Art!

This is our new painting - well it's new, and it's an original commissioned painting by Canadian artist Glen Ronald, and it's of Norwegian explorer and Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Fridtjof Nansen, buuuuuut it's not ours. Too bad - hahaha. We get to display it on our wall, though, until the rightful owners move back to Canada from Norway. Nice art for us for now. I love it!

Fridtjof Nansen - by Glen Ronald

Updated to add: I made this recipe today - steak fajitas. They were really good. I want to make them again someday, so posting the link on my blog for posterity.

Lucy's Chocolate Factory bathrobe and mitts - McCall's 6659

I made a new pair of mittens using the same method I used last Saturday. See here.

Hey, Lucy!

The mitts have a beautiful fluffy pink lining. So soft and cuddly. I only had one mitt made yesterday and wore it this morning driving my daughter to school (très froid). Left hand had new pink mitt and my right hand had a knit mitten. The new pink one was warmer!

Well, that pink fabric was leftover from a bathrobe I made a few months back. It is pattern McCall's 6659. I made style B, the long one. It does not have belt loops so I added some, plus a hanging loop. More importantly, this pattern has a major flaw - has NO pockets! Well, I did add pockets on the front, of course. I like this housecoat. It's warm, comfortable and cute.

 The mitts match the housecoat.

Sitting.

  Comfy times - wearing a Lucy fleece housecoat and listening to a podcast. Relaxing!

Side view

Still wearing the mitts.

Onesie! McCall's 7296 with changes

I sewed this a few months back, but am posting about it now. This pattern was the template. I used some white fleece with little moose and hedgehogs and spruce trees as a print.

I changed the neckline to round and took out any and all waist definition. I basically wanted a rectangle with smaller rectangles for arms and legs. I like the bright yellow buttons I bought on sale. Wanted a bit of fun contrast. And also pockets!

This thing is warm and very comfy! J made a black and white one for my daughter, but now it's a little bit small on her. I use it to lounge around the house and sometimes I sleep in it.

G'night!

An old relic: McCall's 4003

Here's a new t-shirt from a 1974 McCall's pattern:

Groovy girls with long, long legs and hunchy shoulders

I had a small amount of blue flower print knit fabric. Really thin stuff and less than 1 meter. It was a jigsaw puzzle, but after a few false tries I was able to place the short t-shirt pattern pieces on the material with nothing left to spare. Didn't take too long to make, and I like the result with the flowy, retro sleeves.

I added a little pocket and sewed in some pink decorative elastic around the head opening.

This pose is to show the voluminous sleeves.

Went skating, then made some great mitts - in that order

Today was very cold, but Valerie and Mark and Bruce and I decided to go skating anyway. It was lots of fun. I only fell twice, and only one of the falls was a disaster where I'm hobbling around now, like I broke my knee in half and also bruised it. Skating was really fun. There were these trails you could skate along and then end up at several large skating ponds. Really nice! Must go back.

Here are the kids getting ready:

See those bright blue mitts in the bottom right corner. I knit those a few years ago, but those are not the mitts of today's post.

I did some Christmas sewing and had some fleece leftovers, so I thought I'd check around the net and see if any free mittens patterns were available. They were! I used this pattern and instructions and was very happy with the mitts I made today.

I made lizard (or maybe gecko?) mitts for Mark. Here are his hands wearing them.

They are fully lined with some other fleece I used some time ago.

More fleece inside! Double layer is warmer.

I have to make some of these for myself soon. I love the way they feel and how warm they are. Here are some in progress shots. (Why not?)

Leftover fabric. Neat lizards. Pattern pieces from printout underneath.

Two mitts = one hand. Cuffs sewn together, then ram-jam lining into main mitt.

 That was today's sewing. Stay tuned for more.

Sharing a recipe and finished Vogue 8691

Update - I wear this top quite a bit and have had a few compliments. Glad I made it. Will get a shot of me in it sometime and post.

I did finish sewing that top from the last post and it's nice and I wear it a lot. Happy to have it, happy I made it. I'll make another one in plain black soon. I will post pics of me wearing the plaid one too, but for now...

This is Vogue 8691 View B

I ran out of the plaid fabric, so I used some red spandex on the underside of two of the flares. It's a nice top. It zips up.

I'm trying to eat more healthy filling food - too many chocolates and ridiculous amounts of sugar in our house right now. It's a conspiracy to make me fat! Here's what I made: cheeseburger muffins. Also, and unrelated, I used bitly for the first time today.

First scoop blobs of dough into tins.

Then try to somehow spread them out and up the sides.

Finally, scoop in cooked meat, bake, then add sauces, cheese, rebake for 5 minutes. Tada!

Enjoy your day!

POST SOMETHING!! Okay.

I want to start posting stuff on my blog again. I like documenting stuff I do. Why not?

Here's a pattern I want to try. I have some plaid t-shirt fabric, so here we go:

Vogue 8691

 This is a mess. But give me time - I will produce!

All for now. More to come.

Back to it!

Here's a good way to start things. This is my wastebasket. It's very large and I've not emptied it (I don't think) since I began sewing again this past summer. I really really jammed the fabric down, and in the end I had a meniscus of fabric at the top. Must be due to static bonding or something.

I think it's full.

So I dumped it out, and appreciated its impact as art. Also this brought back memories of all the projects I've undertaken during the time.

Impactful Beauty. Not for sale.

Now I'm ready to start over:

Let's rock!

So today I finished up a little jammies project for a friend of mine who recently had a baby boy. I made this pattern (Kwik Sew 3960) in a soft, soft, soft red fleece (it's super-soft!!!), and a matching hat from this pattern.

 I will learn to rotate pics in 2016.

It turned out so cozy, comfy, sweety! Valerie says she hopes I will make a "life-size" one for her! We'll see.

Sleeper plus hat.

Mark puts rabbit in hat.

Hat is on backwards, but no matter.

Monkey wears hat.

In other creative news, my daughter made this cake today. Isn't it lovely!!

Talented girl. Tastes good too!

Bye for now.

I have a whole back load of various sewing projects I did around Christmas. I hope to post pictures of them on this blog in the days to come, plus anything new I make. Gotta go and Happy New Year, everyone!

Everybody should have a hoodie dress!

See, I know this cuz now I have one. I love it! I made this dress using a combination of the Lisse Hoodie pattern from my last post and the Skippy Dress from the pattern company, Make It Perfect. The Skippy dress is really nice. I made mine in some old brown velour fabric I'd had for about 16 years. It made a huge mess when I was cutting into it, and I did not like the way it smelled when I was ironing the seams, ha ha. I was trying out a mash-up of sorts. This is supposed to be a winter dress, so I wanted a crossover hood instead of a scoop neckline. Also, I decided I wanted my sleeves to be flat and not puffy at the shoulders due to it being a winter hoodie dress and not a light breezy summer dress. So how did it turn out?

Well it looks good (I think) and feels oh-so comfy! I'm happy with how the sleeves and hood from the Lisse pattern fit onto the rest of the Skippy pattern pieces. What might I do differently if I sewed it again? I would make the front bodice a little less scoopy so I would not have to stretch the hood piece so much to make it fit. Also, I may cut the skirt a little straighter next time. It is in a trapezoid shape and maybe a little less flare would be better. However, those are minor quibbles. I like this dress.

I finished this on Thursday night and wore it all weekend long to different events. I will wear it again right away to the Grey Cup get together my family is having.

Here the hood is up and you can see the dropped waistband. I like how it sits low and the waistband gives the illusion of a two piece outfit. I also love the front kangaroo pocket, which is hard to see in these pictures.

 And here's the back

Bye for now!

Valerie's Lisse hoodie

I made a hoodie for my daughter out of the same ponte knit I used for my skirt two posts ago. This hoodie is so cute! I used this pattern. Again, using the theme of how much you can make from two yards of fabric, I'm quite astonished at being able to make an almost-to-the-knee adult skirt, plus a teen sized hoodie from the November KnitFix package I got. It's fun to see what I can do with this fabric.

Here's the hoodie on the floor. It looked limp on a hanger, and I don't own a dress form, so it's on the floor for the picture.

Here are some photos of my daughter in her new hoodie. I finished it on Tuesday night and she wore it to school the next day. She said she got lots of compliments on the hoodie, which is really nice for her.

Back view

The glam:

View from the side - she doesn't like posing for too many pictures, so I try to keep it quick by taking only a few shots.

She's in dance. As such, she and her friends are always doing stretchy stuff like this:

Background wall is getting painted soon. Just prepping it!

Fun action shot:

This hoodie makes me want to move!