Hi everyone! I am super excited to join the Minerva Makers team and to share my first project with you all! 

Is anyone else excited for Christmas yet?  Although I hate to see the back of summer, I’m always excited to start the Christmas countdown. I’m also a bit of a sucker for a themed dress, so I jumped at the opportunity to make something from Minerva with Christmas fabric.  I chose this beautiful snowflake fabric in the ice blue colour way.  While I am also definitely a fan of a statement Christmas dress, what I really loved about this fabric is that from a distance it’s pretty subtle, but when you look closely you can see the blue and white branches and silver snowflakes. Plus it also reminds me of Frozen, but in a grown up way (I hope!) 

The fabric is a medium weight cotton and once I felt it, I knew it would be perfect for the Sew Over It Grace Dress, as the skirt needs a little weight to help hold its shape.   The weight of the fabric also makes it perfect for the waistband, which keeps it’s shape really well and ties into a lovely crisp bow.  Plus it was so easy to work with – no slips or accidental snags in the fabric.

I’m usually either a 10 or 12 in Sew Over It patterns, depending on how much ease there is.  The Grace dress is designed to have a little bit more ease, so I made it in a straight size 12, and the only adjustment I made was to lower the bust dart slightly, which is an adjustment I always have to do. If I am making a fitted bodice I will usually make a proper toile, but as I felt I probably only needed to move the darts, I made this adjustment on a tissue fitting.  This made it a nice quick make, especially as the construction was also pretty easy. A party dress in a day!

Overall I love the way this turned out.  The length is perfect for me for party season, hitting just above the knee. I love the fact that the belt is separate, which means it can be tied at the back or the front and it can either be pulled tighter for a waist-cinching silhouette or left a little looser for after a big Christmas meal! Or you can just leave the belt off all together (personally, I like it better with the belt though).  Plus, obviously, it has pockets!

My only issue with the pattern was that the belt has a centre seam, which is visible from the front when it’s tied at the back. I didn’t have quite enough fabric to cut it without the seam, but next time I would make sure to cut it on the fold to avoid having the seam showing.  I’m sure that it’s only me that will notice anyway!

I finished off my dress with a little handmade label. I love adding these to my handmade clothes, I think it makes the perfect finishing touch!

This fabric and dress are the perfect match for the festive season, and I can’t wait to get my wear out of it at all the parties come December!

Thanks so much for reading, and Merry Christmas sewing to you all! 

Jen @miss_jennifer_makes

I’m back on Minerva blog with a product testing post with a Christmas project.  When I was asked to pick a fabric to test for a season themed project I was super keen to do it. Why? You might ask.  Some years ago I started a little sewing tradition of my own: To make for each year a garment using a Christmas patterned fabric. This year’s fabric is this cute polar bears woven cotton fabric (which comes in black or navy blue).

I picked the Carolyn Pajamas from Closet Case Patterns to go with this fabric. I just had to add to my Christmas wardrobe a me made pyjama set. This was presented the perfect opportunity to finally use piping in one of my projects. Working with cotton is super easy and this is a good time to experiment.  I made my own piping using ready made red bias tape and piping cord.

Adding piping to my project meant that it look a little longer to make my garments, because I had to do some prep work before sewing some of the seams. But I feel it was well worth it. Piping adds elegance to my project and makes the pattern on the fabric pop up.

To mark the fabric I used a combination of chalk (stitching line for the fake trouser centre front opening and buttonholes placements), small cuts within seam allowance and thread tracing.

The fabric frays so, it is a good idea to consider various seam finishes. For my project, I used the overlocker, however if one is not available, a zig-zag on the edge of the fabric should do the trick. To reduce the bulk and for a more professional finish, I only overlocked the edges that are visible in the finished garment and once certain seams were constructed.

I never trace the buttonholes placement of the patterns that requite buttons down the centre front. This is because I prefer to set the master buttonhole directly across my bust line to avoid gaping in that area. Using a tool called expanding sewing gauge I establish the buttonhole placements starting with the bust. This means that sometimes I use more or less buttons than the pattern requires. For this particular project I used 5 buttons.

Even with adding the piping making my new set of pyjamas did not take that long. I think it took me longer to decide which buttons to add. In the end, I chose the navy blue buttons because I wanted to make a feature of the red piping.

To date, there are my ‘poshest’ set of pyjamas. Don’t think I’ll only wear them during the winter holiday season. I don’t think I’ll even only wear them to sleep in.  I wonder why I waited so long to add piping to my projects. I keep thinking how much piping will be too much in my projects.

A thing is for sure, this year, my Christmas sleep wear is very elegant, I might even spend the whole season in this outfit.

Below are a few of my tips for working with cotton fabric:

•      Wash your fabric before you start your project, especially if it is a garment you are making to minimise any shrinking.

•      As cotton is super easy to work with, have fun, try to add elements like pipping to your project.

•      Consider finishing the seam allowances, the fabric frays.

•      The fabric is suitable for shirts, tops, dresses and skirts

Thank you for taking the time to read my blog post. And please, do share your makes on Instagram/Twitter by tagging @Minervadotcom and/or using the hashtag #MinervaMakes. I love to seeing what you create.

Simona @ Sewing Adventures in the Attick

Have you ever seen a fabric that caused you to step out of your norm?

Well, that is what happened to me. First, let me start off by saying that I am NOT a pink kind of gal, but when I tell you I got knocked off my feet, that’s exactly what happened. I fell in love with this Metallic Brocade Fabric that I chose to do for my first blog post with Minerva. This color is called Cerise Pink on the Minerva website, but to me, the key word was “Pink” and I just don’t do pink. So you’re probably saying, “What happened?” This gorgeous fabric is what happened. It forced me to step out of my norm and I couldn’t be happier that I did. 

I have worked with Metallic Brocade before but if you have never worked with it before just know it does shed a lot but if you have a serger just serge each piece after cutting and you will be good to go. This fabric is so worth it because not only is the main fabric side beautiful but with the ability to wear the reverse side and get a totally different and beautiful look is so amazing. I don’t know which side I love the most, lol.

When you have fabric this beautiful and with this much detail to it, you really don’t want to use a pattern with a lot of details too because you want the focus to be totally on the awesomeness of the fabric. So with that being said, I chose a simple but yet elegant pattern in the Butterick 4443 view “A” in size 16. I have been known to hack most patterns by making either a small change or sometimes in a much bigger way but I totally decided to make this dress as it was designed to be.

I did a little adjusting to the bodice to assure I had that tight fit I like with off the shoulder dresses to avoid any gapping. This pattern does not call for the use of boning but I did use flat boning in the seam allowance of the front princess seam for more structure. The pattern calls for the lining of the bodice only, so I decided to use the opposite side of this fabric to line the bodice and I am so glad I did. Have you ever made a garment where you felt like you wish you could wear it inside out? Well, this little baby definitely has that chic appeal both inside and out. I used bias tape to enclose the seam allowances, used the Hong Kong finish and bias tape for hemming to add to its appeal.

I’m so happy with how this dress turned out and the very moment I put this dress on I felt more girly than normal. The flow and moment of this fabric is so awesome. This fabric is of medium weight but yet has a great flow to it. Whether you are a pink kind of gal or not, you will definitely fall in love with this fabric the moment you unpack it.

Thanks for reading and be sure to check out my personal blog at Angie J Styles

Angie 

@diysewing_angiej

Hi Everyone! I’m so happy to be sharing my latest make. I love the festive season. There are parties and great food and a sense of excitement in the air. It's funny because we plan and photograph our festive issues at Love Sewing magazine during the summer so I sort of have two Christmases! 

This dress is going to be a great staple this year as it's that magical combination of toasty and fancy.

It's the fabric that makes it so wonderful with subtle silver metallic threads and white sequins woven into the jersey. There is a great texture to the fabric too that makes it feel like a sweater knit you'd find in ready to wear clothes.

I used a mixture of the Dixie DIY ballet dress bodice with Vogue 9000's skirt which I cut on the fold and adjusted at the side seams to fit the bodice. The sleeves fit so well, I love the scoop neckline and you cant best a swishy skirt. I made a slim waist belt in the same fabric but also like it with my black patent belt. I should have made thread belt loops to help stop the belt sliding down! Still time to add those now it's done.

It cuts and sews very easy as the sequins aren't too densely spread over the fabric. I used a rotary cutter and mat then finished everything on an overlocker. The hems are just turned under and stitched. I used a universal needle and narrow zigzag for all the construction. Easy peasy!

It's a little sheer but as you can see with a slip underneath I have perfect coverage. It gave me a good excuse to break out my wedding jewellery again. I feel so sparkly and merry!!

Merry Christmas, happy festive season and a wonderful winter to everyone!

Amy @ almondrock.co.uk

To Make These Placemats I Used:

1m Cotton Christmas Fabric.  

1m White Cotton Fabric for the embroidery,

2m Various off cuts of cotton fabric

120cm per mat Satin ribbon, 18-20mm wide.

1m Sew-In Thermolam Compressed Fleece Dense Batting Wadding

Stranded cotton embroidery floss 7 colours

Iron on letter motifs

Wonder tape

Thread

Essential Equipment:

Large eyed embroidery needles

Embroidery hoop

Dressmakers set square or similar

Sewing machine with ability to lower feed dog

Lots of time and patience

When Minerva asked for something creative using one of their many Christmas design fabrics, I immediately thought 'placemats!'. I thought a 100%cotton fabric would cope with hot plates and wear better. I chose this busy patchwork design as I hoped it would make it easier to keep things square.

The Embroidery

I wanted to make a double-sided mat so that it could be Christmas on one side and Everyday on the other. I also wanted to personalize each mat by embroidering a name, with an iron-on decorative capital letter.To do this, I typed and printed each name in a handwriting font (Zapfino) size 76. I traced all but the capital letter onto white cotton fabric and the worked each word with couch stitch using cotton floss; 6 strands for the filling and 3 strands for the securing stitches.

I kept to the colours of the fabric but each name has a unique combination of two colours. 

In addition to the 5 family members I made another 5 mats with different names: Friend, Family, Welcome etc. The W of welcome I made myself from a scrap of red ribbon, stitched to a square of grosgrain ribbon.

Once I'd worked the names, they got a good press and I ironed on the capital letters. The D and A were smaller, so I ironed them to tartan taffeta ribbon and stitched on the whole square.

The Name Frames

I sized up each name and removed part of the Christmas fabric pattern so that the ribbon effect made a frame for the embroidered names. Some names took up more space, so the size of frame varied. I used wonder tape to position the frames over the embroidery and stitched with a close zigzag.

The Batting

The place mats needed to be a rectangle in a ratio of 2:3 i.e. the longer edge 150% of the shorter edge. I was aiming for 24cm x 36cm. In order to cut the 92cm wide thermolan batting most economically, the actual measurements were 23cm x35cm. 

The Christmas Patchwork

I used some of the Christmas tree rectangles as patchwork pieces and played around with contrast cotton fabrics until I got the effect I liked.  I would have loved to make a half square zigzag all the way round but it was so fiddly I just did the V at the bottom edge.  The rest was straight strips of fabric cut to size.

I stitched everything with 1/4" seams(3mm)- the cotton fabrics were stable enough to cope with such narrow allowances.

This all got a good press and a rough trim to match the batting rectangles, using my set square to ensure parallel edges.  I then hand tacked the panels to the batting around the name and the outer edge.  Phew. Halfway there.

The Everyday Patchwork

I could have just used a solid piece of fabric for the backs but I opted for patchwork with a simpler layout. After a lot of drawing and playing with shapes I came up with a design based on six 12cm squares (ratio 2:3 again). Once assembled it would look like a stretched hexagon.

After a bit of trial and error I decided the 3 horizontal stripes on the middle squares should be 4cm wide and the diagonal stripes in the corners should be 3cm wide. I tried making a template out of card, but in the end, it was just easier to measure each piece with my set square to get a true 45 degrees.  Even then, it was out in places but once sewn together it worked. Sometimes the seam allowance was wider to make the seams straight. 

The effect of the 3-colour hexagon is quite striking don’t you think?

I attached each unique backing piece to the reverse side of the batting with pins, taking care to line up the centres of each edge. 

The Quilting

First I drew a life size plan. Then, I stitched around each name on the Christmas side.

Finally, I turned over the work and did the diagonal lines. The technique I chose was free sewing; I dropped the feed dog, removed the presser foot and stitched by eye but with some pins to mark the start and end points of each line.

Once or twice I forgot to lower the presser foot lever, so the tension was a mess. More unpicking!  Where I had to stop and cut threads, I left long tails to tie off and sew in later.  It got better with practice, and the stitch length became fairly even. I'm quite pleased with my first attempt at free sewing.

Finishing

The final stage with the satin ribbon binding. I had bought 2 different sorts. One was an expensive double sided satin 18mm wide, in ivory. The other was a cheaper single sided satin, 20mm wide, in green. I edged four mats in each colour. The thicker expensive ribbon was fiddly to manipulate on the corners so I elected to hand stitch them. The thinner cheaper ribbon folded easier, but also snagged a little. I like them both. Just a tip- satin ribbon frays a lot so cut yourself plenty of underlap.

After sewing in the ends and pulling out the hand tacking, they were done. Well 8 of them were.

I wanted to get this blog written so the last 2 are still waiting for their backs!

I’m quite pleased with them. They look pretty much as I had hoped. They may lack the finesse of some patchwork and quilting experts, but even novice quilters like me can manage a simple project like this.

By the way, I have enough fabric left to make a few Christmas tree coasters with a firmer, less bouncy backing. Can't have those Christmas drinks falling over! Thanks for reading.

 Anna @ knitlacesew.com