Hi ,

        I recently stitched a sleeveless frock with a shrug ( bolero jacket) with chinese collar for my daughter. The frock was cut from a plain Navy blue shirting material and I thought of teaming it up with the shrug made of patterned fabric.

The deep blue frock is  knee- length, simple in design, with square neck and box pleats. For the shrug, I chose to have three- quarter length sleeves and a mandarin collar. This is where i got the inspiration and instructions for the shrug from- 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCQMsfzfQEM

The instructions are so simple, even a beginner like me could follow it. 

     
     
        Clockwise from the top left corner- the back panel for the shrug, the two front panels, the front
 and back panels stitched together and the sleeves for the shrug.

      

  And, this is the final version of the shrug. I am happy the way it turned out... this being my first attempt with shrug, as well as with collar neck. 

 

         And, once the dress was ready, there sure had to be the accessories to go with it...
  So, made a set with light brown, light blue, transparent white and deep blue colour crystal beads 
in clusters.......There had to be a neck piece, a bracelet and earrings.. 

         Made bead clusters of 4 beads each, of the same colour...To assemble the cluster pieces, I put one crystal bead onto a headpin each and secured it with a simple loop and used side-cutters to clip the excess wire. Four such beads were made into a bunch with a jump ring.

         

         I also made links for the bracelets... each link I made has 3 beads on an eyepin.. looped the other end of the eyepin... Now, each end of the link has a loop.. The loops of the adjacent links are connected with double jump rings... On the ring hangs a cluster of crystal beads.

      For the necklace, I had to make 27 bead clusters to get the length I wanted.... and since they were
 heavy together, had to string them on  a thicker wire.  Attached silver coloured end chains and clasps
 to the necklace, and just a toggle clasp for the braccelet. 

        The earring I made first didn't have the deep blue bead in it,  so made some small changes...
The set took tooooooo long a time to be complete,as each bead was to be wired and then bunched ...
But in the end, I got the look I wanted...
And this is the final set.... 

     
    I could complete this dress and the matching jewellery set in time for my sweet girlie to wear it for 
a function... She was very happy, and so was I....


  Will be back later.
- Chitra.

Hi,

        I had done some wool works with crochet long ago.... One among them being a sweater for my daughter... that was many years back. She had grown out of it and I too forgot about it. Just a few days back,  I found the sweater in the stash of many more of the little girlie's old dresses.

          My brother had bought this soft wool in beautiful, soft pastel shades (Red Heart Soft Baby Steps multicoloured yarn) and this was the first woollen piece I made for my daughter. She could wear it for a few years as it was adjustable at the neck and at the waist, where there were ties. It is somewhere between a poncho and a proper sweater..
          I don't even remember where I got the idea for this dress from... 

 We spent some time to search for her photo in this dress, and luckily, found it...
The little lady was very excited to see her old dresses and photographs. Me  too :-)  It was like revisiting her chilhood... How fast time flies !!

Will be back soon.
 Bye.

-Chitra.
         

Hi,

    Last year was a good one, as I could do a lot of different works that I had planned. Among these, what I loved the most was the long skirt and matching blouse I stitched for my girlie ... that she wore for the wedding of a friend's son... Enjoyed the trip as well.. got to spend some good time with family and friends...

   Clock wise, here, are the steps in cutting for the long skirt or lehenga... The skirt initially was planned with 8 parts, but I had to add 4 parts more to give it the flare I wanted it to have. So the finished skirt has 12 parts.. Instead of a lining skirt, I added lining to each of the 12 pieces before I attached them together. I was satisfied with the result... Attached a cord with some beads and a tassle to the lehenga.

   And, for the blouse, thought of trying a different yoke.. And attached a short sleeve. I wasn't very happy with the finishing, specially the neck; had to attach a piece at the neck as I had cut it too deep.

    And when the dress was ready, my princess started looking at me for a matching jewellery set as well.. I didn't get time to make a set then, but had saved a design in my mind.

   Later, made a set with air dry clay.. a cute set with golden and maroon beads, and a pretty pendant.. there is a pair of simple earrings to match..

    My pretty lady was very happy to get a special dress complete with its jewel set in matching colours... and I was happy too...

More next time..
- Chitra.

Hi ,

It is a long long time since my last post...

Life has been busy... with job and kids, and work at home, how else can life be ??!
As kids grow up, you realise their childhood will be gone soon, and you wish time was slower...
I have been away from the blog for nearly a whole year, but I have never been away from my work...only thing is, I didn't take time to post those here...
So, here I am, with a few of my works...

I have been designing and stitching dresses for my darling daughter since she was little...
It doesn't require much to make a mom happy... you derive so much happiness from dressing one's princess...

This dress was my mom-in-law's saree.. a pure silk material in bright colours.... 

There were so many more dresses that I had stitched, but didn't photograph.. Now I feel I could have taken some shots.. Especially those that my daughter wore when she was not not even an year old.

These dresses were designed from my hubby's shirts, t- shirts and some dupattas... The third one in the first row ( the orange frock) and, the yellow tops in the second row were stitched by hand (didn't have the sewing machine with me then) 

This one was a dupatta my sister had, but never used... This pavada- blouse set was fully hand- stitched when my little prince was born.. The happy 'didi' was very excited with this outfit... The skirt has box pleats and there is a small applique work in the blouse.

The one on the left is upcycled from a shirt ( made into the shorts) and a t-shirt. The one on the right is a medium sized shirt re-sized to fit my girlie..

This is how re-sized the shirt...

Thats it for now... will be back later with more posts..

Bye,

- Chitra.