Hand bag designed by Alyssa
My seven year old niece Alyssa asked her mum if she would help her to sew a bag with her sewing kit. I asked her if she would like me to make one for her, of her design. She looked up at me with big round eyes and said “Can you make bags Aunty Karlene?”. I replied that yes I could, and showed her the bag I was using that day, that I had made. She had a look, got very excited and announced that she would draw a picture of her bag design right away.
Her is her drawing, complete with detailed design brief:
She wanted a round blue bag, with two handles, red on the top, a green button, a pink bow surrounded by black dots, “a real one, you can make the bow and then sew it on, Aunty Karlene” and a purple letter A for Alyssa. Wow! You can also see her first drawing of a more square bag that got crossed out when she changed her mind. This girl knows exactly what she wants.
I followed her design as much as possible and here is the result:
I used blue denim for the base and red velveteen for a flap. I wanted to use black sequins for the “dots” but do you think I could find any? After an hour of hunting in the sewing room and house, I decided to use beads instead. I used zig-zag stitch to sew on the purple ribbon to make the A, and managed to find a green button in my stash that looked ok with the other design elements.
I hope she likes it!
Her younger sister Briana also wanted a bag, more details on that soon.
Basic fairy skirt tutorial
I made a basic fairy skirt to wear to a theme party about three years ago and enjoyed wearing it so much that I wished I had made one sooner instead of waiting for a occasion to wear one. Every day should be a fairy skirt day!
I would like to share the technique I used. It’s a fairly quick and simple way of making a dress up skirt for children – or yourself – if you don’t like shop bought ones.
You will need at least two layers of fabric cut into squares, roughly one metre squared will give you a length approximately to the knee on an adult. You can make the squares larger or smaller depending on how long you want the skirt to be and how wide your fabric is.
I used four layers, first – purple satin lining (goes on the bottom), second-mauve nylon organza, third-purple net/tulle, and fourth (top)-mauve organza with a sparkly star print.
You can use whatever type of fabric you want,but I would recommend using something non-see through on the bottom.
Layer the fabric on on your table or floor alternating between “square” position and “diamond”.
Now you will need to cut a hole in the centre big enough to go over the hips.
Hip measurement plus ease divided by 6.28 will give you the radius measurement to draw a circle with a compass, eg. hip measurement of 94cm plus 3 cm ease (97cm) divided by 6.28 equals 15.45cm, get a compass and set it to 15.45cm, draw a circle, and the circumference should be about 97cm.
Use the circle as at template to centre over the squares/diamonds and cut hole. Ok, back up a bit. Before you lay your squares out, fold each one in half, then in half again to find the centre. You can then use the dot from the compass in the middle of your template to line up with the corner that is the centre of the square and cut through four layers, using a quarter of the template. Or you can fold/cut your template into quarters and place on top edge to edge, then cut. Do this for each layer. If you are very brave, or have a fancy cutting tool you could do all the layers together. Pins are allowed – just don’t hit them with scissors, they don’t like it.
Make a casing for elastic by cutting a strip of fabric as long as the circumference of the circle plus 2cm seam allowance, approx 6cm wide, and stitch together. Cut elastic to fit waist measurement and join up, fold casing in half right sides out and attach to skirt with elastic inside.
This can be tricky, you can attach casing first if you want, leaving an opening for elastic and then thread the elastic through. Personally, I think that way is even more tricky, its up to you 
You could also just use some matching ribbing or knit fabric for a waistband, as long as it doesn’t stretch too much after sewing on to the skirt. We wouldn’t want our fairy to have her skirt falling down!
Now add a pretty top, some wings and a wand and off you go.
The first Mummy bag
Here is a picture of the first attempt I made for a “Mummy” bag for Raewyn.
I wasn’t too happy about the way the handles were attached, but I also didn’t want them in the zip seam so I ended up doing another one for Raewyn.
The fabric for this one (cotton) was again from my nana’s stash, the floral outer fabric had been made into a skirt that looked a little crooked so I knew she wouldn’t mind me pulling it apart to re-use.
The inside has a large pocket stitched on one side and a smaller cellphone pocket on the other.
Wedding dress for my sister
I was honored to be asked by my sister Janelle to make her wedding dress (the wedding was in November 2007) even though it was going to be tough with her in Auckland and me in Paraparaumu at the time. She designed it herself, I interpreted the drawings, made the pattern and sewed it.
Not the best pose, I know, but it was the best view of the front.
She wanted the front to be ‘pretend’ lace up and the back to be real lace up as the opening.
The skirt was made to sit on the hips to show off her tiger tattoo on her back (can’t see it very well in photo) although not far enough down for her taste as it turned out, she lost weight before a crucial fitting 
and it ended up a little tight, even after I let the seams out as much as possible.
I also helped to make the flower girl dresses for my nieces. Janelle had made the skirts, with lovely layered chiffon petals, I did the top bits (On the big day, like seriously) and Mum joined them up after I started having a anxiety attack about the fact that I was still sewing dresses when I should have been putting on my own bridesmaid dress as we were already late for the ceremony – aahhhhhh!
They weren’t exactly how my sister envisioned them to be, but at least the girls had something to wear, and they still looked very cute.
The main thing I learned form this experience is how very important it is to listen to your client and keep communicating until you are 150% sure of what you are doing!
I also learnt I had too much stress in my life and I could no longer bear living so far away from my extended family. Luckily for me my wonderful husband was sympathetic and got a job in Auckland six months later.
BTW isn’t my little sister just beautiful? I am always flattered at any remarks of similarity.
