Thank you Sue for this nomination, I am honoured that you would want to nominate me. The questions posed to me by Sue are as follows:
1. What do you want to make but feel too apprehensive to start?
I want to make something like this strapless pleated dress that I pinned last year. I do already have fabric to make it from, so it would actually help with the stashbusting! I guess I just keep putting it off as although I will make it to fit me, I have nowhere to wear it, it's just going to be a sample dress. And although I have this diagram to help me make the pattern, it just seems like a lot of effort to go to for the fun of it. Especially when there are more bras to be made!
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I'd have to say paper and my patternmaking ruler. I make the majority of my own patterns, and often it feels like I spend more time with paper and pencil than with my sewing machines!
3. What is the next skill you want to acquire?
So many to choose from! My husband thinks that I try to do too much already, and that I jump from one obsession to the next (hence the title of my blog!) I had a go at corsetry, and didn't get past making the first one, I've wanted to do tambour beading since I found out what it was called about 5 years ago, and managed to buy the special needle to do it with, but have yet to give it a go.
I also read a post recently from Amy at A Challenging Sew on couture pleated dresses, and thought maybe I should do a sample of that.
A realistic goal on what I would like to do is freehand machine embroidered fabric, using Solvy as a base. I wanted to give it a go last year, and just never got around to it. I'm thinking something using very little or no fabric, but mostly thread. I'll need a lining under the finished fabric of course, and would like to make a dress out of the finished fabric.
4.What is your all time favourite pattern?
I don't really know if I have an answer to this one! I use my blocks a lot to make my patterns. My most used and most loved would be my strapless dress block, but I have only used it a few times to make clothes for me. From memory, my wedding dress and a top I made for my honeymoon. Sadly, neither fit anymore. I do use it extensively for client dresses, and prefer making dresses based on this strapless block to anything else. It's so forgiving for most body shapes and sizes!
5. What is your favourite era for clothes and sewing?
I don't know that I have a favourite era. I just pick and choose elements from garments that I like and mash them together in the clothes I make.
6. What other creative pursuit do you have?
You'd better sit back and relax with a cup of tea for this one, it might be a long answer.
Knitting is something that I learnt while I was in high school, but didn't get past knit and purl. I recently started knitting again, and have made 2 cowls, finished one Miette cardigan, and have started a second. I have long term plans of a pattern I would like to try, but I know it will be tricky, so I'm in no rush!
Embroidery. Mostly cross stitch. Here's one that I started about 7 years ago, and have not touched since I
This cross stitch is about one third done, so given my current rate of working on it, I think my daughter might be finishing it for me when she's in a retirement home. Only kidding! If I was to start work on it again, and did some every night, it would still be a couple of years away from being done. I think this much was about 1 year's constant work every evening.
Miniature teddy bears. I've made a stack of them, and have many more lying around the house unfinished, and every now and then do a bit of them.
Miniatures in general. I have a half finished shadow box of a sewing studio that I've been working on (and I use the term loosely) for many years. You'll have to wait til that's finished to see photos. Don't hold your breath!
Tatting! My oldest sister taught me to tat in an afternoon about 15 or so years ago, just to prove it was possible to teach someone in an afternoon. I've got quite a few tatted doilies and runners around the house, but with the furniture we now have in the lounge room, it isn't practical to use many of them.
I've tried my hand at scrapbooking, and despite wanting to spend more time on it, I don't seem to have the necessary passion to follow through on it. I only have one complete album that I've done, of a family holiday to Hong Kong in 2010. I have started on my honeymoon album (from 2004), and should really do some more of it!
I'm pretty sure this list is incomplete. Some hobbies come and go, but most have suffered from a lack of spare time since having children. I've had to cut back and focus on one thing if I have any hope of completing anything, and that one thing has been sewing.
7. Where would you really like to shop for fabric?
Is price a factor here? Fly me to New York, please! I've read so much about the Garment District in New York, I so want to go. Take me to Mood Fabrics, and if I have any room left in my bag, I'll be able to check out some other stores too! Do I still have time in my itinerary, and room on the credit card? Maybe I should come home via Paris. Montmartre next stop please!
8. Where do you mostly buy your fabric and notions?
Back to reality now. I love going to the Fabric Store in Sydney to buy fabrics for myself. I'm on their email list, so I get advance warning of sales. If I'm in need of a particular fabric at the time, you can generally find me there on day one of a sale, hoping my husband doesn't notice how much I put on the credit card.
I have an extensive supply of notions in my studio, including a Gutermann thread stand, and a stash of many hundreds of zippers that my mother gave me. I do tend to frequent a few local wholesalers in Sydney for specific items. E & M Greenfields in Surry Hills is great for notions, if you want to buy them in bulk that is, and is also great for silks - I often send clients there for supplies.
9. What stops you from doing more sewing?
There are not enough hours in the day. I would sew all day if I could, and some would say that I do. While the kids are at school, I'm sewing. When they're home, they are my number one priority. So, let's blame the fact that school is only for 6 hours a day, drop off and pick up takes up an hour of that, and essential breaks takes another hour. So, that leaves 4 hours per day, 5 days per week in which to sew.
10.What place is top of your bucket list?
I've actually already been to the place at the top of my bucket list. Ever since I can remember, I've wanted to go to Paris, and I was lucky enough to go there two years ago. My husband thought that would get it out of my system, but it just makes me want to go more! I've been secretly stocking up on small amounts of Parisian themed fabrics, with no particular use in mind, and anything with the Eiffel Tower on it. I even got my father to digitise the Eiffel Tower so I can sew it onto anything I want, not that I have yet.
And now my nominees
I was wondering if I should do this bit at all, since I feel so bad about not having even noticed my own nomiation! But of course I should! I think it's important to let other people know that they are appreciated and keep the ball rolling as it were. Choosing someone to nominate was hard though, I tend to read snippets from a lot of blogs, but there aren't that many that I try not to miss a post from, and I feel that I should nominate someone that I actually follow. On reading up a little on the Liebster Award, one of it's aims is to recognise blogs with fewer followers, so I was on the lookout for blogs I read with followers in the hundreds, rather than thousands, not that you can really tell a blog's following just from stats visible on a blog.
As my questions are sewing related, and my blog reading revolves around sewing, my nominees are both fellow sewists.
My first nomination is Megan from Meggipeg - create with wild abandon. Megan comes across as being so down to earth, someone who I'm sure I'd be friends with if we lived in the same place. She makes fabulous outfits, and I love her copycat outfits too.
My second nomination is Emily from Tumbleweeds in the Wind. Emily, AKA emsewcrazy, co-founded the Stashbusting Sewalong, now in it's third year. She has graciously allowed a handful of other bloggers to assist with the hosting of her baby this year, and we're all so excited to be helping out!
My questions for you are as follows:
- Where do you find the most inspiration for your sewing?
- How many sewing machines do you have?
- What is your favourite machine and why?
- What is your favourite seam finish?
- What is you favourite fabric to sew with?
- What is your next / current project for yourself?
- What is your favourite type of garment to sew?
- Who do you most like to sew for apart from yourself?
- OK, Stash question now. How much fabric do you estimate that you have in your stash?
- When buying fabric, are you more of an impulse buyer, or do you need to have some kind of a plan for a piece of fabric before buying it?
Thanks ladies, I look forward to reading your responses.
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