choices

The decision was a tough one, but finally I settled on a pattern and fabric for my christmas dress. I'll make the Darling Ranges dress by Megan Nielsen:

Right now, my fabric choice is a bright red rayon crepe like the one below. Will I look to Santa-ish? Or is a red dress just fine for christmas eve? Some darker colour will for sure look more festive. But then I actually try to avoid fabric shopping, knowing that I will probably end up with more than I planned on buying...

I already traced the pattern and will sew a (wearable) muslin next week. But now I am having a look what the others did so far for the christmas dress sew-along.

Love, Ulrike

something to look forward to

I am not kidding you when I say that I was starting to look forward to the christmas dress sew-along 2012 on december 25th of last year. My navy ponteknit dress was such a success: it made me feel comfortable plus I got a lot of comliments from my family. So it was a no-brainer when Katharina asked who's going to join this time.

When it comes to actual sewing plans, I have the following ideas. I want:

• a dress
• with short sleeves
• made from a woven fabric
• and simple is good

Since I already own an insane amount of sewing patterns, I won't buy any new one for the sew-along. Right? No matter what gems I will find over at the other participating blogs, I will stay strong and make something from the patterns I already have. Okay? Okay. I will resist. *mantra-mode* 

Here are some of my candidates:

Sureau dress by deer&doe

Anouk or Chloe dress by victory patterns

Darling Ranges dress by Megan Nielsen

Noticed my soft spot for indie pattern designers? Except for the Sureau dress I haven't made any of these patterns. But since the designs are rather simple, I guess a wearable muslin is doable within the given timeframe.

Thanks again to Katharina for organising this sewalong! 

Love, Ulrike

Rainy day dressing

Oh well, summer break was a little longer over here. But I don't want to fool anyone, I just wasn't in the mood for sewing or blogging. Life is too short for regrets, so no big sorries from me today. Still I hope you enjoyed today's MeMadeMittwoch as much as I did! (Are you too excited about the new MMM blog? I love it!)

It rained a lot this morning. Instead of getting wet hems on my jeans, I pulled out my new shorts and tell you the story about the pattern: 

A friend of mine just started sewing. She is tough and fearless, so she uses Burda style patterns for her first projects - from the magazines and the tissue ones (Einzelschnitte?!). Once I joined her for fabric and notion shopping at a local department store. As I was on fabric diet back then (haha!! Who am I fooling?), I wandered around and had a look into the Burda pattern catalog. Not for the first time in my life, but the first time it occured to me that I too could sew with Burda patterns. Don't get me wrong. I tried Burda magazine patterns a few times before with mixed results and sticked with the Big4 or independent designers for the last ... uhm ... maybe four years. I tried print-at-home ones and japanese patterns and spanish ones and drafted patterns with the help of a dutch textbook and ... you get it. To me it felt really strange to sew with Burda. But that day I was adventurous. "Let's do something crazy", I told myself and bought Burda 7550. 

shorts: Burda 7550 | shirt: RTW

pattern review:

pattern: Burda 7550, view B

fabric: medium weight denim

alterations: Pockets are super important to me, so I added slant pockets in the front and a patch pocket in the back. The way Burda wanted me to install the zipper actually sucks, so I used the instructions of Jalie 2908 (which include a fly in contrast to the original pattern).

fit: Not bad if I might say so myself. Actually the shorts fitted me surprisingly well.

Will I sew it again: I want another pair, but with narrower legs. I will adapt view A for the second pair.

Okay, have a happy rainy day and see you soon again!

Love, Ulrike

copy cat

Sometimes the internet can be an evil thing, when I have a thousand things to do, but keep browsing all those wonderful sewing blogs instead.

However, at times it is still whorthwhile procrastinating all these tasks when I find a gem like Ali's blog. And since copying can also be a form of admiration, I gave in and made a skirt with button closure, too. Here is the original. And here is the rip-off:

 

 shirt: bought | skirt: new look 2452

I am especially in love with the red buttons. And in love with summer. So please come back! Still I wish you all nice day. And again super-big Thanks to Catherine of Cat&Kascha for the MeMadeMittwoch.

Love, Ulrike

honor

I feel very honored. Minnies was so kind to share the Liebster Blog Award with me! And as I like her blog very much, too, the pleasure to be chosen by her is even bigger.

To catch two birds with one stone, I also want to start updating my blog with the things I've made lately. Today I am sporting the Banksia top by Megan Nielsen. Other than the pattern suggests I took a knit fabric and it worked like a charm. The pattern itself is such a little gem that I decided to write a separate pattern review later this week.

shirt: Megan Nielsen Banksia top | jeans: RTW

Have a nice day everyone and enjoy the MeMadeMittwoch party given by Cat&Kascha!

Love, Ulrike

Dear blog

Dear blog, I kind of missed you. You know, one month is really a long time.

Let's not talk about resolutions and such stuff. Let's leave it at how happy we are to have each other back again. See, I even dressed up a little bit for our reunion. Well, as dressed up as I still feel comfortable to be. With my uniform of course: striped shirt, skirt and boots.

cardigan: hand-me-down from my mother | shirt: boden online shop

skirt: vogue 8435 (shortened)

As the weather gets warmer, I particularly enjoy these days where you can still wear boots but can leave out the heavy coats. I hope you too enjoy your MeMadeMittwoch. I certainly do over at Cat&Kascha, who kindly hosts this weekly get-togehter.

Love, Ulrike

My resolutions, where are thou?

Well, dear readers. It's not even the end of february and I already have some serious struggles with keeping up the resolutions I've made for this year. Neither dresses are on my agenda today nor my SWAP. And although I want to show you something me-made, you might already have noticed that it is not exactly wednesday (it's rather thursday...). Still I call it a Me-Made-Mittwoch today and promise to show more dresses (for my SWAP) in the future. As the year is quite young, there's still room for improvements, isn't it?

t-shirt: simplicity 4076 view d | jeans: jalie 2908 | cardigan: RTW

Love, Ulrike