I’ll get to my post in just a minute, but first a quick REMINDER for Kirsten’s “SWEDISH SWEETNESS” listed on Ebay. It ends this evening and I hope to see you at the finish line! :o) If you want to take a peek at the outfit, you can click on the picture at the right side bar or click HERE.
Next… I had a super busy weekend with LOTS of different things going on… Our basement flooded from all the rain we had… not terribly, (it’s been worse) but there was probably 1/2″ of water all on the concrete floor… It’s an 1892 stone basement and not pretty at all, but it looks even worse with water down there… The sump pump couldn’t keep up with all the water and it overflowed…
Next… My hubby is having someone from Orkin put down a new vapor barrier in the crawl space because he can’t do the crawling under there himself now. They are going to spray all the wood under the flooring and a few other things. My hubby got a ladder and climbed up into the hole in the stone wall and was able to do a little bit of work gathering up some wires and other things… I was the “Gopher” girl… Go fer this, Go fer that… and he kept me quite busy…
Next… I had a friend who needed a sweater fixed… if possible.. it had gotten some holes in it and she said it was her favorite… How could I not fix it? It’s far from perfect, but I tried to match the thread as closely as possible and pulled the holes together so she could at least wear it without feeling like everyone was staring at her… (I should have taken a before shot but I forgot!)
Next… I had another friend who needed a pair of pants altered for his daughter’s wedding in a few weeks… I had to take in the waist, (simple job), shorten the rise, (harder job which is actually taking in the width of the legs of the pants so they aren’t so full in the thigh area… it’s done by taking the crotch seam undone and then taking the seams of the legs apart down to the knees, and then sliding the back leg over and restitching the seam to take out some of the fullness. Then you have to restitch the curve of the crotch.) I had to hem them as well… this is just the finished project. :o) I was glad when this was finished!
Then I had to find some time to work on Noel’s jacket… hmmm… what to do?
I decided to go with my gut and use the rose colored wool felt jacket I had already cut out… It goes perfectly with the fabric as you could see from the pictures where Bitty Bethany is wearing one like it.
I decided to do it the way I usually do… and not take any shortcuts. I used my embroidery machine and stitched a design on the felt to use as a guide for filling in the flowers and leaves with silk ribbon.
It’s a little bit tricky to stitch the design on a curved piece that is rather small. The design is just meant to be stitched in a straight line… not curved, so you have to pivot your jacket a few times to get it to stitch in a curved pattern. It doesn’t have to be perfect, because you’ll be filling in lots of the areas with embroidery. I used an olive green thread for the applique stitch and the machine embroidery.
Once the design was stitched on and the edges were finished off with an applique stitch around the edges, it was time to find all the colors of silk ribbon (I hoped I had the right colors) and start making it up as I went along… I like doing this… it’s relaxing to me. So these next few pictures are what I ended up with…
I added 3 of my tiniest buttons to the one side… This picture is probably pretty true to the right colors…
I even added a few flowers to the back of the jacket.
I laid Noel down on my cutting table to see if the lights shining from above might make the colors appear better… They are close…
It was kind of cloudy outside, but VERY VERY windy, and I decided to see if I could get any truer pictures of the set. We both had quite the windblown look to our hair when we came inside…
I’m hoping for better pictures when I list this on Ebay… I need to have everything set up and get it just right… The best thing I can tell you, is, IF you like this set in these pictures, thinking you know what it looks like, you’ll be VERY pleased if you win it. It is a stunning combination of colors in my opinion…
Well, I have more to do to finish it, but I wanted to show you what I spent my time on this weekend. Hope yours was not quite so busy as mine!
See you tomorrow,
Blessings, Jeanne
You certainly were busy with things that are not as much fun as making dolls clothes. I like the pink jacket so much better. Bringing out the color of the flowers instead of the material background is a much better choice. Good job! I have always loved Noel. She is an adorable doll. Have a good day!
Oh, boy, Jeanne, I feel your pain as to the leaking basemen! Been there, done that, several times! Twice it leaked thru the chimney and fireplace brickwork into the center of the part under our living room–gave a whole new meaning to the term “pool table”–we had a “pool” under it!! Fortunately, most things in that area were in plastic bins, and once we got the brickwork tuck-pointed, that stopped the problem.
We’ve also had leaking in the part under the two bedrooms on the east side–a tiny crack in the foundation fairly low down plus a huge heavy rainstorm….And this doesn’t take into account the times something to do with the washer has caused water on the floor!!
What a job to alter those trousers! I haven’t had to do that particular alteration (crotch depth) but have read about how to do it, and it is indeed very labor-intensive! And not much fun….(ditto mending!)
I love the pink jacket, and I think your pictures today are showing much better how well the pink matches the print. I could really see it in that first picture, with the jacket laying flat on the fabric. Really shows up there! And thanks for showing us about doing a decorative machine stitch as the foundation for your ribbon embroidery. What a great idea!
Whatever you did in taking pictures, you did it well, Jeanne, and the pink is not so PINK anymore! AND, the blue is blue, not gray! Yay! Yes, it is a stunning combination, and works very well. What a difference!
So that’s how you do that fancy embroidery! Since i don’t have a machine that does that, I thought it was all free hand, but that’s great that you have guiding lines to work with.
So sorry about your basement! We have been there too, but thank goodness those days are over. Since our family room, office, laundry room, and workshop are in the basement, it had better stay dry!
As far as being windy yesterday, yes, it was! My daughter and I were in Cape to see the production of “Cinderella”, put on by the college students, including my granddaughter, and we almost got blown away!!
So now, what happens to the blue jacket you made?
Still worried about the new roof. Were you able to get someone out to take a look? Maybe the insurance people too?
So, with the ground under the house covered with a vapor barrier, will you also be insulating the floor? Maybe that is done already. We really need to have a vapor barrier done since we often have moisture under the house. Sorry to hear about the sump pump. It happens, but looks like everything was off of the floor so that is good. Now, if some of that excess rain could be piped this way, we’d be so thrilled. Looks like we may get a few drops this week. Not much at all, but we will gladly take it.
Those pants must have been a tremendous amount of work. So kind of you to fix them.
Noel’s new outfit is definitely matching colors now. Love the outdoor photos that are a much more muted look and show the true colors. 🙂
We’re heading down to see the grands this morning and celebrate a birthday a few days early for middle grand. She’ll be nine. 🙂
I really love this outfit. The jacket is perfect. The pictures are good. Can’t wait to see some in the sun.
Thanks so much for showing the “template” for embroidering the flowers, etc., on the jacket. It actually inspires me to do something like this. I’ve done a lot of hand embroidery but never with ribbon. I have a book on it so I might give it a go. But doing regular hand embroidery after doing a machine embroidery design first could also prove interesting and fun. I used to do a lot of handwork of all kinds in the evenings and really need to get back to that. Not sure what has changed but I need to find out and go back to whatever I used to do that gave me more time in the evening. Having dinner earlier would help but I’d need hubby’s cooperation on that and he gets tied up with things that always take longer than expected.
I had the shock of my life yesterday when we met Sean and family for lunch. Granddaughter, Jaiden, had her 18″ My Life As doll with her. That is a first ever. Rosa sat between us for lunch and Jaiden made sure she had plenty to eat. Her mom never got to experience little girl things and seems to really have trouble relating to this. But Jaiden has a lot of girlfriends now and they all have 18″ dolls and Jaiden is playing dolls for the first time. But she is still a little iffy about her Nanna’s interest in dolls. She goes along with it but gives me funny looks.
On my way to an early lunch. The Chorale will be singing at a memorial service this afternoon and I won’t relax till I’m dressed and there.
So sorry about your leaking basement, Jeanne. That happened at the house I lived in as a pre-teen. We had just moved in and the rain flooded the basement family/ rec room. I remember helping to tear up the carpet. Luckily, that’s about all that was ruined.
Noel’s jacket looks perfect now. The jacket and dress colors match so nicely now. I really should have kept my opinion to myself since i don’t have a doll that can wear this anyway and you can see that the colors match.. The embroidery is super sweet. i didn’t realize you had a machine to do the preliminary lines. That is very helpful. I thought it was freehand as well I would have to measure and mark as I did when I did silk ribbon embroidery on a few collars of dresses for my daughter. I might need to try that for a doll as they will never outgrow the dress/ jacket and I loved doing that craft.
I would love to see your embroidery work for one of your girls. Love that look. 🙂