The Little Foxes

In lieu of the Thanksgiving and Christmas season, I'm making a few felt fox cup cozies for goody bags. Unlike Bette Davis in The Little Foxes, mine are considerably less conniving. I'm tempted to keep them for myself.  I recently signed up for a subscription to Lia Griffith, and this is one the patterns/crafts I really loved. There are some bear cozies as well if you're interested in that sort of thing. I also work at Starbucks, so I used my employee discount to buy some reusable coffee cups to put them on the bag.  Not sure if that's thrifty or cheap!😂

I had to learn how to do a blanket stitch since most of the project is bound together that way. Really easy after my trial fox (whose pattern I also printed at 70% scale instead of 100%, so he was a bit of a runt), took any where from an hour and a half to 2 hours for each, and that is mostly due to the blanket stitching. My second one was a little bigger, so it slid up the cup and gave a good gauge of how tightly they should be sewn. Loved them and would use the pattern again. I'm thinking of making a panda bear pattern from this.

Happy Sewing!

Brits on the Bluff

If my boyfriend ever existed as a fabric, this is what he would be.

He's an undeniable British car enthusiast (and I by association and what he would probably call 'corruption and indoctrination' to the dark side) and so is the creator of this fabric.  Spoonflower, the great creative abyss of irresistible fabrics, actually has quite an array of British car fabrics, and naturally,  I had to make shirts.  His mom has a great stash of vintage patterns and I picked a casual men's shirt from 1954, Simplicity 4981, and a 1960s women's blouse, Simplicity 6549, which would have cost a grand total of $1 back in the day.

Neither were  terribly difficult, but the buttons on his shirt were a little difficult. My zipper even turned out wonderfully.  I decided to make the collar green because the car pattern was just to big and would just make the shirt look messy, I thought. The only problem I had was getting the arms to fit right and they still don't fit right, but it would be more work than it would be worth. Overall I'm pretty satisfied with both shirts and would use the patterns again.

The Gayle Shift Dress (New Look by Simplicity 6500)

This is a quick little post after my long delinquency in not posting for nearly 5 months! I decided to try out a New Look pattern by Simplicity, #6500.  Instead of keeping it one solid piece of fabric, I went ahead and put in a waistline. The pattern was easy to follow, but I probably cut 2 sizes off after I had started in order to make it flattering. I suspect that there was some sort of mix up on sizes and body measurements.

Because I dislike blunt or plain seams at a waist line, I added a strip of cream lace, to make the fabrics segue a little better, a little feature with which they both coordinate. Overall an easy pattern, but the little details (or an outrageously bold fabric) definitely add a little character since it is such a simple pattern. Another feature I changed was the back; I already look considerably younger than I am, so I opened up the back, so it had a little more elegance and I didn't look 10.  There would probably be a facing for that if it was original to the pattern, but I just used bias tape. I am rather pleased with the outcome, and actually wear this a lot, so obviously its comfortable after you get the sizing back on track.

The reason I call this "The Gayle" is that all the fabric I used was from a woman named Gayle in a batch of odds and ends she was giving away, and I though it would be appropriate to name it so.

Happy Sewing!