Getting 2014 under way

I feel like a thief. I read lovely inspirational sewing blogs, but almost never comment and clearly have been a rubbish blogger myself. Hopefully things are about to change.

I have sewlutions this year. I want to blog once a fortnight, participate in at least one sewalong and I'm going to participate in the stashbusting challenge 2014. That aligns with my overall plan to only sew from my stash (self imposed shopping ban), to sew regularly and to work my way through my patterns.

I'm also going to shift my blog reading from the RSS feed in my email to a blog reader that will facilitate commenting and engaging with blogs and to make my reading of those blogs more public and less covert (I wasn't aiming for covert when I set up my feeds, it's just ended up that way).

So, on to the sewing. I did some sewing before Christmas, santa sacks and the like, but I'm not ready to put my children's names on the internet, so I think I'll start the year with my last project of 2013, a By Hand London Victoria blazer for my beautiful sister.  I ordered and received it very quickly from Stitch 56.

My sister is a lithe and beautiful size 10. Sometimes a size 8, but very tall. So I cut her a 10 in the cropped blazer, hoping that any sizing issues can be ignored because it's a nice slouchy, relaxed fitting blazer (very relaxed because I can fit my chubby self into it, although it doesn't look nice and relaxed when I do). My sister (and I) has quite long arms, so I figured the cropped sleeves would be handy there too.

I wanted a fresh and nice look for my sister to wear with summer dresses. Plus she's a teacher in Sydney, so I figured the blazer would be handy for her, but it was important that it be fairly lightweight, because she lives in a humid place. So I chose a white sand washed linen for the shell and a floral voile for the lining and contrast cuffs.

Fresh and floral Victoria blazer

Lovely lining, not just flowers, but also butterflies 

Cuff close up, a bit washed out alas, stupid flash (or bad photographer?)

The pattern came together really easily. I must admit to being intimidated by the dart/neckline thingy. So when I came to that I read the tutorials, got confused and put it away for a few days. When I picked it back up, the stars aligned and I had my a-ha moment and it was easy peasy.

I'm pretty happy with how it turned out over all. I still haven't seen my sister for Christmas, so not sure if the fit will work or if she will even like it, but as it was my only homemade gift, I really really hope so. I know you should only make things for people who will appreciate them and my sister fits that bill. Plus it's a way I can show her how much I love her. So hopefully she likes it. Unfortunately the linen is less opaque than I thought, but I'm hoping she can live with being able to see the lining a little bit.

So that's one garment down for 2014, it's not from my stash, but it is using a new pattern (to be fair, having only been sewing for 18 months, that's not exactly an achievement) and it was finished relatively quickly.

Now I've just got to finish assembling her birthday presents (from July) and I'll be ready for her visit next week.