Knickers

This week I got an exciting delivery and impatiently had to wait until today to use it.  

170m of picot elastic

In October I will be teaching a class I have called "Knickertastic" and I have been making knickers now for the last couple of months, but I only had a small amount of picot elastic, so I ordered this lot from ebay.  

I drafted a pattern and did make a pair of knickers a couple of months ago (sorry no photo), but they came out too large.  This was because, at the time, I hadn't got a clue how to adjust the pattern for the stretch in the cotton jersey.

So using Kwik Sew Pattern 2908, and bits and pieces in my stash I made a pair of knickers. Here they are:

From the measurements I have redrafted my draft and and made a pair of hipster knickers, these are now the same size as the Kwik Sew ones, so I now know I have the right calculations.

All I now need to do is: draft all three sizes; write up the instructions; make a lesson plan; and put together some kits for the lesson in October. . . . . . 

(The bright pink elastic is for me though, I have some beautiful bright pink stretch lace elastic that will become knickers and bras for me).

Time to reward myself with an evening of knitting.

Lack of Sleep

Normally I am a 9 hours sleep a day kind of girl.  Which is difficult to fit in when you are working 12 hour shifts.  But I manage it.

However, recently I have been having trouble sleeping.  I keep have a recuring knightmare and it wakes me in a cold sweat.  As soon as I wake up I know what the dream is about and what my anxieties are.  But, until September there is nothing I can do about it.

My anxiety is coming from the fact that starting on the 17th September I will be teaching "Beginners Dressmaking".  This has been a long held dream and it is about to come true.  So my fears are not really fears, but they are the feeling you get when you are about to start something new.

All I can do is wait.  I have my lesson plans ready, my materials, the course has students already booked.  I will be doing a promotion of it in September.  Nothing to do but wait.  Oh, and make a whole new wardrobe, so that I will be wearing something I have made everytime I teach.  No pressure.

So for now, it is back to my daily plod.  It is now 6am and I have to go to my job that pays for my hobby.

Grandma's Button Box

I learnt to sew from my Grandma, but the one thing that always fascinated me was her button box.  I would play for hours with it, or just simply put my hands in and swish them around.

When my Grandma sadly passed away, it was the button box I wanted to keep as a memento.  I have her sewing box and tools as well, but they are not as tactile as her buttons.  I can spend hours with my hands in the tin, (yes it's a tin, not a box, but box scans better with button) sometimes getting them out, sorting them or just choosing one. I have tried to split them into categories, but they never seem the same, so I put them back together, just loose playing with their buddies, together in the tin.

In there are odd ones, or full sets.  The ones that I love the most are the ones that came from garments my Grandma made and wore.  At the end of the garment's usefulness the buttons came off and were put in the tin.  When I find a button the catches my eye, I remember my Grandma using it, or, if it is one I have never seen her wear, I image what garment it could have been on.
Some buttons have shouted at me and one set have really made an impression.  So much  so that I had to find the right material for them to make something to show them off.  They are 8 purple shanked hexagons and when I was given 3 metres of purple lining the hunt was on to find the right fabric.  
I eventually found it at Knit and Stitch and I knew I wanted to make a Navy Pea Coat Style jacket, and here it is -

A hip length jacket with double breasted front and slash pockets

The purple lining is a great splash of colour

With some scraps of purple silk I made bound buttonholes

Thanks to my Grandma's frugelness I have a jacket that is unique and not only because of the skills she passed on to me, but also because of the buttons, her memory lives on.