Skip to main content

New books for book week

The important part first.

There is a Thing here in Australia (or maybe just Tasmania?) called book week.  Heck, maybe this is a Thing in the US and the UK.  I didn't have kids or really know many people who did in the UK so who knows?

Aaaaanyway...Book Week.  We didn't have it when I was at school (in the UK). I kind of vaguely knew about it but not enough to know much of the when or the what.  On Monday, there was a reminder posted on the door of the Kinder class where Thing One goes, re the dressing up as a favourite character which would occur...on Wednesday. Yes.  TWO days notice.  Both days that I work.  Craptacular...

Thing One had some ideas along the lines of highly inappropriate Arial costumes which involved wearing singlet tops in the middle of Winter.  I should note here that while Winter in Australia might sound like a thing British people do to get some sun, Winter in Tasmania is actually reasonably chilly; at least at times.  I pointed out to Madam Truculence that she was supposed to be a character from her favourite book (purportedly Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson) so we set out to magic up a witch costume in two days (iggity, ziggity, zaggity, zoom).



I think we did OK.  In the book, the witch wears a red top and a purple skirt with a zig zag hem.  So I used a fairy dress which already had one and a top she already had.  The hat and nose are from Spotlight.  The only bits I made are either absent or poorly picture in this photo; namely the cape (a reuse of Marcus' wizard cape I made for her birthday party) and the bow from her long ginger plait.  She seemed happy and I was happy to send her in something which had some effort and wasn't just a reused Disney fairy / princess costume from the cupboard.

In other bookish news...I had a birthday recently (half way to 70 but not at all phased by that really!).  My mother-in-law is seriously awesome in so many ways (two night sleepovers for the kids spring to mind as examples of said awesomeness...).  She is always super generous with presents and this birthday I was extremely pleased to get a Booktopia voucher which I used for the books below:

I am still not sure about this one (even though I bought it!).  I aim to sew a lot with stretch, and there isn't much in here.  I also don't know that the look suits me that much.  I do love the taffy blouse and the licorice dress so I will definitely make those.  I have no idea why you would choose the dress / picture on the front when you have the gorgeous picture of the model in the spotted licorice dress!

The other book (not yet arrived) is this:


Again, I don't know if the styles will suit me but having read the blog for a while and seen the odd pattern around by Gretchen I am crossing my fingers there will be things I like!

I guess for both of these books the real thing for me is that they are good manuals for sewing, adjusting patterns and making decisions in the process of making a garment.  Hopefully that will be the case and I can't wait for Gertie to arrive!

What are your go-to books?  I think a voucher purchase was perfect for these as a "see if you like them when they get here indulgence!"



Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Blogtoberfest (2) giveaway! Zakka Style!

So here I am again :) Twice in TWO days... As I mentioned yesterday, I joined in Blogtoberfest on a whim.  As in, I heard about it yesterday.  And I joined.  I also mentioned I might even go hard and have a giveaway.  Apparently things move fast in my blog world (first time ever...) because here we are at the giveaway post already! Without further ado...I would love to giveaway a copy of the mighty Zakka Style by Rashida Coleman-Hale :) This book is fab.  I haven't made anything from it yet, but have my eye on about 5 things in there for me or presents (I am a slow mover, despite much excitement!). So why, I hear you cry, are you giving this wondrous book away?  Do you not treasure it and need to keep it close to you at all times?  Well... *hangs head in shame*, I was so excited when it came out that I entered EVERY blog giveaway going to get one.  I didn't win any (boooo).  So I sucked it up and bought it.  In fact, I was SO brave in the face of such inequity I acci

What to wear to a winter wedding?

I recently attended the wedding of a close friend in New Zealand.  If you aren't aware, early August in New Zealand is COLD!  Cue a lot of googling on what to wear to an (outdoor) winter wedding :)  I even made a pinterest board of ideas I also took inspiration from my #SewStyleHero as part of the theme month that was running via The Sewcialists .  You can read about that here . Here is what I came up with: I used a heavy stretch navy sequin ( Pitt Trading ) for the skirt... ...and a soft silvery beige colour stretch velvet (from Tessuti ) for the top. The skirt was self-drafted and designed to be as full and sequiny glorious as the amount of fabric i had would allow.  I will probably cut off the skirt now to make it more wearable in everyday life, though I loved the effect for a fabulous winter wedding. The top is the  Seamwork Astoria  and was a bit of a revelation.  This was my second Seamwork pattern and I really liked it.  I know it's tren

What Kids Clothes Week does to the kids...

Two interesting moments today. Moment 1:  asking Marcus to model a lovely hot pink striped dress. Just the shot I wanted for my blog and to check the fit...complete with a nice flash of his monster alien underpants :) Seemingly wearing a dress is the funniest thing ever. Moment 2:  Issy drawing a picture of us today. There's the dog (looking like a cat...) on the sofa at the top, Mummy on the left, Issy and Marcus playing with toys at the bottom. Let's have a close up of Mummy in that picture: Yes, I am standing at the raised counter bench area, doing some pattern tracing and cutting.  Significant enough impact on her life that I made it into her pictures...Should I feel bad?  Nah...I am seriously considering making this my profile picture :) Here it is again once coloured in, as she did such a nice job. Woo Hoo for KCW!