The Velvet Cape

June 14,2010

I wanted to share with you the cape I made for a customer. I had made one for my granddaughter, and she wore it alot last winter to school, and one of her friends loved it and kept after her mom, that she wanted one. So she bought the material and the linning and asked me to make it.

The material is black velvet and the linning is also black but silk. I have never worked with velvet and was a little nervous, it's rather expensive. I had heard that velvet was a pain to work with, because it slips really bad and ravels alot.

The patteren itself is fairly simply and straightforward, bascially sew up back seams and then sew up the side seam all the way from one end to the other in one continuous motion. With velvet you have to be careful, because you can't iron it, you will flatten the nap, (the furriness
of the material) so you have to steam it carefully to lay your seams down.

The linning was a different story. If you've ever had anything silk, you know how it feels, it slides over your body, well, it slides when you try to sew with it also. When you line something you bascially are making another whole garment. It is used to sew inside the main garment and then you turn it right side out, and all the seams of the orginial garment are covered up inside the garment. I got off track there for a minute, anyway the silk linning had to be pinned and then hand sewn, and then sewed on the machine. I tried to just pin and sew but it kept slipping away from the main garment.

All in all I was happy with the way it turned out, my coustmer is out of town right now, so I have'nt been able to see how she likes it.

She also had me make a simple little sleeveless dress with matching hat, she picked out the material for this one also.

dsthreadsdownsouth out for now.

The Clothes on my Page

It has come to my attention, from one of my followers, who I thank, that my blog might be a little confusing, as far as the clothes are concerned.

The clothes that my model/granddaughter are wearing are thosehat I have made her. Any of the clothes you see on her can be made, with you deciding on your color choice and different fabric type. Most of them are made from cotton blends and are wash and ware.

The clothes that you see that are not worn, are clothes that I have made and are in stock and they are for sell. Of course you can also choose a different color combination with any of those also. The dresses that you see that are tied on the shoulders with ribbon are called "pillowcase dresses" they are very adjustable to accommodate a child's size. They can also be worn as a blouse if the child outgrows the length.

If you have something in mind and you don't see it on my blog, feel free to e-mail me and I will try my best to see what we can come with. My e-mail address is as follows:
d.sthreadsdownsouth@yahoo.com

Now deciding on the fabric can be done in 2 different ways, you can tell me what your looking for and I can get it, of course showing you first to make sure we're on the same page, or you can fill free to purchase the material yourself. Of course all of this would take place after we discuss what it is your wanting done.

As far as the prices go I'm very reasonable, but to give a set price I can't do because it all depends on the piece to be made, but I can say that I know how hard it its to raise kids these days and I will be very fair to my customers.

So I hope I have cleared up any confusion and would love to see what we can come up with in the future. Don't hesitate to ask any and all questions that you might have, if I have the answer, I will surely pass it on to you.

Ds out for now.

May 15, 2010

This is for all of you that might think that people who sew pretty much every day, don't really bad experience, this is where the outfit pictured above comes in.

I realized that I have'nt really sewen to much for boys, and I know why now, it's not as much as fun as sewing for little girls, or myself. Now don't get me wrong, I love boys, I'm married to one, I have 3 of my own, and 3 grandsons.

When it comes to sewing, it's pretty much like everything else you have to enjoy what your working on, and you have to be in the mood. To be honest little boys clothes do not excite me, therefore anything and everything that could go wrong does.

When I was in Fla. helping my folks we went to a fabric store, and they had this shirt material for a really good price, it has cowboy hats, badges, boots, sort of boy material, then I found the denim for a good price, so figured I'd make a few shirts and jean shorts.

The thing with boys clothes is they have collars, sleeves, buttons and buttonholes, not to mention the shorts, pockets, flys, zippers, and double stitching, cos we know how rough some little boys can be.

I have to say that I did'nt really have to much trouble with the shirt, and it came out really cute, that 's why I like sewing, you get to see the end result of what you've been spending your time on, but the shorts were a different story.

I had a pair almost done, and I was looking at them and noticed that they looked like girls, I made the waistband elastic, and no pockets of any kind and no fly. They also looked awful little compared to the size of the shirt. So since I had so much material, I cut out another pair, bigger this time.

I will spare you all the time I spent on these shorts, but they do have front pockets, and a mock fly, and the double stitching, but they still have the elastic waistband, because I realized I did'nt have the right zipper.

All in all it's a cute outfit, but just know that we who sew all the time have bad days and we still rip out at least one time in an outfit, so if you have an interest in learning to sew, jump in and you will be fine, the more practice you do the better you get.

D's out for now.

My Parents at 82

May 12,2010
I can't believe it's already almost the middle of May, where did April go? I guess it was a busy month, but I can't remember why.
I'm going to tell you a little about my parents, who are now both 82 years young. About 10 years ago or so, I'm not good at realizing how much time passes so it could be longer, they sold their house in Florida and bought a 5th wheel camper. They decided they wanted to do some traveling. They have always been very active.
So for the last 10 years or so every May they planned out their summer travels, then they always went back to Fla. for the winter.
A couple months ago they decided it was time to quit traveling so much and buy a small house and give up the "life on the road." They found a nice double wide mobile home in a retirement park and bought it.
I went down a couple weeks ago to help them move all their stuff out of the camper and into their new home. The house was fully furnished and I mean it looked like the people packed their clothes and walked out the door. They left everything from towels to dishes.
So first, we had to take out what my mom didn't want in the house and give it a good cleaning, well we wiped out the cabinets in the kitchen, it wasn't really dirty.
I have a son who has moved back here from NC so I went through the stuff and by the time I was done the back of my little cruiser was loaded. Then came time to bring in their stuff from the camper.
Now, I know this was their home for a good many years and you wouldn't think that a camper would hold very much stuff ha ha ! It took myself, my brother, my dad to take everything out of the camper, while my mom and sister-in-law tried to put things up, it took most of the day.
Like I said earlier my parents are both 82 and they were both right in their doing their share, and it had gotten hot that day, we are in Fla. after all. The only thing they did get concerned about was each other, my mom would tell my dad "Jim you need to come in and cool off and rest" and my dad would tell me to tell my mom to take a break, so she didn't get tired.
We got them moved in and before I left we had it pretty settled and now they are still putting on the finishing touches to their new house. While we were going through what was in the house we came across a sewing machine, this is good for me- so I brought it home with me to check it out. I knew I probably wouldn't need it but my daughter-in-law said she wanted to learn to maybe how to sew- I was thinking of her when I carried it back almost 500 miles.
The experience with teaching her on the machine will come at a later time so stay tuned maybe I can even get her to take a picture of what she's making or working on?
So that's the story of my great parent's getting their home at 83 years young, and I do mean young, sometimes I think they can out do me. I love them and I'm happy their in one place, at least for awhile, I have not doubt that their traveling days are not over.

dsthreadsdownsouth signing out for now..

Purple w/ Pink Design w/ Matching Hat

2pc
Purple Design w/ Pink w/Matching Hat
Size:

Summer Dress

Beige Flower Print Dress
Size: 5 &

A Little History

Hi Everyone.
Since this is a new blog, I thought I'd share with you the people "behind the scenes" of my new blog. The designer of my blog is my son's girlfriend, I have to admit I'm not very computer swavy yet , not like she is, and I think she has done a great job.
The "model" on my site is my 7 year old granddaughter, and I am her grandmother, but I think she did a beautiful job, and made the clothes I made look even better. She's a very shy girl, so to get out there and pose was a HUGE favor to me. Most of my sewing has been for her or my other granddaughter, or myself.
My daughter-in-law has taken an interest in sewing, and we made another dress for her daughter today, finished all but the hem, and I will see if I can get her to pose 1 more time in the near future. I don't know if her mom will pursue this or not, she said it was a lot of work, but we did spend the afternoon together which is always nice. It's also nice when someone says "I didn't know how much went into making clothes" but it is a sense of accomplishment when your done, and I really love doing it.
So now you know a little history behind the blog, and I hope you come by and browse around and feel free to e-mail me with any questions or comments you might have.

-D's signing out for now-

Pocket Dresses

Pocket Dress

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3, 4, 5

Strawberry Short Cake Dress

Strawberry Short Cake Dress

Size: 2&3; 7&8

Watermelon Dress

Watermelon Dress w/ a choice of

Different Tie Laces

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