Room 101 - 'shit petite'

Some of you may recall the brief rant in my last post about petite fashion. It turns out this was a mistake as it's now become something of an obsession and all I can think about. So I'm going to have a bit of a moan on here and hopefully, lay this bug bear of mine to rest. 

Examples such as the ones above are what I'm referring to when I say "shit petite". I'm 36, I shop in the stores that stock them and I cannot understand how any woman in her right mind would want one of these things. Teenager? Perhaps (although I'm not even convinced about that one), but woman? Nope.  I don't buy it. And I mean literally, I don't buy it. And neither do any of my short friends either. Yes. We all hang out in gangs. We're easier to spot that way.

"Good things come in small packages". Ew. This just sounds like a bad joke to me. 

"Short stuff"? Reminds me too much of my school days. 

"Fun size"? Do I look like a Mars bar to you?! 

And while I'm having a rant, sticking some french words in to the mix doesn't make this collection filler (because let's be honest, that's all they are) any more 'chic'.

I'm not even going to list the shops the above items come from because they don't deserve the acknowledgement.

Just, please high street stores, PLEASE. Stop it now. 

And while we're at it, scrunchies. Also no. Although maybe that's a rant for another day.

Here Come The Girls!

Since I made my Mojo dress last month, most of my spare time has been spent in front of the sewing machine. And two dresses I made in that time went live in the shop yesterday!

Shop

I'm not ashamed to say that I'm bloody proud of them both.

I've finally reached a point where the quality of my work is matching my expectations which makes all the late night stitching sessions and endless hours of practise worthwhile. It tickles me that I only got into sewing because I had to. Being short meant that I was forever taking up jeans and various hems.

I'm serious! It wasn't all that long ago that the petite sections in high street shops were virtually non-existent and those that did exist only included the basics. I still find them annoying today to be honest. The selection is never as good as that for regular women and some of the designs are just plain lazy.

Top tip for high street stores: no short woman wants a t-shirt emblazoned with  "good things come in small packages".
Do you even sell any of those things?? DESIST.

Anyway. What was I saying? Ah yes, dresses.
I was very good. I made both of these vintage style dresses with fabric from my existing stash. I'm going to wait and see how well these are received and if they prove popular, then and only then will look to make more.

Oh and also, another thing that's made me wildly happier than it should is that I can now list my items to buy on my Facebook page! This will make it easier for people to see what is in stock without having to leave Facebook and it's another simple and secure way to purchase. 

All in all I'm feeling quite accomplished today and not a little relieved that it's nearly the weekend as I could do with a breather!

Although something has just occurred to me..while I've banned myself from buying new fabric for shop dresses, I could totally buy new fabric to make myself one!

Oooh, now there's a thought..

Ask Molly

It's the end of a busy couple of weeks and last night I came across this article on the Guardian website. It was one of those 'Ask Molly Ringwald' features. Someone was asking how they could stop being lazy and get motivated and as I've been feeling my own motivation start to slip away these past few days, I decided to give it a read.

Two sentences struck a chord with me;

"Your brain desperately needs the hormones that fire during exercise.."
and "..our living spaces are reflections of who we are."

Ok, well I know exercise is good for you both physically and mentally. I know that when I ran regularly, I felt and functioned better. I know that the 'runners buzz' you sometimes hear about is actually a thing and I know that surprisingly it's also addictive.
I also know that the first run is an utter bastard and isn't so much a run as a walk with the occasional Bambi-like, legs flailing everywhere, shuffle thrown in. Because no one tells you that you won't look like a proper runner at the beginning. I learned this the hard way when I caught sight of my shadow during my first run.
The image I had in my head of what I might look like (Paula Radcliffe having a gentle jog), was shattered as I saw my shadow self lolloping along in a slow Quasimodo style. But if you can past the lame excuses, the fact that you will not look like Paula Radcliffe (at least, not yet) and push yourself through that crappy first run, you'll find genuine enjoyment.
So yes, that will be happening this weekend. I will kill my demotivation dead with running.

And of course, the other thing I took from that article was the bit about our living spaces reflecting who we are.
It made me look around my living room and I saw, splashes of pretty, unfinished projects and a LOT of mess and clutter. Which pretty much sums up who I am perfectly I think. If I had to change anything from that little lot though it wouldn't be the mess or the clutter. Which shows how much I've changed in the past few years as I was a self confessed neat freak. Nowadays I view the mess as a sign that we're a family and I've written before about how bloody grateful I am for that, so no regrets there whatsoever. That said, perhaps I wouldn't be adverse to painting over the crayon and sticky hand prints on the wall now.
No, if I had to change anything it would be the unfinished projects. But as Alessi is now at a more independent age, we're finding that time is ours to play with again. That feels like a gift in itself. So I'm sure there will be more DIY and projects coming up in the not to distant future.

This post doesn't really have a point necessarily. But I've noticed that I've been self censoring what I write here lately. This blogs readership has grown over the past year which is what I'd always hoped for, but oddly this has made it harder for me to write as freely as I have in the past. So this morning, while Dan took Alessi out I thought I'd just sit down and write. The Molly Ringwald feature and my thoughts on it seemed perfect. Does it affect anyone else? No. Will it enhance anyones life? No. Is it even relatable? Probably not. Do I care about it? Why yes, yes I do. And that's the point.
I want to get this blog back to being what it was, a personal space for me to write shit. It isn't a platform to sell my work. I share my work here and on social media because it's a huge part of what I do and I bloody love it. But I don't make money from this blog. It's merely my spot on the internet to record my inner monologue of thoughts and today that includes Molly Ringwald, running and my living room.

I fully expect my next post to be about what a stupid idea running is, how I hate my living room and how Molly Ringwald can suck it. ;)

The Mojo Dress

In my last post I said that I was working on a dress for myself. Dan had a work do and I wanted something new to wear. Although if I'm honest, my real motivation was to see if I could get my sewing mojo back.  

When I decided to make the dress, I'd fallen out of love with dressmaking a fair bit. I had managed to ruin it for myself by setting too many deadlines and piling on the pressure to achieve things that I was in no position to. Ridiculous stuff really and more annoyingly, not the first time I've done it to myself either.

I had no interest in spending my time sewing and was completely devoid of ideas. I honestly thought that making this dress for myself would be a chore. Thankfully, it was anything but. Even better, I'm already thinking of ideas for the next one! And it was so nice to have something new to wear on a night out too.
Though perhaps next time I'll leave the heels at home. I mean, they looked great and I got to be a normal height for an evening, but wowza. My feet were crying by the end of the night! To be fair, the skanking and jumping about on the dance floor probably didn't help. And on hindsight, it's a miracle I didn't land on my arse, so I should probably just count my blessings that I got away with sore feet alone!

With regards to The Dress Tree. I haven't thought further than this point so I'm not sure what comes next. The important thing I've taken away from this is that my love of sewing is still there. The sorts of things I like to wear (and therefore make) has changed a great deal since last year so maybe all that was needed was a change of direction after all.

For now I'm just going to continue to take things easy and play with ideas. The shop will probably be on a slow burner now for the rest of the year, but I think I'm happy with that. At least for the time being while I work out exactly where I want it to go.
Slow and steady is better than fast and furious. In this case at any rate. 

And on that note, I will leave you with this picture of me dancing like a loon in a dress that gave me back the sewing bug. Which is why I've affectionately nicknamed it my mojo dress.