

Ahhhhh! WHAT IS IT??

This is the face I make when something huge and buzzy tries to land on me mid-photograph! I think it was just a honey bee, but it was so big I thought it might have been a hornet for a minute!!

Right, that's one recent make finally ticked off the 'to blog list'! Yay! I'm hoping I'll catch up with myself soon! Me-Made-May '13 is definitely helping because it's forcing me to take photographs of what I'm wearing, and I don't have enough me-made clothes to ignore the most recently made items, so I'm often wearing them and putting photos up on the MMM13 Flickr page well before I've had chance to blog about them!

I hope everyone had a lovely weekend, and people in the UK made the most of the Bank Holiday and lovely weather!

Maybe Manageable May!

Wow! Has it really been a month since my last post??? How did THAT happen?

Well, I guess I know how it happened, but I just hadn't realised that it had been a whole month! Let's face it, a body in motion tends to stay in motion, but a body who stops blogging tends to find it hard to start again, amirite?

Anyhoo, I had some (minor!!) exploratory surgery done earlier in the month, and was feeling pretty sorry for myself and tired and sore for a little while afterwards, although I did get a TON of reading, TV series and movie watching done, and lots of knitting, and I EVEN managed to get some of my spring sewing done too!

But then, before I knew it it was back to work (Boo.....) and Mr Cuckoo and I have spent the last two weekends decluttering the house (finally!) and getting rid of approximately 4 car loads of stuff, and we're nowhere near done. These Victorian houses might not have a lot of floor space, but it appears that they sure can contain a shitload of crap!

With all this going on, I was still thinking about blogging pretty much all the time, but I never seem to have the time and energy to take photos of my makes at the moment, and I feel like there's no point in me blogging if I've got nothing new to show, you know?

BUT. Tomorrow is May. And we all know what that means!!

'I, Alexandra of Alexandra and the Cuckoo Clock, sign up as a participant of Me-Made-May '13. I endeavour to wear one handmade/upcycled item of clothing each day for the duration of May 2013'

So, now I really have NO EXCUSE not to blog, because I'm going to be taking photographs of myself every day for the month of May! I'm hoping that the frequency of having my photo taken will help me to get a little bit more comfortable in front of the camera... It didn't seem to last time, but you never know!

Right, now please excuse me, I need to go and ransack my wardrobe for me-made items whilst muttering maniacally about having nothing to wear. (don't look at me like that, you're all doing it too!)

Giveaway Winner and FINISHED: Peony

Phew. 

It's been a pretty manic few weeks since my birthday, and although it's been lovely going away on holiday and seeing family, all the travelling, coupled with some hospital appointments and a ton of errands have totally tired me out recently. 

Mr Cuckoo and I have decided to make sure that we keep April free of travelling, and I'm really looking forward to a month of sewing and decluttering the house, before wedding season comes around again!

So, FINALLY, here is the winner of my birthday giveaway!

 Taking out all the non-giveaway comments, comment number 4 is:

Congratulations Sophie! One Anise pattern coming up!

Now, in an attempt to blog some of the backlog of finished sewn items, I'm posting some hastily taken photographs of a Peony dress that I made back in NOVEMBER.

Will I ever look comfortable in front of the camera? I'm guessing not.

I actually made TWO muslins of the peony bodice since pretty much everyone had mentioned fitting issues with the Peony, and I took a load of photos, meaning to blog my progress, but... well... that never happened!  Oddly, after doing an FBA on the bodice, I was still really struggling with the fit, and in desperation, copied  Rochelle's changes to her Peony, even including the two tucks at the neckline! Thanks Rochelle, for doing all the hard work for me!

I wanted to make the Peony for a wedding in December, and knew that I'd need to make it up first in another, less precious fabric to make sure I was happy with the fit, so I bought this floral polycotton from the market for £4 a metre. I really liked this print even though it's really busy and more girly than my usual style, and I'm pleased to say that it has seen a lot of wear since November!

I don't really have all that much to say about the dress really... It's a shame that the busy print camouflages the tucks at the neckline, because I actually really like that about the dress.

Tucks! Can you see them?

I've been wearing the dress with thermal tights and a cardigan, but I'm hoping once the weather gets better (come on now, it's April for crying out loud, I'm ready to see the SUN!) I can just wear the dress on it's own. 

I hope everyone is having a lovely Easter break!

Unscheduled Blogging Break!

Apologies, but due to a few hospital appointments and family obligations, I'm having to take a bit of an unscheduled blogging break this week, but I'm hoping to be back on either Sunday or Monday with a post, AND the winner of the giveaway!

Also, I'm blogging from my iPhone, which I've never done before, so apologies if this doesn't look right!

I've tried to add a photo of Leicester in the snow earlier in the year, because I can't bear a photo-less post, but I can't seem to do anything with it, so I don't know if that will work either!

I hope everyone enjoys the long weekend (if you have one!)

Sun and Snow and Shears!

I can't believe it's been a week since my birthday! What a difference a week makes! This time last Thursday I was either on a snowy piste, or perhaps having my lunch and a coffee in one of the restaurants up a mountain!

I have to admit I'm feeling a bit sorry for myself today, back at work with a to-do list as long as my arm, so it seems the perfect time to upload some holiday snaps! Don't worry, there is a very little bit of sewing related stuff in this blog post, but I'm going to put it RIGHT AT THE END, so you've got to go through all the holiday photos before you get to it. I'm mean like that! Having said that, if you're really not interested photos of the French Alps, you can always just skip to the end! :)

Me and my snowboard at the top of a glacier!

We spent the week in Val Claret in Tignes and it was definitely the biggest and best ski resort I've been to in the Alps (but that's not saying much really, and I've never been anywhere BUT the Alps, so I have no idea how it compares to resorts in North America, say). The lift pass we bought (in order to get up the ski lifts) was the 'Espace Killy' one, which meant we had the full run of all the pistes in Tignes AND all the pistes in Val D'Isere, the neighbouring resort, which meant that we had a MASSIVE amount of space to play around in! It was really amazing, but EXPENSIVE, over £200 for a week, just for the pass itself.

The weather and conditions were pretty much spot on every day! Sunny all day, and then snowy at night, so we would wake up to fresh snow, which was pretty awesome! Of course, the only day that the conditions were less than ideal was on my birthday, when there was a TON of snow during the day, which meant that you were in the middle of a cloud, whilst it snowed on you!

Lunch on top of the Grande Motte!
I'm not trying to look sultry here, I'm squinting because it's so bright!

View at lunch!

I was pretty convinced that the slopes would be absolutely packed full of people, as it's one of the biggest resorts in France, but there were SO MANY different pistes, that (barring the two or three main runs into each resort) we would often have the slopes to ourselves!

Mr Cuckoo consulting the piste map.
Those two black dots are the only other people around!

Snowy!

More snow!

And er... y'know. Snow.

I was really happy about how quiet it was, because it meant that I had much more confidence trying to improve without worrying about little kids barrelling into me at high speed (it's happened!) and I also spent a lot more time than I normally would off piste, indulging in all the fresh powdery snow (it's the most AMAZING feeling, you feel like you're floating! There's nothing else like it!) I'm not the most confident boarder (this is only my third trip) and having quiet and space to practice really makes all the difference! 

Mr Cuckoo (and his wild man beard that he refused to trim the entire time
we were there!!!)  heading into Val D'Isere for some well deserved beer!

Beer time! We insisted on sitting outside even though it was
snowing and freezing!
(ASIDE: self made hat right there folks!)

We'd pretty much finish up each day with some beer and hot drinks at a bar in either Tignes or Val D'Isere. On my birthday, we went into a Grand Marnier place in Val D'Isere and asked for coffee with our crepes only to be told 'We only do drinks with Grand Marnier in them!' Okay, well you twisted my arm! It was my birthday after all! (but really, only in France!)

We weren't really into the 'apres-ski' thing on this holiday, since it was just the two of us, so we'd generally head back to our little one bedroom apartment after a drink or two, for dinner, and then a marathon session of either 'The Killing' or 'The Walking Dead', whilst I knitted!

It wasn't a cheap getaway by any means (even though we self-catered most of the time to keep costs down) but I would DEFINITELY DEFINITELY recommend going to Tignes if you're thinking of heading to the Alps for snow!

Bonus photo from in the centre of Tignes - Val Claret.
Yes, I have a totally lame sense of humour, but tell me that doesn't look
 like a big wooden penis! Or a match, I guess, if you're not dirty minded like me!

Okay okay okay, if you got this far without falling asleep, you get two stamina points! (although, these are only a tiny fraction of the photos we took, so maybe you should just thank your lucky stars!) 

I was feeling pretty bummed to say the least when we got back from holiday, although, as I've already said, my AWESOME sewing machine find totally cheered me up! But, on Monday, after heading home from my first day back at work, feeling super glum, I came home to this:

AWESOME NEW SHEARS

A pair of AMAZING new tailors shears from my friend Serena! They're the BUSINESS. They're 8" tailors shears made from certified Sheffield steel by Ernest Wright and Son!!!

Before I went on holiday, I was definitely feeling a real lack of sewing mojo, but with all my awesome new sewing gear I'm pretty much frothing at the mouth to get back in the sewing room! And, of course, I can't this weekend, because we're down in London all weekend, but I AM planning on using some of my birthday money buying fabric and maybe some vintage-y items from London markets. So it's not all bad! ;) I'm planning on going to Walthamstow market and Wood Street indoor market. If you have any other suggestions for good shopping places nearby, let me know!