Wrap Around Skirts

More skirts I’m afraid. These two were presents for my two best friends (Matron of Honour and Chief Bridesmaid at the wedding respectively) who are like SISTERs to me  I made wrap around skirts, as although I could guess their vague sizes, I didn’t want to spoil the surprise by asking for their measurements.

I based them loosely on this wrap around girls skirt, however obviously the sizes are very different as they are adult sized.

I made the panels in roughly the same size (although the black/red) version is a few inches longer as the recipient doesn’t like her knees, and just altered the number of panels to alter the width of the skirt.

I hemmed both top and bottom with bias tape – at the top to create the tie for the wrap around, and at the bottom because I felt it finished it nicely, giving continuity to the look.

I must confess, I’m absolutely in love with this brown and white polka dot bias tape – it’s so cute! Each of the skirts is lined in red lining fabric, and all the seams are overlocked. The black and red version matches the notebook described in this post as they were both gifts to the same person.

The buttonholes were done on my friend’s machine (which she very kindly let me use) as I didn’t have my new lovely Janome at that point, and therefore was stuck struggling with a 4-step buttonhole. They came out pretty neatly, and I have since completely mastered buttonholes on my Janome. I am the master of buttonholes.

Hopefully they were well received – the brown and white one was a trial to give away, I will confess that (it’s not that I like the other one less, well actually, I do, but it was made for a friend with a very different style to me). They were really quick and easy to make and I think with the overlocking and the bias bound edges they’ve ended up looking pretty professional!

Katy x

Actual not sewing, but actual cooking!

Don’t freak out – but this is a post which is NOT ABOUT SEWING

Yes, I know, this is a HOUSEWIFE BLOG and generally a HOUSEWIFE does things which are NOT SEWING. Ok, maybe not this one… I mostly do sewing.

I made this from a recipe book that I’ve had for ages (it’s a student cookbook of some description) which has a really nice beef stir fry in it, but I wanted to try this because it had corn flour in – and corn flour both excites and terrifies me at the same time. Excites because you can do that cool thing where you mix it with water and then you punch it. It terrifies me because then you are also supposed to use it in cooking… science AND cooking? This can only go wrong, can’t it?

INCORRECT. It went very well, the sauce was pretty easy to make (soy sauce based, nommy). And tasted good enough that I’ve made it a few times since… admittedly it’s not replaced my standard beef stir fry in terms of my favourite, but it’s really good if you’ve already had a lot of beef and are fancying stir fry? (Usually chicken is my most overused meat so this is quite a rare occasion)

Another thing I have PERFECTED in my hunt to be an AWESOME HOUSEWIFE has been the cooking of rice. When I took this photographs I was still in the phase of rice-failure. It would ALWAYS stick to the bottom of the pan, and I’d make TOO MUCH or TOO LITTLE and frankly, it was just a mess. Since then I have progressed and through the little trick of putting a tiny bit of oil in the pan with the rice – I am a rice champion. Except for last night, when Mr P was half an hour later home than he said he would be… then we had thoroughly overcooked rice… what’s a girl gonna do ey?

Oh yeah, I have doctor who plates – I really am just that cool.

Katy x

A Ruffled Jeans Skirt

This skirt was a mash up between two great skirt tutorials I found a while ago at riley blake designs firstly this one which I got the ‘jeans’ part of the ruffled jeans skirt, and then this one for the ‘ruffled’ part of the … you get it. That second one is actually from the wonderful Elizabeth’s over at simple simon and co so I’m a massive fan of their tutorials and their ideas are way better than mine… so what?

Basically, I have this issue with my jeans where they get a hole in the bottom of the seat (IN THE BUM) which makes them unwearable as jeans, but perfect for this. I say ‘my jeans’ because I always buy the same jeans… I have a design that fits me and I like it… don’t judge me… I’m not a trousers person (at ALL) so getting me to wear jeans even a little bit is an achievement.

So I cut the top bit off (usually just above wherever the hole has decided to appear) I then cut the legs off and then cut the seams away from the legs. This leaves me with four long strips created from the legs, which I stitch together to make the bottom section. I think this ended up as about 3 times the width of the top bit – so I made a strip of regular fabric that was twice the width of the skirt fabric (Math Graduate… BOOM) and gathered until it fit.

I lined it in an old sheet again – it’s my favourite skirt because it is SO WARM. And put a little bit of gathered lace around the hem for interest. I’m actually wearing this RIGHT NOW. It really is my favourite skirt. I got so excited when another pair of jeans wore through because it meant I could make myself another skirt!

I wish I’d had my overlocker when I did this – because I zigzagged all of the seams, but it’s really not enough. I don’t know why, I’m sure someone else does, but this denim has frayed A LOT. SO yes, I’d recommend overlocking, or binding the seams even.

As I said, I’m going to make another one of these soon and I might do a tutorial along with it! Because that’s what real bloggers do… and I’m a real blogger…

Katy x

P.S. I only just noticed I only had ONE picture of this skirt… mad sorry about that!