Dress Eighteen: Accidently Pink

You know when you think you're a very careful fabric washer, and when you think you're becoming the WORLD's best seamstress/fashion designer, and then it all goes horribly wrong? Here's a happy feel good story that was once disaster. Oh the Horror!

So firstly I got this really weird, stretchy material from the op shop one day. It was kinda granny but kinda retro, so could be kinda good somehow. It was WHITE with pink and blue random 'bits' on it.

I also got some burgandy tights from another op shop on another day, and was very pleased with myself because they were brand new in the packet straight from 1981 (or thereabouts, the packet was OLD, but the stockings were new).

And then I assisted my Husbie one day in doing the washing, and lo and behold we'd put both these said op shop finds in together ACCIDENTLY...

And thus the white material with bits of weird colour had miraculously turned a total GRANNY SHADE of PINK. Disaster. Or was it?

See the results of this frock in tres Granny Chic:


So it didn't turn out too bad! There's surely more terrible disasters in the wash to be had, but let me tell you how GRUMPY I was yesterday after a sewing catastrophe!


So whilst I'm actually really proud now of my fashion designing/mad skillz at sewing etc, yesterday it had all gone to the dogs. I have a gorgeous dress from Lush (on Brunswick Street in Melbs) that I've had for 12 years. THAT'S 12 YEARS. I actually had another one in black, but it started to come apart a while back, so I've just got this sweetie little blue-ish floral dress that has a lovely tie at the front etc but it's prolly going to get a bit threadbare eventually, so I really wanted to make up some dresses in that style. I followed a few patterns from the pattern stash to get the right shape, and then started on the edging (the ties and the neckline bits) and it just started going YUK!

So cause it's stretchy I overlocked the hell outta all the edges. Then I was going to turn it under and top stitch, but I tried normal top stitch and it went all bubbly and wonky and then I tried ol' zig zag (I'd read that it was ol' reliable on stretch materials) and that looked SHITHOUSE and my machine just couldn't cope. . . . MAYBE I had the wrong sized needle in (thinking about it now) or maybe I was going to fast on the machine. But after it looking so bad, I gave up and became a Masterchef at tea time (see below) instead... but today I was in a much better mood and....

Voila:


It's come together really lovely thanks to the ever so thin cowl neckline or OLD FASHION BIAS BINDING. SAVED THE DAY. So instead of looking like Holly Hobbie in a terribly bad mood, this dress is almost tres chic, even if the pink still looks a bit granny! (Can you tell I don't wear pink that much?)

And here's how I became Masterchef for dinner last night, by following this recipe and making the BEST Tom Kha I've ever tried:


I've been obsessed with Tom Kha (vegetarian not the chickie version) for a while now, it's the coconut, galagal, lime flavoured soup that's perhaps found in Thai places and it a taste sensation. It has sweet, creamy, sour and salty all together and I can't believe I can make it myself JUST AS GOOD AS THE SHOPS!

What a rollercoaster of emotions, disasters, fails and wins in the past 24 hours. Phew Phew Phew, glad it's over and glad I'm back to being fantastic again!