As winter sets in

I can't avoid mentioning my blogging absence. It's sort of my "thing" so it hardly seems worth mentioning it's just that so much happens in that time.

To be honest, I don't even know WHY it happens. Overwhelmed, under-whelmed.. who knows. Sometimes I think it all just gets too much reading about the perfect lives of perfect people in the blogesphere. Techinicaly we all know each other isn't perfect but who am I kidding?! Some of these mums with their baking and sewing and happy kids and magazine perfect photos.. they make me sick. It's nice for a while to read their blissful words and their pics really aren't to be complained about as they're so wonderfully composed. But when you're struggling to make ends meet, keep the child alive and drudge through each and every dreary day just to start the next one it's not always so blissful. More like a huge kick in the face.

Jessica's health has been reasonably good this year. Her eczema is looking far better than ever (in her whole life - ever!). She still has to travel to Perth frequently to see doctors and monitor her medications and progress. Anaphylaxis hasn't been an issue but minor allergic reactions and hayfever etc have all been pretty uncomfortble. As I write this in my sleep deprived state I am reminded how disruptive her asthma has been the last few days. Neither of us have had much sleep while she coughs her lil lungs up all night long. She's feeling pretty run down and having more time off school. To top it off, at her last check up in Perth her doctors are concerned she hasn't gained any weight in over 6mths. Will be interesting to see what this means for us on our visit in July.

I started a new job! Way back in January.. I love it :) Suits me really well. I am kept active enough both physically and mentally, working with people and given a huge chunk of responsibility. I am working in an Australia Post Licensed Post Office and from the moment I was hired (head hunted!!) I was told it would be semi managerial. I say semi as in a small, privately owned business there is no need for a "manager" per say, except when the owner is away. This is what she intended. For me to run the show so she CAN go away. I wasn't looking for work. I was still trying to overcome the inadequacies and apprehensions my last job created for me on a personal level. When I was asked to take this position I baulked, but told her I'd give it a go. Never expected to LOVE IT and not complaining that I do :) It's been good in many ways. It got me out of my reverie, has me socialising even if it is only at a seeing people at work level and reinstating some long lost confidence. I've learned so much. The business has been on the market for a number of years and now my mum has put in an offer and really hopes to be the successful purchaser. Finance permitting. This will be a whole other can of worms that I will leave closed until it bursts open.

I have been creating. Nothing fancy. A toy here, a piece of clothing there. Some hand sewing, embroidery, wood working.. Baby steps. I always have these big plans and get so annoyed at myself when they don't come to fruition.

Here's some recent items

I hand pleated some fabric to attempt smocking.. but I don't know how to smock haha

Baby dress for my 7mth old cousin - pattern from Ottobre

A top/tunic for Jessica - pattern McCall's

Library bags I made Jessi and our 2 cousins for school this year

 

Jessi's 8th birthday cake. Could have been better if the 45C heat wasn't melting it!!

Dummy (pacifier) chain, heandband and baby shoes for my 3mth old cousin

Still working on finding peace with myself, my actions, my words and my feelings. Fingers crossed I get there one day soon as I feel like life is flying by and I am only a spectator, but also feel like I am completely unable to change it. 

Holy Smocking!

I went back to a tutorial I was going to try once and never did, by Lia of Lia's Space for a pattern she calls Diamond Smocking. This is done in the "American Smocking" method I believe.

I re-sketched Lia's diagram not for any other reason than I bought my stitches closer together. Lia had a row of dots between which I am unsure it it were intentional or not. This is my diagram, based on the method explained here. Please see the original site for a written tutorial. Very simply take your needle up through the fabric at dot one, down at 2, up at 3 and so on and so forth. The other thing I did slightly different to Lia was I took my needle under just a few threads right underneath the dots on my fabric. It gave me these cute little 4petal type flowers. Lias's method bought 4 dots back together as 1. I probably should have used a larger dotted fabric for this example!!

On my quest to find smocking tutorials using the American style, I came across a great blog called La Sewista! where the author Bunny explains many smocking styles! I had no idea there were so many!! You can read about them here. She lists English (what I always thought was traditional smocking), American/Canadian, Counterchange, Italian Smocking/Shirring, and Picture smocking. In my travels I have also seen variations on the above forms with Geometric Smocking, Dot to Dot Smocking, Lattice, Continental, Grid Smocking... WOW!! Are you keeping up?! Although people who do English smocking (the variety that is pleated before embroidered, often with the pleats let out after construction) typically use a pleating machine it wasn't always so. With amazing precision those pleats were once hand sewn, often using a grid of dots much like the American smocking.

In close reach I found a copy of Australian Smocking and Embroidery Magazine (Issue 45 1998). This magazine is still  printed in Australia and popular world wide. It includes full paper patterns for the garments as well as smocking patterns (called plates) as well as all other kinds of useful info. For example, this particular edition shows you how to use a pleater to pleat a curved panel. The two pictures and examples below are photographed from the Australian Smocking and Embroidery magazine Issue 45, 1998.

Counterchange Smocking

design "Journey of the Heart" by Alexandra Baldwin (South Australia)

English Smocking (combined with Heirloom sewing)

design "Enduring Spirit" by Lyn Weeks (Illinois, USA)

I have absolutely no idea what I will do with my samples of smocking, but I have enjoyed the process and being introduced to some very clever bloggers along the way!!

Smocking is NOT Shirring

I've been playing around with smocking. American Smocking apparently. I never knew there were two styles, one American the other English. I have a few books that contain smocking info and of course various issues of Australian Smocking and Embroidery magazines but I'd never actually done any! All that pleating and embroidery really put me off. Seems the American style doesn't need pleating, only well placed stitches. I say a post on the OnePrettyThing site for a smocking tutorial and decided I REALLY needed to try it. I dug out some remnants of spotty fabric (let's face it, I am far too lazy to draw all those dots!) and gave it a try. The tutorial I used can be found here.

These were rather large dots each spaced about 1.5cm from centre to centre. I really love the effect it gives! I did this row by row with just sewing cotton and a needle. I may go back over it with embroidery floss. (the measuring tape used is in inches) 

Although Kara at Craftastical! did a fantastic job of the smocking tutorial I still managed to muck it up! Below is the first try, on a much smaller dot printed fabric. The results are pretty cute, though now how it was supposed to be. I do like the zig-zag effect!

One of my pet peeves is people calling things by the wrong terms. This is smocking, it is NOT stretchy. Go for it, make it with elastic thread.. it still wont stretch. It's not supposed to. The stretchy thing you're thinking of is called Shirring! Smocking and Shirring are two very very different things! Shirring has, in the past, been called "poor man's smocking". So, if it's elasticated and gathered do the right thing and refer to it as shirring. It's not smocking. Smocking takes a whole lot more work!

Another common mix up is when it comes to multicoloured thread/yarn. Almost always called Varigated when the correct term is Ombre. Do you know the difference? If you're a yarn lover you really should..

While we're on the "peeved" topic. I am curious why people who sew and flaunt their "designs" are so lazy as to not add arm scythes to their garments? Don't know what an arm scythe is? It's that curve that goes under an arm, where you'd insert a sleeve. Now, most of the garments I am refering to are tanks, ties, halters. There are no sleeves. But for whatever reason these "designers" drag a garment (usually for a little girl) straight under her arms and around her back. It draws the bodice down in front, is awfully uncomfortable to wear, and means the back too will be low. I am guilty of this also. A ladies skirt I reconned into a dress for Jessica in a real hurry. It looks awful! The arm scythe (dip under the arm) makes a garment fit better, sit better, and more appealing to look at. Try it out!