Beautiful Dress

I have just finished the dress and jacket for my friend. It is for her son's wedding and this is truly a custom design. Every step of the design was done with Linda, including the fabric shopping, the cut, the details, the jacket shape. I love the results and hope she feels just perfect on the wedding day.
The short sleeve un-lined jacket is the fourth tier in the layers of hemlines. The fabric is so light it moves when she moves, and the jacket floats with the skirt.

The bodice has small tucks diagonally across, and the nature of the fabric (sheer and not-so-sheer parts) creates a natural wave to the tucks and to the hems.

I even added a purse to go with the set....

Outdoor Drapery

I love our deck in the summertime. The morning has a cool shady spot to have breakfast that is so private I can do so in my pyjamas. Late afternoon, however, the sun shines directly on the deck and it can be SO hot, I can't sit there. I would love to BBQ, then sit at the small table and eat dinner there.

Then comes the idea of a shade curtain. Fabricland had their outdoor fabric (fade, mildew resistant) on sale, so off I went. Basically I need two rectangles, mounted with rings at the top, and hung from a curtain rod inside my deck overhang! A room outdoors!

New Dressform, New Dress and New Cushion

I finally bought my own Dress Form... She was on sale at Fabricland and is easy to adjust to lots of sizes. Her name is Shish, named after me (the name my sister uses for me!).

This beautiful fabric is for a special dress. It is for a wedding and my friend is the mother of the groom. We found this in Hamilton on Ottawa Street, and is a silk with a hand painted look pattern in so many colours you can't really say what colour it is! The weight is light and flows easily. Photos as it develops!

The last photos are of a new cushion for our front porch brick wall. Hubby and I like to sit in chairs and put our feet up on the wall. We have tried cushions from inside, but if we leave them out they get rained on, and blow around. This is custom fit and made of outdoor fabric (dries easily and no mildew. I covered the foam with plastic before sliding inside the cover.

Our feet are very happy!

Sock Monkey Golf Club Cover!

A while ago I dabbled in sock monkey sewing. I made a few and had some fun, but how many do we really need? This week I lost the cover for my fairway wood (fell off my cart at a course we were visiting) and I decided to create something new and fun for my heroic four wood (it rescues me from a lot of trouble). I grabbed a sock monkey (previously made in the traditional manner) and cut him across the butt (sorry buddy!). I took out the stuffing of the body, and left the stuffing in the top of the head. I cut an opening on the inside under the muzzle (to allow for the head of the club to nestle in the mouth space). I then took another sock (for lining the cover, and wrapped it in quilt batting. This allows the body to be a bit sturdy, while still remaining hollow. I inserted this sock into the body and right up to the eye level. I secured a few stitches around the ears right through to the lining sock so that it would not pull out when the club is removed. The last step was making the butt opening smooth, but under-turning the outside sock and the lining sock and loosely stitching the pieces together. You still need an opening that can stretch over the golf club, so not too tight.
This works really well for the fairway wood, in the cotton work sock that the original monkey was made. I think a Driver may need a men's size wool work sock, and a bit more stuffing and stretching. But it could be done too.
He looks really cute riding along with my other clubs in my bag. Try one yourselves!

Cutouts

Continuing the work on the applique for the quilt, I drew the rest of the cutout lines and stitched the lines by machine. Then carefully cutting close to the stitches, the resulting applique is very cool and finished! The large design will lie in the center of the queen size bed.

I have not yet purchased the backing fabric and will do so this weekend. Next will be to sandwich the layers, baste in place, then start machine quilting of the 52" by 60" piece.

Close up photos of the cutout design....

New Quilt, top well underway....

Canada Day for us, means one day off (thursday) and back to work for Friday. Nice morning for golf, cool and sunny. Left the afternoon for sewing, and I spent a few hours working on the center panel of the quilt top. I finished the 54" x 60" pieced blocks, using green rows alternating with turquoise rows, and the Kokopelli batik squares randomly placed in both rows.
Then I sketched a rough Kokopelli in the beige batik, and machine stitched on the outlines. I carefully trimmed close to the stitching, leaving a quarter inch rough edge that will fray a bit on washing and leave a bit of a fuzzy edge to the mystical creature.

There will be further cut-outs throughout the body, similar to the small batik images on the quilt cotton.
I will layer this with batting and background and quilt at this size, then add a border, then more green, turquoise squares, to complete a Queen Size quilt! I will use the sewing machine to free motion quilt stitch around the center motif.