Dress Ten: Va Va Voom

Here's my Va Va Voom Dress for Number Ten (A Dress for Each Day of October: Frocktober) and I'm now decidely THE hottest girl in the street because of this LBD.

But! Diana is the model today, as Husbie's working late! And as I've said before, Diana is a pretty hot kinda gal, but unfortunately she doesn't make this one scream Va Va Voom. So here are my seductive photos of her in Number Ten:

Off the shoulder (to show you the red lining) HAWT:


OOOH! Such a cute back Diana, stop! (to show you the big motherfreaking zip I used - SECONDHAND peeps! It must have been from a school bag, it's that massive!)


I really need to get out op shopping to find some more black zips of the petite variety... or stop making black clothes. BUT I CAN'T HELP IT!

And thanks Diana, you look cute enough here:


But darling readers, not as Va Va Voom as your dear author here. But perhaps it's better not to post sexy photos of oneself on one's blog.

I'm a bit behind schedule for the old dresses for Frocktober, but I've got a plenty cut out but just not made. I had to stop off for a facial today (as a yay for not drinking for 2 weeks) and hi to you darling SVBG, I hope you're enjoying your stripey frock!

Also, I knitted up another pole (am I making excuses here?) along my laneway, so I'll post those pics tonight too. xoxo

Dress Nine: Oranges & Apples Prototype

I like blogging because you get to hang out with people you'd never really bump into down the street or through a friend. And I'm not sure how you view the whole "writing a blog about your day, then reading some other people's blogs who you admire, and then reading some comments nice people have left on your blog, and then leaving some comments on other nice people's blogs" thing, but I'm starting to feel kinda gushy toward a lot of you.

Gushy in a nice, 'oh my friend who writes/reads blogs' kinda way. And perhaps an example of this is how I've gushed this weekend a little over Franca, who writes on Oranges and Apples and is simply too cute to boot! This weekend I wanted to try a few dresses in her size and style (as it is Frocktober, and I was thinking I'd donate some dosh to the real Frocktober appeal here in Australia if peeps buy any of the frocks I make during October*) and ANYWAYS...! When I sew I find it so reflective and overall a wonderfully relaxing experience and my mind has totally wandered thinking about you Franca, and about your day to day life in Scotland etc, so much so that I think we've become TOTAL besties in my mind now. GUSH!

And so, Dress Nine for Frocktober is a prototype of this dress (one of the ideas that Franca mailed me):



Now I know you didn't say Charcoal as a colour you'd like Franca, but I had a lot of this leftover from another dress (that I made ages ago) and thought I'd test it out:


I love the sleeves, and how similar they are to the first photo! Would you believe it's actually the same type of pattern as this floral dress (I've dubbed it the milkmaid dress) but with bell sleeves instead and a longer frock bit, oh, and no tie bit at the back.

I'm not sure if I'll copy the dress in the first photo though, but adding the strip of lighter grey, NOT SURE!


Anyways! So this is your size Franca, if you like it, I'll list it. If you like it but in a diff colour I'll find something else.

Sorry about the crush post darlings, but I do have a vivid imagination and my mind goes WAY too fast usually, so when I sew I feel like I'm putting all my thoughts in order and slowing down a bit. It's been a great weekend with my thoughts and my creations! More to post later so better hop to it!

xoxo





* so far I'm sponsoring $10 to and donating at least $10 (could be more after I take a stash of dresses to work this week) because I've sold one dress to a gorgeous-head reader.

Dress Eight: Yay for Floral

Yay!

Internet Win!

So, it was the airport of my Husbie's computer that let us all down! This old hunk o junk that I use in the sewing room works fine (albeit v. slow) so at least I can still post wirelessly today!

Here's dress 8 for Frocktober:


Another cutie floral dress for my friend!


It's the same but different as my frock, same vintage 80s material, pre-faded cause it's old and from the op shop and now 2 gorgeous lovely frocks. I now have a 'line' of clothing. Two things of different sizes mean a line right? Hee Hee!

I'm on a catch up sew/blog roll today, so I'll see you later! You can totes see it's an 'inside' day for me, weird hair, no makeup and weirder hot/cold weather... great for sewing!

Yayz!

Internerdz Fail

Well, I can't blog my Frocktober efforts when the internet fails right?


I love iinet, and the speedy connection but for some reason yesterday it decided not to work. I'm heading home now to fix it up, so I hope I can post again soon.

See ya!

Dress Seven: Small Stripes!

So, I actually didn't have any time to try anything new after all. We had a meeting at work that I stayed around for, and then when I got home I just had to sleep for a bit with my teddy bear ... oh, I mean puppy dog... and then my Husbie got home and we watched an episode of Mad Men... and then it was almost 7 o'clock.

YIKES!

So luckily I had this cut out already, and this time it took perhaps only 30 minutes. THIRTY MINUTES!




It's uber lightweight knit cotton, from The Fabric Store (again on sale) and this is the only one! I only have a bit leftover for a tshirt for my fairy godson! (Speaking of, does anyone know any good sized 1 or 2 baby patterns? I'm going to google tomorrow)

The colour looks burgandy from afar, but it's actually thin brown and red stripes. NICE!

Talk soon!

Dress Six: It's all for me again!

Well, a slow day for me sewing... only because of the wonderful inside day yesterday!


Yep, after yoga I stayed in with the thunderstorms and made this dress:


And I wore it to work today with 'uge success. I looked very cute indeed. The material is totally a vintage find (yay!) and took less than an hour to sew. WHAT THE HELL? I'm amazing!

I especially am proud of my cap sleeves here, puffed and gathered up the top, but finishing earlier than the underarm bit. LOVE THIS LOOK.


And what about the label:


I can't help showing you! I freaking LOVE my labels! Thanks Husbie for the best birthday present around! YAYZ.

So instead today I tried to get angry at the workmen (they're making a big 4 storey apartment block behind my darling little house, Not Happy Jan) but they were nice truck workmen today, and suggested I write a letter about my broken backFENCE, and they'll pay for it to get fixed. I think this'll be better than going through our insurance peeps as we have a $500 excess. (I wish I understood insurance a bit better) Anyways, HATE developers, but can't hate nice workmen who are just doing their job. (They could drive better though. But a broken fence is better than just a crap fence that needs to be mended anyways).

Then I played on the computer for ages, tried to make a pair of undies (something's wrong with the zipper stitch and my automatic needle threading device!) and cuddled up with my Doggie Darling when she heard the thunder. CUTE!

See you tomorrow for Dress 7, looking around the sewing room here, I'm not sure what it'll be. I have two more dresses cut out like the above... but I'm getting a bit tired of the factory work. Maybe I'll try a new style if I have time tomorrow!

Bye!

Dress Five: Stripes!

It's a public holiday here in NSW, but I had to work as normal. SADFACE. BUT, I worked really quickly and got outta there as early as possible!

I finished this dress off before yoga! (or Yoges, as I say, and my friend suggested that's how it's spelt. Yogs isn't right. Abbrev Queen!)


It's the same easy stretch knit that I've come to adore making (these past few days) as it really is so EASY! I just love it in stripes!


But the twist (what could it be?! I hear you gasp!) is that this material is actually BRAND NEW! It's from The Fabric Store in Surry Hills! It was prolly $12 a metre or something (pricey for me!) but it was during their sale last month (or was it the month before?). So WOW. Brand new slinky knit material that was a little tricky to sew with (it kept slipping around, plus the added headache of matching the stripes) but over all I think it looks WONDERFUL!

It still feels like holidays around here (and I can't actually remember my last holiday) so I'm going to keep sewing!

Day Four: YES another LBD

It's all a bit sweatshop around here in Veronica Darling world! Or is it a sweet(heart)shop? (bad LOL sozza)

But, I'm on a roll for this style of dress cause, as I mentioned, a lot of my pals are keen for one! I'm using up a lot of my stretch fabric that I've collected over the years, and making each dress unique by tweaking either the collar, the length, the size etc.

This is a normal tshirt material type dress, with gathered puff sleeves:


And a slight gather around the middle, that accentuates the skirt. Also, I'm really proud of this neckline, as it's my best yet:


It lays flat, and instead of serging just one side of the ... the... um... bias bit... (the long skinny bit of material you use to make the neckline of stretch fabric, dur, can't remember if it's called something diff. than bias tape)... anyways, instead of serging one side of the bias tape to the bodice front/back, you serge both sides (right sides together, and then iron it up, and then topstitch the bodice (and tuck the serged bit under as facing, so the topstich includes it)... GOSH I'M BAD AT DESCRIBING SEWING. Sorry! Anyways, I like how neat and flat it looks compared to my other efforts!

Gah!

See my factory sweat shop line:


A nice grey stretch for the next one, and underneath a BLACK AND WHITE striped knit all ready to go!

So, if you hadn't noticed, it's Frocktober 2009 around these parts (ie my blog) and I've noticed a lot of you lovely bloggers are in for Blogtober so we're all posting like crazy! Yay! I'm making a dress day for the month of October and I'll get around to posting a proper linky dink on the side bar soon! I have to work tomorrow though, so it'll be after work and yoga. (and after I sew up the grey dress!)

Night!

Dress Three: Mini Dress for Me!

So I made my bestie's dress and posted it here, and then I thought I'd like one too! Lucky I had more material!


So this is the 3rd dress on the 3rd of October... all up to date! And it's perfect for today's dreary day, as it's got a slight wool blend in the knit. I think I was actually given this material from an old flatmate, so I've had this in my stash long long long before I even tried knit sewing let alone had an overlocker... it may have sat folded up for perhaps 7 years!

While I sewed today, my darling Husbie tidied and vacuumed as our upstairs reno has been dusting up our whole house. It'll be done for realsa soon and then we can get rid of all our stuff from downstairs and finally lead normal lives.

Now I'm about to make dumplings and then we'll watch Milk. Yay for Satdee nights at home!

Dress Two: Black Knit for My Bestie (AKA 100!)

Yay! 100 Outfits completed and blogged right here on Veronica Darling's Crafty Adventures! Yippee! I'm very proud and would like to thank Mr Veronica Darling (aka Husbie) for all his support over these past 18 months! He's a total dearheart, of course, and has often waited an extra hour or two to go out, whilst I was hemming or fixing or swearing, so that my outfit (or my friend's) looked just perfect.

Now for my 100th Outfit! It's a wool blend knit dress for my bestie who lives in London!


She's coming over for our summer, but I thought for her bday (and her son's first bday) I'd send a care package and this dress would suit the UK as it starts to get colder there.


I've pulled out all my stretch and knit materials, because I've got a few orders for this style from friends and thought I'd sew up all my knits so people could choose their faves. (If you've contacted me for a special frock in the past, I'm aiming to have it completed within Frocktober, so thank you for waiting for me to get my sewing shoes on again)

But... the best bit:


I sewed up one of my tags into my bestie's dress, it's the first tag I've used! What a way to celebrate 100 Outfits!

Dress One: Wiggle in Green (aka Outfit 99)

And finally, my first dress for Frocktober, and it's pretty geeky but cute at the same time.



It's a 1959 wiggle dress, and probably looks better on me than Diana (although Diana has a fine figure, let's just say I fill those gaps a little bit more). This was from a vintage pattern, and it took so long because it was a little bit fiddly. With at least 2 darts in each pattern piece there was a bit of preparing to do (I kinda do darts too quickly, and there's a slight measurement stuff up on the front bodice bit that hopefully no one will notice) and THEN I didn't read the packet first on what materials I'd need because there are TWO ZIPPERS!


Yep, a back neck zipper that you chuck in first (only 7 inches) then a side zipper that you put in last and I'd never really done a side zip before!!! SUGAR! But I read the instructions through about 12 times (luckily it was one of those patterns that actually tells you how to sew the zip in) and it turned out ok! Although the flap is a little bit bigger than you'd find on a store bought dress, I'm pretty happy for my first side zip effort (where the flap hides the zipper).

BUT! I did alter the pattern to what I thought would make a better fit on my upper torso (my bod is usually in proportion to normal patterns apart from my shoulder to bust, which means straps have to be altered almost 2 inches) but in my haste I also altered the in built sleeves (vintage patterns often tend to have bodice and sleeves all in one) so the sleeves (perhaps you can tell in the front on pic above) are pretty tight around my arms. Husbie reckons that I should cut them off, and stick another sleeve on...?

Anyways, so it was a bit of a bigger project to start this Frocktober challenge, but oh well! Done now!

If you'd like to donate dosh or sign up for the real Frocktober and Ocsober challenge (for real charities) you can find them here for now, as I'll fiddle with my blog here and put a linkydink on the side bar soon.

And for extreme followers of my blog, this was Outfit 99 in the 100 Outfit Challenge... which means this current dress I'm working on will be Outfit 100. Yikes. Gulp. I'd like to say 100 Outfits went quickly... but it didn't! Phew Phew Phew!