Sewing Weekender 2017

This time last week I was lucky enough to be at the Sewing Weekender! Hosted by Kate and Rachel (The Fold Line) and Charlotte (English Girl at Home) this took place at Murray Edwards College in Cambridge.

I must have had a good time and been rather occupied as I seem to have a complete lack of photographs for most of the weekend!

This year's event was absolutely fantastic - there was nearly a sewing machine per person and the tables laid out in long rows this year which made walking around/chatting and general logistics much better. The fabric and pattern swap had grown so large it had its own room alongside Elle (Sew Positivity) who was doing embroidery machine tutorials!

I took a seat at the end of the room and was soon joined by the lovely Eliza Sew Little and Amy who are just wonderful human beings generally - in fact I was struck by how friendly and amazing everyone was, this sewing community of our really is something special.

On arrival we were treated to the biggest goody bag you've ever seen - thank you to the lovey sponsors. An alien and tortoise pattern! How perfect!

I had a bit of a *swoon* moment when Elena - my all time blogger-girl-crush-fav-sewer - of Randomly Happy fame came over and brought me some turtle fabric that she had found in the swap!!! Unbelievable times. I did however manage to maintain my chill this year which was a significant improvement on last...


One particular highlight of this year was an impromptu 'ninja challenge' whereby Melissa (Fehr Trade) and Fiona (Diary of a Chain Stitcher) were called upon to pick a pattern and fabric from the stash giving Liz and Sue 1 hour to complete it!

Both were incredibly good sports doing this, despite the apparent regret about 5 minutes in, However they produced fairly wearable garments in 55 minutes!! It was declared a draw...

I actually did a fair amount of sewing this time which was odd as chatting and tea drinking were a large part of Saturday! However I made my 6th Ogden Cami so that may account for speed as this has now become a bit second nature. And I wasn't the only one! Check out all these ladies who also made the Ogden!

I missed out on going to the pub dinner at night as by this point I was really struggling with a bad cold and the start of shingles :( so I made an executive decision to stay in my room and sleep it off a bit (not before getting Wagamama's on Deliveroo to the room haha). In fact Sunday morning I nearly went straight home but decided to pull myself together for the last few hours. I'm so glad I did as Sunday was one of my favourite days. It just seemed so chilled out, everyone in good spirits finishing projects and stopping for talks by Melissa Fehr on active wear and Elena regarding mindfulness and sewing.

These were both excellent talks as Mindfulness is something of particular interest to me and Elena's speech about remembering to breathe resonating with everyone there! Melissa was also modelling some excellent sportswear from her forthcoming book - can't wait to buy that and give it a go to make some fun yoga gear! I didn't manage to get pictures of the talks but you'll just have to trust me these ladies were beautiful outside and inside. Great women, very inspiring.

Despite Saturday being an absolute washout weather-wise - on Sunday the sun came out! I managed to get a quick snap of my project for the weekend. A 'faux' jumpsuit comprising of the Ogden Cami and some loose trousers very vaguely based on Carolyn PJs. Essentially I traced a crotch curve that I know works, then just winged the rest a bit. Straight legs that were big enough to go over my hips and an elastic waist band. To much surprise it actually worked!!

The fabric is from Minerva Crafts and is a beautiful soft tropical print viscose. I was kindly given some of this for an upcoming make for them in September (keep your eyes peeled) and I managed to squeeze this jumpsuit out of 1.5m of leftovers!! (It's very wide fabric ;-)

I went to try these on in the toilets and the cheeky Eliza Sew Little STOLE MY ACTUAL CLOTHES!! I was therefore wandering around in my faux jumpsuit for the rest of Sunday. No massive deal but I though the style was too trendy/cool for me however I realised that is ridiculous and just wore it. Talk about secret PJs. We later went on a walking tour of Cambridge at lunchtime and damn were these comfortable.

A massive thank you to everyone who set up, sponsored, helped, and attended at this event - it was wonderful to meet you all :)

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