Sew Ruthie

Picture Links Requests

2012-02-01T21:27:00.004Z

In response to Ginger's request for the little wardrobe pics on the left to link to something, I have found some of the original larger pictures and made them link from the thumbnail. If they are linked I have edited the description to say so. Some of them I can't find the original matching picture in a blog post at the moment, but if I come across them I shall add. I've now added the year as well, so if you really want more info on the patterns used etc, you can go to the Blog Archive (at the very bottom left) and find the year and month and the posts should be there.

I realised I'd not added thumbnails for the most recent wardrobe collections so I had a little trawl through and added all the newer collections, including some I had forgotten (Newspaper Collection anyone!)

The very oldest ones were my early attempts at collections and my style and ability to create collections has evolved quite a bit since then.
So unless anyone speaks up for 2006-2007 collections they are history. I was plus size then so all the clothes are gone now, and I wasn't blogging then, so details of patterns etc are probably lost in the mists of time.

Hope this proves useful.

Interestingly in a normalish year I seem to do
SWAP (which is a double collection really) and is Spring clothes
which you can then wear in the UK Summer
then an Autumn Collection
then a Christmas Collection
and then start all over again with the next SWAP

SWAP Musings

2012-01-31T21:51:00.001Z

Long day at work today so not trying to do too much in the way of sewing tonight, however a large mug of Earl Grey tea and I can pause and review progress.

I have a black dress on the sewing table from New Look 6071, plus plans for the Burda seamed skirt also in black. (This is a lot of black for me, but this wardrobe just seemed to need it, maybe the crazy print makes up for it?)
That would bring the total up to 8 pieces and would mean I had :-
2 tee shirt style tops
2 cardigan style jackets
2 knit dresses
2 skirts

Reading back through the SWAP rules, I see I need to make 7 different sorts of garments, 4 made twice. As I always have a few wadders I thought I would in fact have at least 7 types of garments and make them all twice, and then make an overall collection from this larger selection of pieces (time permitting).
Since I will have already used up 4 of the categories and some of them I just wouldn't want to sew for my everyday type wardrobe and the vibe of the 'Angled Poise Collection' , my current thoughts are to make 2 each in the following categories
Trousers - using a great pattern in an old Burda magazine I got from McGintie, make this twice in pinstripe and black denim.
Tailored jacket - as distinct from the cardigan jackets - collarless and sleek, incorporating the forward head alterations. Make this twice in red and pinstripe.
Blouse - tie neck blouse. Make this twice once in sheer, the other in red.

My reserve pieces would be one or two waistcoats (vests), a shirt with collar in a black/white stretch shirting (prob only one of these), and if I found appropriate fabric a simple raincoat. The fabrics are in boxes under the sewing table, so I might pull them out and see what speaks to me. Sometimes when stuck for ideas the fabric leads.

P.S. I haven't made any pants for a while so maybe this is what I need to sew next......

Print Dress

2012-01-30T23:22:00.000Z

Here's a print dress made from New Look 6071. The 6th item in the 'Angled Poise Collection' I'm making for SWAP 2012.

I've lengthened the dress by 4.5" and shortened the sleeves to elbow length.
I plan to wear this tomorrow!
And with the other items....

I think the vision I had for the 'Angled Poise' Collection is coming through in the pieces, even when they only hang limply from the hanger.
Next up is a longer version of the black dress, and then I shall have to see what speaks to me.

Snow on the moors

2012-01-29T17:51:00.001Z

Well I've had a strange week and not productive at all from a creative perspective.
I'm still doing the Artists Way, and wrote my pages each morning, plus went on a lovely walk on the moors where it had snowed which was gorgeous. This hasn't seemingly translated into anything creative as far as I can see. I have been cooking for the freezer and reading old Burda magazines and other people's sewing blogs but not doing anything actually creative myself.

(view from Abney Moor)

I'm transitioning my old role at work which I have found a lot more emotional than I expected, especially the bit where I realised I was going to have to move out of my desk, and it looked for a while that I wouldn't have anywhere in the office to work in 2 weeks time. I'm hoping this gets resolved on Monday, but I have found the 'desk wars' exhausting. The new role is in a completely different part of the organisation and I don't know any of the people, and I think I'm going to hugely miss my current colleagues (some of whom have become friends).

So this week has been a bit of a slog. Change is good and necessary, but its also difficult and unsettling. I've still not got anything done for the Craft Fayre, and have not sewn any steps on the knit dresses. Aware it was all getting a bit stressful I have booked a day of leave on Friday to give myself a bit of mental space. Here's hoping for a better week this next week.

February Burda Skirt

2012-01-26T23:04:00.001Z

I am planning to make a version of this skirt in a fairly heavy black ponte.Its pretty much the only thing I liked in February's Burda Style Magazine.

I don't really like that long separating back zipper. Think I could do an elastic waist or a shorter invisible zipper?

The Artist's Way

2012-01-23T23:33:00.003Z

I've done two weeks now of the Artist's Way and am finding it simultaneously hard going and very productive.
The very first week something unlocked in my brain and I rewrote my internal CV (resume) describing myself in a much more creative (and true to myself) way in the opening paragraph. I then used this to apply for an internal job, which after 2 interviews (one by phone, the other in person) they decided to offer and I accepted. The descriptions of my actual work experience and qualifications remained unchanged, so it shows that intro bit really matters!
I'm now in handover mode as I wind down the old job and then begin to learn the new one.
Not quite what I was expecting from a course in creativity :-)
However I really love the field I work in and want to bring creativity into that, so this feels right if a little scary.
I suppose I anticipated the impact would come in my sewing, photography or various crafts, so the creative spark coming in my work took me slightly by surprise.

I'm very excited that there are now 150 followers of this blog. Wow! Thank you all. I am humbled and encouraged that you want to see my projects.
I shall continue to sew as much as is feasible along with everything else and share the results here.
I do have some plans, but opening the door to being more creative may well change those as I learn and grow :-)
I'd still quite like the direction to include lots of hill walking, wardrobe sewing and things for the Craft Fayre, but maybe there's some other fun things waiting for me as well.

The rainbow is there because there was a great one on my way to work this morning. I enjoyed it as much as I could whilst still driving safely. I know rainbows are a little hackneyed, but they do bring me such joy every time I see one - all those pretty colours and almost always on a dismal day!

Cream tops coverhemmed

2012-01-21T22:28:00.001Z

Rather than starting sewing another garment, I decided to rethread the coverhem in cream and hem the bottom and sleeves of the two cowl neck tees. Well worth doing as I can now wear these if I want to.

Sometimes its good to finish something off. There's a lot of satisfaction to be had from that!
This style is great to wear under wool sweaters or jackets that I can't bear to have touching my skin, and are basically my looser collared version of rollnecks.

Craft Fayre Sewing

2012-01-21T09:00:00.000Z

There will be 3 craft fayres through 2012 and I plan to supply goods for them all, and help sell when I can. The first one is Sat 3rd March, and clashes with a weekend away, so I'll just supply the goods and others will sell them. That might be quite good actually as it'll take the personal element out of it - ie the aspect where you want the person to buy because you made it, and it hurts a little bit when they don't. I'm hoping this will give me an idea of what to make more of and what to make less of. I'll need to label and price up in advance as well. I think I'll print on ordinary paper, cut up and hand sew with a bit of thread, though sticky labels could also work, and would be quicker!
The next one is on Sat 1st September. I might do a few extra 'new term' type things like pencil cases and tote bags for that one. And then Sat 1st December, the Christmas Fayre, which can have Christmas stockings, hot water bottole covers, and anything which might be a nice Christmas gift for someone. I'm also going to pot up my baby spider plants and sell them as well, nothing at all to do with sewing :-). The lady I'm sharing space with makes greeting cards and gift boxes, so hopefully we will complement one another well.

Do you think a service where you can have the initial of your choice handsewn onto a cushion would prove popular? I could have felt letters and spare felt ready and sew on with embroidery thread in their presence. I could only do this at the ones where I was actually there, so not something I have to decide for March.

Thanks Ruthie

Black Drape Front Cardigan

2012-01-20T21:27:00.002Z

The plain black version of the drape front cardigan is finished.
Hanger shot as per usual. It IS properly black, the camera has lightened the shot and I've left it so you can see the detail.

Works very well with either of the tops and skirt :-)
Here's the 5 pieces, you can see that already I have quite a few outfit combos.

Little print tee

2012-01-14T21:47:00.001Z

Here's the little print tee I managed to cut out with the dress. I could only manage short sleeves, but I think that still works. I think this would work well under a plain black pant suit with a bold necklace. And it is a free garment as well, so I'm pretty happy with it.

It is a completely crazy print but a simple tee, and does work with the whole 'Angled Poise' collection I think.
This is a variation of the top from my most used pattern New Look 6735 - view C.

Since I now have the sewing machine, serger and coverhem machine all threaded up in black, I am going to carry on and sew the two dresses and another version of the drape front cardi this time in black.

New Look 6071 - print and plain

2012-01-14T11:11:00.002Z

I really got a lot of use out of the Christmas New Look 6071 dress. Black with gold sparkles is a little too much for the office though, so I'm making it again in a bold print with a 4.5" added to the drafted length and also in plain black, which I will hopefully cut a lot longer, to come below mid calf length.
The leftovers from the print should be enough for a little top as well if I am carefully with cutting out. I'll keep you posted!

Clothing of the right size, wardrobe cull etc

2012-01-11T22:02:00.002Z

I found this old post on Corporette very interesting, especially the comments.
Buying a Bigger Size
especially as I have 2 nice pant suits which don't currently fit but would be useful for work.

I would be interested in how people have tackled wardrobe culling, building a basic work wardrobe etc.

The area where I work is likely to undergo quite a lot of change causing my role to change, or perhaps me moving to a new role, so giving off the right vibe with well fitting and appropriate clothing is going to be a bit more important in the next few months than it has been. I've gained some weight since I've been living alone and adjusting to my new single life so this has been of particular relevance to me.

Burdas from 2003-4

2012-01-11T08:06:00.000Z

A lady on Stitchers Guild was clearing out some of her old Burda magazines and asked if anyone wanted them. I did although she's miles away.... but I've managed to arrange for a friend who works in that area to collect them from her and hopefully they will be on their way towards me on Friday. Apparently its the whole of 2003 and 2004, and given that I'm not usually one to embrace the latest fashions in Burda, may well give me lots of patterns which would work.
I had a little search on PR and people were sewing Burdas then and had good reviews, so I'll have to see when they come.
I'm really quite excited, and hope there will be some patterns that are quite me in there. Not sure if it'll disrupt my SWAP plans if I get distracted by something different than planned. However I have taken a different approach this year with a mood board and 3 boxes of co-ordinating fabric rather than anything more specific. So as long as the yardage is enough for whatever I fancy sewing I can have this freer form way of sewing which I think will be good.

Chunky Necklaces

2012-01-10T20:41:00.001Z

I treated myself to some chunky necklaces from http://www.prettycool.co.uk
They are very Ruthie you have to agree?

First up chunky coral coloured resin. Coral is a great colour for me and gets 'looking well' type comments from people.

Hammered chunky gold, great for reflecting warmth up into the face. A great piece to add to a boring suit.

Lime green multi-strands. Another great colour for me. Have been looking for something a bit like this for quite a while, so jumped at the chance.

And last, but by no means least, a silver tone leaf necklace. Trees and leaves are my preferred motif and bring me great joy, so I really wanted to get this. It is great for my 'Flamboyant Natural' personal style.

'Garment' A Month and cuuuute tape measure

2012-01-09T08:01:00.003Z

There's a proliferation of 'garment' A Month type topics on Stitchers Guild. I've decided to join in with Jacket A Month, Top A Month and Pants A Month, but leave the others well alone.
If I manage 12 in any category than that'd be great but I'm not too concerned about actually completing them, I'm using it more as a self pacing exercise to sew a balance of items for my wardrobe. For my definitions, jackets include cardigan type jackets as well, tops are any tops but mostly knit ones, and pants are any pants including PJs, waterproofs, walking trousers etc.

My lovely non sewing friend E was over yesterday and we went out for lunch and exchanged Christmas gifts. Part of mine was this adorable little tape measure. It's sooooo cute and has a recessed button to retract the tape. Isn't it lovely! I wouldn't have ever bought it for myself, thinking it somehow frivolous, but I adore it.

All Points Skirt Completed

2012-01-08T23:07:00.003Z

Here's my version of the All Points skirt. I made a mistake cutting out and needed to add a deeper waistband with elastic so it was long enough. I also didn't like the raw edges on my fabric so serged, turned and stitched. I think it needs a bit of a press so shall not wear tomorrow.

I love love love this ponte knit, and will probably go back and buy some more so I can make more pieces - a cardigan, dress, slim leg pull on pants, maybe leggings as well. This is the sort of stuff those travel wardrobes are made of, and at £5 per metre I need some more of it!

The All Points Skirt by Rhonda

2012-01-07T23:25:00.000Z

Although I loved the Tablecloth skirt on Shams' blog, I knew it wouldn't work on my bottom heavy figure, so just admired it as a thing of interest. So I was very excited when I came across The All Points Skirt by Rhonda Buss which appeals to me very much. This drapes from the waist and doesn't have the angular points which add visual weight I don't need, so I think it could work very well for me.
I could not decide which of the knits in my SWAP pile to use, and in the end went into the fabric shop in town and discovered they had ponte knits, and bought black (for SWAP, particularly this skirt) and rust (for stash, prob next Autumn).

It's not really worth a photo of black ponte, so I'll just say its smooth, light to mid-weight and should work very well for the skirt. I've measured me and the fabric and will be able to cut out the panels across the width of the fabric, which will be very efficient use of the fabric, and means I can make something else from the rest of it - maybe a simple black dress.

Jenni suggested that if this skirt style works well for me I should consider it in a pinstripe woven, and I am hugely excited about that. There's something quite subversive about a suit in a conventional fabric, but with unusual lines. I probably would need to keep the jacket quite simple to avoid overload.

Hopefully I will be able to cut out and sew up the skirt tomorrow and share with you.

With the sweater set and skirt, I would have a whole new outfit to wear next week!

Sweater Set

2012-01-07T17:39:00.000Z

Remember the drape front cardigan? It's now a sweater set as I sewed a little knit top out of the same sweater knit to go under it. This came out quite well, and I really utilised the fabric carefully, having only teeny weeny scraps left over.

Tip if you want to make a sweater set, cut both garments out at the same time to make sure they fit onto the fabric. I interlocked the pattern tissue pieces and also realised I needed to shorten the top slightly so it didn't show longer than the cardi.

Sale Shopping

2012-01-07T15:13:00.001Z

I got some money for Christmas and decided to do a little sale shopping.
If you've been reading my blog for a while you may remember that I loved a red-orange dress in Monsoon but decided I could NOT justify the £70 price tag.

I went back today and bought the dress for £21 in the sale, and am very happy. I also picked up a little red-orange butterfly pendant to go with it.

Drape front cardigan

2012-01-04T00:05:00.001Z

Not quite finished as a thread broke on the serger at an unhelpful point, but thought you would like to see the drape front cardigan out of the black and white stripe sweater knit.....

There's also a 3/4 sleeve scoop neck sweater cut out (but not yet sewn up) to make it into a modern sweater set.

Edited to add a little more about the pattern and construction.

The cardigan is based on New Look 6735 View A, the cardigan jacket. I had already altered this to deal with my forward head and shortened it for a previous cardigan. For this version I made a new pattern piece for the lower front and back (which I'm calling a peplum) as described in the last post - basically a rectangle the length of the hip circumference and the depth of the original waist to hip length, with squares added each end for the drapes. Then when cutting out I stopped the cardigan front and back at the waistline.

Construction order was as follows:-

- shoulder seams

- insert sleeves (flat)

- sew up sleeve and upper side seams

- sew 2 sections of peplum together.

- sew peplum to lower edge of cardigan

- sew 2 sections of neckband together.

- sew neckband to front of cardigan.

I've cut a version of the view B top to make it into a sweater set with the cardigan. I shortened the body and sleeves slightly to make sure it both fitted on the fabric and would not show longer than the cardigan. Hopefully I'll sort out rethreading the serger tonight and can sew up the matching top in the next day or two.

All sewn to the rather chilled strains of Lauridsen :-)

SWAP sewing

2012-01-02T19:26:00.000Z

Honest I AM starting on my SWAP.

So far I took the Autumn 6PAC fabric that didn't get made into anything and packed it away in two huge plastic boxes and stuffed them under the sewing table. Kinda sad as there's some boiled wool in there that didn't want packing away really and made a bit of a fuss when I tried to get the lid on, but we've a new season coming up, so it had to go away.

Then I fished out the 3 boxes of SWAP fabric and went through them getting out the knits that could be sewn with black thread. These are now on the ironing board waving at me. One - the black and white sweater knit - is laid out on the cutting board on the bed whilst I think how to get a cardigan and a top out of it. I'd initially planned a classic sweater set, but then decided I really wanted a cardigan with those draped hem points, so I've been investigating my RTW cardigans - and its really easy - so I will try to share my findings with you so you can make your own :-)

First up find yourself a pattern for a cardigan which consists of a front, back, sleeves and neckband as a starting point. Confirm the basic finished length you want (not including the hem points) and mark the hem and waist positions on your pattern. When you come to cut out the cardigan use theexisting pattern pieces for the sleeve and neck band, plus the front and back as far as the waist marker. Then cut a new piece for the lower body. This should run in the opposite direction for interest. The width is equivalent to the waist to hem length plus seam allowances. The length is equivalent to the waist length plus the waist to hem length twice. When you sew it together, pivot the peplum part at the centre front waist and sew it to the front band, this creates additional triangles at the side front giving the dipped hem. Easy but very effective.

If I get it to work I'll share a picture :-)

Craft Fayre

2012-01-02T13:17:00.000Z

The next craft fayre at the church community centre is Saturday 3rd March, and my aim is to have a whole table of Ruth sewn items to sell. I'll pass any profit on to the community centre, as I'm not doing this for my own financial benefit, but to use the stash up in a creative and useful way.
I think I'll call the stall 'Sew Ruthie' as well (the current blog name) and I will have to get shifting on the sewing as there's basically 2 months to get everything ready.

I've partly sewn a few items, and have collected loads and loads of ideas. My head's almost ready to implode, so I wrote them all down in a Word document so I won't forget any of them.

2011 Review

2011-12-31T10:19:00.000Z

2011 has been a strange year. I moved house twice and got divorced. I spent quality time with my parents, and built a new relationship with my mum and dad as an adult. I moved to a new town where I knew a few people from work slightly, but no-one else. I lived on my own for the first time ever, and also holidayed alone. I went camping with my parents and nieces. I've taken up hillwalking, made some new friends and started volunteering with the young people at church. There were also a lot of changes at work during the year - a change of boss and working a lot more with staff in India.
There have been some tough days, but I've had two friends who were particularly supportive at the low points and I made it through.

Oh but wait this is a sewing blog ROFL!

This year I've hardly been on Pattern Review but have enjoyed the community at Stitchers Guild very much. Thank you all. I follow a number of blogs and use the side bar as my blog reader. I get lots of ideas and inspiration from this online sewing community.

This year for the first time since 2006 I have not really managed to sew myself a co-ordinated collection. I didn't enter SWAP 2011, and haven't really completed a 6PAC. I'm not beating myself up about this, but am going to really go for SWAP 2012.

I have done some sewing this year though :-)

Before I moved to my parents last Jan I made a faux shearling jacket - this may have been at the very end of December..... I've not worn it yet and it still needs the fur hooks sewing on - maybe Monday before I go back to work.

February and March I didn't sew anything. In April I made some cushion covers for cushions to put on an old sofa my parents were going to give me for my own little rented place.
May I moved into my new home and unpacked. My blog followers got to 100, I thought about a giveaway but never quite followed through (sorry).
In June I made a top - but without the overlocker so doesn't quite have the inside finish I prefer.

July I didn't sew. In August I started sewing for Autumn. The theme was orange, brown and cream. I made 3 knit tops, a cardigan, a hat and some mittens. No bottoms though so a bit of a cheat as a collection goes.

I had planned to sew more pieces in this colourway but it didn't really pan out. In September I made the cardigan on the right. I went on holiday and turned it into a fabric buying spree!
In November I switched focus to Christmas party type clothes, plus made leggings. The pieces don't really work as a wardrobe, but I did another collection board anyway.

The dress on the right and the red furry jacket were sewn in early December but did not get worn as something about them is just too much.
After Christmas I came back from my parents and had a few mad sewing days making cushions and covers for bean slabs.

And then two new knit tops, which work in with the Autumn Collection.

My plans for 2012 include the SWAP on Stitchers Guild, making my home dec scraps into useful things and selling them at the church community centre craft fayres, and something of a wardrobe edit.
I hope you'll continue to tune in to Ruthie's Sewing Adventures in 2012!!

Birthday

2011-12-30T08:46:00.001Z

Its my birthday today, and the first since I've been living on my own. Its a tough time of year to arrange social things as lots of people are busy with their families, and it makes a singleton feel a bit left out.
However in the end I've had some kind people help me make plans for today.

First up is lunch with my mum, auntie and two cousins at Ikea today. We pick Ikea as a meeting point because its a similar distance for us all to drive, the cafe is not expensive and you can also buy storage boxes or whatever! This is my craft show sewing auntie too, so she's bringing me some samples of her work, which I am welcome to copy and adapt. We live far enough apart that we're not going to impact each other's sales :-)

Then this evening a few ladies from church are coming round for drinks, nibbles and a chat, which is definitely nicer than staying in on my own feeling glum. Its quite hard when you've moved to a new town and although you know people they are not really close friends yet, so I appreciate these ladies making the effort to care for me.

A few cards came already in the post and I put them carefully under the Christmas tree to be opened this morning. A BIG THANK YOU to Jenni (aka Yorkshire Lass) who sent me a very elegant card with a dressmakers dummy on it and a beautiful embellished notebook which says 'Once You Choose Hope, Anything Is Possible' - almost too lovely to write in :-)

Cowl/turtle neck top 2

2011-12-29T23:25:00.001Z

Here's the second version - this time in plain cream.

This also needs coverhemming on the hem and sleeves.

Both tops have cross grain strips sewn into the shoulder seams and back neck seam to stop things stretching out. This was quite fiddly to do, but I hope means the tops will retain their shape in the longer term.

Cowl/turtle neck top

2011-12-29T19:02:00.000Z

When the weather gets colder I would love to be able to wear a turtleneck to keep cosy. My forward head means normal turtleneck styles are unwearable, so I have been getting by with scoop neck tops and soft scarves, but this leaves a draft at the back of the neck, and doesn't work under scratchy wool jackets.

So I have adapted my altered scoop neck tee pattern, lengthening the sleeves from 3/4 to full length, and replacing the neckband with a loose collar which is a looser version of a turtleneck but which works for me. It still needs coverhemming but I am very pleased with the John Kaldor cotton print knit top as my first version.
I have a cream version cut out, ready to do next, and then will probably switch the machines to black and do something which will work with the SWAP colourway :-)

Burda Style January

2011-12-28T10:21:00.000Z

I picked up Burda Style for January yesterday.

I quite like the pencil skirt and the chiffon wrap blouse.

None of the underwear is calling my name, but it'd be handy to have access to the patterns if I have a lingerie push in future.
The ruffle collar jacket also has me interested, and I wonder if it would work with boiled wool.

This is also the costume edition, which might I suppose come in handy in future.
There's a rather lovely plus tunic - used as the cover model on the UK edition - though I am not sure its worth the effort to downsize it.
The apron pattern might be useful, though I must admit I have a simpler approach which is just to trace around a purchased apron!

The slim leg pants also look interesting and might be a good way to introduce this silhouette to my wardrobe as well as being a good starting point for making jeans (since I have such a Burda butt)

Home Dec Sewing

2011-12-27T17:22:00.002Z

Here's the three 22" cushions I made for snuggling on my slightly battered terracotta sofa.

I also recovered the big bean slab, used for feet, TV remote etc.
The bean cube tends to live in the hall for somewhere to sit when talking on the telephone or putting shoes on. The small bean slab (standing on end in front of the bean cube) can be used as a back rest for the bean cube to make it more chair like.

I made the inserts for the cushions on the sofa yesterday evening as I didn't have anything large enough to hand. The bean cube and small bean slab are also homemade (from a long expired beanbag) but some time ago, but did need new covers.

I don't have much fabric left over but will cover a little lumbar cushion to match, and see what scraps still remain after that!
After that I will probably make a knit top or two whilst the cream thread is on the machines.
And then after that, it will be SWAP time :-)

Socks, SWAP and sewing

2011-12-27T09:35:00.003Z

For Christmas Jenni (aka YorkshireLass) sent me some absolutely gorgeous handknitted socks. They are lovely!!! Look rainbow stripes :-) How lucky am I? (Very that is....)
I never mastered knitting and am in awe of the knitters, since I can only sew. Thank you Jenni!

SWAP has started and I'm desperate to sew. For some reason the sewing urge has manifested itself in a spurt of home dec sewing, which slightly took me by surprise. But its using up stash, and producing useful stuff so who am I to argue?
It is a little strange when the creative drive is in a different direction than the conscious brain thought it was planning, but I'm just going with it for now, though it may needing reining in if I am to complete SWAP!

So far I have made covers for 3 bean items - a cube, a large slab and a small slab. I then fancied large cushions (22") so proceded to make 4 cushion inners this size from one of my huge bags of stuffing. I now want to make covers for these cushion inners and will have then used up all of that particular piece of fabric, bar a few rectangular scraps, which I may just throw away! (We shall see).

Having hauled some of these home dec pieces through 3 moves now, I want to use them up usefully this year as much as is feasible, and get the volume down some as it poses a bit of a storage problem. Home dec and crafts which could be gifts or sold for the church community centre seem a great way to go, so I'm really pleased I have some ideas.

SWAP 2012

2011-12-26T12:56:00.000Z

SWAP 2012 sewing officially starts today at Stitchers Guild, which works well for me as I have a few days before going back to work in the New Year.
However I also want to make some new (giant) accent cushions for my sofa and recover my bean cubes in nicer fabric (currently dark blue/black faux leather) as well as do some craft sewing for church.
So I'll see how all those things work out together!

If you are interested in SWAP 2012 it is here on Stitchers Guild.

Joyful Christmas!

2011-12-24T11:07:00.001Z

I would like to wish you all a Joyful Christmas. I'm off to spend a few days with my mum and dad, and make some space to think a little about the birth of my Saviour.

It'll be good to spend some time with my family also. And whilst I do really enjoy the meals with colleagues, the sparkly decorations and the gift giving, I don't want to lose sight of the Christian festival that sometimes gets obscured by Santa and all the hype.

When I get back I shall launch myself straight into sewing, and want to really make a dent in the SWAP whilst I have a few quiet days off work. I have two big boxes of fabrics and a style sheet rather than any concrete plans, so probably need to do some firming up of Fabric X with Pattern Y.
I have a need for some cowl neck tees to wear under boiled wool jackets, so may sew a bunch of those even if they don't quite make it into the SWAP.

Jacket A Month

2011-12-18T15:14:00.001Z

The Stitchers Guild Site have had a thread called Jacket A Month which is about sewing 12 jackets during 2011.
The idea is very appealing to me but sewing has been at a lower output this year due to life circumstances.
I have managed a few though :-)
first up, and this was probably technically sewn in December more than January is a faux shearling jacket, I'm going to sew the beige fur hooks on today, this is a sort of coral orange colour, and toasty warm to wear.

A big pause then on the sewing front until the Autumn, when I made a cardigan coat from a cotton sofa throw. This worked very well though would have been good with more closely matching serger thread. The cotton throw fabric was very thick at certain seams and I went through a few needles on the sewing machine completing the project.

The next project used the same pattern, and a lacey sweater knit for a shorter boxy cardigan.

My final jacket project was a red furry jacket, intended for party wear but actually not worn at all as yet.

4/12 isn't fantastic, so I think I'll have another go next year at Jacket A Month.

Partywear Update

2011-12-18T13:30:00.000Z

Perhaps unsuprisingly, the red fur jacket and blingy stars dress have been hard to wear in real life.
The dress is stretching out across the back neck and needs elasticting back into place. I think it would have more life as a top with black jeans, so will hem shorter.

However I've worn the black dress with the gold sparkle multiple times and it washes up well ready for the next occasion. Each time I've accessorised it a little differently - jacket, necklace, boots etc. So this one is definitely a wardrobe keeper. On Friday I wore the velvet leggings and a cami under the dress for warmth and a previously made shrug from the same black velvet.

Icy underfoot so stuck to my flat boots.

Although I'm seeing family for Christmas and New Year I am back home in between, and will be starting the SWAP sewing as well as having a frank assessment of my wardrobe. It's crammed and not everything is wearable. And New Year is a good time for reassessing I find :-)

Too much together?

2011-12-11T22:51:00.001Z

I've been pulling together my outfits for the 4 events I have. Friday night is going to be in town for drinks and dancing until late and if the opportunity for the most sparkle - is this going too far?

Velvet leggings with star tunic and red velvet shrug. Too much, or do they somehow balance each other out a bit?

Christmas Collection

2011-12-11T18:27:00.001Z

Here's the recent projects

Knit cardigan (not really Christmassy), fur shrug, two sparkly knit dresses and two pairs of leggings - one velvet, one denim.
Not sure you can really mix n match the pieces all that much with each other but they add to the Christmas section of the wardrobe.

Tips on sewing with faux fur.
Cut out from the wrong side in a single layer and try to just cut the backing and not the pile. This reduces the amount of fluff everywhere after you have cut out. I did do this and it helped quite a lot.
Its worth chalking around the pieces before you flip them into their new location (I did not) as this lets you see you really can fit them on before you start cutting. I didn't do this, and what I thought was the halfway fold on the fabric was not, so my back piece came out too narrow and I had to add a piece later.
Obviously faux fur is a napped fabric. I went with the fur pile going down the body. This means you have to cut all the pieces the right way up.
Once cut out do pin together and try on just to check it works. I did do this and found it helpful.
You can trim the pile from the seam allowances, though I admit I did not do that, and maybe my seams are bulkier than they might be because of this.
My jacket is lined, inserted by the machine bagged method. You need to leave a bigger than normal gap in the lining to pull the bulky fur through, mine wasn't quite large enough and I got a little tear I've had to sew up. Its under the arm though so not noticable.

Red Fur Shrug

2011-12-11T17:20:00.001Z

The red fur shrug is done. I shall now go and hoover everywhere. Not too bad on the fluff front tbh since I cut from the back in a single layer.

The back has a long wedge to make it wider, as I made a mistake when cutting out, but actually I quite like the almost swing coat look that gives from the back.

The lining is matt slightly crinkled mystery fabric which was a very good colour match. I had thought about black satin, but actually this is a much better look I think.
I had bought some ribbon to use for ties, but am not currently convinved that is a good idea, instead I plan to sew a fur hook in the tie position and see what that is like.

Its based on the shrug from Simplicity 4192 view C, only with the upper and lower sections pinned together before cutting out, the back detail as mentioned earlier and a bagged lining.
Bagged linings always give me a moment of severe doubt having sewn the sleeve hems up, but before turning through!

I also cover hemmed a dark PURPLE jersey RTW maxi dress to be a midi dress. I also hemmed the piece I cut off so it could be a sort of scarf should I so desire. I also removed the empire waist ties. The whole original look was rather frumpy I thought, but cinched at the waist with a wide purple belt and hemmed to midi length it works much better for me.
Black version of my purple dress (pre alterations by me).

Argh fur and an old project

2011-12-09T22:20:00.001Z

Well the red faux fur is having mixed success tbh, but hey I will salvage it. I will explain in more detail tomorrow. Definitely a "don't do it the way I did" type project, but all a learning experience!!!

In the meantime here is a still not quite finished project from last Dec (prior to moving out form the old house) which is made from a remant of faux shearling. I was VERY creative with the layout. It just needs some fur hooks and its cold enough again to wear it, as its a super toasty little jacket.

Seems to be in the colour for 2012 - Tangerine Tango. A complete accident, it just happens to be a great colour for me.

Idea for the Red Faux Fur

2011-12-07T23:17:00.001Z

I thought this beach wrap (view C) might adapt well to the faux fur cover up.
I'll have a little trial tomorrow evening and see how it works out.

The plan would be to pin the upper and lower fronts together and cut it as long as the fabric will allow, add a lining and I'd have a little shrug!

Sparkle dress

2011-12-05T23:54:00.001Z

I need to level off the hem, but I don't think I shall coverhem as the stars are a bit lumpy for seams, so I shall leave raw or at most serge the edges.

To make this work the cowl collar and the back are in a contrast black and silver mesh. I needed something soft for the collar and the fabric wasn't really wide enough for a front and a back. So I chose front and sleeves.
The fabrics are slightly sheer, more obvious on the back, so I will wear with a slip, or opaque tights and a cami.

Christmas tree skirt - explain it to me

2011-12-04T19:59:00.001Z

Sooooo I see people writing about their new Christmas tree skirts and I'm not sure if I need one or not.
I have an artificial tree which sits on three legs. My cunning plan is to pile gifts under and around it so the legs are not seen. But I am a sewing lady so I could sew one. If I could see that I needed it. And tbh I'm not sure that I do.

They are sold in Marks and Spencer (a British Institution heh heh) so probably are a required item.

Using contrast fabric

2011-12-03T08:17:00.001Z

For those times when there is not quite enough fabric for the project. A few ideas of how you can use a contrast fabric. These blouses all have the contrast in the necktie.

Red Fur Shrug

2011-11-21T07:44:00.001Z

I have a 0.5 metre length of gorgeous dark red faux fur and fancy making it into a little shrug to wear over Christmas outfits. Not sure what style to go with just at the moment - ie try and get separate sleeves out, or just go for an extended shoulder.

Here are some ideas I have saved from online stores, though I am also wondering about the style which is a simple 2 seam shrug, I believe there were instructions in a Threads Magazine (which I don't have) as per this review on PR.

Any suggestions?

Multi Strand Pearl Necklace

2011-11-20T18:13:00.001Z

I've sewn a simple black dress for Christmas parties and its going to be a good dress. It is a little more understated than the usual Ruthie look. My style personality is Flamboyant Natural, ie a Natural style with a very large dollop of Dramatic. I've learned to embrace this and find things that are me and still suitable for the office without looking too crazy.

Anyway I fancied pearls to go with my black dress, but not a single strand, or a carefully graduated set of three strands...... no I wanted a full on set of 10 strands of pearls as I need the impact which can only be obtained by larger jewellery if I'm wearing an open neckline. Pearls are a Natural material and a good colour for me BUT as I am not a Classic style personality, its not my best look to wear the normal classic pearl look.

I bought 3 sets of very very cheap costume jewellery pearls in white. Each had one long strand of medium sized pearls and one slightly shorter strand of smaller pearls. I also bought some double sided grey ribbon. After some experimentation I chose to use all 3 strands of the medium pearls, but only 2 of the smaller pearls. Once I was happy with the layout I tied the pearl grey ribbon through the strands, knotted twice, added a dab of FrayCheck, knotted again and snipped the ends off.

I then pinned a diamante brooch from my grandmother on the lower 3 strands off to one side.
I also bought some simple pearl elasticated bracelets and some pearl stud earrings.
(All my pearls in this set are cheap plastic, not even glass pearls and definitely not real. I do have a classic triple strand of real pearls + some glass pearl bracelets, but I've not used them here. This was done partly for cost, but mostly for the weight which in nice quality glass pearls would be a bit much for a normal neck).

I followed the memory of a simple tutorial I found somewhere on the web but have since lost the link for. I will add it back in if I find it.

Remnant Cardigan

2011-11-19T17:07:00.001Z

I finally got the buttonholes and buttons done on the little cardigan, which I made from a strange shaped remant of fabric. This is a sort of stretch lace with boucle fabric, the lace part is black and the boucle bits are cream and caramel. I've used textured black, cream and caramel buttons and continued them up and around the neckline for fun.... The first 5 button, and the other 5 are just for decoration.

Here it is styled with tan blouse and black necklace.

Meanwhile I went through the less interesting boxes of fabric and pulled a few pieces out, including some scraps of black and silver mesh knit which would work well with the black and silver stars fabric.
We will see how it works out.

Finishing things off

2011-11-17T21:29:00.001Z

I have a couple of pieces which need finishing off.
The black and taupe cardigan needs buttonholes and buttons and the black velvet leggings need hemming.

Here's the hemmed velevet leggings. I am hoping to make a tunic out this very blingy stars and black sequinned fabric to wear over them as a comfortable but fun Christmas outfit.
The buttonholes on the taupe and black cardigan are still causing me a lot of trouble. I will have to think about my plans for them, but I will hem in the meantime whilst the coverstitch is out and ready.

One thing which was holding up progress on both was the black thread I was using kept snapping. Its a brand called WIMSEW. I had 10 spools each of black, white and cream free with a machine (either the coverhem or the overlocker, I can't recall which) and whilst the white and cream seem to be OK, the black has not impressed.

I went to Fred's Haberdashery at lunchtime earlier in the week and purchased 6 reels (all they had) of Moon thread which is not expensive and has been good for the overlocker etc before.

SWAP 2012: Angled poise - garment plan

2011-11-16T23:06:00.001Z

SWAP 2012: Angled poise - garment plan

My current thoughts are as follows:-

I am going to limit myself to red/black/white, simple shapes, use stripes and plains. An office wear wardrobe (My captions will read Monday at the office, Tuesday on a work teleconference, Wednesday in a work meeting, Thursday travelling for work etc) which doesn't try to be anything else. Sophisticated, grown up, but still with that Ruthie twist of colour/print.

Season wise, no heavy wools, also no lightweight summer clothes. Mid weight stuff you can wear in the office pretty much all year round.

At the moment I'm thinking .....
red knit dress, possibly with a red knit cardigan in the same fabric
red/black/white/pink funky knit print dress

black and white sweater knit cardi (if I find the fabric in the stash.....)
red skirt and jacket which can be worn as a suit or split apart
black pinstripe suit - jacket, trousers, skirt and waistcoat, perhaps a simple dress though less likely
black and red print silk tie neck blouse
black and white stripe shirt
Black and white stripe tee, red/black/white/pink funky knit tee (maybe with black to eke out fabric leftovers)
this is slightly too many things but allows for changes of mind, projects going wrong etc.

Angled Poise SWAP 2012

2011-11-15T13:19:00.001Z

Here's my thoughts for the SWAP 2012, I've called it "Angled Poise" which is inspired by angles and has a generally grown up feel. I have used pictures which inspired me, rather than these being garments I shall reproduce exactly, but it give an idea of the vibe, colours, styles etc.

I am planning to use the black, red and white palette. Lots of stripes, top stitching and simple, almost stark silhouettes. Dresses, suits and separates suitable for the office.

Real Ruthie

2011-11-14T22:36:00.001Z

Whilst not the most flattering photo ever, here's a photo my mum took of me when I was out walking the canal with my parents the weekend before last. It is so great being able to spend some time with them now I am nearer.

Dad sent cryptic instructions to meet at a certain location, I then drove them to another location, we then walked back along the canal to their car, then drove back to my car and then went back to our respective homes. Complicated but actually worked really well.
Here's mum and dad as taken by me. (see lock mechanism in the background).

They've been so good to me :-)

Black Velvet Leggings

2011-11-12T22:51:00.001Z

I'm still thinking about the jacket honest, but in the meantime I cut out and sewed up these black velvet leggings. The little velvet bits which float in the air after cutting did make me sneeze a bit, but the leggings have come out quite nice and are super comfortable. Tomorrow I will coverstitch the hems and they will be done.
I've added a tiny scrap of cream knit to the centre back as a blank 'label' so I know which is the back.

Jacket Plans

2011-11-12T08:01:00.001Z

I haven't ever really managed to make a jacket that actually fitted. However my fairly recent discovery that I have a forward head has been quite a revelation, and I now know how to alter patterns for knit tops, knit dresses and cardigan type jackets to fit better. This is good.
My woven jackets have always been a bit hit and miss, but armed with my various new wedge alterations I thought I'd start with a simple collarless jacket. Because I have worked out on my tops what to do with Simplicity/New Look patterns, plan to use a Simplicty pattern.

A bit of a trawl through my pattern stash resulted in finding Simplicity 4194, and my original plan was to use the short jacket from this pattern

Then I had a look through some of the already selected patterns on my sewing table and found I had Simplicity 4081. I decided this was going to be a better choice and will be working on View B (the red jacket) though without the detailing. This doesn't have a centre back seam so I shall need to add one.

More fabric purchases

2011-11-11T21:18:00.001Z

As you might have noticed from reading my blog I am a bit short of fabric (hahahahahaha NOT). Anyway I was surprised to discover I didn't have any plain black jersey, and I wanted some black leggings to wear with boots plus some leftovers for other nefarious sewing purposes.

On this basis I went to town at lunchtime, and discovered what I thought was a carpet shop with a few rolls of fabric, has loads more fabric upstairs (which I thought was a storage room). This was good. I found the plain black jersey and bought 3 metres of it. I also bought 2 metres of coral pink jersey, 1.5 metres of cream jersey with a brown leaf print and 5 metres of striped black washable suiting to make separates. I came back to work very happy!

I suppose you would like a picture of the goodies?

OK here goes :-)

Denim Leggings

2011-11-10T23:10:00.001Z

Using the basic Burda leggings from the January 2011 magazine in a size 44, I cut out some stretch denim leggings. The denim was a lot less stretchy than the last fabric I used which was a 4 way stretch knit, so I added super large seam allowances and then sewed the seams at 1/2". They are snug but quite wearable.
I took 3" of the top of leggings and 1.5" off the bottom before cutting them out and they are still plenty long enough. I used 2" elastic for the waist and did 5/8" machined hems to the legs, and there is still some scrunching at the ankles. I am 5'5" or therabouts.
I have chunky legs, and definitely don't consider leggings to be pants, so I tried a few things on before I settled on a wearable outfit. The best one only showed a tiny bit of the leggings
- long white linen shirt, worn over long coloured cami, dark denim leggings, knee length brown suede boots. Topped with the mink cable cardigan made from the throw.

I like them, and can see other dark stretch denim fabric pieces being used in a similar way in future.

My Image Magazine

2011-11-09T18:56:00.002Z

My Image Magazine has arrived.

I ordered both Winter 2001/2012 (above) and Summer 2011 and am very pleased they have come so quickly.
I wonder what I shall try first!

This is a Dutch magazine and as far as I can tell is only available in a few fabric shops in Holland and Germany, but nowhere else, so yes if you want to order it use the links above to go to their website. You can use your credit card to pay via Paypal as a guest and they will ship anywhere in the world.

More dress

2011-11-08T21:40:00.006Z

I'm going to work on the dress a bit more tonight honest.
<cheeky grin>

I am wondering about getting a haircut. I have mid length naturally wavy hair, fine but lots of it. I have a greasy scalp though, so team clarifying shampoo with plenty of good conditioner on the hair ends.
Now here comes the confession. Other than trimming my fringe (bangs), I have not had a haircut since January (before I split from my ex) as I had a home hairdresser who came to the house to cut both of our hair. I've been quite happy to grow my hair out as its felt girly and I like that. However 9 months without trimming can't be good for the condition of those ends. I have done a home colour twice or maybe 3 times in that time just to keep the greys at bay and don't overdo it on styling etc, but I wonder if sometimes I look a bit too natural, and maybe like I don't really care.
Maybe I'll ask the girls at work tomorrow and see what feedback I get, they are fairly honest but nice with it.

I found with my hair type I either needed a short layered style - but that only works when I'm right at the bottom of my weight range and my face has thinned right down - not currently. Or a lot longer with layers. Style personality wise I am Natural with a large dose of Dramatic, and the long wavy layers has that Free Spirit Chic look. I could take the colour more dramatic (ie more into the red) which would bring out my green eyes more, but maybe make wearing some of my Spring pinks it a bit more challenging.
For work, especially when I need to be serious, professional or metaphorically kick someone's butt, I twist my hair back and make a twisted loop on the back of my head which I pin place with a barette.
I like being able to have both as I can literally let my hair down at the end of the day!

Right enough wittering back to sewing or I shall have nothing to show for it!

Updated to add quick hanger shot of the dress, still needs hemming.

Dress progress

2011-11-07T23:38:00.001Z

The dress is cut out and I've constructed the back, front twist and lower bodice at this point, so only sleeves and hemming to go, hopefully tomorrow.
I'm liking the fabric. The gold sparkles are somehow woven into the fabric, not printed on, but are very subtle, and only on one side. I have no idea how it is done but for a poly it has great hand, not plasticky at all. I think it'll make a nice little black dress with a twist (literally). Though the gold sparkles will probably make it too much for work. It should however be very flexible for events. I can see the centre of the twist being a great place to pin an accent brooch, or sew a faux jewel, and since it'll have sleeves I shall be warm enough and not be exposing my upper arms to the world.
The length does appear to be just about knee length with the additional 2.5" so I shall do a scant 1/2" hem on the coverstitch machine and hope that's OK.
So it will need black hosiery to slim my calves, but I think will be very wearable.

edited to add for some strange reason some of the colour came off onto my fingers whilst I was sewing. Not what I would expect from a polyester knit. I'll need to wash it before the first wear to avoid getting a tide mark at the neck from the dress. Very odd and slightly disconcerting.

Dress Idea

2011-11-04T23:14:00.001Z

I have some 2 way stretch black knit with gold sparkles. It's very polyester in content but really rather tasteful. (Some sparkle fabrics are tasteful, some are blingy, this is tasteful).
I think it is going to be a dress from New Look 6071 with sleeves. I've sucessfully altered a few New Look patterns to deal with my forward head so I think it quite doable, as it even has the back neck seam already.
The sparkles make it too much for work, but it could be great for those Christmas parties. And being poly should wash and dry very easily ready for the next event!
I imagine it styled with pearls and velvet evening knee boots, red nails and lips.

SWAP 2012 thoughts & Party outfits advice wanted

2011-11-02T22:19:00.001Z

The SWAP thread on Stitchers Guild is still undergoing questions, including various exceptions which confuse me as they appear counter to the main rule set, but perhaps these will be incorporated into a final rule set before sewing actually starts and this will address the current apparent contradictions.

I must say I'm not hugely enamoured of the 'new' rules as they seem a long way from the wardrobing approach of 6 tops, 4 bottoms and a jacket which was the orginal SWAP, but hey its not all about me, and I'll eventually find a way to sew a new SWAP plus some extras to fill things out (especially more knit tops).

I had already planned a colour scheme and theme for SWAP before the rules were published and still like it a lot, however I'm not going to share that here or on SG until much later. That's because I've had experiences of people being so inspired by my mood boards they copied it directly before I had time to sew things up which was rather a shame and rather took the wind out of my sails. Sorry about that folks, but you will get to see it at the end of SWAP when you can judge for yourself how closely I stuck to my original inspiration.

I had my powerpoint slide of the mood board printed off, and one key fabric which seems to sum up the whole collection nearby and then have been through most of my fabric stash deciding what would work and what would not work. This was not quite everything as there's some fabric I recall owning which I have not yet found, presumably still in a moving box someplace. As ever this is enough fabric for about 3 collections but since its every piece which might work, and of course could be too short yardage, wrong weight/fibre etc when examined more closely etc I'm happy enough with that and it gives me a starting point.
When sewing capsules, wardrobes or collections I like to have a few alternatives for when things just do not work out as expected. And pretty much each time I have a few things which work better than I expected and a few other things which didn't quite live up to the original vision. I see this as part of the creative process and don't beat myself up about it too much, but it does mean I need some extra options for when things go a bit a pear shaped.

I still need to think what I am going to do in terms of more Autumn/Winter sewing, as well as what I should do for dressy events over Christmas.

I already have one week with 3 Christmas events on consecutive evenings (Wed, Thu, Fri of the same week) which blows my usual '1 outfit for all events' approach out of the water as not enough time to launder. I have one sleeveless dressy dress which is red and I tend to wear for both weddings and Christmas things as well as various sparkly blouses/tops and plain trousers, so I probably need to get it all out and try on to see what works and what doesn't. Because the sparkly stuff gets so much less wear I tend to keep it for a lot longer and it may have dated rather.

Remember I am a not too slender pear, with long wavy hair and newly single.... what do you suggest?
(Edited to add make that 4 on 4 consecutive nights, the date of the Church Youth Ball (I help as a youth leader so kinda need to go to this) is now confirmed and is the Saturday after all the others!)

SWAP 2012 Official Rules

2011-11-01T07:06:00.002Z

The SWAP (Sewing With A Plan) Official Rules are up at Stitchers Guild. DragonLady has taken things in a slightly new direction.......

No purchase neccesary anywhere; this contest is open to anyone with a needle and thread, regardless of budget or availability of items. Just jump in and join the fun.

When SG ran the first SWAP contest after Julie Culshaw gave it to us, we switched the emphasis from "wardrobing" to "sewing". Several people told us how happy they were that sewing was the main point, because SG is foremost a sewing board. Thereafter, the "sewing" aspect has been the primary focus. However, last year's challenge was an undeniable flop. Lots of people made plans, a few bought supplies, a few made a garment or three...but only two people finished. A wide variety of reasons were offered, ranging from other life challenges to simply feeling overwhelmed with the rules. I want to continue keeping "sewing" as the main focus of our contest; however, I also want everyone to end the challenge with a wardrobe of gorgeous clothing.

There is, today, also a thread in the "chatter" section discussing sewing success rates. An informal poll has revealed that a large number of our members still struggle with wadders and failures. But the tip-over point seems to be fitting, and working with NEW patterns. Whether they are purchased or self-drafted, a set of basic patterns that result in successful garments on a consistent basis helps ensure that sewing time results in wearable garments. And that those that still fail don't make the sewist feel like a failure -sometimes, the pattern or garment just doesn't work.

This year, our SWAP will focus on fitting, and making tried-and-true patterns: testing and fitting paper patterns, muslins, and fashion garments that will help lower the overall sewing failure rates, result in fabulous clothing to be proud of, and (hopefully) give every contestant a pattern or two that works every time it is used.

Choose any seven garments from this list:

Button Down Shirt w/Collar
Blouse or polo shirt
T-Shirt
Vest
Overshirt
Dress
Long Pants or Jeans
Shorts or Capri Pants
Skirt
Jacket (jean jacket, windbreaker, hoodie, etc.)
Coat (suit or sport coat)
Overcoat or Raincoat
Bathing Suit & Coverup

From those seven, choose four to make twice for a total of 11 garments that will work together. Those four may either be repeated garments from the same pattern, or one each from two different patterns.

It doesn't matter what styles you choose, but *do* keep in mind these should be patterns you will be using over and over in the future, so keep 'em simple with lots of room for future alterations, changes and embellishments. You will probably want to make a test muslin of each pattern, so that any fitting issues can be addressed early on.

If you already have a full set of basic patterns, this is your opportunity to expand a bit. You may have all the coats and coat patterns you'll ever need, so you can skip that and make two skirts instead.

There is no requirement regarding the type of fabric, whether you use solids or prints, or a certain number of tops and bottoms. At the end, you should simply have eleven garments that fit you nicely, will live together peacefully in the same closet, and be wearable -often- together. We're not looking for the most breathtaking garments; we're looking for the ones that fit the best and will work hardest as wardrobe staples.

Sewing will begin December 26th, and all garments must be finished by April 30th, 2012. Muslins, pattern fitting and cutting may be started whenever you are ready.

This is not quite what I was expecting, since I am still a fan of the "wardrobing" side of original SWAP. So I have some thinking to do, and some patterns to consider.

Aug-Oct sewing summary

2011-10-31T20:42:00.003Z

Here's a summary of the pieces I've sewn during August, September and October. Not a great many I think we can see. I also altered some RTW pieces which I don't show.

I've got more social activities on the go now, which has been cutting in to sewing time but is good for the rest of my life.

I'm planning to sew some more pieces in this colourway. I have some previously sewn trousers which I have been wearing with the other items to make outfits.

Harris Tweed: 100th birthday

2011-10-28T07:20:00.000+01:00

I found this article about the manufacture and history of Harris Tweed which I thought might interest others.

Harris Tweed: 100 years of the Orb

I have been sewing

2011-10-23T22:19:00.002+01:00

I have been sewing though I don't seem to have a lot to show for it.
The first two jobs were to fix the pants of two very smart RTW pant suits.

The first needed rehemming 2 inches shorter. I'd cheated by wearing them with heels but they were still dragging on the ground. They are now properly rehemmed and pressed.

The second pair of pants are wool and were unlined, so I cut out a lining from some very dark plum bemberg type lining, sewed it up and hand slip stitched round the waistband and front zip.
I also sewed on the inner and out buttons. These pants don't look any different at all but hopefully will be more wearable now. So I now have two very smart winter pant suits.
They are both pinstripe, one a very dark navy the other a very dark grey. They are proper suits for a serious person, so I will wear them with loud print knit tops and plenty of jewellery to Ruthiefy them.

I then decided that today I would take a remnant of a novelty knit and make a little cardigan. This has a black mesh background and then tan woolly fibres knitted through the mesh. The cardigan is now made bar hem, buttons and buttonholes. I have made 2 of the 5 buttonholes, but the thread keeps breaking in the needle, so I think I need a stronger thread. I also want to cover stitch the hem on my coverhem machine, and sew the buttons on (Black/Tan varigated buttons - from stash astonishingly) then do a final fitting as I think it needs to be slimmed a bit through the body.
This should be a useful little cardi to tie black, tan and cream items together into an outfit.
The remnant was an odd shape, but I used a single layer scheme when cutting out and have made really good use of the fabric and am pleased with myself.

Last week I sewed black snaps onto my black and lime cardigan jacket and wore the suit for work, though I think the silhouette would be better if the jacket were shorter, so I might lop a chunk off and rehem the jacket.

Postscript: Tried the suits on and I have gained some weight since I moved out from my parents. I lost some whilst my divorce was going through, but I've been looking after myself since May, and have gained now. I suppose I need to take a look at my food, drink and exericse and see what I can do to reverse the current trend. The charcoal grey suit would probably be OK with control panties, and both do up, they are just a bit tight.

More non sewing Pictures

2011-10-21T07:49:00.002+01:00

These are all from Derbyshire
a few close up shots from my garden

This one is the reflection of a plant in the surface of the rain water butt.

and some from last weekend in the grounds of Chatsworth House (the house is used in lots of period dramas so you might have seen it on TV) but locals can go and walk in the grounds for free.

The autumnal colour is quite hard to find - maybe I'm a bit early.

Non sewing pictures

2011-10-20T22:46:00.000+01:00

Here's a selection of my recent photographs. Its a good motivator to get out and about in the countryside. These 3 shots are taken from Arnside Knott in Lancashire.

And these at Grizedale Forest also in Lancashire

This last one is a place called Nicky Nook (seriously!) near Grizedale Forest.

No pictures of the bit where I got lost in the rain and had to climb over a rusty fence in a farm.

Fabric Purchases Part 6: Chesterfield

2011-10-18T19:12:00.002+01:00

The final purchases are at Chesterfield market on a Monday lunchtime (I nipped into town from work).
The same stall is also at Loughborough market in Leicestershire on another day of the week.
(The open air markets are on different days of the week, so the sellers often cover several towns in a week, I think 'Washable Fabrics' also does Garstang on a Thursday for example).

I bought two pieces of nice soft jersey in different prints.

After all this I shall have a break from fabric shopping and sew instead.
It may not be obvious but I have still only bought fabrics for 3 ongoing colour stories in my wardrobe.
Autumnal darks browns with lime and orange.
Black, Black and white stripes/geometrics -with red and or pink
Navy blue basics to wear with any bright.

I've not bought any teal/turquoise this time as the stash is already quite heavy with it, and the lime or red/pink/orange are more flattering to my Spring colouring skin tones.

Fabric Purchases Part 5: Preston Market

2011-10-18T19:03:00.003+01:00

After Abakhan, Jenni and I went on to the market. This is maybe not the best way to do it if you are having a day in Preston btw as the market starts early and packs up early where the Abakhan does more 'normal' shop hours.

For the market, you want to go on a Friday and in the morning or early afternoon.
The shot above is of the 'outdoor' market which is under a large roof for some protection. The stalls here vary on different days of the week. On a Friday there are two fabric stalls, one with very cheap/poor quality fabric which I would not recommend, but I suppose would be OK for one off use costumes or something like that.

My favourite is 'Washable Fabrics' (see above, though he was already packing up) which has very nice quality fabrics, and correspondingly higher prices but is stuff you are happy to have in your stash later.

Here's what I bought on the market
Left, top to bottom, top left- warm pink poly for blouse, centre left - animal print poly for blouse, bottom left - coral pink poly for blouse.
Right, top to bottom, top right - jersey print, bottom right - navy blue 100% boiled wool.

There is also a permanent indoor market right next door. This has one fabric stall which also has pattern books, and a haby/buttons stall where I bought the two reels of coloured shirring elastic - one burnt orange, the other lime - as they are not common and I don't have these colours in stash.
It's smaller than Leeds market, but does have stalls selling lots lots of other things.

The owner of 'Washable Fabrics' also specialises in Liberty print fabrics, which he also sells online (his other fabrics are not online) through an e-bay shop. I can't quite work out which one because I think his auctions end on a Sunday and his location would be Lancashire.

Fabric Purchases Part 4 : Abakhan Preston

2011-10-18T07:57:00.002+01:00

On the Friday of my week of holiday, Jenni aka Yorkshire Lass headed over to Preston and we met up at Abakhan Fabrics. There are a few different Abakhan fabrics across the North West of England but none near either of us, hence why we make the effort for a special trip. Their main shop is a mill in Mostyn, North Wales, but that's a bit far to go now though I used to visit from the old house. They do also sell some things by mail order which I used once.

My purchases.
Back row left - orange knit and right - orange linen look cotton, these are both for next spring/summer and were on deep discount.
Middle row - all knits, some from the pieces in the remnant boxes by weight, and some cut from the roll. For knit tops.
Front row - all wool mix lightweight suitings for trousers/skirts - 2 narrow stripe, 1 broad stripe and one plain, but all black. The leftovers will make a waistcoat (or maybe even a jacket) which combines ALL the black fabrics together.
Jenni's fabrics are here if you want to see what she bought.

Fabric Purchases Part 3: Fabrix

2011-10-18T07:42:00.000+01:00

Fabrix is in Lancaster, and whilst away on holiday I was staying in a village just outside, so I really did need to go :-).

They also do mail order though I've never used it. The fabrics are relatively expensive, but lovely. They will send swatches out to other parts of the UK.
I did spend a lot of money here, which is easy to do especially when you start buying boiled wool, which I did.

My picture is not very good.
Back row L to R
left - Burnt orange boiled wool, centre - brown boiled wool with lime and orange felted pattern, right - dark brown sweater knit.
centre the 3 patterns I bought.
Front row
left - black brown paisley lining, centre - lime ponte (has come out too bright in the flash its a bit more olivey, right - remant of red textured fabric for a blouse.

Fabric Purchases Part 2: Pennine Outdoor

2011-10-17T23:09:00.002+01:00

Whilst I was away on holiday in Lancashire I took a trip to Pennine Outdoor who are mainly internet/mail order, but do have a physical shop also.
Pennine sell waterproof, windproof and thermal fabrics in particular, ideal for walking and other outdoorsy things.
If you do want to visit the shop you can combine it with a visit to the nearby Ingleton falls for a nice day out.

In the photo of the shop, you should be able to see that 'Bentham Imaging' a photographic gallery is on the ground floor. To reach the shop go through the archway to the right and go up the stairs and through the door marked 'Pennine Outdoor'.
The owner is a lovely lady who let me take photos of some of the fabrics to share with you.

I was a bit boring and bought 3 pieces of navy fabrics for 2 prs walking trousers and 1 pair of waterproof trousers, plus some needles and some seam sealant.

Mailorder is mainly UK, but also Europe, though I think technically they will ship pretty much anywhere in the world (except US for insurance reasons).

Fabric Purchases Part 1 : Leeds

2011-10-17T22:55:00.000+01:00

I've done quite a bit of fabric shopping over the last 3 weeks but not shown any of it here on the blog.
I'm working through from oldest first, so starting with a trip to Leeds market.
My company has an office in Leeds which I visit occasionally, on 2 recent visits I bought the following.

The fabrics are all jerseys and all from Jacks Fabrics on the market.
The haberdashery items are from Samuel Taylor's which is a shop in a road near the market.
Also on the market there is B&M fabrics, which I have bought plain coloured jersey from in the past, and MK Fabrics who have a wool section too.

Leeds Market has LOADS of other stuff too, though I don't normally bother with them and just head for the fabric stalls.

October Update

2011-10-16T22:47:00.000+01:00

Remember my plans of things to be done before the end of October?
Well I have cleared the garage out and have been parking the car in it nightly for a week now.

This has a slight side effect of nine boxes of fabric and 4 bags of cushion stuffing being in the dining room, but hey the car can fit in the garage.
As to the other things, no progress whatsoever.

I have now managed to get the photos off my camera chip though, so will photograph my new fabrics, and over this coming week write up the posts about the various places I have bought fabrics.
Then I need to sew some of it becuase at the current rate I'm SABLE and only 40!

Fabric Items: ideas please

2011-10-10T19:08:00.001+01:00

The local church I attend has a community centre. It opened recently, but there are ongoing fundraising events for it. Two ladies I know make bead jewellery which they sell, and I've offered to add simple fabric based items to their stock.

I want to sew from stash, so as to keep the costs down, though obviously I also need to bear in mind the attractiveness of the finished objects so they will sell.

I've had a few ideas of things but am open to more suggestions.

reusable fabric bags
aprons
felt Christmas decorations
pencil cases
makeup bags
bunting

I have quite a lot of cushion stuffing, which would lend itself to non standard shape cushions, though nothing is really coming to me - maybe heart shaped red cushions and gold star cushions?

I have remnants of fairly traditional home dec fabrics and a linen sample book etc.

Anything you can suggest?

Jacket A Month

2011-10-08T13:44:00.001+01:00

There's an idea out on Stitcher's Guild about sewing 12 jackets throughout 2011, its called 'Jacket A Month'. Its a great idea. I made one in January but have not put fastenings on it yet. And I made a throw into a cardigan a bit more recently. I'm thinking hard, but that does seem to be it. I am well behind since its October now and I can't see me making 10 jackets in less than 3 months, but hey you never know.
The Material Lady has a nice blog post about this dilemma.
My plans include several tasteful cardigan style jackets, but nothing too complicated. Remind me to put pockets in the darn things though as the pocketless women's suit is a thing out great frustration to me.
I have an astonishing amount of sewing planned BEFORE SWAP which includes 2 entire collections for me and a raft of fabric bags and dinky felt Christmas decorations to sell to raise funds for the church community centre. I work full time, my deputy is taking multiple weeks off in November and going to Australia (argh argh) and I have a bit of a social life now. I might have to give up TV or something to have time to sew. I'm definitely going to have to give up wine during the week, once I've had my dinner and my glass of wine, sofa&TV wins over sewing room, which is fine for chilling but no good for sewing.
Anyway here are my good intentions and you may call me on them.....
Before end of October (and to the U2 soundtrack...)
to have made two pairs of navy walking trousers and one pair of navy waterproof trousers
(This is so I can do some walking during the winter)
to have made at least one sample fabric bag and at least one Christmas decoration to show to the lady who sells crafts for the community centre.
to have cleared the garage enough to put the car away in it over the winter.
to have rotated my linen summer clothes and summer sandals into the hall cupboard.
Other stuff would be a plus, but with work and other committments that's probably enough for now.

Autumn thoughts

2011-10-06T17:22:00.001+01:00

I'm away on holiday, elsewhere in the UK and am alternating hill walking and shopping. The shopping is mostly fabric related, but other bits too. The weather isn't great with lots of rain storms and wind, and once I get soaking wet I give up for the day and come back to my room to dry off and warm back up again. I'm self catering so I stay in during the evening surf sewing blogs, watch DVDs I brought with me and eat my dinner and read, so that's working pretty well.
I'll do some separate posts on each of the fabric shopping places when I've done them all. Each has its own characteristic so I don't want to mix them up.
The fabrics I've bought so far are for planned garments to wear over the next 3 months, so I need to get on and sew them up once I get back. I've also bought some New Look patterns as they were on sale for £2.95 each, and I use a few of my New Look patterns a lot so these seemed candidates to be new favourites.

I'm quite busy these days with work, church and social events so need to be quite focussed to make sure the sewing gets done, and I'm not just reading about other people sewing and not actually doing any!

Fall In Love with the Lucky Dozen

2011-09-30T19:25:00.000+01:00

I really enjoyed this section on the Banana Republic site which has 13 pieces for a month of autumn outfits. Since 2 of the pieces are shoes, that's sounding like a very SWAP like 11 pieces :-)

Their pieces are as follows:-

· Collarless blouse

· A line skirt

· Long sleeved shirt

· Dark denim jeans

· Print dress

· Classic trousers

· Cardigan

· Straight skirt

· Print tee

· Bright sweater

· Fitted jacket

Which summarises to

· 4 bottoms

· 1 jacket

· 1 dress

· 3 tops

· 1 cardigan

· 1 sweater

Burda October 2011

2011-09-24T22:58:00.002+01:00

I quite like some sections of the October Burda, in particular the double page in the start of the 'Boho Chic' section with this dress on the left and the trousers, blouse and waistcoat on the right, all very me.

The dress is a simpler version of the Monsoon dress I loved, so I could make a version of the right fabric fell from my cupboard or was purchased.
I also already have similar trousers/waistcoat, and just need a floaty blouse (though will skip the hat) to make this outfit work.

I shall take Burda away on holiday with me and do some tracing (and maybe even some sewing!)

More thoughts on colours

2011-09-19T22:43:00.003+01:00

I have long been a big fan of teal. Its kinda blue and kinda green, it makes my eyes really sparkle (especially when I wear my contacts).
Yesterday when wearing a dark teal and gold scarf which was a gift from my mother I realised that actually teal is NOT great right under my chin, as it creates those dark shadows which makes me look lumpy round the jawline and is unflattering to the chin. It was a bit of an ah-ha moment and not really in a good way.
I remembered that years ago before I realised I was warm toned I wore white or red tops with nearly everything because it made my skin look good. We shouldn't forget those things we intuitively realised about ourseles.
My mother had pointed out about the teal near the face, more recently, but it was just after I moved to live with them as my divorce went through, so I wasn't really concentrating on clothes and colour, more on hanging out with them and the cat :-)
I need to do some more clothing colour experiments in some good light (this may not be until April!) as my bedroom lighting is poor, but early results seem to show that the best results come from coral pink, red ornage, red, ivory being right up by my face.

Other colours are not too bad if there's a fairly deep scooped neckline, so the skin of my upper chest is reflecting on the chin rather than the colour of the tee etc. Scarfs worn up around the face need to be in these good colours, so maybe I need to wear the teal scarf in a different way, so its away from the face,
Interestingly, the new Colour Me Beautiful book differentiates between Clear and Cool and Clear and Warm using Clear Salmon vs Cyclamen (warm vs cool pinks, warm pink much better on me) and then Kelly Green vs Dark Teal (warm vs cool greens, the dark teal creates unflattering shadows..... is Kelly Green the way forward?) Not sure about Kelly Green but Lime and Yellow Green are looking positive. This is a bummer and there is hardly any of these colours in my fabric stash.

I am however still in love with the way my face lights up in Coral Pink, and wonder why there is not more of it in my wardrobe?
Maybe I'll be seasonal and embrace the Oranges in Autumn, the Reds in Winter especially around Christmas and then move into Coral for the Spring?

Trying other crafts: candlemaking (uh oh)

2011-09-18T17:16:00.002+01:00

As part of my trying new things, I decided to revisit a previous favourite craft of candlemaking.
I purchased a cheap milk pan to melt the wax and dug out my box of supplies.
The main supplies were in the garage, but I had another in the house so started with that.
A lovely star shaped candle mold with stand and several partially used candles and block of wax were in the box. The pretty mould looked a bit like this before I started.

So I decided to make a large red star candle - great for Christmas.
............................................................................
Unfortunately things did not quite work to plan.
I melted the old candles and blocks of wax in the pan and turned the heat down when it started to make spitting noises. I fished out with a wooden spatula the various old wicks etc. The longest wick I chose to reuse for my new candle. I fitted the wick to the mould, plugged the bottom with blutack and balanced a wooden skewer across the top.
The wax was now ALL melted nicely so I poured it neatly into the mould. All looked good for about 3 seconds, but the wax must have been too hot for the mould which then softened and bent allowing hot red wax to pour onto the kitchen worksurface, running down the face of the cupboards and dripping on the floor as well as spattering me in red drips of wax.
I whipped the cotton scatter rug from the floor and used it to stem much of the flow, and poured the remaining wax back into the pan. I then threw the rug in the bin, scraped what I could off the work surface with a wooden spatula and gave a very large sigh.
'Ah' I said to myself calmly 'I think that wax was a bit hot for the mould'.

I reheated what I could of the scrapings, but not letting it get quite so hot this time. I then poured it gently into a red pot, standing this time on a tray, to make a pot candle. Unfortunately this is only half a red pot candle as most of the 'spare' wax had fused nicely with the kitchen scatter rug making it difficult to return to liquid form.

I must admit candle making turned out to be quite a lot more exciting than I remembered it being.

Boots and skirts

2011-09-13T22:38:00.001+01:00

Remember this flared skirt which comes to just below the knee - well it works with knee high boots.

I LOVE knee high boots but always wore them with longer skirts, but you know what? I think it is OK for me to wear them with skirts that length. I think a rash of 25" gored skirts is required from my uber favourite pattern New Look 6735.

I may also shorten a few of my dumpier long skirts to this length. Opaque tights cover all scary varicose veins and I have a host of leather, suede and faux stretch boots in various shades (Teal faux suede with buttons anyone?) though am short of a purple pair!

Monsoon Orange Jersey Jacqueline Dress

2011-09-10T22:20:00.000+01:00

I saw this dress in the Monsoon shop window today and absolutely LOVED it, but its £70! so I shall not even go in and try it on despite it being absolutely gorgeous and very very me. Its called the Jacqueline Dress, and the colour is described as red though it looks pretty orange to me.

I am already justifying to myself on a cost-per-wear basis, and imagining outfits where it is teamed up with any of
white, black, brown, pink, purple, navy, turquoise, grey, lime, lighter orange, denim blue, bronze and other metallics etc.

Sewing progress

2011-09-10T15:37:00.001+01:00

Sorry no new pictures, but I have been sewing away in the background. I coverhemmed the cream twisted neck top, wore it and its now in the laundry.
I also coverhemmed the pants, two tops and two dresses from the New Look 6735 wardrobe I made back last November for the Pattern Review Contest. (The pants had been invisibly hemmed but it didn't stay up well in the knit fabric). So at least I am likely to wear these pieces now.

The pants are now part of my gym wear along with New Look 6436 Knit top I made from scraps of black and white floral jersey. This is much more flattering on me than oversized tee + leggings.

I also removed, shortened and reattached the elastic on a RTW print linen skirt. It is dark brown with white, coral, orange and tan flowers and will be great for early Autumn.
I've now ended up with black thread on the coverhem, cream on the serger and brown on the sewing machine, and I'm not sure what to sew next!
I have another of the cream tees cut out but its not particuarly calling to me.

Cooler weather

2011-09-06T22:43:00.000+01:00

Here in Derbyshire the Autumn has suddenly arrived. I was rather sceptical, thinking that Summer would ease into Autumn, but actually the kids are back to school this week, the leaves have begun to fall and the cold wind is blowing up and down the hillsides. I took a day off today becuase I had some time due, plus a house inspection by the letting agency and in the afternoon went off to town shopping. I picked up a few things, in particular a fleece towelling dressing gown (robe) in bright turquoise and some black/cream fleece PJs. Slightly oversized, but more fleece snuggliness to wrap yourself in. I thought there was a serious danger of freezing my procrastinating butt off before the rainbow kitties became a dressing gown since I appear to have got rid of the sad old navy fleece dressing gown my mum made me and I've worn for years. It was falling apart/worn out but I don't recall the actual moment of culling, but perhaps that's due to the moves in the last few months.
At some point it will be properly Autumn and I will crack out my lovely Duo knee high boots.

September can be a tricky month where the weather and temps vary across the day and height (work is in town, lower down and more sheltered, home is out of town slightly and on a hillside) and the whole sandals+jacket vs coat+boots debate is relevant. As I'm new to the area, I maybe need to be a little more aware - Cheshire is largely flat and has mild rainy weather, Derbyshire has hills and the weather appears from behind one when you were not looking.
I'm not usually a huge one for the whole wardrobe rotation thing, but definitely sandals and linen trousers can go away now, with linen jackets (sob) following after. I love my linen jackets as they come in lots more fun colours than normal office wear jackets, so I get a riot of colour all summer. However there does come a point where 3/4 sleeve orange/red/lime linen needs to be put away for next summer.

Boiled wool jacket rather like mine - I have this style in red, lime and a rich purple.

Its probably not quite time to bring out their winter friends, the red, purple and lime boiled wool jackets so I am stuck with the boring black and brown for the transitional period. These can however be livened up with bright tees, and piles of costume jewellery.

Emberglow

2011-09-04T18:28:00.000+01:00

Pantone has an pinky orange called Emberglow in the Fall 2011 Fashion Color Trends.

I'm not quite sure what I'd call this but I like it a lot, and have seen variations of it in the trendy stores in town with the early Autumn clothing coming in. They have interpreted it fairly broadly from peach, to orange to rust to something quite pinky that seems a new colour. I think some of these could be really good colours for me (the orange and pinky rusts at least). I made some pieces in the pinky rust colour a year or two back but passed them on because they didn't work that well in terms of fabric/pattern choices. I only have a bit of the wool fabric left (I used all of the other, and passed all the garments on). I'd quite like to find a pussy bow blouse or cardigan though.

Coral Pink makes me glow

2011-09-04T08:15:00.003+01:00

I put on some PJs I've not worn for a while, and realised with my new darker brown hair (natural medium brown) the colour in the PJ top is stunning on me - makes me look well and almost glowing. I am not sure if the colour would be as great with slightly warmer hair (I suspect it would, as its reflecting my skintone pink, not the warmth in the hair).

So I frantically searched through my various packets of swatches, and books with printed swatches to confirm this is CORAL PINK in CMB land.

I had made a coral pink lace top in the Botanical Garden collection exactly this colour, but it was totalled by my mother doing laundry for me in the early days of me living with them during my divorce. I couldn't make a fuss (could I?) as she was being so lovely doing my laundry when I was in an emotional mess, so I just let it go, after all its only a top. I had made 2 cardiwraps in the lace and underlayer I used for that top, so I guess I could butcher them and make another top if I wanted.

New things

2011-09-03T14:59:00.001+01:00

I recently divorced after nearly 20 years of marriage. It was a huge thing for me, and the split together with the associated double move (via parents for 4 months to my own place) left me a bit numb. I'm now living in a new area and after a bit over 3 months I am finally starting to make new friends.
I've noticed however, having made myself a safe place with all my stuff I was doing a lot of watching TV or surfing sewing sites/sewing blogs that I've stopped doing new things again.

After a long period living with someone who liked things to be a particular way, living on my own and being able to have things my way has raised some interesting questions. "What do I like to eat/do" etc. So I am challenging myself to try some new things, as well as keeping plenty of things I know I like.
I also used overwork to get me through the split, so am trying work more reasonable hours and build in things which are part of that work/life balance.

At work I got myself a mentor through an official scheme. This is a older chap who works in different area to me, and is helping me with people management skills and my own career, which is a complete step change from the 'do the job' mind set I am normally in.

Socially/spiritually I found a church several weeks ago, where I felt at home, and which is large enough to have all kinds of people and various services, groups etc. I'm signed up to help with the teenagers, and go to meet the other leaders on Monday evening for the first time.
I've also made contact with the local rambling club (this is the hiking sort of rambling!) though I have yet to go on an actual walk.

I went back to the gym and tried the Zumba class on Friday after work (and am still recovering!), and I recently dug out the old digital SLR camera got some tips on how to use it and have charged the batteries etc. I've also scoped out some local places I can go walking on my own to get my fitness up a bit for the Rambling club as a lot of their walks are a bit long for me at the moment.

A few of my colleagues have been dropping hints about me dating, but its not something I really want to do. I think I need to work out what things I like to do for myself before I try and add anyone else into the equation.

I'm naturally a homebody and like my comfort zone, so my challenge to myself is to do one new thing each week - to a certain extent just to try things and see if I like it. So this could be a new exercise class at the gym, going out taking photos, taking a walk locally, porting iTunes from the old PC to the new etc.

I dare say a bit of sewing will sneak in along the way, and I still love to sew, but I also want to have other things in my life for richness and diversity.

I will keep you all posted - love Ruthie

Those Self-Sewn Challenges

2011-09-02T08:00:00.001+01:00

I'm quite interested in those self-sewn challenges, and a few bloggers I read participate and I enjoy the results. September arrived without me really taking too much notice, so I am not prepped for Self-Sewn-September, and tbh I don't have the drive to photograph myself every day, though I've dug out the ancient digital SLR and have started wondering where in the house I could set it up for semi decent indoor shots from tripod.
However I do want to try and wear something Ruth-constructed every day (even if its only jewellery) and did manage it yesterday though no picture. I wore the new warm navy cardigan, new squares print blouse and some made-by-me brown tailored trousers from a much loved Burda pattern. Since I plan to wear purchased jeans today I'll have a Ruthie tee - which is often my solution :-).
I quite like Autumn because I can wear my leather boots, wool coats and all those rich colours and great textures. mmmmmmmm.

I've also coloured my hair - "Natural Medium Brown" apparently - and its a lot darker than my usual "Highland Chestnut" though I expect close to the medium brown colour that my hair was. Not sure I like it, though it does have less red undertones to it and I suppose therefore should make a wider range of colours work for me.

Autumn Pyjamas

2011-08-31T23:32:00.002+01:00

I actually need Autumn pyjamas more than I need Autumn clothes. I also need relaxed gym clothes.
I therefore have a cunning plan which is to make yoga pants, leggings, knit tops etc in various fabrics and wear the loud ones as nightwear and the more 'normal' ones to the gym. I can try some new patterns as wearable muslins which become PJs. I am particularly interested in slim pants and leggings in PJs as I think they would be less prone to creawl up the legs, flap about and be cold. I am cold at night so need long sleeves and long legs in things, none of this cami top nonsense, I am also planning on making the rainbow psychadelic cat fleece fabric into a dressing gown (aka robe).

Aren't they jolly? And of course if there is any left over..... I foresee hat, scarf, fleece booties and all other manner of hideous fleece-age. I can't wait and of course will be super toasty this winter if I do so :-)

Colour Seasons

2011-08-31T08:03:00.000+01:00

Rhonda asked about the colour diagnosis's I've had.
I self diagnosed from the early CMB books as a Winter in about 1990. This seemed to be the only matching category for mid brown hair, green eyes and light skin. I wore Winter colours for years and can't have looked all that great, though I favoured red and teal by the face.
Then in about 2000 I got into a now defunct message board which looked at the indviduals colouring. Here I worked out I was definitely one of the Warm undertoned categories though not one of the obvious ones ie not a classic original Autumn or Spring. I concluded I was a Soft Autumn (which is Autumn with a Summer influence) and sent off for a swatch packet from an online site which sold them. This was a little disappointing and whilst it contained some great colours it also had loads I could not wear near the face.
3 or 4 years ago I decided to pay to get my colours done with UK Colour Me Beautiful andwent to see a lovely consultant who declared me to me Clear and Warm (ie Clear Spring, or Contrasting Brunette Spring). I wore my contact lenses for this session, and I'm sure the fact that my eyes are large and green was one of the indicators for her. (I also wear glasses, and as I am very short sighted, this makes my eyes seem much smaller behind the strong lenses, so the overall effect of the green eyes is diminished somewhat, anyway I digress).
I took my 'Clear and Warm' swatch booklet home, though as ever becuase its a generic and only partly personalised palette it doesn't work 100 percent for me.
The Clear Palette which is half Winter/half Spring is used as the basis of the swatches for the Clear and Warm and the Clear and Cool. They then add in extra strips from the secondary areas, in my case one of Warm and one of Light I think. The consultant then marks the colours which are your best ones.
I discovered for instance that I can wear some really quite warm colours which are not in the C&W palette (its deliberately fairly neutral), and have got a little leaning towards Autumn - ie a little bit of that soft/rich. Its obviously not the main factor though as the consultant dismissed this as an option when I suggested it, and I agreed that the Clear and Warm drapes were better than the Soft and Warm.

I also colour my hair with semi permanent rinses in various shades of medium warm browns. Sometimes these are more auburn and the cooler colours are less good. Other times I've picked a slightly darker plainer brown (no red undertones) which is closer to my natural haircolour and then the slightly cooler colours work better, as do the higher contrast options.

I carry both the old Soft Autumn and the new Clear Spring palettes with me, and try to see if something has both the warmth, richness, contrast and clarity that somehow blends with both.
Perhaps I should be a little creative and destroy both palettes and just take the best swatches from both.... or somehow try to create my own custom palette, but for the moment this works well enough and I'm happy getting dressed in the morning.

Opinion varies a lot as to whether you colour palette changes with age, and I can see that as your hair colour changes with greying and/or whatever colouring you do with your hair this has to impact your best colours. I suspect you stay broadly in the same category since you skin vs eyes contrast will remain similar but you need to soften and maybe cool your colours slightly, and I should think look at what is your 'Key Neutral' as this is based on your hair, or lowlights within your hair.
I knew a bright ginger haired lady who had then gained creamy white hairs as she aged until she was a variegated caramel blonde, she was still warm, but the strength of the colours that suited her had changed to those with less strong pigments. She had a natural understanding of her best colours and tweaked accordingly and always looked lovely.

On another note I bought myself another cardigan and blouse following some of Nancy's recent advice.
The cardigan is the same style as the cream one, though this time in a Warm Navy, a new colour for me, but one which I think will work well with my darker navy separates.

And this print blouse which I think would be a GREAT linking pieces. It contains rust, cream, navy and several shades of brown in the mini squares pattern and I think will be very versatile.

Autumn Sewing

2011-08-29T08:19:00.001+01:00

I've been thinking for a little while about sewing for the upcoming Autumn Season and have fabrics laid out in the sewing room ready to go. Whilst it was still technically summer (though not massively summery weather here in Derbyshire - cool and rainy) I didn't want to get down into the brown fabrics straight away so I started with what turned out to be 2 orange tops, and have followed up with the cardigan coat and a cream top. I've already worn the orange tops, though the cardigan coat is too heavy still. I've already bought some dark brown leather shoes and handbag (purse to the US folks) and am still looking in case I find a suitable belt and watch in the same dark brown (I may have to head to the men's department). Here's a mood board showing some of the garments and fabrics. Unfortunately the colours are a little off but hopefully the general idea still works.

Hopefully the dark brown print fabric will be a great key in to the rest of the wardrobe. The question is whether I sew a top and dress or a top and skirt from it. Nancy would have the top and skirt to give the maximum mix and match opportunities, but I'm not huge on knit skirts.

To get the look of a dress from a top and skirt is I think quite hard, though if the skirt had a smooth faced waist rather than elastic (even though its a knit) would that work? You could then tuck the top in and belt everything......

Personal Style

2011-08-28T21:23:00.001+01:00

If you've read a few of the style/colour type books which have come out since the 1980s (and of which I have an entire library! well a bookcase anyway), there are 3 things which come out over and over.
- flattering colours (variations on Color Me Beautiful)
- body shape and what clothing styles work for that shape.
- personal style e.g. natural etc (and to a certain extent lifestyle)

Building a successful wardrobe needs you to have started to find the answers to the above whether you are going to sew or buy your clothes, or a mixture of the two. I sew, thrift and buy RTW to get my wardrobe and this works well for me. I also do a bit of jewellery making but don't knit.

Flattering Colours
I'll come straight and say that I have spent a lot of time on this and in the end did spend the money to go and have a fairly basic consultation with the UK Colour Me beautiful people. For me that was worth doing as my colouring - medium brown hair, pale ivory skin, green eyes can be seen in lots of the different categories. Some of my confusion came from some of the techniques in the books - which looks better - light baby pink or warm camel? - answer neither, so not very helpful!
When I went for my consultation the lady said emphatically that I was Warm and Clear - Clear Spring or Brunette Contrasting Spring. I already knew that pastels (baby blue, baby pink etc were hideous) and black was bad by the face, but I'd been all over the place colourwise (as can seen in my stash!!). Some of the colours I had worked out were good myself were in the palette, and with a little tweaking I am really enjoying my colours now.
If you don't already know which are your best colours its worth trying to find out what works as it saves you a lot of time when sewing or buying clothes.
Nancy has several posts on finding your colours.
Color Cues,
Using your colors
Color Contrast

Body Shape.
There are various different approaches to body shape, good old HOAX and the different sorts of fruit. I'm not sure we all clearly fit into one or another and some of the more complex ones like Trinny and Susannah's Body Shape Bible are still not perfect.
Nancy has a few posts on this - Figuring out your Figure
and Styles for your shape
I don't really match any of them exactly, so decided I'd go with the most prominent bit of me - ie the widest bit as the indicator. Viewed from the front the sides of my thighs are the most prominent thing, and I always carry excess weight however much I manage to lose. Viewed from the side I have a little bit of a rounded tummy (made more obvious by a tipped pelvis) and a very round bottom. I don't have much bust, but I do have relatively broad shoulders. This fits most into the pear or “lower body dominant” shape as I also have 'sturdy' legs, though it is offset a little by the broad shoulders. I think Nancy's 5 categories are pretty useful as long as you then personalise it for yourself.
I also had the opportunity about 2 years ago to be a guinea pig for 2 ladies training as Style Consultants with UK Colour Me Beautiful, and somewhere have a little booklet of the flattering styles for me.
I took lots of clothes with me so I could try them on and they could say why things worked or not. I deliberately took some items I never wore to discover WHY they were wrong and that was very useful. There are loads of books on this topic. I found the original Trinny and Susannah book, and Style Rx most helpful out of my huge library :-)
Nancy now slightly dated book 'Looking Good' is also pretty good for this sort of stuff.
You can work it out though by looking at what clothes you have that make you feel great, or get you those 'have you lost weight' type comments.
Examples from my journey are short neck/broad jaw/forward head, so need open necklines like V, scoop, cross over, loose cowls etc - no turtlenecks or classic round jewel necks for me.
Because I am heavy in the butt/hip/thigh area I keep my pants/skirts in fairly plain/dark fabrics and always avoid shiny, print or bias cut on the lower half. I also keep my hemlines below mid calf whether crops or skirts as I just don't have the legs for it. In the winter with opaque tights and fitted knee boots I can take the skirts to just below the knee I discovered this last winter.
I therefore keep all my interest in tops - either knit tops or jackets in bright coloours, prints, texture etc and tie them into the bottoms with colours in the print, necklaces or scarves.
Obviously for those with different body shapes than mine you need to find your own set of best shapes.

Personal Style
This needs to take into account the first two categories but also both the lifestyle you live but also your personality. Lots of places have categories like Tailored Classic, Sporty Natural, High Fashion Dramatic and Feminine Romantic (examples from Nancy's book 'Looking Good'). Nancy hasn't covered this yet, but still has 20+ weeks to go of the 52 :-) so she's probably got some planned.
I found my best fit in the horrendously flowery and 80s book 'Metamorphasis' by David Kibbe. This has a wierd yin/yang scale basis but basically allows some mixing of the usual categories and in short I am a Natural with a big dose of Dramatic. ie my shoes are comfy, but heck they are leopard or red or something, and my tops are natural fibres like viscose (rayon) knit but in very bold prints teamed with enormous necklaces.
I wouldn't necessarily recommend Kibbe's book unless you can find it for 5p on Amazon used books, as its very based on body shape rather than personality and is dated, but my category works very well for me so I am pretty pleased with it. I reread it last week after several years and its still spot on.
Of course this needs to take into account your actual lifestyle - again something Nancy has a good section on in her book 'Looking Good' and I daresay will therefore appear in her posts at some point.
The basic approach is drawing a 'Lifestyle Pie' and a 'Wardrobe Pie'. The 'Lifestyle Pie' shows the proportion of your life that is Professional, Social, Sports, Family for example and things like Anytime Casuals, Classic Sportswear, Evening Dressy, Active Sportwear as cothing categories. The idea being that you need to have clothes to fit the life you actually have, which is pretty obvious but we don't always do, especially if life changed a lot.

Phew that turned out a lot longer than I expected! I realise I have used myself as an example here, but that's becuase I've had lots of years dressing myself now :-) and pretty much none with anyone else. Hopefully there are some useful bits for people there though.

Capsule wardrobing - opinions please

2011-08-28T09:13:00.002+01:00

Hi all :-)
I've generally used this blog to write about my sewing on a day to day basis, but I have an obvious bent towards wardrobe sewing - ie sewing items which work together and adding in the accessories etc to do that. I haven't particularly majored on that here on the blog, but I wondered if that's of particular interest to people who come and read here.

So for instance my various old wardrobes - which just have little sidebar sections, would you like them to open up to have more detail?
Or would you like to see more detail on how the accessories are put together with the clothes on my current projects and the wardrobes mixed with each other and RTW?
Would you want to see me wearing the clothing and accessories in an 'outfit of the day' type way? (Not sure I could sustain this tbh, but hey I'm asking). I'm very ordinary and have a non-glamorous life working long hours in IT and living in a not quite ideal rented place, I'm also not a model in any sense - I'm 40 pear shaped and a size 14-16.

If there's no feedback I'll just carry on posting whatever I fancy as I do now, but if you would like to see something specifically, please let me know and I will see what I can do to try and meet that.

Cream Tee 1 - nearly done

2011-08-27T22:52:00.001+01:00

Here's the first of the Cream Tee Collection.
I've used my classic TNT scoop neck tee pattern with two small changes.
The first is the neckband is cut slightly wider and then twisted an inch before being sewn in place. The second is I sewed some knit leaf shapes on the front on one side as a little bit of tonal interest.
Hemming still outstanding, and I'm in a battle with the Coverhem which seems to have overly aggressive tension and the thread keeps breaking. Not quite sure what the problem is.
Anyway here's progress so far.

For some reason the front is 1/2" longer than the back. I think due to cutting out on a table with stretch knit yardage pooling on the floor. I think the others will need cutting out on the floor until I get nearer the end of the 5m of cream jersey I bought from Totally Fabrics some months ago.
(I bought multiple times from Totally Fabrics and only had the occasional fabric which wasn't what I expected. I totally recommend them! I'd still be buying stuff from the 'Lycra Jersey' pages except I'm a bit skint really)

Hat, gloves, belt and Leeds Fabric

2011-08-27T11:34:00.001+01:00

I had some bits left over from making the cardigan coat and felt compelled to put them to good use. On that basis I made a narrow belt from sections of the less stretchy ribbing. As this had a raw edge I made it into a tube and turned it through. I think I might give it a press to make it a bit flatter. You can see the tiny sections of stretchy rib at the ends of the belt. I left this open and sewed the overlocker threads back through the seam allowance for neatness.

I also made a knitted fabric hat. It has darts in the upper section to draw the width up to the point. I couldn't make it come to a gathered point, so it has 4 little seams which meet at a point. These have then been hand gathered inside. The ribbing (more of the less stretchy sort) was applied separately, partly becuase of the way the ribbing ran compared to the cables of the knit, but also to draw things up.
I still had some bits left over, so made some matching mittens as well. To get these from the scraps I've had to have the thumbs as separate pieces. I was out of ribbing by this point, so used some of the main fabric cut shorter and stretched to fit.
The scraps leftover are too small for anything meaningful, so I felt I really got good use from this sofa throw.

The week before last I bought some beautifully soft knits on Leeds market, which I'd not photgraphed earlier - here they are.
Left: red and white stripes, Centre: chocolate brown, Right: white and black stripes.

I don't currently have particularly clear ideas what I want to make with them :-) tops probably.

The gym and a strange hat.

2011-08-25T22:37:00.002+01:00

Today I went to the gym for the first time in 10 years. I did a class called Body Balance which is one of those stretching pilates type classes. I loved it, though I was not at all good at standing on one leg like a star or whatever it was. My legs felt like quivering jelly afterwards so it must've worked.

I wore my navy Burda leggings and a big old oversize t shirt. It looked pretty hideous, but since it was in the room for classes away from the main gym, I was there to exercise and the rest of the class (and the teacher) were ladies older than me I didn't fret too much. Seeing yourself in those mirrors round the edge is quite interesting, much better than I get to see in my sewing room mirror at home. I shall be back at least twice a week.

I don't currently have a lot of plans for gym stuff but will throw in the odd pair of leggings and maybe some better tops as I'm sewing other things.

Meanwhile I decided to use some of the teeny scraps left from sewing the cardigan coat to make a matching hat. The band fits OK but the rest of it is huge and I think it'll need darts to get the hole to close at the top as the cotton knit fabric is very bulky and a drawstring approach didn't work very well. I may need to reduce the length a bit as well.

Cream tees

2011-08-23T07:27:00.001+01:00

Yes that's cream tees not cream teas!

The idea being that a few different cream coloured tees would be great in the wardrobe.
A more wearable version (and easier to sew!) of the 5 white shirts challenge that was about in sewing blog land a few months back.
My plans are to have
1. A plain scoop neck with 3/4 sleeves. This would be a super basic with no fancinesss.
2. Next up a mock wrap princess seam from Simplicity 2977 with added sleeves.
3. Then a version of the HotPatterns top with a draped neckline. I made this before in a poly slinky which looked great but was very sweaty for me to wear so I donated it. It worked with loads of outfits though so I need another one in viscose (rayon) knit instead.
4. Next up a loose fitting top with a soft cowl, YorkshireLass has leant me a pattern for this (I think a Loes Hinse).
5. Since by this point I will have probably lost the plot and never want to sew cream again there probably won't be a number 5, but I've previously made the Jalie crossover top in the same fabric, so may sub in a previously made piece.

This coming weekend is a 3 day holiday in the UK (August Bank Holiday) and I took some extra days off work planning to go away. Instead I think I will stay home and have a Cream Tee Staycation! I could do all 4 new tees in that time :-)

Taupe Sweater Knit Cardigan

2011-08-21T17:45:00.001+01:00

This knee length cardigan is made from a cotton cable knit sofa throw from Dunelm Mills (UK home dec store). I'm not sure what I'm going to do yet for closures. Possibly giant press studs with buttons sewn on the outside, or maybe just left with no closures.

I used the ribbed edging of the sofa throw for the hem on the cardigan and sleeves and the side ribbing as the front band. I think its worked out quite well and is pretty wearable.
I think a soft roll collar top would be great under this with the wool trousers for Autumn, add a crazy print scarf and brown chelsea boots, and would be very comfortable.
I have some funny shaped scraps left, plus a little bit of the ribbing used for the front band, so might see if I can cut a knit beany hat or some other fun things!
This was made from the cardigan jacket in my old favourite New Look 6735. I added 7 inches (plus the 1.5" hem) to the length to get the knee length cardigan coat look I was after.

Building up my neutrals

2011-08-21T14:46:00.002+01:00

One thing the Nancy plan showed is that I actually like colours and prints way more than is practical for maximum wardrobe mixing and matching, so I have made a little bit of effort to increase my neutrals quotient.

Since my stash doesn't necessarily reflect this, I decided to use some purchased items as a starting place, and then add in some sewn garments as well.

I started with the trousers and cardigan I bought last week, then added a crinkle blouse and faux suede skirt in similar colours. These last two were thrifted yesterday and both required alterations, so I decided to do the alterations promptly today, put the garments through the laundry and then I would be ready go.
The blouse just needed the sleeves hemming a bit shorter, but the skirt was too long, too loose on the back waist and too tight on the hips, so I did a lot of messing about shortening from the top to give more hip room, making the shaped waistband narrower and shorter, adding back darts, a back invisible zip etc. The end result looks good, and I couldn't have purchased the fabric for the price so it was worth doing.
The skirt and blouse are in shade between the light brown trousers and the cream cardigan and I suppose could be called champagne, sand or similar.
Next item is a knee length cardigan made from a knitted sofa throw. I'm going to go and cut this out now and get sewing it up. The colour is what I would call taupe and is darker than the trousers, though the different shades of beigeness all seem to work quite well together. Entire beige outfits are VERY boring on me, but I understand the flexibility of these neutral item.
After the Taupe cardigan I am planning on making some plain cream knit tops, including a plain scoop neck as well as some more adventurous designs. I quite often find I'm looking for a cream top to work with other wardrobe pieces, and only have colour and pattern, so although boring these should be useful.

New You: Wardrobe Plan

2011-08-18T22:59:00.005+01:00

Nancy's just posted the last part of the current wardrobe plan, and she says that going forwards "we'll talk about where you might go from here to build in more variety And after that we'll spell out the concepts at work here so you can get similar results in your own wardrobe whether you follow this specific formula or not."
Summary is as follows:-

Garments
Dark neutral colour e.g. Chocolate brown - Trousers, Skirt, Cardigan/jacket/shirt, Top
Lighter neutral colour e.g. Camel - Trousers, Skirt, Cardigan/jacket/shirt, Top
Accent colour e.g. Turquoise - Cardigan/jacket/shirt, Top
Print including all 3 colours - Skirt and Top

Accessories
Dark neutral colour e.g. Chocolate brown - Shoes, bag and belt
Lighter neutral colour e.g. Camel - Shoes
Both neutrals together - Bag, Necklace, Scarf
All 3 colours together - Necklace, scarf, pashmina
Accent colour e.g. Turquoise - Necklace.

If I try to interpret this in my chosen colours it looks something like this....

Garments
Dark neutral colour e.g. Chocolate brown - Trousers, Skirt, Cardigan/jacket/shirt, Top - yes except top
Lighter neutral colour e.g. Mocha - Trousers, Skirt, Cardigan/jacket/shirt, Top - yes except skirt
Accent colour e.g. Burnt Orange - Cardigan/jacket/shirt, Top - yes
Print including all 3 colours - Skirt and Top - no but could sew from existing knit fabric

Accessories
Dark neutral colour e.g. Chocolate brown - Shoes, bag and belt - yes though belt is a little casual

Lighter neutral colour e.g. Mocha - Shoes - well nude ones
Both neutrals together - Bag, Necklace, Scarf - bag no, necklace and scarf yes
All 3 colours together - Necklace, scarf, pashmina - yes I think so
Accent colour e.g. Burnt - Necklace. - definitely yes :-)

The Madison Avenue Collection at CC could be made to work in a Nancy type plan, in shades of chocolate, camel and ochre with accessories and everything.

Fabric

2011-08-17T23:11:00.002+01:00

I bought fabric on Leeds market.
They are red and white stripes, white with black stripes, and a lovely soft dark brown. All are knits.
They might get their photos taken another day, since I need to go to bed.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Buying entire outfits

2011-08-16T19:40:00.001+01:00

I did something today which I have never done before - ever.
I went into a store and bought a whole outfit, all full price, all from the new season collection, just as it had come in. I tried the pieces on together.... until I had an outfit that worked. I then also bought a belt which fitted in the belt loops. It wasn't an expensive store so the dent in my budget isn't huge.
Here are the pieces that I bought.
The wool mix trousers, a chiffon animal print blouse and this cardigan only in cream (not grey) which is slightly lighter than the brown trousers. I also added in black leather belt from the menswear section.

Capsule Summary

2011-08-16T15:17:00.000+01:00

I've tried to summarise the most common options in the CMBLYB wardrobes and have come up with this:-

Jacket:     Neutral1
Jacket:     Neutral2
Dress:     Colour1 or Neutral1 or Neutral2
Skirt:     Neutral1
Skirt:     Neutral2
Skirt:     Neutral1&2 weave
Trousers:     Neutral 1
Blouse:     Colour1
Blouse:     Colour2
Blouse:     Neutral1&Colour1
Blouse:     Neutral2&Colour2
Sweater/Wrap:     Neutral1

When I then plug in my planned colours of Chocolate, Taupe, Orange and Ivory I get....

Chocolate Jacket
Taupe Jacket
Dress in Chocolate or Taupe or Orange
Chocolate Skirt
Taupe Skirt
Skirt in Chocolate and Taupe weave
Chocolate Trousers
Orange blouse
Ivory blouse
Blouse in Chocolate and Orange
Blouse in Taupe and Ivory
Chocolate Cardigan

I'd swap out lots of the skirts for more trousers, use a weave which has all 4 colours in it, and have knit tops for the blouses. My planned dress is probably in a print also with a chocolate background.