Barbie clothes, Barbin vaatteita

Posted in Sewing by LiisaMaarit

My interest in sewing started with making Barbie doll clothes. I made literally hundreds of them, for myself , my sister, cousins, later for my daughter and all our goddaughters. Long dresses were my passion, and I took inspiration from old films with historic costumes.

Innostukseni ompelemiseen alkoi Barbin vaatteista. Malleja ja inspiraatioita hain vanhojen leffojen puvustuksista ja erityisesti pitkiä pukuja syntyi lukemattomia. Tässä alla vanhimpia malleja, yläkuvassa kultaisesta trikoosta ommeltu iltapuku tyttäreni kokoelmista.

Here are some of the oldest ones that I’ve saved after my daughter’s doll games. All made in my early teens and in need of repair! The golden dress in the top picture is one I made for my daughter. I’ll make a longer post of these later…

The reason I dug these out is I bought two samples of lace for a wedding dress I’ll be making and bought enough (20 cm) to make Barbie clothes with 🙂

Barbin vaatteet kaivoin varaston kätköistä kun tulin ostaneeksi kaksi kahdenkymmen sentin pätkää pitsikangasta hääpuvun mallikappaleiksi ja ajattelin että niistä voisi tehdä nukenvaatteita 🙂

2Feb2018

Umbrella to shopping bag, sateenvarjosta ostoskassiksi

Posted in Sewing by LiisaMaarit

A lightweight shopping bag made from the fabric of a broken umbrella. Roll it up into a tiny parcel and it won’t take much room in your handbag. Now where is that umbrella I bought from the Van Gogh Museum? Not thrown away I hope!

Kevytja pieneen tilaan kääriytyvä ostoskassi valmistui nopeasti rikkinäisen varjon kankaasta. Uusiokäyttöä kauniille mutta usein lyhytikäisille sateenvarjoille!

I used an old bag as a guideline for the mesurements.

Leave two sections of the fabric together to form the front and another two to make the back. The sides are made of one section folded in half and turned upside down. The side sections start about 5 cm (2″) up from the bottom seam to give the handles a little more length. I unraveled the seams, if you cut them you’ll get a slightly smaller bag.
Cut a triangle from the top of the front and back sections and rounded bits to form handles for the side pieces.
Reinforce the center seams. Sew the the side seams twice: fold along the first seam and sew a second time near the edge.
Cut some tape (about 2.5cm/1″ wide) from the left over pieces to turn the top edges of the bag with. First sew the tape onto the right side. Then fold it double over to the inside and sew along the seam from the right side.
Sew the top of the handles together folding the seam inside and reinforcing (welt or french seam?).
Fold wide pleats to the back and front of the bottom seam and sew a double seam along the bottom edge.
Sew on the attaching strip (the one you had on one of the leftover pieces) to the top and adjust the length. I had to sew a new piece of velcro to replace the worn out one.

Leikkaa sateenvarjon kahdeksasta osasta kaksi kahden osan palasta, etu- ja takakappaleet, sekä kaksi yhden osan kappaletta sivuiksi. Minä puri ompeleet – hieman pienempi kassi tulee jos leikkaa saumat pois. Kaksi osaa jää ylimääräiseksi, toiseen jää kiristinnauha. Kassin sivukappaleet käännetään kaksinkerroin ja ylösalaisin ja kohdistetaan noin viisi senttiä alasaumasta ylöspäin.
Leikkaa keskimmäisten kappaleiden yläosasta kolmiomainen pala pois. Leikkaa sivukappaleista pyöristetyt osat niin että muodostuu kahvat.
Vahvista keskisaumat ja ompele sivusaumat vaikka niin että käännät reunan ensimmäisen ompleleen ja ompelet sen viereen toisen sauman.
Leikkaa ylimääräisistä kappaleista noin 2.5cm leveää kaitaletta jolla päärmäät kassin yläreunan ja kahvojen reunat.
Käännä leveät laskokset alareunojen sivuilla sekä eteen että taakse ja ompele alasauma kahteen kertaan.
Kiinnitä kiristinnauha kassin suuhun – tarkista että se tulee oikein päin ja sopivan pituiseksi.

18Jun2017

Dressing up for a formal occasion, akateemisiin juhliin sonnustautumista

Posted in Jewellery, Sewing by LiisaMaarit

It’s not often that I get to wear an evening gown, but this week-end a friend of mine celebrated her doctoral degree in the traditional way. She was dressed in a black long dress, which I had the honour of making for her and the guests got to put on their best and look quite “academic” in their tails. For my own dress I decided to cut corners a bit by just adding a hem to my ready made tunic. I made these silver wire earrings from the same jade beads as my old bracelet and necklace to complement the sea green attire.

Ystävättäreni tohtorinväitöskaronkkaan saimme sonnustautua parhaimpiimme. Minulle lankesi kunniatehtävä valmistaa hänelle musta iltapuku kaikkien taiteen sääntöjen mukaan. Omaa iltapukuani varten menin siitä missä aita oli vähän matalampi. Kaapistani sattumoisin löytyi lempiväriäni olevaa silkkiä (juuri tällaista tilaisuutta varten vuosia sitten hankittua) jota lisäsin kevättunikani helmaan. Miehustaan värkkäsin ison silkkikukan ja uudet korvakorut tein hopealangasta jadehelmikorujeni kaveriksi. Ainakin henkarissa kokonaisuus näyttää aika hyvältä 😉

The bead is threaded onto one end of the wire and then the wire is just wound irregularly around the bead. I used a 1mm thick silver coated wire and added one dangling bead. The clips are glued on with super glue.

I added some extra glamour to my dress by making a flower out of the same silk as the hem and attaching it near the neckline.

I gathered the stitching around the petals a little to make them curl in slightly, tacked them together overlapping each one and pulled the thread tight to gather them into a flower shape.

A long length of tulle is gathered both under and over the silk petals and some silver beads sewn in the middle to give the finishing touch.

My new long gown waiting on the hanger 🙂 I do love the colour!

6Dec2016

Dressed up for the Finnish Independence Day, Itsenäisyyspäivän juhlapuvut

Posted in Sewing by LiisaMaarit

This year today, the 6th December, Finland celebrates it’s 99th Independence Day. A kick off for the Centenary festivities in other words! We fly our blue and white flag and parades and festivities take place all over the country. The biggest affair is held at the presidential palace where the guests include the diplomatic corps, the leaders or the country and it’s economy along with this year’s sports’ medalists – i.e. the Finnish royalty 😉 . The whole nation watches with a scrutinizing eye how the celebrities have dressed up this year.

The children are taught to honour the day in a special way too. For a couple of decades now the Mayor of Helsinki has invited all the fourth grade pupils of the Helsinki schools to an Indipendence Day reception. The ten year olds get to put on their best – clothes and behaviour, be welcomed with a handshake from the Mayor, experience a music show from some popular artists and enjoy an evening of dancing and food and drinks galore, just as the adults do at the presidential palace. My youngest goddaughter and her sister will be two of the princesses at the mayors reception this year in these party dresses, handmade by Liisa of course 😀

So three cheers to one of the best countries in the world to live in, and that’s not just my opinion!

4Jul2016

Men’s shirt refashioned into a top, kesätoppi miesten paidasta

Posted in Sewing by LiisaMaarit

To prepare for the summer holidays I made this little top out of my husband’s old worn out shirt. You can easily make the pattern with a top that fits you – if it’s a knit just make sure you take measurements before cutting!

Mukavan pehmeä ja vilpoinen kesätoppi syntyi helposti vanhasta miesten kauluspaidasta. Kaavat sain sovittamalla vanhaa toppia paidan päälle. Jos käytät trikootoppia mallina niin mittaa rinnanympärys, ettei uudesta topista tule liian kireää!

Old shirt

Cutting the bias

Hemming the edges

I moved the back to the front, the pocket to the other side and made bias tape from the sleeves to turn the neckline and armholes. I also added a dart to the side seam for a better fit. Next time I’ll make a new little pocket cut on the bias too to make it stand out a bit more.

Napitus siirrettiin taakse, tasku etupuolelle ja hihoista leikkasin vinokaitaletta kaula-aukon ja hihansuiden kääntämiseen. Sivusaumoihin tuli muotolaskokset rinnan kohdalle. Ensi kerralla teen vielä uuden taskun vinoon leikatusta hihasta jotta taskukin erottuu paremmin.

19Jun2016

Personalized linen, yksilöidyt laudeliinat

Posted in Sewing by LiisaMaarit

Here are some little crocheted motifs to mark linen towels with. We use these as seat covers for the sauna, so it was an appropriate gift to take to our friends’ summer cottage 🙂

Kesätuliaisiksi ystäville vietiin pienillä virkatuilla kuvioilla koristellut pellavaiset laudeliinat.

The oak leaf is a design I found on Charlotta’s crohet blog called In the Yarn Garden . The “grapes” and the “tree” are made of little circles the same way as the crocheted earrings in my two previous posts.

Tammenlehden ohjeen löysin Charlottan hauskasta virkkaus-blogista In the Yarn Garden. Pyöryläkuviot tein samaan tyyliin kuin edellisten postausten virkatut korvikset. Kuviot on kiinnitetty valmiin liinan kulmaan tavallisella ompelulangalla.

The towels are hemmed the way I described in my post about tablecloths, with a little strip of tape to hang them from sewn on to the opposite corner from the decoration. The same technique could be used to decorate other soft furnishings e.g. the napkin rings I made in a previous post.

Liinojen käänteet ja kulmat on tehty pöytäliina postauksessa selitetyllä tavalla. Vastakkaiseen kulmaan kuviosta ompelin nauhan ripustuslenkiksi. Saman tapaisilla virkatuilla kuvioilla voisi yksilöidä muutkin liinavaatteet tai esimerkiksi lautasliinarenkaat aikaisemmasta postauksestani.

22Apr2016

Sewing a tablecloth, pöytäliinan ompelua

Posted in Sewing by LiisaMaarit

Tablecloths are easy to sew – when you have the right size fabric! This time the table was so wide that with normal fabric the sides would not have dropped down properly over the edge. Two solutions: sewing one seam along the middle or adding pieces onto the sides, both of which mean buying twice as much material! I usually opt for the latter alternative which I think makes a neater result.

After removing the selvages and cutting the pieces to length I cut off 20 cm from both sides of one length to add onto the one that needs to be wider. I sewed them on with a narrow seam, the selvage sides together, and then zigzagged. Luckily the side table in the room measures just 70 cm wide, and as it’s sometimes used as an extension for the bigger table it made sense to make a narrower tablecloth out of the left over piece to match. This Marimekko linen was 146 cm wide after removing the selvages so I ended up with one tablecloth about 180 cm wide and the other just over a meter.

To measure the length of the fabric I counted the length of the table + half a meter for the ends + 10 cm for the folds + about 15 cm shrinkage. It’s usual to make a wider border for the ends than the sides. First mark 5 cm from the edge with sewing pins, turn the first fold to where the pins are and then make the final fold so that the marker pins are on the second fold. Sew near the edge of the first fold.

With curtains and tablecloths you can make one simple fold for the edge IF the selvage is neat and doesn’t pull. Here I turned the edge twice to make a centimeter wide border but below is another tablecloth with a single fold on the selvage.

This French cotton below has quite a wide selvage so you’d be better off cutting about 2 cm off and turning it twice.

A while back I bought this blue and white fabric to make some place mats. It’s from Svenskt Tenn in Stockholm, the Swedish equivalent to our Finnish Marimekko. They have beautiful cottons and linens that very much remind me of Liberty prints.

I had some white calico for the lining and first washed both the materials in a hot cycle to shrink them before sewing. The mats measure about 40 x 30 cm with a 1 cm seam. One meter of material was enough for eight table mats plus one useful unlined napkin – for the bread basket for example.