Skip to main content

Forgotten projects

 Last week was intended to be my last blog of the year, with a roundup of my crafting projects, but I was reminded of some that I had missed, so I went back over my photos and found more than 20 that I had overlooked! Many of them were in the middle of the year, hidden in WhatsApp messages.

Starting with the jerseys, I made a pullover in a rich terracotta for my daughter, followed later in the year with a green cardigan. My mom has the ultimate pattern which I have copied - every size from a four-year-old to a men's XXL, and all the variations of sleeve and neckline options.


I took a short break from adult knitting to make a jersey for a small child using yarn left over from one of my mother's projects.
I had some of the green yarn left over from the cardigan, so I thought it would be fun to make a pullover for my daughter's favourite small boy. 
I thought I would have just enough, but I ran out half-way up the second sleeve. Unfortunately, I could only get matching yarn in packets of 600g, so I was commissioned to make a pullover for my daughter (yes, green is "her colour" for almost everything!)
And then there were all the shirts! In August, I made one from my absolutely favourite William Morris design, and used the printed selvage to make a "Morris and Co" label for it as proof of authenticity!
Still in August, I made one with the Liberty snowdrop design in blue - the pattern I often use for shirts can be made within a weekend including all the finishing. It is a timeless design, so perfect for the long-lasting Liberty cotton fabrics.
I then made a very simple project - a waterproof tablecloth to protect a beautiful solid-wood table. Fortunately I still have my old wooden T-squares - very handy for marking out such a large piece of fabric.
I was then back to making shirts, the next one for myself with another of my favourite William Morris designs. For this one, I chose out mother-of-pearl buttons that I had been saving for something special, and the greys and pinks of the fabric were just perfect.
In my last blog, I mentioned making a couple of dresses for my Nephew's young daughter, up-cycling the remnants from other projects for the skirts.
Another quick and easy project was a very simple skirt in quite a heavy tweed - perfect for UK late autumn.
Then came the flurry of gifts for my daughter to take with her for all the UK relatives. I showed some of these in last week's blog, but forgot to include a shirt for my brother-in-law.

I then made a pyjama set for my mom for her birthday.
While I had the pattern for her pants handy, I started on the Christmas gift marathon, with two pairs of trousers. I keep my patterns in a wooden box, so it can be quite a treasure hunt to find one I haven't used for a while. The patterns date back to one I bought in my 20s - a Vogue that is still very much in use for making waistcoats.

I then made some oven gloves and an oven mitt for my soon to be son-in-law - he is a passionate cook, especially on the braai, so the black shwe-shwe fabric was perfect. I managed to get some very heavy felt as heat protection - as ever, thanks to Arthur Bales.

I had been planning to make a dress for my younger daughter all year, and finally got around to it for a Christmas gift - from a very versatile pattern that I have now used many times, here with some flamboyant detailing in gold piping on the back.
To finish the year, I made four pairs of matching pyjama shorts with some remnants of Christmas fabric. We found some T-shirts in a perfectly matching red, and the finishing touch was some Christmas elves that we appliquéd.
And finally, the last bit of Christmas madness was a couple of hand-stitched felt mice as "secret Santa" gifts for two of our family of eight cats. 











 




Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Welcome to my blog

Sitting outside the Wits Architecture Building My name is Anne. I have just retired from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa where I was an Associate Professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, working in the environmental engineering and project management domain. Prior to that, I was a lecturer in the School of Architecture and Planning, teaching many aspects of architecture, including architectural history, design and skills in graphics. Before lecturing at the University, I worked briefly in local government as a junior architect and then in a commercial firm of architects. After this I ran a private architectural practice with a focus on architectural heritage design. I have qualifications in architecture, construction management and employment creation through construction. Now that I have retired, I want to continue to provide educational context about architecture, engineering, design and project management in a different forum ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Rain gardens

  Last year I wrote a blog on green roofs , so today I want to follow up with a much smaller and more versatile type of green infrastructure, the rain garden, sometimes called a bio-retention cell. These can be introduced into a small corner of your garden and have even been used as slightly modified planters along roadways where there is not enough space for a more extensive vegetated installation such as a swale. A vegetated swale Creative Commons Licensed:  https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Planted_brick_swale,_balfour_street_pocket_park.JPG One of the most severe environmental impacts of urbanisation is that the porous soil and vegetation of the natural landscape is replaced by impermeable materials for buildings and roadways. This prevents rainwater from seeping into the soil and replenishing the groundwater (the water naturally stored underground) and becoming cleaned by percolating through the plants and soil before returning to the natural water courses. In urban...
Post a Comment
Read more

Useful and beautiful

  Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful. (William Morris) Morris was born in 1834 and lived through one of the most profound changes in design and manufacture of everyday objects, brought about through the industrial revolution. His rejection of the over-elaborate designs of this first generation of industrial design is seen in his passion for hand-crafted work, something of a luxury in his own day, but even more so now. The question is whether we can still uphold his philosophy, but capitalising on the wide array of industrially produced goods that are now available. Wallpaper design by William Morris We live in an era of overwhelming choice, ranging from the most tawdry or over-elaborate to extremely beautiful pieces, the latter often very reasonably priced. I find my own taste will be met either by the cheapest or the most expensive item on offer, perhaps an indication of my Modern Movement upbringing! So what should we be looki...
Post a Comment
Read more