Fluorescent yellow velvet leggings and shorts 😀

I love the shorts and I hate the leggings. 

 

Same fabric, same pattern but just different lengths. 

I obviously had one of those "Oooo shiny shiny" moments you get when you have a fabric obsession that leads to you having a lovely to look at, but very unwearable fabric stash!

I try to restrain my self nowadays, and just buy practical colours navy, pale blue, black etc or nice prints - since at least thats wearable. Sometimes however, like this yellow, my liking takes over and I end up with stuff thats a beautiful wantable fabric, but what the hell am I going to make from this?

I have tons of it. I think I stupidly bought 3m so have loads still to use. Well it was cheap. Thats the only good thing about this buy - it was £2.25 a metre so at least I did not waste much money on it!

 

I have a liking though for cycling shorts of all lengths - being a cyclist. But also as a fashion item. These are really not up to serious cycling since they have no padding but they are great now the weather has become so hot. Its meant to get to 28 DegC today.

I can see me wearing the shorts lots but really cannot handle the leggings. 

 

I suspect in fact that these leggings will end up as my campsite PJs. Still at least they should have a use then and in the sunshine will not care about the over brightness of these.

I have loads of this yellow velvet that was meant to have lycra in it but I am not sure thats true. It does not really seem to have good enough recovery to be a lycra fabric - still never mind. I can use it for something though maybe in that case PJs will work better than actual leggings so its not such a loss that I am not keen on these after all. Though I do not think I can handle a matching top. At least not to be worn at the same time as the leggings.

 

But they will be fine for tramping to and from the showers/ toilets when on a campsite - after all as a close friend always says - anything goes when no one knows your name ..............

I do though like the shorts so much I am even considering a second pair. Well I have to find some way to use up the rest of the 3m of this I have in my fabric stash and its not really going to be an easy one to use. 

It seemed a great idea to buy fluorescent yellow velvet at the time. 😀

There is a local yearly event where everyone wears Dayglo and marches around Coventry. 

Maybe I should make a costume and join in next year?

 

Though the idea of fluoro velvet undies and some scrunchies does appeal and I may have to make some of each but the problem is I just have loads  of this yellow velvet! Scrunchies can come out of offcuts - so can undies. Not sure about swimwear which could work but I would have to line the fabric I think. I suspect it will look transparent when wet. Still the RP bikini I made a while back is lined so maybe that might be a good choice. There is a longer version of that pattern too which could look good. I will have to have a think. I kind of fancy a longer tankini bikini. The sea is never ever warm in this country so velvet could be a nice choice and the lining if containing lycra should hold it all in shape nicely. The idea is growing on me. Especially since the longer tankini version would look good as a top with a matching skirt and this could make a great tube skirt. 

I am seriously keen to use this fabric up this summer and not to leave it longer in my stash. Its not at all a wearable colour in winter despite being velvet and its already been in my stash around a year. Time to get rid and make use and find a way to wear it. I do think I might wear a tube skirt in this colour - at least when its hot so probably an evening skirt really since the velvet would be a bit too warm for very hot summer days even in the UK.

I do like a bit of fluorescent yellow - and orange - and green and occassionally even pink. And velvet too.............though on this particular occasion I am so glad I did not invest in all the different fluoro colours they were selling at the same time as I bought this.

Summer evenings here I come - and they will see me coming from a long distance away 😀

Happy weekend and see you soon

Bracken

My first attempt at a V neck T shirt

This fluourescent green skirt and top has my very first attempt at a V neck T shirt. Its an overlapping V neck. I need to get this right because I want to replace a T shirt belonging to my partner. Its his fave top for the last 20 something years and is literally falling to bits. I have some fabric that will work wonderfully but need to be able to make the neck work. I do not have enough of this fabric for it to go wrong either so I need to do a few practice tops first and this is the first attempt at this and having never done this type of neck before makes it a challenge which if course is always good.

Its the T shirt from steam punk pattern Simplicity 1819 so yet again I bought a costume pattern that is very useable for normal clothing and costs a fraction of the price.

Since I also bought the pattern in a sale it was even cheaper but nearly always costume patterns cost less than normal clothing patterns and if you ignore the picture on the cover and look instead at the line drawingsyou see the possibilities!

I will say right now this neck is not quite right but maybe my next attempt will be better.It actually looks better in the photos than in real life. My other half has said it will work for his top but I want to make it better first and need to do a few more practive attempts.

 A major problem is I never overlocked round the neck and cannot work out how to. The fact the neck ends overlap means that does not quite work. All I can think is to overlock the neck edge and the neck rib before sewing together. That would give a neat inside which this version lacks. I suppose it will not matter because this fabric will not fray but I do lke to try for a RTW finish where possible. This is not!

The skirt is the front section only of  New Look 6230. Its meant to have a split at the back like a pencil skirt but I wanted a slightly shaped tube skirt. Measuring the pattern against my other skirts I reckoned I only needed to use the front to get the size so cut two fronts and then added a waistband. Threaded with wide elastic and voila.

The hem is slightly wavy but will probably wear in. I did not press this at all but wore straight after making.

Its also a bit shorter than the New Look version but it worked out far me "me" if you know what I mean.

Thanks for visiting

Bracken

Fluorescent yellow dress and Upcycled band T shirt - Damned Damned Damned

 

I have always loved the Damned. 

Right from about age 12 I have been a fanso I do likea Damned Tshirt. I bought this one at a gig back in 2016 but despite my love of the band I do not love this T shirt. It started out virtually identical to the one below except my lettering was in white.

Its the wrong shape. I hated the tight neck - I am sure Damned T shirts used to be less tight round the neck when I was younger - maybe its my saggy old body😕

Or maybe cos int he 80s I cut the neck and sleeves off all my Tshirts!

Whichever I do not like this T shirt. I considered Ebaying it but will probably only get 99p or similar for it and in the end its a really good album - Damned Damned Damned that is so I would like to keep it. It also cost quite alot because I bought it at a Damned gig so its an official Damned T shirt and not copy.

I previously upcycled a few other old Ts and it was a real success because I live in them so I reckon this would also be good for this one rather than me chuck out what is a virtually unworn T shirt.

So there is was sittingw aitng for me to get round to doig something with it and I decided to look for powermesh to make a bra ( see a later post because this is yet to be finished). I find msome powermesh and also this offcut of large holed fishnet that I used to make this top inspired by Frieda Petrenko in Holby City.


You can read about that one here: https://brackencrafts.blogspot.com/2018/03/black-mesh-frieda-petrenko-inspired-top.html

So finding the mesh got me inspired and I decided to go a differnt route to my previous upcycling of T shirts which all use my TNT pattern McCalls M6612:




I do not want a low neck on this top because I want to keep all of the print so I am thinking slash neck maybe and because its the Damned and I previously had a tour T shirt with black lace on it I am going to trim the overlocked edges with black stretch lace rather than just hem them.

My intention in fact was to make something like this from it

 

So I used Butterick 5562 View D and this is how it turned out. Theres is black stretch lace on neck sleeve edges and hem of this top and I really love it though perhaps the neck is better without it being a boat neckline it sort of stands up. Stuff it, its there now anyway so I can live with it.

Here is worn over my fluorescent yellow vest dress which I also sewed up this weekend.

This was just a very quick make to use my lovely fluoro yellow ribbed fabric before summer ends and it becomes unwearable. Its not best shown here really because the black round the neck belongs to the exercise top I am wearing underneath it. Its just a basic vest dress.

I love this type of basic vest dress because they are so easy to wear. This is my old TNT pattern McCalls M6612. I really need to get round to tracing a version of this before it totally falls to bits. I have repaired it many times already so if I want to keep on using this its time I traced it. Its really weird because I bought this pattern by accident. I never realised I had put it into my shoppoing cart until it arrived and there it was. I bought it in a sale so no point returning because the retrun post was more than it cost. Yet I have used it more than any other pattern I own. Just shows you a basic pattern is often best I suppose.

This dress is some very stretchy lycra unknown fibre ribbed fabric off Ebay. I also own a green version f this fabric which I am making something from next I think.


Its exactly the same pattern as my fluoro pink dress but about an inch or 2.5cm longer since I thought the pink one is maybe a tad short. Also this is of course made from a different fabric. I love that dress so much though so that the obvious thing was to make a second one. Though I am thinking maybe I now need a racer back dress pattern. Just for a change.


I am planning a hoody to go with this but the hoody will be in stretch polyester crepe - my long hated but very warm fabric, but as most often, I intend to reverse this to make it handle-able for me. I think the hoody should transition well into autumn which is useful and will be very wearable with jeans etc. More on that later because I have yet to even cut that out or decide on a pattern.

I must admit to slight feelings of childishness when I wore this to Asda. 

But there you have to be who you truly are, else its no point in living is it?

I do love fluorescents! 

Bracken