shoe heaven

my favourite shoes - from left to right - 1. pink strappy heels bought in a sale, great with jeans or a posh frock and guaranteed to get comments, 2. leopard print and patent ,£20 from new look - worn at work and play, 3 - the favourite pair - red patent bought in a sale, worn at work and play and always gets nice comments, 4. vivienne westwood jelly shoes, 5. black leather and £20 from new look, worn at work and playthe favourites in close up - yum, yum!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

fixing my Venus de Milo

I've made Gladys an arm today from the instructions Geoff gave me. Unfortunately I didn't pay attention to which was the right side of the fabric so I appear to have made her a left arm (it was supposed to be a right arm) but I don't think it will matter too much. She obviously wanted to be left-handed like her owner who finds her own right-hand pretty useless but likes to think that being left-handed makes her more creative and adept at problem solving.

personal fitted toile

Last week I put together a personal dress block and toile using the classic 'metric pattern cutting for women's wear' book. After some fitting adjustments - lengthening and widening the bust point , an extra pair of back darts, extending the original back darts and some crookening at the neckline to reduce gape across the chest when I lean forward it was finished. So now I can start designing myself some well fitting clothes.

The toile is not overly attractive, bearing a resemblance to a straight jacket (appropriate some might say!) and before sewing the back up a hospital gown.

As I was making a personalised block using a size 16 as a starting point and that makes me feel a lot bigger than any dress size I'd buy in a shop I made myself feel better by wearing my size 8 abercrombie and fitch denim hotpants which are actually too big (bought in New York last year, and the US sizing system is more flattering).

Also got some tips on pinning the fabric before sewing. It had never occured to me to think about how it would go into the sewing machine before pinning and this made things much easier.