April 2013: new cover for cushion roll

Oh my, I have such a backlog, but I’m slowly trying to catch up with all the things I have made.

Here is the new cover for a cushion roll, which I have on my sofa. Which is, incidentally, also new.

April 2012: wooden tissue box

I have been very busy creating, despite my lack of posting, but the one doesn’t mean the other. Also, I’m working on several projects I can’t post about yet.

Anyway, here is a little thing I made last week: wooden tissue box, primed and then spray painted, and scraps of funky fabric glued onto two of its sides.

It’s for my newly decorated conservatory.

Conservatory before

This weekend I’ll be changing the look of the conservatory.
After all, I haven’t been redesigning a room for…a few months.

March 2013: funky upcycled towels Mark II

Here’s the second batch of towels. This time I dyed boring white ones a bright, cheerful pink.

The big bath towel got the same fabric-stripe treatment as the purple ones, but I did something different for the wee hand towel. That one had a woven-in pattern, so I put on a couple of different embroidery stitched on my sewing machine, and embroidered along the pattern. Quick, easy, and it looks lovely.

I’m afraid I didn’t get a neatly folded shot of the bath towel, because my darling Mr F decided it was the perfect place to snooze on. And I just can’t be heartless and shoo him off anything.

 

And this is the small embroidered towel.

 

March 2013: up-cycled funky brightly coloured towels

Have you ever had towels that are still good quality and nice to use, but where the colour has become tired or you just don’t like them anymore? There’s an easy and fun solution.

I had pale grey towels which were a few years old, and while there was nothing wrong with them, pale grey is so not me! I decided on dyeing them a lovely deep purple, which worked brilliantly. Just get some Dylon (here in the UK) machine dye, add the 500g salt and follow the instructions. The colours are vibrant and won’t come out.

I decided to add some cheery fabric strips where the woven bands are in the towels, and used leftover scraps from the retro nightdress I made last month.

 

I had a bath towel and two smaller towels (I always use a set of three) and here they are. A fun, easy and cheap project that turns boring old towels into unique and funky ones.

February 2013: Retro nightdresses

Remember the Burda pattern feast? Well, I have been cutting out patterns like a goodun, also been cutting out some fabric. I must admit I did end up with a fabric-buying feast to accompany the pattern feast. Ho-hum, I’m a greedypants when it comes to sewing. But as everyone knows: she who dies with the biggest stash, wins.

Anyway, I finished the two night dresses in February, but didn’t get round to posting about them, so now here they are. I made them from thin cotton, which I got super cheap for £2.50 per meter. It is the Burda pattern NR. 7109-V, which is a download pattern.

I absolutely love this pattern. Love it so much, I made two night dresses. Both with the Empire waist (I used a drawstring) and with different lengths and sleeve variations. However, be aware that the cleavage is enormous on this pattern, and that I had to add lace to the first one (the red and white polka dot) and added an inset to the second one.

As you can see, I first only used some bias binding, but after wearing it once I decided that it was just pointless being so enormous, and added the lace. Also, I was a complete idiot when cutting this out. The fabric was a narrow width, thus I had to cut the 4 panels singularly. What did I do? Huh? The silliest beginner error ever: I forgot to flip two of the panels over, and ended up having to piece things together. och well, can’t really tell and it’s just a night dress. Eventually, I finished each of them like this:

 

 

 

January 2013: Burda download patterns feast

I spent my creative-time this weekend glueing together and then cutting out a whole raft of Burda download patterns that I had printed some time ago.

I have to say, I rather like doing that. It’s very soothing, the gentle snip-snip then glue-glue and finally snippety-snip.

We have here from left to right and from top to bottom:

• NR. 122B-092011-DL  Trachten Janker (jacket) for my sister
• NR. 7137-V Shift dress
• NR. 130-032010-DL elegant Couture coat
• NR. 130-022012-DL elegant simple coat
• NR. 134-022012-DL Empire line dress
• NR. 7109-V 1950s Retro Nightdress
• NR. 7181-V Longline jacket trouser suit
• NR. 134-102011-DL A-line winter coat

P.S. Alle links sind zur deutschen Burda Seite, ich kaufe meine Burda Schnittmuster von burdastyle.de und nicht der amerikanischen. Natuerlich nicht!

 

 

January 2013: strawberry cotton night dress

One of the sewing WIPs I posted about is finished: the nightdress made from strawberry printed cotton. I once again used the Simplicity 4048 night attire pattern.

I am afraid to say that the reason why there’s a line of red bias tape ruunning down the front is because I was an idiot and didn’t cut the front piece in one, but in two. Doh!

December 2012: decoupage table in sewing-room situ, and fancy lighting

With the sewing room completely finished – for now (we all know that down the line I’ll completely redecorate everything again, don’t we?) – let me show off the wee Victorian decoupage table in its location, with my new lovely Tiffany style lamp in its intended position: on the table.

Then there’s the new window treatment, of course, now finished with the red voile curtain that had been in the bedroom.

Last but not least there’s the decorative lighting on the wall, which I bought a year or two ago for tuppence in the IKEA Christmas sale. I added some fake greenery plus some glittery bits, and there it is, glowing softly.

I’ve already written about the chandelier pendant lamp I re-purposed and which is now on top of the new shelves. Here it is again in close-up.

December 2012: paper-decorated cardboard storage, IKEA hack

I almost forgot about this quick and easy hack. A couple of years ago I bought the BARNSLIG RINGDANS mini chest of 4 drawers from IKEA. It’s in their kiddie section. I figured that I might have a use for the sturdy cardboard storage one day. And indeed, I do now. This is the original:

I then went and spray-painted the pale blue outer with some matte black I had left in a can. Warning: this method does not stand up to any abuse. Sitting nicely in a shelf is fine, but any rough-n-tumble and the paint chips off.

I then rummage around in Aladdin’s loft, remembering I had some cheap antiqued maps that were up on the walls of some of my previous abodes (those maps could be bought years ago at every historical place gift shop, I assume they are still sold there?) I used a London map, chopped it into four pieces, glued it on, and voilà!

 

Rather nice, even if I say so myself, and only a tuppence.