Author: Michelle

Disappointment… and Success!

~ Michelle

My last bra wasn’t even blog worthy, so I decided to make another beige bra. I really do need a couple of lighter bras for summer.

And I wanted lace on the upper cup too. I love lace. I’m still trying to figure out how to incorporate a lace upper cup. The shape of the upper cup curves quite a bit on this pattern, and most upper cups are fairly straight across that upper edge. I did try using lace on one beige bra. I cut the lace following the curved edge and zigzagged over the raw cut edge, but I didn’t love how it turned out. I’m thinking a dart might be needed to incorporate the curve, maybe two. Like this:

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So, enough of that disappointment, and even the contemplation. Here is my most recent Beige Plunge:

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I love this bra! It’s so pretty. To use the lace, I cut the upper cups from Duoplex and then laid the lace over that. The Duoplex is from Bra Makers Supplies (BMS), and so are all my other components, except the lace, which was a gift. Thank you again, Naomi. The pattern is from BMS too, but altered to fit an Omega shape and then altered again to make a ‘fake’ demi bra, or plunge-style bra.

The lace is a nice stretch lace, but it was a bit challenging to use at first. I pinned it down, and did a zigzag over the lace, and it moved. I took the stitches out, and tried again, and it moved again. I changed my stitch length, tried again, and it moved again! I thought briefly of not using lace, but instead got out my trusty Temporary Fabric Adhesive (TFA), and sprayed the back of the lace, laid it over the upper bra cups and sewed it. It didn’t move at all. I love TFA for anything difficult like that. It worked perfectly! I’ve used it before and highly recommend it for anything like that.

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Here you can see the lace overlaying the Duoplex. I may use this technique in a few more ways. I really am happy with this and how it turned out.

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I loved the look of the lace on the upper cup, so put some on the band too. I wanted the scallops to show, so didn’t cover the whole band. The elastic has a lot of stretch, so it works very well on the band.

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And the back band. There were no problems here.

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Here’s a close up of the bridge. How pretty is that? The trim, the lace, the bow? I’m very excited to now have two bras that fit so well. What a struggle this has been.

On my desk next week is to work on the Kwik Sew 3300, sew an apron for a friend, and clone a bra for her. I told her I’m willing to clone her favorite bra so she has a pattern, and sew her up a copy, but I’m very weary of alterations just now, so no alterations.

Happy Creating!

A Shout Out and a Few Accomplishments

~ Michelle

I’m one of those people who LOVES gifts. Just ask my dear hubby. Our first year married, he got confused because my birthday and a former long-time girlfriend both had our birthdays on the 15th – just different months. It was a lovely fall day, and he was heading into the room I was in with a card in hand and something behind his back. His Mum realized what he was doing, and stopped him. I had no problem with it at all. I just told him I wanted my gift. I didn’t care what the occasion was. I was good with the mix up – just hand over the gift. He made me wait. But that tells you a little of my personality there. I love gifts!

So, I want to say a big ‘Thank You’ to a couple of wonderful fellow bra-makers (whom I met on Amy’s Sew Along) who have sent me the loveliest gifts. Thank you Ginny and Naomi!

A while back, Ginny sent me these lovely laces and elastics.

Laces and elastics from Ginny

I’ve dipped into these elastics on more than one occasion. Elastics have become a valued item here. I hate using precious elastic on something that ends up not fitting! And I have plans for one of these laces on a bra I’ve got all cut out. But not the one I’m working on right now – I ran out of strap elastic for the cut out one.

Ginny also sent some adorable earrings she’d made – which didn’t make it into the shot here. You can see some of her hand-made creations here in her Etsy shop.

These are the laces I just got from Naomi. I love that beige. I’ve always been a beige or black girl. But there are too many laces out there that are so pretty to stick with that. Pretty colors, here I come!

Laces from Naomi

And a bunch of elastics, straps, upper cup elastic and more. Oh, that dark purple… such a beautiful color.

Elastics from Naomi

So a really big Thank You to both ladies.

And those accomplishments I mentioned? I finished my moulage AND my sloper. Both patterns are packaged away for the time being. I have to sew something now and I’ll pull the sloper out after I get my sewing fix.

moulage done

Here’s the final moulage. I found this great material in the clearance area and it worked better than the printed one I’d used previously. It is such a relief to be done this. Naomi sent me a great idea to transform my dress form using the moulage. Take a look at how Mary did it in her blog Cloning Couture. I’m definitely mulling this idea over. It’s a great idea!

And lastly, here’s an idea I got from Sigrid’s blog. And I looked and looked for this posting from her, and could not find it. Here’s what she said, “Pin (or baste) the cup over a well fitting bra, using the seam allowances for the pinning.”

Testing Bra Cup size

This is a new pattern for me. It’s Kwik Sew’s 3300, and I had to guess which size I was going to be. I did pretty well. This is a great starting point. I’ll have to change it from a partial band to a full band, but I can do that fairly easily knowing the basic cup pattern will fit so well.

Standard alteration to fit in smaller wires

This isn’t the easiest to see, but there’s a pin there at the bottom of the cup where there is excess material. That’s about a standard amount I need to take out to account for the smaller wires I need. So this is on it’s way to being pretty good already. Off to work on some pattern alterations now.

Happy Creating!

Moulage III and a Hair Update

~ Michelle ~ 2 Comments

Oh my! I’m on moulage number III in numbered ones, but I crumpled up the real number one, so this is actually my forth. The instructor assures us it is worthwhile to be picky. And I’m being picky.

I got a better picture this week. I changed the paper I’m using and the lines show up better.

Moulage III

I’ve just re-drawn it and cut that out to use as my pattern. This one should be perfect. Oh, fingers crossed!

Other than that I haven’t been doing much creatively, and I’m getting restless. I like quick projects. Bras only take at most a couple of days, and I have some wonderful new materials I want to get going on; but I am determined to finish this and use that basic pattern/sloper to make the cardigan pattern I bought.

Yesterday I was looking on my blog stats. It’s always fun to see what part of the world is reading about what I’m doing. I always share with my hubby some of the different countries and he’s always amazed. I think bra-making and other creative projects are alive and well on planet earth!

One thing I noticed yesterday when I was looking, was that someone had clicked on a link for the henna website I’d posted a while ago. I thought, oh, I need to update that. I’m still using henna for my hair, but not from the same company as before.

I love that henna is natural, and so is indigo, but there were a couple of things I didn’t love. It took about an hour and a half to do my hair, and even though I used the indigo with the henna, my hair was getting redder and redder – not a good color combination with my skin. So it was time to look for something else.

I was in the health food store and found just what I was looking for. Surya Brasil Henna Cream. I tried the dark brown first, but it took too well, and my hair looked black. Now I mix the light brown and dark brown together and I love the color – it’s so close to my own natural color.

Here’s my hair first thing this morning – in need of some loving touching up.

Hair before

You can see, that after a month, the grey isn’t really grey still – it’s a light brown. It does fade a bit over a month’s time, but no so much that it bothers me. It’s the little slivers of silver that I’m not so fond of! And I tried to not get leaves growing out of my head, but as you’ll see in each of the photos, I failed. So, let’s call them creative placement, or a decorative backdrop.

Hair During

And here’s the in between stage. One I brush the henna cream on, I cover it with plastic wrap to keep the moisture in, and then put a pretty shower cap on. This is time for me to just sit down and relax for 45 minutes. It’s not the five or ten minutes the commercials promise for hair dye, but it’s natural and doesn’t bother my skin at all. It’s worth it to me.

Hair After

And here I am after.  I’m all happy because I can’t see that silver stripe anymore. Have I mentioned that in my blog before? I have a Cruella DeVille stripe. Oh, and see the artistic placement of the leaves coming out of my hair? A nice touch I think.

Hair Close Up

And another close up showing all that grey and even the light brown gone. It’s all nice and dark again.

Hopefully, next week I will be done my moulage, AND my sloper and onto a fun project!

Happy creating!

Moulage 2 And 3

~ Michelle

You might be wondering about that title. What happened to 1? I went through the whole process of measuring myself, having my hubby measure me, putting all those numbers onto the form that comes with the class, drawing out a basic moulage with the instructor, and then drawing out my own. And I was so sure I had done it incorrectly that I crumpled it up and threw it in the trash.

When I was done my second moulage, I realized what I had thought was wrong on the first one, hadn’t been wrong. I decided to wrap it up to more practice was good for me!

Moulage 1

Here is the first sewn moulage on my dress form. On this you can see where I pinned the shoulders to take them in. I also decided to move the bust width together more, and the waist was loose on me.

I wish I had taped the audio from that second moulage being pinned on me. I thought we sounded like a comedy routine. First, my hubby was sure pinning the moulage on me would take hours. I have no idea why he thought this, but he was convinced it would. I finally had to tell him to be quiet and pin me up.

The moulage was to be pinned up the back, and I had explained to my hubby that it would be tight-fitting. He kept saying, ‘This is pretty tight.’ And I’d assure him it was supposed to be tight. I told him it was to fit like a second skin even. But he must have commented four or five times on how tight it was.

Once it was all pinned up the back, I told him to pin the extra out of the shoulders and he did. With no give, I couldn’t pin myself.

I think five minutes have passed by now, if that. At this point I’m done what I needed to do – I’ve seen how it fit and where I needed to adjust it. So I tell my hubby to go ahead and unpin me. ‘What? Why? Didn’t I just pin you up? Why do you want to be unpinned now?’

Well, I didn’t want to wear it forever! My poor dear hubby really had no idea what we’d accomplished in this not-hours-long endeavor.

On my next one, I decided to take some of the drama out of the fitting and left the center front open and sewed up the back seam.

Moulage on dress form

You can see this one is a little more fitted around the waist. Not a huge difference, but this one is snug around the waist, whereas the first sewn up one wasn’t.

And here it is on me.

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See. Definitely snug. But I’m told this is exactly what I’m wanting. Amazingly, making moulage two and three took a couple of days each! I had hoped to have the sloper done by now too, but that will have to be later this week.

Happy creating!

 

Slopers and Styles

~ Michelle

I saw this and it gave me a smile. I thought I’d share it.

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The other day my friend came over and she’s taking a class on making a sloper. She was having trouble getting her muslin to fit using the sloper pattern, so we looked at her instructions and it wasn’t making a lot of sense to me. I’m not the best when it’s all numbers.

I finally suggested she put the muslin on and I’d pin the sides where it needed to be taken in. She then traced the pin lines, and laid the pattern over the muslin and traced those lines onto it. And it worked. She sent me a message the next day to tell me I got an A+ on her assignment. We laughed over that. I was thankful her instructor did explain what she’d wanted her to accomplish with the numbers, and our way was just another (non-math) way to do it.

My sloper, or actually moulage, that I’ve been working on for a Craftsy class I’m taking is done. It’s an awesome class by the way – Patternmaking Basics – The Bodice Sloper. Boy is it a detailed class. And remember, I said I’m not a numbers person. There are a LOT of numbers; at times she’s using one set of numbers and I’m having to remember to use my own numbers. Whew! It’s a workout. But I’m trusting it will be well worth the effort by time I’m done.

My class is also fraction of the cost of my friend’s class. She paid over $300 for the class she’s taking. I think the Craftsy class is a much better deal. Oh, and I took another Craftsy class this past year and the instructor never responded to any of my questions – even after I mentioned this to Craftsy. And from reading the questions and comments, I wasn’t alone.  This class, I highly recommend and the instructor gets back really quickly.

One of the things I learned is before you make a sloper, you make a moulage, which is an exact skin-tight pattern. Then you add in some ease and have a sloper. My moulage was done in pencil, and although I took a picture, the paper looked blank. Here’s a sample picture to show what I’ve been working on.

sloper

I bought some fabric today and will sew it up either today or tomorrow. I know I don’t have the shoulders just perfect yet (my dear hubby measured me), but will use that same pinch method to get them better and anywhere else I need to fix. Then I will adjust the moulage.

Happy creating! I’m off to work on my moulage.

Seemed to Take Forever!

~ Michelle

A while back – it was January, I think – I mentioned I’d ordered a booklet on altering bodices. It was one of those things that seemed to be taking a long time getting to me, so I went online and looked up the tracking number to see when I had ordered it. It had been about a month at this point. I thought it should have arrived by now.

What I found surprised me. That little packet had made it all the way from Australia to my little town in Alberta, Canada, but didn’t make it to me! I could hardly believe the label fell off while it was on its way to being delivered to my door. It made it to the post office, was out for delivery and then the next thing on the detail list from the tracking number was it had been sent to the Undeliverable Mail Office. Maybe I should call that bag of bras that don’t fit The Undeliverable Bra Bag.

What a run around! I spoke to one woman in the post office and she took all the information I had like my name, address, the tracking number, the sender’s name and address too,  and at the end of the call said for me to stay home the next day – the parcel would be delivered then. Well, that day came and went, and I waited, but no one came to my door. I called the post office again.

The next person I spoke to was most unhelpful. She could not give a straight answer no matter what I asked her. I might get the parcel in a month, but there was no guarantee. That, definitely, without a doubt or hesitation, was a very frustrating phone call, and nothing resulted from it.

I think a weekend came at this point and I had to wait a few days before I could call again. The person I spoke with took all my information (again), and this time was very helpful. She assured me I had given enough information, and with the tracking information, was the person who was supposed to receive that package. Whew. I was told it would be on its way to me.

During all of this, I was in contact with the sender and author of the booklet. She was as anxious as I was for this parcel to be delivered. I’d shared every false-positive start I’d had.  We were both in waiting mode at this point.

The next I heard from the post office was a lovely official letter telling me that as the addressee I had no authority to start an investigation as to the whereabouts of this parcel! So, I contacted the post office again, but this time to ask why all the run around. Why was I being asked for information, providing it, being told that was enough, and then being told it wasn’t, later, in a letter. They apologized profusely at this point, and told me what information the sender needed to include to start an investigation from her post office in Australia.

All I can say is, 38 emails and 5 or 6 phone calls, a letter, and three months later, I got my parcel. The envelope it was in was pristine! Not a mark or tear on it; no label either. Somehow, that had gotten lost.

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But here it is now, on my desk. Now to finish that bodice sloper and get started on some fun projects in here!

And lastly, a bit a teaser. I’ve been playing with some lace placement.

playing with lace 1

I bought this lace from Margreet’s Etsy store, Merckwaerdigh. She has so many beautiful lingerie sets.

playing with lace 2

This may not show wonderfully, but this is the bridge. More pictures to come soon.

Happy Creating!

A Few Accomplishments!

~ Michelle

My husband and I went away last week for our 22nd anniversary. We found a wonderful deal at Christmas time and bought it and put it away for ourselves. We only live 4 hours from the Rocky Mountains, and it’s our favorite vacation spot. Our suite had a tremendous view! Just look at this:

View from Windtower Rm 234

This was the view from the kitchen patio door. I could just sit and look out at that. We spent 4 days with that view, and although there was still snow on the ground, and we even woke up to snow one morning, it was still perfect!

I took a few projects on my trip that I wanted to complete while I was there. One project was to complete the measurements for a bodice sloper. That’s not a big deal, but for some reason those last few measurements just weren’t getting done. They’re done now, so I can work on that.

Another project was fingerless gloves. I was determined to get them done. (I know, Andrea, it’s a bit late in the season.) I’d looked at many patterns, and finally settled on one I found on Ravelry. These are based on the Vanilla Frappe Fingerless Gloves. You can find the pattern here.

I really liked the ‘body’ part of this pattern, and decided to do just that, with a scallop border on the top and bottom. The body is knit; I crocheted the borders, so mine look different than the originals, but I’m happy with them.

fingerless glove 2

I’ve sewn one, and one waiting to be sewn up.

fingerless glove 1

The ball of white yarn is to do some flowers or hearts or some type of embellishment.

So two projects done. I also took my sewing kit to tighten a button on my coat, but that’s still on my to-do list.

And when I got back I had one more accomplishment!

I worked on another bra. I knew the area that needed work – the bridge – so I tackled that as soon as I got home. And another success! I have the best fit I’ve tried for yet! Let me tell you, if you’ve never had a properly fitting bra – one where the bridge goes all the way back to the chest wall – well, it’s a different feeling. I’ve never felt that. It’s not uncomfortable, but it is different for me.

plunge bra prototype

When I started this bra, I have to admit, I wasn’t feeling super encouraged. It feels like there have been too many challenges along the way that left me less than hopeful. I even skipped some of the little finishing details on this bra – finishing details that made it onto all the other attempts I’d made. However, this one only needs minor tweaking. That has me excited!

One of those minor tweaks? The bridge can still come up about 1/4″. But that’s it’s. So now I need to look at plunge styles. I haven’t seen a lot of patterns for plunge bras. Does anyone know of any?

For this bra, I took my Sewy Rebecca pattern and made it into a Classic pattern. I also straightened the lower edge of the upper cup to get the most lift. I decided not to do a three or four piece cup on this so it would sew up more quickly, and also I don’t see a lot of plunge bras that have those features. So, once I had a basic Classic pattern, I used my trusty Bra Makers Manual to change the cup shape to a plunge style, or ‘fake’ demi-style.

plunge back 2

A very basic back, with the Prima Donna U-shaped back. I don’t think they’re the only ones doing this now, but I do remember them advertising this feature.

So a few little glitches I ran into while sewing this? You can see in the above picture that the back band is a bit smaller than the hook and eye closures. That’s a small adjustment. You can see it better here:

plunge back

That’s not a big deal – just a small tweak.

Another small tweak is the lower cup. I still have to make adjustments for the Omega shape, and need to fit a larger cup into a smaller wire. On this bra, (again) I didn’t put a lot of effort into it. So when it came time to fit the cup, I simply put a fold in the lower cup’s material. The cup still fits fine, and the seam line fit as well. I have altered the pattern with a dart to take out that excess on the next one I do.

plunge bra dart

You can see the tuck here. It shows more here than when I’m wearing it.

Bow to cover seam

Lastly, a tweak to make is my order of sewing if I do this style again. On this bra I had the cups sewn into the cradle and then looked and I still had to add the neckline trim. On a style like this, I think it would be better to do that before putting the cups into the bra. It works fine, but would be neater sewn the other way.

So, I’m very happy to say I’ve had SUCCESS! It feels really good to know I’m there with just a few minor tweaks now. Whew! I said a long time ago that I hoped my journey would encourage someone else not to give up! How long has it taken me?

Here’s to happy & successful creating!

Will It Ever Stop Snowing? And Other Greats!

~ Michelle

I saw a cute video by Rick Mercer, a Canadian comedian, which depicts how I feel so well:

Yes, that is the sad state many Canadians are in right now. We’re just hoping for warmer weather, and … well, it’s snowing right now. Sigh. So much for the calendar saying Spring.

I’ll happily stay indoors today and work on my pattern, right? Sigh, the pattern. Okay, I’m going to focus on the positives and deal with the challenges next.

I got the short wires from Bra Makers Supply. I’m was hoping for the same length on the side, and shorter at the front to accommodate the lower bridge. Great! But nope, those didn’t work the way I wanted them to – too short on the side. I think I still want the Vertical wires, I’ll follow Amy’s suggestions on her blog (Cloth Habit) for shortening them.

With newly shortened Vertical wires in hand, I got out my Bra Makers Manual and drew a new bridge & cradle for these new wires. Another great! But, I’m not done with this topic yet. More to follow…

Then I decided to make sure my custom bridge really was the best fit I could get. An article from Threads that talks about making a Duct Tape Sloper was my inspiration. I decided to follow the same principle and use multiple layers of tape to make a ‘sloper’ for my bridge. That worked well too. And then I checked it against the custom bridge I’d made. It is almost exactly the same as what I’d done when I followed the instructions in Norma’s book, Demystifying Bra Fitting and Construction. So I have my correct bridge shape. Great!

full bridge

Here’s my little tape sloper. I didn’t continue the sloper past the marker – that wasn’t the problem area, so I focused on the middle of the bridge. The rest of the wire was fitting fine. But that area…

Well, a picture is worth a thousand words, so here is the difference between my little tape sloper and the newly drafted cradle pattern. Yes, there is a problem.

cradle issue

Do you see that area at the front of the cradle where the bridge is? It’s nice and round. I don’t match. So, what to do about that?

I have asked that question before, and didn’t get an answer that was satisfactory. I was told by one person there was nothing to be done about that. But that’s an important very supportive area, and it does need to fit. So, I re-drew the cradle with the custom bridge in place of the bridge here.

Back to those shortened wires. Oh my! I will tell you, shortening them is not a problem. However, covering that rough edge is! I read Amy post, and decided to follow her suggestions for using Plasti-Dip. There was no variety of colors, in fact I had my choice of red or black. That was it.

So with red Plasti-Dip in hand, I came home and dipped my newly cut and filed wires. I let them dry overnight even. They looked great! And then came that magical moment when I went to insert them into the bra channel. I should have taken a picture… I inserted the newly rubberized end of the wire into the channel and pushed, and pushed and pushed. Then I did what I’m sure 99% of married women do when they can’t do something physically — I called my husband. ‘Honey can you help me?’ He pushed and pushed. And then looked at me and said that’s not going anywhere.

It seems Plasti-Dip is a rubber coating. Rubbery is not what I was expecting. I’ve been to every hardware store in 3 towns and no one has anything other than the rubber coating-type Plasti-Dip. Well, that didn’t work.

I have read about others using Goop, but I don’t think that is a preferred method. I bought some heat-shrink tubing and will try that. I’ve said this before, and it’s still true… I’m close.

Happy Creating!

I Tried a Custom Bridge Already

~ Michelle

I kept thinking about how to alter the bra pattern sitting on my desk so the bridge would fit and go right back to the chest wall. Last year I spoke with the staff at Bra Makers Supply, and they’d suggested I lower the bridge if it wasn’t going all the way back. That really helped. So that was one of the things I’d done on the custom bridge I made as well as a couple of other changes.

And some of the ideas I was thinking about to alter the bridge, like narrowing the top of the bridge but keeping it a normal width at the bottom, were the same alterations I’d done using Norma‘s book: Demystifying Bra Fitting And Construction. I had no desire to go back down that road again, trying to re-invent this, especially as all the changes I was thinking of were the same as before.

I decided to look at what I’d done last year when I made a custom bridge. I have a bag of bras I’ve made, and they are put into the bag when I’m not completely happy, or I deem them ‘unwearable’. It’s like the Bag of Bra Shame! I’ve kept them all so I can use parts like wires, rings & sliders , hooks & eyes again. So I dug out the bag, and pulled out the bra on which I’d done the custom bridge.

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I didn’t even finish this completely. The channeling didn’t get sewn down. No little bows to cover up the seams at the straps. Poor little Ivory Shelley. When I made this, I was disappointed in not getting the fit just right (again), and I stuffed it into what seemed to be an ever-filling Bra Bag.

This morning I tried it on again, and there are a few minor adjustments to be made but it does fit pretty well. The bridge works just like it should. It goes all the way back. So I thought some more about what I didn’t like about this bra.

I decided to look at the wires. I originally had put in 38s, then 40s, (my original bra pattern changed shape a bit when I altered the bridge, and the original wires didn’t fit properly.) and although I’d been told I wasn’t likely a smaller wire size, I decided to try one. I had a couple of 38 Vertical wires, which correspond to a 36 wire. It worked out quite well that I hadn’t finished that channeling.

And… drum roll please. It fits! The wires aren’t too tight. I am amazed! In one little experiment, I may have taken care of all my fitting challenges I couldn’t figure out. I’ve had this little Ivory beauty on all day and it’s more comfortable than any of the $200 bras I own.

I am so excited! It’s drafting time again. Now with the bridge problem fixed and past adjustments to the patterns, I’m ready to make something that fits PERFECTLY!

Happy creating!

Changes in the Wind

~ Michelle

I’ve posted many photos of jewelry I’ve made recently in the classes I teach. I’ve really enjoyed taking people through the steps of making each project. I’ve also really enjoyed seeing them learn and make their own creations. However, all this is about to change, and I’m not sure I like the changes being proposed. It seems, in the classroom, I will no longer be making jewelry. Going forward I am expected to explain how to make jewelry using large photos which illustrate it. I’m not fond of this change and am thinking a change in employment will be coming soon.

Another change I experienced this past week was to lose my Lifestyle Coach. She’s no longer working with my physician, so no longer available to me. She helped me through a really rough health patch a few years ago, and I’ve been with her for 6 years. I will really miss her. As I was leaving the office and giving her a hug goodbye, she commented on the abstract poinsettia brooch I had on my coat. I took it off and gave it to her without a second thought.

I have no regrets about giving a gift to a friend, however, my coat now looked quite plain. So I pulled out my felt again, and sat and came up with a couple felt brooches to dress up my coat. I find hand-sewing to be very relaxing.

I’ll count this as part of a commitment I made to myself to make (at least) one project each month. I am on track for that with these, but it’s still early in March, so I plan to get something else sewn up. Hopefully I’ll resolve that bra alteration in my mind and get that off my desk and sewn up!

Here’s the first felt brooch I made. Quite similar to the other abstract poinsettia brooch, but this time I used some deep red with a black polka dot on it. It’s really charming felt.

red polka dot brooch

This one came off my coat for the photo shoot here.

The next one is very similar, but I changed the shape a little. I wanted it a more uniform shape.

pink zebra brooch

I LOVE this felt! It is so fun and flirty.

And the last one I changed the design again.

leopard print brooch

I had fun with all of these, and really do enjoy sitting down and doing some hand-sewing. I bought some Swarovski Hot Fix crystals and I’m going to add some bling to these.

Something helpful I’ve realized about myself while writing this blog is I really like to think things through before I decide to do anything. I don’t think I realized how much internal discussion I had with myself before making a decision. For example, I’m still contemplating the bridge on that bra alteration. I’ve even re-drawn it but am still contemplating it.  And I’m not ready to start cutting fabric on that project yet.

What’s next on my project list? Well, I do want to continue with the two sloper classes I’ve signed up for on Craftsy, and tomorrow I’m heading over to a friend’s to help her with a sloper too. Seems like slopers are next. And that bridge. I will get them done!

Happy creating!