Print your own shopper bag

I am holding another 'print your own shopper bag' class on Friday 10 October 9.30 - 12.30. Its £30 to include all materials  - all you need to bring is a top you don't mind getting inky and a few ideas of what to print. Don't worry if you can't draw lots of help given as well as chatter and homemade cake! For more info go to my classes page.

Beachy day

Off to the beach today for a bit of sketching and sandcastle making. Its a fab beach down at Studland, Dorset - very old fashioned with beach huts, soft sand and shrimps to be caught. This is my lino cut ' stripes' - think will do a few more rowing boat prints.

Shirt and Skirt classes at Lady Sew and Sew

Ever wanted to make your own clothes? I am so excited to be teaching classes at Lady Sew and Sew in Henley on Thames. There is 'make a skirt in a day' for adults as well as a half term one for children and on wednesdays a six week 'man shirt' class.  To book and for more info go to lady sew and sew

How to make a pie frill collar

I found a couple of pie frill shirts in a charity shop and just love the whole 80's Lady Diana thing about them . As I was not too sure about the summer dress( previous post) I reused the fabric to make this shirt.

For the frill take a 4cm wide x 3 times the length of your collar stand piece of fabric, fold along the length, pattern on outside and press.

Press interfacing to one collar stand.

Pin the frill to the interfaced side of the collar stand, pattern to pattern- use lots of pins! pleating as you go, fiddle about with it a bit to get even pleats. I found about 0.5cm per pleat worked well. The open edge of the pleated fabric is facing out. When you have finished pinning tack/baste the frill in place then lay the other collar stand on top to make a sandwich with the frill hidden in the middle.

 Stitch a 1.5cm seam , I have done this in green so it shows up, then clip the curves as below

 Turn the right way out and press, tah dah!

Pin the back of your collar stand to the back on your shirt, right sides facing, tack then stitch in place with a 1.5cm seam

For the inside of the collar, press a 1.5cm seam on the collar stand , you may need slightly less/ more of a seam so that the collar lies flat, pin and use a hand stitch to attach, ladder stitch works well.

 Finished shirt - perfect to keep the sunburn off the back of your neck and for those vintage moments.

Another A line skirt pattern 6128

A lines are so this season! so made another, not with pockets but with a deep pleat at the front.  I love this fabric Parson Gray Seven Wonders, Westminster Fibres from Lady Sew and Sew. I am going to be doing A line skirt classes at Lady Sew and Sew... more info soon.

To make the box pleat at the front I moved the front panel pattern back from the fabric fold when cut it out  to include the extra bit( see below) This was then stitched and pressed to form the box pleat. For a deeper pleat just move the pattern back a bit more. Although I cut out a tie belt I did not use it prefering a more simple look to the skirt.

Beach skirt newlook pattern 6128

This skirt is for my sister, I love the grey/ white spots on the 'dashwood' fabric - perfect for the seaside or even with a smart white T for lunch out. The patten was easy to follow although belt loops needed to be added. Going to try the straight skirt with square pockets that came with the same pattern..

Newlook 6803 summer dress in liberty fabric

I made this dress in a few hours - the pattern is super simple and has the option of pockets, tunic, belt and different necklines. It does not have a huge amount of shape to it but perfect for slinging on at the beach with a pair of flip flops. The fabric I have used is liberty tana lawn - found on ebay.