Making a bustle pad, a little tutorial…

If you’ve ever made a cushion, making a bustle pad is easy! I need one for my steampunkish pirate costume so making one was the way to go. I made it from calico, ribbon and some thick wadding I had in my stash so it was cheap and only took about half an hour.

First measure around the back part of you hips and transfer this measurement to your chosen fabric. Then draw out your bustle shape, notice the slight curve on the side that will touch the body. Cut out two of these.

Then cut out your wadding. I used four layers of thick polyester quilt wadding in the end but you might want a bigger or smaller bustle so you can experiment when you come to stuff it. These must be about an inch smaller than your calico all round.

Next take a length of ribbon that is long enough to tie around your waist but with long ends for adjustment. Pin this along the straight edge of one of the pieces of calico. The ribbon will be on the inside when the bustle pad is finished.

Sew the ribbon on and then pin the long ends of the ribbon to the other side of the piece of calico. It is important to pin the ribbon well away from the edges so that they don’t get caught when you stitch the two pieces together.

Now pin the other piece of calico face down. You must make sure that the ribbon ends are on the inside of the sandwich but that the ribbon sewn along the edge is on the outside at this stage.

Now sew all around the edge, leaving a couple of inches open so you can insert your wadding.

Turn the whole thing inside-out and check your ribbon hasn’t got caught in any stitching. Press flat and insert your wadding. Before you sew up the hole it’s a good idea to try it on to see if you have enough or too much stuffing!

I sewed an extra row one inch from the flat side to help it sit better.

And you’re all done! I’ve seen some with an extra, smaller pad above the larger one. I’ve also seen some so elaborate you’d be happy to wear them outside your clothes (well, almost)

Mine is not beautiful, but it will do the job!

Beccy

Steampunkish pirate…

In July I’ll be doing the York Rotary Club dragon boat race with my work colleagues! (sponsor me here!) We’re going as the ‘college crew’ and since everyone goes in fancy dress, we’ll be going as pirates. Maybe not the most original idea, but definitely one both the girls and the boys could get behind!

We’ve all been given a hat that looks like this:

Hat available from Ebay here.

But I wanted to make mine a bit more special. It was a bit boring, and waaaaaay too big. I thought I might be able to make it smaller and steampunk it up a bit while I was at it!

I browsed steampunk piratey hats on the internet and found a winner on Dragonfly Designs by Alisa, a wonderful blog full of intricate and beautiful steampunk clothing Alisa makes herself.

She had a bowler hat which she had made smaller as part of an airship pirate costume so I decided to copy her design and adapt it to fit this hat.

First I cut off the crown to leave just the brim. I then cut through the brim at the front and wrapped it around my head until it was snug. After marking how much I needed to remove, I did some measuring and cut an equal amount from each side at the front.

Alisa had used eyelets to fasten the brim back together. The ones I had were shiny shiny brass – too shiny. To get an aged look, mum suggested I chuck them in some bleach and do you know what? It worked!

Then I hammered like a demon to attach the eyelets to the brim. The next bit is important…

I didn’t take a photo, but I laced the brim up as tight as it would go and then glued the crown back on. If you don’t lace up the brim, the crown won’t be in the right place.

When it was dry, I removed the poppers from the sides with pliers – because I had shortened the brim they no longer met to hold the sides up. In their place I cut two slits about half an inch apart right through the brim and crown and used ribbon to tie them together.

With a few feathers and a votes for women rosette (also made by me from ribbon and a badge – don’t you think female pirates would have been Suffragettes? I mean if there had been female pirates in 1913? I do!), I think it looks the part!

Stay tuned for the rest of my costume!

Beccy

Jubilee bunting!

Bunting is easy peasy to make! I whipped this up while I watched an old episode of ER this afternoon.

First you need to cut yourself a load of triangles – I made a cardboard template and had lots cut in no time. If you are making double-sided bunting you’ll need an even number.

Place two triangles together face to face and sew down the two long edges.

Then turn them inside out and iron the hell out of ‘em. They’ll look all neat and pretty… see!

I used cheap apron tape folded in half and ironed flat then I inserted the triangles between the fold about 2” apart, pinned and sewed through all four layers (2 tape and 2 bunting).

Et voila! I used red white and blue colours because it’s the jubilee this weekend and I love our old queen. Those of you who have been following for a long time will recognise scraps from dresses I have made – always keep your big scraps! If I have enough I might make a Union Flag too…

Beccy

Quick draught excluder tutorial…

Brrr…. it’s been chilly here lately and I realised that there was a particular draught coming under the front door. Mum said to just get one of those brush strip thingies, but boy are they ugly!

Instead, I decided to make an old-fashioned fabric one like my great-gran used to have (although I have a feeling hers was in the shape of a dog – awesome)

This one is going to be like a long tube with round ends and will be stuffed with reclaimed sofa cushion stuffing. I used part of an old floral curtain to make mine, but you can use any sturdy fabric you have in your stash.

First you need to decide how large you want your draught excluder to be. I wanted mine to be about 6” diameter so I rummaged around the house until I found something round and approximately the right size to use as a template. I drew around this lampbase and then added a centimetre seam allowance. Cut them out.

I then measured around the lampbase to determine the width of the main fabric piece. It was 14.5” At this point I also measured the door, which was 40” wide.

I then cut one large piece of fabric 15.5” x 41” (don’t forget your seam allowances!)

Place the large piece of fabric face-to-face and sew along the long edge so you have a tube. Leave a 6” gap in the middle somewhere – this is where you will stuff it.

Now I pinned in the ends. This is a bit tricky but easier if you pin one side, then the opposite, then the gap in between each pin. Try and make sure it is still round and even and use as many pins as will fit!

Then I sewed in both ends. Go slowly and pull the fabric slightly to avoid wrinkles.

The ends all sewn in.

Now snip those curved edges. This allows the fabric to curve properly when you turn in inside out. You can also trim the seams to remove bulk if you like.

I then turned the whole thing right-side out and stuffed it with my ever handy stash of old sofa stuffing. I pinned the hole and hand-sewed it closed.

Sorry for the bad photo, it was pretty dark today. This is the finished draught excluder. It’s a little bit pretty but if I’d had more time I would have made it nicer with buttons… or ribbons… or I would have raided my stash of vintage doilies… or done some embroidery. It still does it’s job though!

If you want to add embellishments, the best time is after you have cut your pattern pieces but before you sew them together.

Beccy

Painting handles with pizza boxes?

Just a quick tip. I needed to spray paint a load of nasty discoloured plastic drawer handles and realised that the easiest way would be to attach them to something stiff and do them all at once. I raided our recycling and found two pizza boxes that were perfect for the job!

After giving them a good clean I attached them using the screws they came with.

Then blasted them with a couple of coats of my favourite sky coloured plasti-kote.

Et voila. Lovely, shiny, bright handles. The round ones were an 80’s red with cream accents. Yummy.

And the result? Well it was always going to be a melamine chest of drawers, there’s no changing that, but it looks a hundred times better than it did and a can of spray paint is a damn sight cheaper than buying something new!

And anyway, it’s for a boy’s who thinks elegance is a lazboy and some pepsi.

Beccy

Nature will find a way…

… is what my friend Trace always says. Something about Jurassic Park, or something. She has a uniquely ad-hoc style of gardening as a result, simply chucking handfuls of annual seeds around the flowerbed and letting nature do it’s stuff. If it grows, it grows – if it doesn’t, it doesn’t. It works though. Sure, sometimes things die and others get out of hand but the result is a bit like manicured nature. Clouds of pretty things left to their own devices.

It was her birthday last week, so mum decided to make her a plaque for her garden.

After choosing a gardeny font, mum printed it out to the appropriate size.

The base of the plaque is an old drawer front, taken from our (ever growing) stash of Interesting Things.

Mum placed the print out over the drawer front, holding it up to the light to make sure the lettering was in the right place, and used a pen to draw over the letters making sure she pushed into the wood slightly.

This created a template that she simply filled with white acrylic paint. It’s a lot easier if you work from left to right, doing all the letters on the left before moving over. Use a tiny brush and don’t overload it (mum says). She also says curves come out better if you move the wood, rather than the brush.

Two suitably old screws were added to the top to attach a bit of wire for hanging and it was done!

Doesn’t it look great?

I’ll show you what I made tomorrow,

Beccy

Resizing a too-big skirt…

This skirt already had pleats in it, all I did to make it smaller was to add a few more, regularly spaced, until it fit.

Another easy refashion, and the bonus of this kind of alteration means that if (when?) I put on any weight I can just lose a pleat or two.

Beccy

Summer top resizing…

I picked up this summery top for 40p at a jumble sale. It’s lovely and crisp cotton with a little bit of stretch and cute pintucks but it was a size 18, and I’m not a size 18.

First I slit the sides to below the darts – I didn’t just need to take it in, I also needed to make the darts smaller so I opened them up too.

First I pinned the darts the right amount (check out a shirt that fits you well for a guide) but this left a lot of excess fabric above. I decided to sew this as another dart running flush to the seam of the band around the top. This meant I could hide the excess fabric and make the band run level all around.

When I was happy sewed the darts up.

See how the top hem runs flush? I then pinned and sewed the sides, removing about an inch from each.

It looked fine on the mannequin but on me it gaped a little at the top so I had to put in a little pleat. It’s not the most elegant of solutions and I might have another look at the elastic at the back to see if I could pull it tighter at the top.

It’ll do as a little summer top though!
Beccy Ridsdel