beach trousers - north ayrshire style....

 Laika was going through one of her 'phases' a few months ago when she chewed a hole in the back of Mr Midnites best waterproof jacket. He has a shiny new one now thanks to the amazing sale at trespass in largs so she has been forgiven (ish).

anyway - I took the oppertunity to turn them into a pair of waterproof trousers for james. They sat in my sewing box for months - althrough the snows of december and rain and mud of january when they would have been really useful. Now I have finished then the sun has come out - not that I am complaining about that though.

Its the same basic pattern as all the other dungarees I have made over the past few months, I left the back open with cross over straps as it will usually be worn over a jumper and it is easier to get on and off as you don't have to undo them to take them off. I stitched a small piece of thick elastic between the base of the straps as it was gaping  a bit. the strap fastenings were harvested off a rucksack - it has loads of straps - they cant all be useful? well hopefully not anyway. The front zip pocket was transplanted directly from the jacket - so no fussing about with the zip was required - I lined the front sction and a strip around the waist with the fleece material left over from the dressing gown. I was going to line more of it but James couldn't really move his legs so I trimmed it right back.the hem at the foot holes is elasticated on the inside to fit snugly around the wellies, I used the elastic cord from the jacket to do this, and threaded it through the jacket cuff hem ( the legs are made from the jacket sleeves)

I did take some photos on the beach but they are stuck in some dark recess of my cameras memory that i cant seem to access

everybodys happy!

 my sister gave me this fabric for Christmas, its dark blue fleece with large cars and trucks on it - I'm gussing she had james in mind when she bought it and not me!

Mr midnite immediately suggested that I made a dressing gown, I had wanted to make some kind of hooded poncho for post bath/swimming pool running around, but Mr M pulled a face and insisted a dressing gown with lapels, pockets and a little tie would be cute. He won, kind of, it basically is a dressing gown with all those things but I added an oversized hood and a button fastening on the front  so I can  can just do that up when he comes out the bath and let him run himself dry. the best of both world? Everybody's happy.

The best thing about working with this material is it does not fray at all - you can just sew, and go.....

The basic shape was based on the wizard's costume I made at Halloween which in turn was based on the shape of an Ikea sleeping bag. The sleeves are narrower - I made the too narrow initally - they need to have a bit of flare to allow the arms to fit easily - I had to re cut them but I was able to reuse the original sleeves as the side of the hood. this is the first time I have made a hood and I am pretty pleased with it - It fits pretty well and looks good too.

I made the belt out of a strip of the material folded over with regular seams sewn through it - I put the belt loops in completey the wrong place and had to move them - cuttung a small hole in the fabric :(

In the end I decided against pockets - there was a lot going on already - I might still add some

James loves running about in this at bed time - I sometimes regret putting the button and button hole on as it spoils the look of the lapels - but it is functional.

Tweedy

 Winter has arrived - All of a Sudden - I think autumn lasted for about 4 days with its mists and mellow fruitfulness and now bleak novembers win's ensuin, baith snell an' keen. James has only 2 pairs of long tousers - both jeans and both getting a bit small for him.

I had had these tweed trousers for a couple of years - I did not realise when  I bought them that they were a hideous fashion disaster, but fortunatly for me, I worked in a pub at the time and the regulars there were only to happy to to tell me. Phew. I have not worn them since.

I used the pattern i had made for the blue linen short dungarees, just made it a bit bigger - far to big in fact - I had to trim 4 cm off each of the legs fold up a big flap in the front that then became the waist band. The waist band looks quite smart - I will try to copy it in future projects - it was a lucky mistake!

! used the pocket flap from the trousers fro the front pocket, everything went a bit skewif with the single welt pocket entrance under the flap - but nevermind, the flap hides it all. I used 3 buttons from the trousers on the front but the dog chewed off and ate the pocket button so that was replaced with the only other spare button i had - a big flat tarnished brass one

I am pretty pleased with this - it turned out way better than I expected. Its a shame james wouldn't pose for a proper picture of the front, he has now poked a hole in the front of one of the legs where the material was damaged from before so the dungarees are patched now and decidedly less smart

halloween

"I've just spilt my dinner all down the tunic - you dont mind do you ,mum?"

james' first halloween outfit (we did not bother last year). its a lot of effort for at best 2 or three parties, but a great opportunity to let imagination run wild I sent Mr midnite to mandors to get the material - ! m for the tunic and 1.5 m for the hat and cape and 20cm gold material for the trim. he misunderstood (how?) and came back with 2.5 m of the ridiculously stretchy dark blue material - perfect for the hat and cape but an old bedsheet had to be sacrificed to finish the tunic.

I made the tunic first - based on a well fitting sleeping bag as a pattern with  short sleeves added - the gold material proved very difficult to handle - it frayed like crazy and seemed to have a life of its own - I eventually beat it into submission and used it to bind the neck and sleves and trim the hem. the tunic was a pretty tight fit but I added elastic at the waist to give it some shape.

the cape was also based to the sleeping bag as a pattern - I added wedge shapes to the seams to make it flare out at the bottom and flared wizardy sleeves - the gold cuff on the sleeves were sewn in right at the start so all the seam are included in the sleeve seams and they turned out really neat. I finished the neck line by draping it over james and seeing where it lay best without rolling over. The sleeves are lined in red lining and the rest is lined in the old blue bed sheet . I found a tutorial online (if I find it I will add a link) about how to sew a lining into something with sleeves - somewhere along the line I went wrong and ended up with a twist so I had to cut, untwist and resew the inner lining - cape done - Phew!

The hat was a family effort with Mr M in charge of drawing the patterns and doing the maths. the rim was made out of thick corrugated cardboard - 2 discs of the covering material were cut and stitched right sides together on the outside of the circle - this was then turned the right way round and slipped over the rim. Mr M made a brown paper template for the shape of the cone. I cut one shape from the stretch material sewed the edge of the cone and then hand stitched the bottom to the cope. I the stitched the brown paper pattern to the lining material and made a cone that I sat inside the other cone with the paper sandwiched between the 2 materials. I placed a stitch to hold the tips together and hand sewed it at the base with all the seams covered. the brown paper helps the cone to keep its shape but allows it to be moulded it a more crooked shape if required.

with all the sewing done james threw a huge tantrum when I put it on him the first time but soon settled down - I had made the hat too small and it did not sit on his head but as you can see from the photos he was quite happy to hold it there as long as required.

what i made first

I made these short linen dungarees for my wee boy to wear this summer. I had trouble finding patterns for boys clothes that i likes so i made this pattern from a mixture of ideas from dungarees he had been given and some projects from burdastyle. I tried to make then as simple as possible. I was not totally happy with the way the straps joined to the back section – there has got to be a neater way of doing this, also the back section gapes very slightly – perhaps i need to increase the overlap between the back and front sections or take a tuck somewhere . I thought the little tucks at the back of the waist might look a bit girly, but I think they look pretty good on
i used linen because i thought it would be cool in summer also its really easy to sew. I bought 1m and used a little over half of that. the 2 buttons are the only decoration so far but i might add pockets.
if anyone has any advice on how to improve on this?.