Gudrun mittens

I wanted to knit Gudrun Mittens for years but since I´m not fond of wool mittens I needed someone to knit them for and my cousins dauther Vanna was the perfect choise

 The pattern is on ravelry and by Maria Lärkäng  and I used some stash yarn, the mustard is some kind of superwash wool and the greenish is felted tweed, It would have been so much easier two use two "proper" wool yarns. The pattern is quite big but made the green outerlining more of a frame so I pulled the mustard yarn between switching needles. My sewing and knitting has been down for a while due to this:

I fell and broke my foot in three places and have been staying with my brother ans SIL for three weeks and right now I´m at dad´s house. My appartment is on the third floor and no elevator....Luckily since I got a new job in september I´ve been able to work mostly from home, I brought my sewingmashine and had a Kalle started that I could work on a bit but it´s hard to send someone down to the sewingroom and pick some things up for you so sewing and knitting have been mostly down but I have yarn on the way and hopefully it will arrive tomorrow.

I had a vacation planned for India; Delhi and The Golden Triangle for a week and then Cochin for 11 nights, but due to the footissue I skipped the first part and are only going to Kerala. That is if my Visa is admitted….applying for Indian Visa is a lot of work...

Burda Boho dress

I´ve been sewing more than usual the last 6 months and this is one of my favourites. It´s from Burda´s june issue and I liked the to me very 80 style, I could totally have made this and wore it back then. The fabric is a rayon I think you can call it a challis, I bought it at the remnant bins at Ohlssons; a Swedish chain store that I don´t like that much but they have remnant bins there you buy per kilo and here you can find a lot of nice stuff, for instance I bought a lot of active wear fabric there last fall and you have to go often so nobody else grabs the good pieces.

I made some changes to the pattern like the neckline I just used a bias tape from the fabric instead of the shaped piece the pattern calles for, I also did not do the big sleeves of the pattern, they have a kind of very widely spread shape, mine is straight and I also did a casing with elastic instead of a placket, mostly due to that I screw up measuring so I just used the fabric, I omitted the front seam and the belt and added pockets in the side seams. 

This picture showes the cut that my fabric hides and my dress looks very different from the one in the magazine die to fabric choises.
It was a fun make and I have been wearing it a lot and I always use the black belt becourse I like how the leather make a contrast to the flowery and sweet of the dress.

neckline with ties from twisted floss and sleeve with elastic casing

Pink Ribbon 2018

The Pink Ribbon 2018 id designed by Bea Szenfeld and slightly different becourse it´s made from paper that is her prime media

Bea is born in Poland but lives in Stockholm and beside paper she is famous for refashioning, I first came in touch with her work when she appeared on "Fashion House" that she won, Fashion House was a pre- Project Runway there the contestents where from different countries in Europe.

This year I salubrate 7 years after cancer treatment and I urge you to not to put any hearts or colors of your underwear on FB but to actually donate Money to research!

I started a new job 2 weeks ago and are away during the weekdays for training and miss my sewing mashine a lot, but I spend my free time knitting a brioche shawl, I finally found out how to do the brioche stitch and I´m enjoying it so much. 

Shear or Winter is coming

Winter is coming and something to keep my head cosy is needed. Brooklyn Tweed has in my opinions the best patterns and this one is no exeption, it´s knitted in Fine Tweed from Americo Yarns that I bought when I was in Toronto two years ago. 

And look how beautiful  the decreases are made!

and a side view on one of my summer hats

Stockbridge

I bought this yarn from Geilsk a couple of years ago and knew I wanted to knit a cardigan, but the one I started had a lacy detail pattern that the tweedy yarn did not do justice to so I frogged and put it away and drooled over the yarn whenever I saw it, Then a couple of weeks ago I came over Stockbridge by Isolda Teague and it is basically a very straight knit cardigan, very simple but the body is knit in one piece bottom-up and the sleeves are picked up and knit top down with shaping done by short rows.
I´m currently workin on the looong rows of the body but the yarn is really nice to work with so it´s a treat and the texture of it is lovely.

I´m using two pieces of grey yarn instead of little fancy markers that are actually more fun to look at as you knit. I know I have a tartan wool fabric that I bought in Edinburgh a cople of years ago that matches and I also have a kilt pin with a purple stone to match it so maybee it´s time for my kilt this season.

Manolo Blahník at Bata Shoe Museum

I have to admit that I never heard of Manolo before Sex and the city but I understand that despite the heels they are comfortable, and he actually also do low heels even though Carrie would never wear those.
After PR weekend I spent a week in Toronto who happens to be one of my favourite cities and I visited  the Bata Shoe Museum . I´ve been there before so I skipped the historical exibit and went straight to the Manolos. The exibit will last until jan 6 2019 so you have plenty of time to go there.
There are plenty of shoes to drool over and some of them are combined with sketches or should I say paintings, real artwork, you can come real close up and study the details and pictures are allowed. So I´m just going to add some eye candy here:

Hopscotch

Hot pink addition to my sock drawer, used the pattern Hopscotch from the book Think outside the sox, a book filled with 60 sock patterns with innovative design, these must be one of the basic one. If you are interested in knitting socks from hexagons, entrelac and a lot of other tecniques this is a great book. I don´t remember what yarn I used, I like to buy sock yarn as souvenirs and this one is actually a little more Hot than the picture will show

Closet Case Pattern´s Kalle Shirtdress

Working with Closet Case Patterns is such a thrill! The patterns are well drafted and the Tutorials are always  well written and illustrated. 

I really love this dress, I made the longest version and added yet 5 cm and also did a little bust dart and for the next version I will make it a little bigger. I don´t remember what size I used but it was after my bust measurement and I could have gone down a size but on the other hand beeing very loose fitting is very nice this summer becourse we are having temperatures in the upper 20:ies to lower 30 since the beginning of may and this is something we are not used to but I´m enjoying every day of it

 I did the placket and what I like about it is that it is made exactly the same way I´ve been making sleeve vents for 30 years and its the best way to do them

This was the first time I used my whatchmacallit for cutting the button holes. I bought it at the leather store that´s on Spadina Avenue in Toronto.

The fabric is a rayon challis that I bought at Len´s Mill when I was in Canada for Pattern Review weekend, actually not as tricky to work with as rayons can be, the fabric had some holes in it but I was able to cut out the entire dress and still have some leftovers

The buttons are from a local store called Greger Sy and have an entire wall with buttons and a lot of other things like interfacing, thread, lace, bias tape and also sells sewing machines.

Close up on the back, the yoke is double using the burrito method.

And two more pictures of me wearing the dress.

The pictures with me wearing the dress is taken in my local fabric store run by Sara who is a friend of mine, she also sew and sell clothes  and I´m standing in the part of the store with ready made things. The store is called Den är min! That´s mine! and also do mail orders

Sew House Seven Tea dress

I´ve seen a lot of Sew House Seven´s Tea dresses lately both on the net and in my close sewing community  and bought a pattern when I was in Canada for vacation and PR weekend. I´m very fond of buying 3 meters of fabric and this one needs almost 4 but then I took a chance and used this what I think is Liberty Lawn fabric but not the flowery stuff...( I have one piece with swirls in more blues too) and I think I got away with 3 meters even though I omitted the ties where would have been enough for the too!
I prefer clothes that are not cut off at waistline but I had plans for adding the "watchmacallit" at the back to hold a tie but then I tried it on without  and when summer is like this year this is the way I like to dress.
I did som changes to the pattern like constucting the pockets differently and added a different direction piece of fabric at the top and made the top 4 cm longer and added 5 cm to the shorter version of the dress so it´s something in the middle now.
I´ve been wearing it a lot and have plans for at least one more in the very near future, I saw some pictures on Instagram when 2 fabric where used and I have some fabric in teal that are suitable and I will go with the ties this time.
I´m not so fond of the the way the sleeves end but I saw a nicer way on some better RTW the other day that I will use for my next dress

Gucci Skirt

We are having a really warm summer here in Sweden and the dryest as far as anyone can remember so what´s more suitable than to talk about my wool skirt that I have been wearing consistantly fall- winter- early spring. 

Front view

I made it early fall last year at a sewing camp there we where 20 women sewing for four days and evenings and getting food and coffea served to us reguarly

I was supposted to make a regular 6 gore A-line skirt but forgot the pattern at home so I went with what I had, the pattern is from an old Burda Plus and probably also a Burda Style and has a different cut at front that I liked and a went at the back, no waistband.
The fabric is an endbolt och really nice tweedy rusty wool that I bought from Italienska Modetyger.

Detail from inside back, hangers from the lining fabric and I also put my name on it!

It´s lined with a rayon lining and stabilized at the waist with some kind of twill tape, I´ve made skirts without stabilizing them at the waist but it really makes a differense doing it so no more easy way out here...

The last picture here shows the inside and I completely underlined it with silk organza, it´s the first time I do that in a complete garment, I used it as an interfacing before but never like this. Silk organza is hard to find in Sweden at least at a moderate price but I have a small collection now.

Underlining with silk organza is a winner! It gives a structure to the skirt that suprised me and I feel that it keeps the fabric from not stretching so my promise to myself is that I will never sew a wool skirt without it ever!!!!
Rust is a nice color that works well with navy and I really like these colors that reminds me of fall.

Hello 2018!!!!

New year and new start!
I did not set up any sewing goals for last year but I will for this year;
I signed up for the RTW fast so I´m not buying any clothes for this year....I have a tendency to shop spontanesly so I think it´s a good idea for me . I also used to be the girl who saw things on the catwalk or on high street and made a copy myself and I would like to find her again and to be honest I Think I can do 3 years with the clothes I have part from undies and stockings...no I do Think I have stockings for 3 years....
I would really like to find the optimal wrapdress pattern, I have two wadders that prooves that I´m still searching. One will be transformed into a skirt and the other into something else. I´m not even sure I want a wrap dress, I just want something wrappy over the bust. I like to wear jersey dresses and finding dressier models would be a goal and MariaDenmark and Sysiden is one option but also Knipmode/Fashion style has some great models for elegant jersey dresses.
I would like to find a way to sew the optional pantie or make a decican to just continue buying them.
I would like to sew a shirt in an inexpectly fabric that only can be found in a quilt store.
I will go to Toronto, Stratford, London and Rome and Stockholm and Copenhagen
Will be making some kind of fun X-mas outfit since I will be working all X-mas and NY and need something fun and tacky for this, ugly X.mas sweather is not enought!
I will blog more often...