More Imke Love

I haven't blogged all the times I've made this pattern, but suffice it to say, It Rocks!! I use it for my son and my daughter, using the boy/girl options the pattern gives so that they each can get the "look" they want. Here's my latest Imke - incredibly easy in fleece, because if you don't want to hem you can skip it. Yes, that's the latest Mini Boden catalog on my table there - not because I'm a customer, but because I'm a copycat! It is a great place to see what's trendy for the season and a lot of the styles are very basic. So it isn't that hard to rip off get inspired to make a few things of your own with that Mini Boden flavor. Right now I'm eyeballing that swim cover-up on the front there -  it's a simple tunic length hoodie made from toweling material. I could do that!! Anyhow, back to Imke:






This would be a good choice for a beginner to try sewing a shirt, because having a hood instead of a collar makes it easier to finish the neckline. Collars take practice! Either way, I seriously recommend using a basting stitch to attach the hood or collar because you may need to adjust it. If you don't baste, you could find yourself spending lots of time with your seam ripper! Not that I would know anything about that.

So there she is - I just love the sweet flared sleeves and bodice. And I love how easy it is even more!

A Little Progress... and a Sharpie trick

Have you ever had the feeling you are on a treadmill, that just getting one tiny thing accomplished takes way too much effort? Sewing was like that yesterday and I barely made any progress on the Imke hoodie. Today went better though - I completed the bodice & sleeves, put on ribbon embellishment and a decorative patch and hemmed the sleeves & bodice. Now all that's left is to decide if I will line the hood or not, and get it attached.

Once that was finished, I felt like doing something different so I made a pair of mittens from a tutorial I found at Five Green Acres. I used leftover pieces of an old sweatshirt and skipped the lining, what I was really after was to check the sizing. I made it in the Child Med size and it was a bit too long and wide in the finger area so I trimmed it down a bit. My boy-child was not here to try them on so I guessed, if they don't fit I am sure there's someone to give them to. The exciting part wasn't the mittens, though. I had a page of iron on transfer paper on which I'd printed out the image for the hoodie. I thought there must be some way to use the rest of the sheet, which having been cut, could no longer be printed on. So I tried making some simple stripes on the mittens by using a Sharpie marker directly on the transfer sheet, then ironing it on. Maybe I'm the last to know, but it works! I'm now in the market for a full set of Sharpie markers with all those great colors, and surfing the web for more image transferring tricks.

Sewing Imke - Girly Version

After sewing several hoodies from the Lil Blue Boo pattern, I'm finally working on one from Farbenmix out of the book I have (Sewing Clothes Kids Love) as a gift for a niece. I just love the bright knits and fun embellishments they show in the book - but my selection of knits locally was rather limited. I came up with a loose collection of stripes, dots and cherries for this one. It seems like planning and carrying out the embellishments takes as much time as sewing the entire garment! But what a fun way to spend your time.