Overlocker bargain

I've often thought that having an overlocker would be handy - yes a standard sewing machine can do the job - but I personally have found working with stretch materials a bit of a pain on the normal machine. Finishing of the seams is a real pain, and call me lazy, but sewing a narrow double hem seems to take me forever (and I'm already very slow at sewing as it is!)

Maybe I'm just making excuses but when a girlfriend of mine (thanks Linda!) told me that there was a Singer Overlocker on sale for half the RRP, my ears pricked up. *Hmm... this could be interesting...* She was lovely enough to even call Harris Scarfe to put one on hold for me and it's a good thing she did - the rest sold out after 2 days on sale!

So now I am the proud new owner of a Singer 14T5545 overlocker *HURRAH*

More booties

It seems these days that there has been a bit of a baby explosion around people I know. Everywhere I look, I see expectant mums or a beautiful new bub (or two) so I decided that it was time to make a few more pairs of baby booties. Seeing as it has been super warm recently and one of the bubs I had in mind for pair lives in a tropical country, I decided to ditch the flannel and try them out in a lighter material - muslin.

I found some gorgeous pink and baby blue material, as well as some cheery yellow fabric with ducks to play around with and these are the results:


I'm very pleased with how they turned out, but I did at one point wonder if I had made a mistake in selecting muslin due to it being so thin. When I was sewing the elastic onto the inside of the bootie for the first time I was worried that the reinforcing stitches I was putting in were going to rip the fabric, but with a bit of care I managed to make it work.

Hope they are warm enough for teeny tiny feet!

Books!

2 new purchases - Amy Karol's book "Bend-The-Rules Sewing"


and Kelly Doust's book "The Crafty Minx"


Both of them are gorgeously presented and after having read "Bend-The-Rules Sewing" from cover to cover I am absolutely loving it. I suspect from flicking through "The Crafty Minx", it will probably serve more as inspiration than an out-right instructional book as it seems to have fewer diagrams/patterns than a lot of sewing books I have come across.

Hopefully I'll have something of note to show from these soon!

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

Melting Monday

I am usually really happy when the weekend comes about but the next few days are going to be pretty warm, building up to a scorcher of a Monday. Check out the forecast!
I'd like to stay in the confines of my house with the AC and sewing machine running (bliss!) but unfortunately I have a few things on this weekend, and the killer 41 degree day had to fall on a weekday where I'll be commuting in to work.

Heat + public transport = unhappy me :(

UPDATE It reached 43.6 degrees!!!

First for 2010 - Inspired Ruffled Skirt

Happy New Year everyone!

As the title says, this is the first project of mine for 2010 - a ruffled skirt inspired by this post on Dixie Mango. The 2 skirts up there were so cute, I decided I needed to have a bash at it as well.

After umm-ing and ahh-ing over what materials I had in my stash to use, I followed the steps listed in the recommended online tutorial and came up with this:

The gingham print is actually a pinky-purple on white, which hasn't come up too well in the photo but you get the gist.

Hopefully it fits Princess S!