Lovely Nettie

Hi peeps,

here I am again.
I promised you to show off my Nettie (recently released by the talented Heather Lou) as soon as there are some adequate pictures... well, since my good friend Alexandra stayed with me last week, we made a few shots that I´m not totally ashamed of, so I can present to you my two Netties.

The third is still on my sewing table as this time I want to try out the snap crotch option and didn´t have the right supplies while making the first two versions. Number one, the high front neckline, the very low back neckline:

made from a black superthin and strechy spandex, more for dance class than actual street wear... but I like the dramatically low back.

I´m wearing an A-cup, if anything at all, so I excluded the breast-pads.

Version number two is a more everyday wearable piece, this time I made the scooped front and back neckline in a four-way-strech cotton/viscose blend in black and white stripes with red bias binding. Love this one:-)

Since I am a long-torsoed gal, I lengthened the body for about 3cm, seeing the pooling of fabirc at the back I think I will reduce that a little and make a swayback adjustment for number three. Also, the shoulders of Nettie are very narrow and tend to fall off  the shoulder... maybe I will lengthen them a little to stop the drop.

Paired with my red Hollyburn it´s a real showstopper :-)

I also like the sporty look the stripes provide.

I chose the 3/4 sleeves both times as I think this length suits me most. 

Ok, my legs are still as white as a Mozzarella cheese from Italy, but it is only the beginning of June and the sun didn´t grace us with her presence very often so far. There are still about 88 days until I leave for Down Under, so plenty of time left to accquire some tan :-)

Speaking of Australia, today I bought my first bottle of sunscreen with 50+. Never used it before, the sun isn´t that dangerous in these parts, but it´s good to be prepared.

Don´t think a Nettie will accompany me on this trip, I have to keep my luggage light. But still, I am really thrilled with this pattern and will definitely try a pattern hack with it, like cutting off the bottom and taking the top as a crop top with a high waisted pair of pants or a slim pencil skirt.... so versatile this pattern. It came together really fast and the description is easy to understand and follow. At first I thought a bodysuit is so 80´s and I never missed these pieces, but I rediscovered my passion for them. The striped one will be worn a lot this summer.

So, this is the last May post this year and I kept my pledge. Only thing I will change from now on is not to buy fabric randomly anymore, just because I like it. My stash is bursting already and it takes away from sewing sustainably and economically. 

I do sew for fun, but I want to focus more on sewing what I need not only what I like.

However, there is a new Perfect Pattern Parcel out and I would recommend it to any home sewer. This time there are even five patterns in it if you pay 28 Dollar or more. I think it´s a wonderful idea to pair up independent pattern designers and charity organisations to benefit from each other. As soon as I found out there is a new one, I got it. So the next dress on my cutting table will be the Staple dress from April Rhodes. Interested? Do pop over to Perfect pattern parcel and buy your copy of four/five lovely patterns to follow your passion and stuff your closet with beautiful selfmade garments AND do good with a donation to a charity organisation. Can´t be any better.

That´s about it for today peeps, see you in time to report about my new dress or more of these cute little cork-men I found in Berlin.

Happy sewing and stay safe.

Dresden is worth a journey :-)

Hi folks,

I´m back from a short weekend trip to Dresden, one of the most beautiful cities in east Germany.
Since it is only two and a half hours by coach from Berlin I wonder why it took me so long to get there.

Anyway, I took the coach after work on friday afternoon to arrive in the early evening hours, where my host for the weekend awaited me with Iranian food and a nice conversation over a glass of red wine, before we both retired to our (separate!) bedrooms for an early night. It was my very first experience as a couchsurfer and I must say, I will do this again! It opened up my personal horizon on my hosts culture as well as gifted me with a tour guide for the city :-)

In the morning on Saturday we had a light breakfast and then made our way to the old town of Dresden.

To my surprise there was the Dutch fabric market on the market place! But since I was there to explore the city, I only had a short look and then went on to see the Kreuzkirche, the Frauenkiche, which was bombed in WWII and only rebuild in 2003, the Semper Opera House and of course the Zwinger.

market stalls of the Dutch fabric market...

Frauenkirche

All of these architectural masterpieces had an air of 17th century and Grandesse about them, and I could almost imagine the coaches carried by horses to take some Herzog and his Lady to enjoy an evening of classical music at the Opera... 

Semper Opera House

Zwinger

View towards the Opera House

Zwinger

The weather was nice too, a mix of sun and clouds, not too hot, and it was nice to walk along the river Elbe and enjoy a cool breeze. 

River Elbe with a view to the Dome and the Opera

When I travel, there´s always little details that catch my eye, more than the big sights I like to take snaps of those details. Here´s for example a girl-traffic light, where normally there is always a male figure on display :-) 

Or the drainage in the shape of a dragon clung to the Academy of the Arts. 

Unfortunately it began to rain, no, it poured after three o´clock, so we skipped further parts of town and retreated home to have a hot cup of tea and some traditional music made by some of my hosts friends. 

I really enjoyed this trip, though I didn´t see all of Dresden and certainly not the surrounding regions, but still I´m glad I did it. Now I know my country is at least as beautiful and worth seeing as any other country on this blue marble and I will return to see what else there is nearby (e.g. the Sächsiche Schweiz) or Königsstein. 

Hope you liked my little report and next time there will be sewing topics again (and the promised pictures of my Netties) :-)

Thanks for reading and till next time
XX Milan

MeMadeMay and I

Hi folks,

so, May is almost over and I must admit, I really did wear a lot of my self-made garments, I just didn´t always have someone to make a good picture. And when I see all the other bloggers with their professional pics I feel a bit ashamed of the quality of mine (or the lack thereof).

So what, now I will post a few pics that I can stand to look at and hope you will forgive me for not showing all the crappy ones...

This is Simplicity 1653, a quite recent make. I had to take in a lot at the sideseams, since the pattern was only available in double sizes (meaning s/m m/l l/xl), but in the end, I´m content with it.

I never realized I had so much of a backside...

This is a pattern hack of a Lady Skater, I just cut the skirt pieces short and made a peplum shirt from it. The cute flowery jersey caught my eye on the Maybachufer market, my favorite source of fabric, and I took it home to rest it in my stash until this idea came along.

I like it a lot and often wear it to work.

If you should wonder about my hairstyle, I recently developed a passion for braids, since my hair is again long enough to do nice creative hairstyles with it and I discovered the amazing blog of Australian resident Christina called Hair Romance. You should give it a try if you´re interested in beautiful hair :-)

funny face inclusive

This basic shirt is made from a pattern of the finnish company Ottobre. After a critical viewing of my closet I realized I posses way too many dresses and way too less separates. This is one attempt to change that fact. Also, a very different print on the fabric than my average rather girly style and a much simpler cut. I like it :-)

I also made two Netties, since the first was such a big success, I immediately dove into my stash to dig out some more four-way-strech fabric and made a second, with a third already cut out and waiting.

Those pics are not available yet, as I didn´t want to make selfies wearing a bodysuit with a lot of that bootie showing... so you have to wait. Or maybe I should join the flickr group of Closet Case files.... 

Anyway, I´m going on a weekend trip next Friday, to explore a bit of my own country for a change, trying to couchsurf for the first time in Dresden. I really do hope the weather will stay fine and sunny like today (28 degrees, yes!) and I will shoot a few nice pics for you to see when I come back.

Until then,

C u,

MilanManyPins :-)

Me made may first week review...and a travel report

Hi folks,

here we go and the first six days of May have already passed me by... here are my first three pictures.

As I don´t possess enough self-made clothing (at least not for wearing with these temperatures), I will show you as many as I really wore:

this is a Burda Style Shirt with polca dots :-)

This and the shirt below are from the same pattern, Joanna 

by joulijou, an indy-pattern designer from Germany. Actually this shirt is my first make since I started sewing again :-)

I got to spend a long weekend at my old hometown known as Bielefeld, the city, that doesn´t exist!

Actually, it is an old joke made up by some students in the 90´s to make fun of some conspiracy-theories going on, but it somehow survived the decades and has even resulted in books that focus on that topic... lol.

So, for the first time in a long period I made one way by coach. I like travelling by train and would have done so this time either, but realized too late, that I needed to book in advance in order to get a decent price. So I checked the coach sites on the web and finally decided on a ticket with the BerlinLinienBus for 22€ one way.

The coach was comfy and the trip not as exhausting as I expected, I even had a chat with an elderly Lady sitting next to me, definietely do it again.

When I arrived, temperatures had dramatically dropped by about ten degrees, so I shivered a bit in my leather jacket... but got some warm jumper courtesy of my best friend Christian, once I arrived at his place :-)

I spent some nice days in Bielefeld, though the weather did it´s best to dampen my mood, and I shot some nice pics for you. 

Impressive, ain´t it?

Should you ever come to the area, don´t leave it out, it´s a nice and rather quiet town, lots of bars and restaurants, a beautiful old town and small expensive shops mixed with galleries and art shops. Of course there are the ugly parts of town with dirt and rotten places, but you really have to look for them.

So here come a few shots made in the old town and I hope you like them. :-)

I´ll be back with more pictures from my latest makes, til then, stay safe.

Cheers,

Milan