It's the 13th of the month again, which means that today, is my birthday!, and time for another post in my When we were young series. This month I am very happy to have my new sewing friend Mie from Sewing like mad guest posting.  If you love sewing and you read blogs, you have probably heard of Mie and seen her amazing sewing.  We 'met' through Project Run and Play.  Mie made it to the finals - woohoo! Her sewing is just amazing.  I have not come across another sewer who sews as impeccably as Mie.  All her finishing and details are so professional, and I love her fun style.  Check out some of her great sewing tutorials (if you want to know how to sew properly, listen to Mie). She sews for her two beautiful daughters and herself.  Mie also hosted her first guest series recently - Sewing for Kindergarten which was very popular. I'm sure the Danish fashion house that once were lucky enough to have Mie sewing for them was sorry to see her go when she moved to America with her family five years ago.  Here is a sample of some of her recent makes...

 

 

The skirt I am wearing is by the way also homemade. My Mom could not remember whether it was herself or my paternal grandmother who made it. We had a lot of sewers in my family. Which makes it even more weird to think about that I only even considered starting sewing when I was like 20 years old. Buuut I think I have made up for my late start!

 

 

So I had to guess how the back looks like and I made it this way.

The front of the skirt is gathered to the front waistband but the back is gathered with an elastic inside. This way it is easy to get on and off. I have buttons on the inside of the back waistband and button holes in the straps.

A closer look at the sleeve cuff.

Here in the end I have to tell you a short funny story. 

So after the photo shoot we went out for lunch and even though Evelyn did not wanted to wear the skirt or have her hair made before the shoot, yeah we managed with some bribing,  she ended up wanting to wear it all the whole day - yup, that a three year old for you. 
SO at the restaurant she starts telling the people at the next table that she is dressed like Mommy. Ha, they looked at me and was totally lost. And me? I did not even try to explain that one - too complicated.

Yeah you know I am a blogger and I am participating in this series and......ohhh, forget about it. But I had to tell you because you will understand!

 

Thank you SO much for having me Suz. SO much fun!

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Thankyou Mie!! You did a fabulous job and I am so glad you enjoyed this sewing experience!!

About six weeks ago, I was calculating how far away Christmas was and, since I am often thinking about sewing, I was thinking that around this time (now), many sewer/bloggers would start thinking about what special outfits they might make their child/children for Christmas.  I love Christmas and for the past few years, I have sewn my daughters a new dress to wear on Christmas day.  I thought it would be fun to start a series that invited bloggers to share their Christmas creations in one central space over the 12 days of Christmas, the 1-12 December.

So, I got to work emailing some blogging friends and also some bloggers I really liked but didn't yet know well.  Nearly everyone was keen and free.  Yay!  I then decided to branch out and ask one of my guests who I didn't know well to co-host the series with me.  I asked the lovely Laura of Craftstorming who blogs from England about sewing and baking.  Her stuff is awesome, and I knew if she said yes, we would have a successful series.  Well, she did...and The 12 Days of Christmas was born!!  All going well, we plan to host The 12 Days of Christmas annually.

So from the 1-12 December, Laura and I will host 22 bloggers (plus ourselves) and will share what we have made for our children as well as how we spend Christmas now  and also share some of our favourite childhood Christmas memories.  We will synchronise our posts to publish at 9pm Australian Eastern Daylight Savings Time over these days.

Laura and I thought a lot about who to invite as we wanted to include a range of blogs - from small to large from different parts of the world.  On our list are bloggers from Australia, England, America, Denmark, Belgium, Portugal and Canada (with a hint of Russian from one of our bloggers too).  To our pleasant surprise, some of our guests are from different religious backgrounds, being Jewish and Buddhist.  These religions do not celebrate Christmas officially but they still enjoy the festive season and we are excited to hear how people's stories differ. Some blogs have less than 100 followers, while some have over 1000.  Here is the guest list....

You can hover and click on any of the blog names on this calendar to visit that blog (thanks to Laura's excellent tech skills!).  (When you click on the link, it will open in the same window).

We have also created a flickr group if you would like to share what you have made for your child/children for Christmas (clothing only).  Laura and I will do a round up on December 19th of any sewers who would like to sew along and share in the group!  Feel free to join the flickr group whenever you like.  And if you would like to spread the word about this series, feel free to use the sew along button below and link back to this post...

We have also created a pinterest board you can follow  If you would like to see what guests are pinning and perhaps be inspired to sew something festive too. If that wasn't motivation enough Santa has a special message for you...

We are excited!! And we hope you are excited too and would love you to sew along and tune in here at sewpony and at Craftstorming from the 1-12 December!!

I really enjoyed hosting my series, When we were young.  If you have not heard of it before, it was a series where guests chose a photo of themselves in an outfit from their childhood and re-created it for their daughter now.  You can read the introductory post here.  The series included lovely stories of guests' childhoods and the creations were all amazing.  I was lucky to have 12 lovely guest bloggers from Australia, USA, Belgium, Portugal and Denmark. 




Aren't they fantastic?  I love them all...and I received so many positive and lovely comments from readers and guests and was sad as the series was drawing to a close.  After receiving some encouraging comments from one of my guests, Sarah, who suggested I keep the series going indefinitely, I started to ponder.... perhaps I could?  Of course, not on a weekly basis, but maybe once per month??

 

On the 13th of each month (because the 13th was the day I was born...November), a surprise guest blogger will pop up her at sewpony to continue the When we were young series.  I have also been thinking about hosting a sew - along/"linky party" (I am reluctant to use that term...but that's what they're called, right?).   This would then open the series up to anyone who would like to participate in recreating an outfit from their childhood.  The linky party/sew along, would probably not be for a few months as people need time to hunt through photos and I need time to organise the ins and outs...and perhaps some prizes!!

So start hunting guys!! Find that treasure of an outfit you wore when you were young and save it somewhere safe...and stay tuned...I will post more about the sew along as I make progress on it...Feel free to join my When we were young flickr pool if you are keen to sew along.

So what do you think?? Will you sew along?

 

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Hi, I'm Kristin from skirt as top and I'm happy to be here at the tail end of When We Were Young!  Such a fun series, I've really gotten a kick out of everyone's posts!  I actually sewed my outfit months ago, I was so excited for this.  Didn't get photos until recently though, and my daughter had a growth spurt in those couple months, but ah well.  I knew exactly which outfit I wanted to recreate and couldn't wait to sew it.  

This is me in 1986.  

As you can see by my mom's note at the bottom, I was 4 and a half.  My daughter is 5 now, so we were pretty darn close in age!  We lived on an acre of land out in the semi-country with a couple lambs that helped "mow our lawn," as my parents put it.  I loved basically going outside in the summer mornings and not coming in except to eat.    

Here I am in my little romper and saltwater sandals, living summertime outdoors.  My mom said my romper was a hand me down (I was the oldest so it was likely from a relative).  You can see my early love of climbing too!

With a series of photos like that, of course I had to make a romper for my little gal.  I knew the print would be almost impossible to find, so I took some creative liberty both with that and with the design (wanted to make it a bit more modern). Here's what I came up with...

The fabric is a thrifted bed sheet, with store bought bias tape for the bindings.

Her salt waters are a different color too, but it all goes together and better reflects my daughter's girlier personality (I was more of a tomboy when I was little).

The pattern is the Retro Romper by Blank Slate Patterns, and it was such a joy to sew!  I love the instructions for attaching the bodice to the shorts and simultaneously creating a casing for the elastic, and it came together super quickly.  I made some fit changes to take it even MORE retro; the bodice is a 4T but the shorts are a 2T (with 4T width).  Aside from the shortened rise, I also shortened the shorts to the 18m skort cutting line, re-rounding the edges to keep the sweet running short look. Short shorts are so quintessentially '80s, amirite? 

I think I should've lengthened the bodice a bit to compensate for my short shortening and give her a bit more growing room, but how was I to know she was going to grow an inch and a half in, like, 2 months??

She likes it and my husband has said it's one of his favorite things I've made for her, probably because she gets all silly when she wears it - something about a romper makes her all acrobatic, much more so than with a dress.  She hadn't worn a romper since she was a tiny baby, so it was fun to make one she could wear as a big five year old.  Rompers are fun!

Feel free to come visit me at skirt as top anytime!  

 

Thanks so much for having me here, Suz!  

 

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I absolutely love your romper Kristin!! I have been thinking about making one for a while, so will have to give one or two (or perhaps three - one for each girl!!) a go this summer!  Thanks so much for sharing your gorgeous outfit (by the way, I love Em's sandals... I have the same pair!!)

This week for When we were young, I have my friend Marta, from Do Guincho, guest posting from Portugal.  Marta kindly tested my Debbie's birthday dress pattern so you may recognise her gorgeous daughters, Teresa and Ines, from the blue gingham dresses she made for my blog tour.  I first found Marta's blog when I stumbled across her awesome 3D dress tutorial at Project Run & Play.  I have used this tutorial here - it is brilliant!!

Marta makes GORGEOUS clothes for her girls (the pink seersucker shorts above were self drafted by Marta).  She is a busy architect so can only fuel her sewing passion at night.  Her sewing skills are amazing and I love that she often takes her daughters on location around her local area to photograph them in her creations.  Marta lives near Lisbon in Portugal - where it looks like it is summer all year long.  I want to go there for my next holiday!!!  Marta writes in Portugese and English at Do Guincho and is super friendly so make sure to say hi over at her gorgeous blog!!

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Then I came across this red and white knitted dress my mother knitted me...

Here I am with my uncle, who was also my godfather.

My mother doesn’t like to sew (back in the 70’ we had a professional seamstress coming to our home once a month to sew our clothes), but she loves to knit.  Since I don’t like knitting, I thought it would be nice to remake my old dress using fabric.

Teresa loved her new dress! Hope you like it too!

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Another beautiful dress Marta!! Thank you so much for guest posting here today!

I have had the pleasure of An, of StraightGrain's company on my blog twice in one week.  She sewed up my Debbie's birthday dress here, and today she is guest posting for When we were young!  As you may have read a few days back, I am a huge fan of An and her lovely creations for her daughter Norah.  An's is one blog that I read very regularly.  She always comes up with new and imaginative sewing ideas and techniques and her patterns are just gorgeous. 

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Where were you born/where did you spend your childhood?

I was born in Duffel, Belgium, and lived there untill I went off to study in Antwerp, where I still live now. In case you're wondering: yes, the duffle coat and duffle bag were named after the little town I spent my childhood in! Indeed, a long time ago, Duffel was renowned for its production of the cloth used for overcoats and luggage. These days, it is renowned for pretty much nothing.

Who did you grow up with?

I grew up with one little sister, Sarah, who is 2.5 years younger. And with Guinea pigs - I love guinea pigs!

Did you have a childhood ambition? 

Becoming a veterinarian. Specializing in guinea pigs, dolphins, and kittens (dogs scare the **** out of me!)

What did you like doing when you were little?

Reading books, and writing stories, mostly. And taking care of  my guinea pigs, of course.

Do you see any similarities between yourself and your child/children? 

This is a difficult question. As far a personality is concerned, I see more resemblances between Norah and her dad, than between Norah and me. But that's probably because I don't know myself that well. 

There is one similarity which does stand out I guess, and that is that Norah loves to play with (matchbox type) cars. She's not interested in dolls at all; she plays with her cars and garage all day long. Her interest in more "boyish" stuff is something we share: I also like doing cool stuff with hammer and saw, lighting the barbeque, trying to fix the sink, and so on, much more than I like so-called girly jobs. Sewing would be one important exception to that rule, of course (although, aren't most successful fashion designers men?).

Where do you live now and who with?

Do you live far from where you grew up?

No, Antwerp is just a thirty minute drive away from Duffel.

 

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I used my upcoming Hanami dress pattern, but left off the flutter sleeves. 

Thank you so much, Suz, for including me in this amazing series!

 

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Thankyou An!  What a beautiful and creative outfit!!  But I was hoping to see Norah in a pair of orange pipe-cleaner glasses!!