A skirt for spring

This weekend I finally had the time to make a dress from the fabric I printed on a few weeks back. It’s not completely finished yet as I’m still considering whether or not to put blue ribbon on the pockets.

Good movies for unstitching

I’ve been too busy this last week to do anything about my DIY-projects. So this weekend I started to unstitch a large dress I got at a flea market a few weekends ago – but argh…it’s a pretty boring task. Therefore I thought of some good entertainment to enjoy while gradually ‘breaking’ the dress up. Actually it’s the same thing when you’re just starting to knit, you have to keep your eyes on the work most of the time, but it’s still easy and does not need all of your attention.

The right entertainment for unstitching can therefore really make the whole process more fun, and when you have a whole dress to break apart, as I have, then a good movie is all you need. However, the movie musn't demand complete devotion and concentration, yet it should still remain interesting. It is for example difficult to enjoy special details or hard keep track of complicated plots, while you do your thing with the needle - for me anyway. So here are two films I recommend for unstitching:

8 Femmes:

This is a delightful and funny film with some of the best French actresses today. A murder mystery taking place in a large estate and the murderer can only be one of 8 women in the house. Catherine Deneuve, Fanny Ardent and Emmanuelle Béart are some of the great 8 women that sing and dance in this crazy film that turns out to be not onlya murder mystery, but also features lesbian love and a secret pregnancy. The plot is not exactly simple, but somehow easy to follow anyway, and the music and cool characters makes it very entertaining. Furthermore, the production design is so forceful in the use of colours and lighting.

Roman Holiday:

This is indeed a great film for all occasions and should for a first timer not be seen while doing anything else. Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck make an amazing couple and as it is shot on location in Rome the whole setting adds an adventures mood to the story.
But for those who like me have seen it a few times already it’s perfect to enjoy again when you’re a bit preoccupied. The reason why it serves well as an ‘unstitching-movie’ is because of the small incidents within the overall plot – like the dancing scene or at the cafe/champagne-drinking scene. Because of the many excellent small scenes through out the whole movie it is easy to enjoy even though you're not completely devoted to it. I could write on and on about this film and how it’s one of the best romances ever, but instead I'll just recommend that you watch it - with or without needlework in your hands.

DIY-Weekend

This weekend I’ve spent most of my time preparing for future DIY-projects. Therefore I can’t show you anything I’ve finished - yet. But instead I will tell something about my ideas and thoughts about what Ive done.
Saturday was spent flea-marketing in search of clothes and other fun things for pure inspiration. The market we went to this weekend was unfortunately mostly furniture, books and old kitchen stuff and the clothes were only a small part of it. However we did manage to find one dress and a skirt for me. The fabric of the dress is cool because of the rose-print and I’m thinking about using the fabric sewing a new style. At the moment it’s very loose fitted with a weird neckline. The dark blue skirt has a simple print and some really cute pockets. I think I’ll shorten it quite a lot -it’s much too long for me and then perhaps change the shape a bit, if I can.

Today I visited my Aunt Sally, who is a master when it comes to printing on fabrics, sawing, knitting and well, al things crafty, I guess. She had all the things I needed in order to learn how to make cool prints for the first time – I just brought my colours and my ideas. As it turned out the process took most of the day even though I only made two different types of prints. This one is made for a white skirt and it is based on a drawing of two birds I found. I copied the drawing in negativ onto a self-adhesive plastic sheet and put it onto one of my Aunt’s wooden frames. It’s actually very simple once you have what you need, but in the actual printing process you have to be thorough and precise which took time. We spent all day doing it and then had to wait for the colours to dry.

So now I'm all set for my new DIY projects - first on the list is to unstich the rose-dress and see what I can do with it. I think an evening in front of the TV with a good movie migh do the trick.