Its all about me!

With only a coule of weeks to go to the Fat Quarterly Retreat in London, it's that time where we tell everyone all about ourselves and link up at the Fat Quarterly Blog!

This is me modelling my newly made Staple Dress which will also be coming to retreat! 

Some of you are going know me quite well through various forms of social media, real life and my online fabric shop Simply Solids. I reckon there are also going to be a bunch of folks who have no idea who the hell I am, so here goes!

I'm a mum of 3 kids, Holly, Max & Hunter! Hunter came to retreat with me last year as he was just a few weeks old. This time there will be no kids - Woop!!

Holly, Max & Hunter with their friend Harland on the right

I bough Simply Solids last September from my lovely real life friend Mandy as she had decided to get a proper job!! I planned on keeping it small and low key, more of a hobby really as I was also a neo-natal nurse. Things haven't quite panned out that way and the shop is going from strength to strength so I quit my nursing job, which to be honest is still scaring me and I'm now broke to boot!

I started sewing back in 2009 and although I don't get as much time to sew as I would really like, I still manage to squeeze in bits here and there. I love making quilts and sewing smaller projects like pouches & cushions.

Scrappy Trip Along

Swoon

Zipped Pouch

Embroidery

Table Runner

At retreat I'm doing Kerry's PJ pants class, Lucie's Improv class & Katy's Triangle City EPP. 

I'm especially looking forward to just hanging out and selfish as it sounds, having some me time away from the responsibilities of 3 children!! 

I cannot wait to chat, laugh, learn some new techniques, sew & of course have a beer or three, meet new sewers, put faces to twitter & blog names and spend some much needed down time with some of my real life best friends.


If you want to connect you can find me here:

Twitter: @sewjustinesew & @SimplySolids
IG: SewJustineSew
Flickr: sewjustinesew

17 sleeps........EEEEEEP!!!!

dressmaking galore

If you follow me on Twitter and Instagram then this is probably old news but hey I want to document here that I've managed a wee bit of dressmaking!!

Hooray I hear you shout. You didn't shout that? Oh, the voices in my head again, ooops.....

A few Saturdays back I drove a fair distance from sunny Yorkshire down to Leicester to hang out with one of my sewing besties, the very gorgeous LJ. Our intention? To make Washi dresses. If you've no idea what the hell I'm talking about then this will all sound very odd, I'm aware of that but bare with me, it's worth it!

After hours of sewing, some of it naked, mucho pattern hashing when we realised we'd made a mistake (read the pattern folks, whatever you're making read the pattern!) First time shirring for me, huge debates on required sizes to accomodate boobs - you're getting the picture right? We actually finished albeit quite late, with two fantabulous dresses that actually fitted us!!!

We grabbed the last of the evenings light and took some silly shots of us wearing our new frocks!!

The dress was easy to make, so easy Laura made another the very next morning and I have another one cut out and ready to sew! The pattern is well written and easy to follow, even for a beginner dress maker which is what I totally class myself as! If you want to check it out head over to Rae's site where you can download a copy now. Actual paper copies are also available at Backstitch here in the UK.


I've also finished up the Staple Dress that I started at Katy's a few weeks ago too. I decided not to shirr this one and will wear it belted instead, I really love this dress and there will be more, of that I'm certain.

Finally I've been busy stitching up some little half inch hexies of Liberty Lawn which will be sewn together to make a name badge for a secret recipient who is going to the Fat Quarterly Retreat next month!!!

The picture above is a few days old and I now have all my hexies sewn together ready for the name adding, it will most definitely be in the post this weekend to the recipient!!

not much sewing!

Here I was thinking I was on a roll and then what happens? A whole week has passed by and I've hardly sewn a thing. Grrrr!

We had a cracking day out for Father's Day yesterday. We went to Cannon Hall and the kids loved it at the working farm, we've now got a Pygmy Goat in the running for our next pet!

I've also been super busy making up new warm and cool tonal bundles for Simply Solids. These will be in the shop once I've had them photographed properly!

The only sewing I've managed is these teeny tiny hexies that will be turned into my secret swap partners name badge for the Fat Quarterly Retreat next month - I'm planning on getting this finished this week!

Finally I just wanted to share with you all a quick picture of my new tattoo. It's sewing themed and I am proper in love with it! Its on my left inner forearm and is huge:

What do you think? It was designed by the very talented Sarah and inked by the equally talented Frank who works at The Bleeding Art in Huddersfield.

I adore it and can't wait for the next installment!!!

Seriously Mahoosive Giveaway!

I've joined up with Fiona over at The Sewing Directory today to offer an amazing and mahoosive giveaway competition! 

Please head over there now to see what you need to do to enter. Go on then. Shoo!

June's Sew Solid Stash Club

Here's a heads up on a little change I've had to make to the schedule - arggh!

June should be greys according to the colour wheel but as my supplier has not one bolt of any grey in the warehouse that's not possible. Unfortunately I'm not magic. Boo.

Anyway after much debate and discussion with the supplier regarding available stock July has jumped forward a month and it's lovely reds will now be June's colour - Hooray!

Here's what you can be expecting:

There will be Kona Red, Burgundy, Chinese Red, Cayenne, Poppy & Wine.

I think you'll agree when you receive your bundle that there's a nice range of colours (they all look dark on screen or is it my eyes? It's late!) I didn't just want the in your face fire engine red, though naturally that's in there too!

You've got until the 15th to sign up to stash club and get June's colours. Check out the details and sign up here.

PS: Don't forget the Tempting Tuesday offer is on until midnight tonight here.

Tempting Tuesday Offer

Tomorrow sees another Tempting Tuesday offer over at my shop Simply Solids.

15% off the cute FQ bundle shown below as well as yardage in those four colours too.

Be quick the offer is only valid from Midnight Monday 10/6 to Midnight Tues 11/6.

Kona Apricot, Lemon, Periwinkle & Bubblegum

Happy Shopping!!!

busy what me?!

This last couple of weeks have whizzed by in a blur and here we are at the beginning of June! 

I've spent lots of quality time with the family and zilch time sewing, which has been great whilst it was happening and the kids have loved having my undivided attention but my workload for the next couple of weeks is now huge!! Hey Ho, home/work balance is something we're all working on right?

I wanted to share some pictures of what we've been up to so here you go:

That's right folks we went to visit the Harry Potter studio tour! It was a joint birthday present for the hubs and Holly from my parents and what can I say...A.MAZ.ING!!

We're all Harry Potter mad here so it was quite emotional for some of us, ahem, read me, to be on the actual real life set. Afterwards we hopped on the train to central London to do a bit of sight seeing and that's when the battery on my phone died. As did the hubs phone. Typical. So no pictures, which is a real shame as it was a glorious day. 

The day after we returned from London, the kids and I had a short break to the East Coast in my friends caravan, she was there with her son too.

As you can tell the weather was pretty poor, it was freezing most days but we still had fun on the beach and in the park! Its just nice to be away and have a change of routine isn't it?

The sunshine appeared of course when we came home, so Holly has made the most of it and got in a spot of gardening over the weekend!

Until next time when I promise there will be some sewing progress of some sort made!