Stitch It Up Stella: September 2012

Life has gotten in the way of life. Well the self indulgent part of my life anyhow, where I make things for myself, take photos of myself and talk about myself and the things I've been doing. I have been busy (kids take up a large chunk of that), sewing non stop. Stacks of practice dresses that I have been flogging at markets and a few little collaborations here and there.

I love sharing my frocks and the beauty of the home dressmaker's story, but the markets are a hard slog and I can't keep it up.

I have found a fab little shop at Sandgate called the Click Clack Lounge (all you Brisbane people should check it out) which is selling some stuff I've made. Sandgate has an awesome old village feel about it and the main shopping strip is only 100 metres from the water. In the strip of shops is Russels, a 50 year old fabric shop run by Michael and originally run by his Dad. The Click Clack lounge is further up the strip in The Laurels Arcade. It has an old shop feel about it being in the arcade and with the fab service.

Something I have made recently and documented too, is a little dress for my little Ginger. Ginger turned 4 recently and overnight changed from a boy/girl who had to wear shorts and everything had to be blue to a girly girl, wearing pink and playing Barbies. Pretty cute transformation.

Ginger chose her ballerina fabric (from Russels), the pink polka dot fabric for the collar, the vintage buttons and the pattern (McCall's 7708 version c from 1965) from my collection. I snuck a bit of gold piping in at the waist, mostly because I wanted to practice using it. The result is nothing short of bonny.

We happened to be at Sandagte a day when she was wearing her new dress, so we popped into Russels to show Michael and he was so taken with her cuteness he gave her matching ribbons for her hair. Funny thing is, Ginger loves singing a song about someone giving her ribbons for her hair.