Me Made May reflections and future sewing plans

It's almost the middle of June so it's time for my traditionally late Me Made May reflections .  I'd like to say a big thanks to Zoe for organising Me Made May again, it's such a brilliant concept and a wonderful community to be a part of. It was great seeing everyone's makes, and I enjoyed taking part even though I hardly took any photos.

My aims were to wear something I've made every day, catalogue my garment fabric and make a summer dress.  So how did I do? Well I wore something me-made every day except one, catalogued most of my garment fabric but didn't manage to make a summer dress.

Wearing something I've made every day wasn't really a challenge as I pretty much do that anyway, except I realised I've a bit of a gap in dresses, in that I haven't sewn any in a long time!  So I'd like to remedy that with a few work appropriate dresses that will also be suitable for winter, as well as hopefully making a summer dress.  Of course every year I say I'm going to make trousers and this year is no exception. Well except even I was fed up with my procrastinating and just went out and bought two pairs from H&M which I now wear loads so the pressure is off!



Marilla Walker Maya top with H&M bright orange trousers

There are lots of repeats in what I wore during May, both in me-mades and shop-bought clothes and I have to say I'm pleased with that - it shows that I make things I like to wear. However I do still have quite a lot of things I don't wear much/at all so maybe I need to think about a bit of a clear out of them.  my most worn me-mades were my 3 Deer & Doe plantain tops/dress and my 3 Megan Nielsen Brumby skirts which I could quite honestly wear all summer!  I also wore my Marilla Walker Maya top 3 times so I think it's time to make a second version of this as I can see the navy is getting a bit faded sadly.

By Hand London Victoria Blazer with H&M dress (for a job interview)

Sherbet Grainline Scout tee with H&M trousers and Hobbs cardigan

Pink Megan Nielsen Brumby with H&M t-shirt & Hobbs cardigan

Pink Megan Neilsen Brumby with H&M top.

Cataloguing my fabric. How have I done? So far I've catalogued almost all my garment sewing fabric, woven & knits, but not my quilting fabrics. For garment sewing then I have 54 pieces of fabric, totalling 80metres, yes that's right 80metres of fabric! It seems a bit obscene to me really so it's definitely helped me resist buying any more fabric. A quick look at Cora when I have an idea for something to sew and I can tell myself that I have quite enough fabric to choose from without buying more.



Now - on with the summer dress! I have a wedding in August and I'm hoping to get one made in time for that.  I've also just cut out another Vogue 1247 skirt in bright pink, have the fabric and a pattern for some wide-legged trousers, and plans for a few more plantains to replace some very worn looking t-shirts.  Did you take part in Me Made May this year, how did you get on?  What are your sewing plans for the next few months?

Me-Made-May 2017 plans

How did it get to be May so quickly?!  In the sewing blogger/instagram world May means the return of Me Made May - a challenge established by Zoe of Sozowhatdoyouknow 'designed to encourage people who sew/knit/crochet/refashion/upcycle garments for themselves to wear and love them more.'
I tend to wear things I've made pretty much every day now so I wasn't sure about taking part this year as I always find it hard to get photos each day. However the photos aren't the main point (though they are a great source of inspiration!) so I decided I could still benefit from taking part if I set myself a new challenge.

Beginnings of my fabric record on Cora

So this is my challenge

I, Kathryn of kathrynsbusytown.blogspot.co.uk(kathryn_mhairi on instagram) sign up as a participant of Me-Made-May '17. I endeavor to wear at least one me-made garment every day. I also endeavor to catalogue all the garment fabric I have in an attempt to sew with fabric I already own rather than buying more. I will also make myself a new summer dress without buying any new fabric to do so.

 

The first challenge I decided on is a bit of a busman's holiday really as I'm an archivist by trade but sadly my sewing materials, books, digital files etc are not nearly as organized as I am in work!  I remembered reading Helen's review of the Cora app for fabric management ages ago so I decided to check it out using the free version first.  Asides a glitch on the price section - due to me having my phone set to the wrong region - I really enjoyed using it.  Hélène, the developer of the app, was brilliant at helping me sort out why I couldn't get the £ sign in the price section and responded so quickly to my query that I decided to go ahead and purchase the full version.  You can add in as much or little information as you like including:

• Photo
• Category (knit, woven, other)
• Weight (light, medium, heavy)
• Content
• Design
• Colours
• Length of fabric
• Width of fabric
• Cost
• Source
• and a notes section.

You can see below how many fabrics I've put in already and I love that you can organise them by price, length, fabric type, colour etc. I like the tool that allows you to export a PDF of all your fabrics which includes the photos and all the information you have inputted. There is also a great section called 'Fabric summary' which tells you how much fabric you have overall. Shockingly even just these 14 pieces of fabric is 26 metres worth.  I really hope having this tool will help me sew from my stash as it seems so wasteful to buy more fabric when I have so much already.

Does anyone else use Cora? Or have other ways of managing their fabric?

In relation to the second challenge to make a summer dress I've also recently discovered the joy of Instagram Collections and have started a sewing inspiration collection which, coupled with my newly catalogued fabric stash, should help me decide what to make. You can see part of my Sewing Inspiration collection below.  Has anyone else been using the collections in this way? Any tips?