A story of 5,000 Dresses

A year or so ago I decided to make a dress for the 'Dress A Girl Around the World' charity in America. 

 MY DRESS!

I was not planning on doing anything more than making one dress. I roped in a few friends to make a few more dresses and then somehow I ended up co-ordinating the charity in the UK (still not quite sure how that happened!) Today I'm feeling pretty proud of what we have achieved in the UK because this week we reached the grand total of 

Yes 5,000 dresses!! In fact we have smashed the 5,000 target with the total number of dresses made by all you lovely people now being 5,392 dresses (and 527 pairs of shorts!). Not forgetting the bags, hairbands, bracelets, puppets and dolls that people have also made and sent.  A HUGE thank you to everyone who has made dresses, held events, blogged about us and to everyone who has distibuted dresses for us in over 21 different countries around the world.

GHANA 2012

We've also hit another milestone! We have now distributed over 4,000 dresses to girls living in poverty around the World.  Dresses have gone to Kenya, Ghana, Rwanda, Tanzania, Ethiopia, The Phillipines, Burundi, Uganda, The Gambia, Malawi, South Africa, Goa, India, Peru, Nairobi, Zimbabwee, Sierra Leone, Zambia, Haiti, Bulgaria and Cameroon. Lots of dresses have been sent recently so we hope to have lots more lovely photos very soon. Watch this space!

GHANA 2012

 MALAWI 2011

We've had hundreds of people make dresses and lots of support from individuals, sewing cafes, WI groups, schools, colleges and guide groups with people of all ages coming together to sew from age 9 to age 92! We've had fantastic support from businesses too (Abakhan Fabrics and Sew La La particulaly who donated fabric to me). We even managed to help get 15 vintage Singer sewing machines to Uganda.

 

 UGANDA 2012

 GOA & KENYA 2012

SOUTH AFRICA 2013

We've been featured in lots of magazines including Sewing World, Craft Seller, Home Style Sewing, Simply Homemade, Do Crafts Creativity and Crafts Beautiful and on numerous blogs. We have features coming up soon in Sewing World, My Weekly and Woman's Own. We've even been featured on BBC's School Report.

 KATANGA SLUM - UGANDA

UGANDA

Dresses have been distributed by people all over the country to schools, baby homes, orphanages, villages and slums. There are some fantastic charities out there doing amazing work all over the world. This project has totally restored my faith in human nature and in the kindness and generosity of most people.

 MALAWI 2012

 UGANDA

 

We've had some amazing celebrity support on Twitter. RT's from Graham Norton, Claudia Winkleman, Ruth Langsford, Lauren Laverne, Emma Freud and  Emma Forbes have been amazing at getting the word out there and encouraging new people to get involved and is much appreciated. I'm still working on Kirsty Allsop!

 INDIA

UGANDA

We also made shorts for the boys!

 

Its been such an exciting journey. I've learnt lots and want the charity to go from strength to strength. We still need people to join in and make dresses and shorts. You can find lots more info on my blog here. There is also a facebook page here. Next stop is 10,000 dresses. Whose with me?? 

Happy Sewing!

Craft Book Giveaway

I have another great craft book to give away on the blog. This time its Contemporary Upholstery by Hannah Stanton.

This is a great book for anyone interested in upstyling furniture or completely renovating an old piece of furniture. 

It has 3 main sections. The first being a comprehensive list of the tools  and materials you may need for your project. The second being a guide to working with different fabrics. I found this section really useful as it listed many fabrics I hadn't even heard of and gave great advice as to what they were suited for, their pros & cons, durability, tips for working with, cleaning and care and even pet resistance. A really helpful guide. The rest of the book consists of step by step guides to upholstery techniques from quick makeovers to longer processes. The book also features some amazing contemporary examples of upholstered furniture to inspire you to have a go! 

If you would like to win a copy of this book all you have to do is follow my blog and leave a comment saying what your next upholstery project is going to be. I have a guilty confession to make! I once bought an old chair to renovate as an upholstery project but only lasted 3 weeks at the upholstery course I started. I just didn't have the patience to finish it! Such a shame as you can do some amazing things to old bits of furniture with the right skills.

To order Contemporary Upholstery (9781906417918) for £16.00 including p&p* (RRP: £20.00), telephone 01903 828503 and quote offer code JS210. Or send a cheque made payable to: Littlehampton Book Services Mail Order Department, Littlehampton Book Services, PO Box 4264, Worthing, West Sussex BN13 3TG. Please quote the offer code JS210 and include your name and address details. *UK ONLY - Please add £2.50 if ordering from overseas.

The giveaway will end on Saturday 8 June at 7pm when a winner will be chosen at random.

Good luck!

Lala-Oopsies DVD & Doll Giveaway

We love Lalaloopsies in this house so were very pleased to receive a copy of the new Lala-Oopsies DVD 'A Sew Magical Tale' to review. 

We also have 3 copies of the DVD plus Lalaloopsy dolls to giveaway so if you have little girls who love sewing you might want to enter! 
 

 

Lala-Oopsies: A Sew Magical Tale - The Movie is out to buy on DVD on 27 May. Great for a half term treat! Its a feature length film where children travel beyond Lalaloopsy land  to meet the Lala-Oopsies. Princess ballerinas, fairies and mermaids who love to throw tea parties, make sweets and knit treats. Follow their adventures as they try to find out why the strawberry milk that powers their land has stopped flowing! (The DVD also includes a great free entry offer for Chessington World of Adventures). 

My children aged 4 and 7 both loved it even Sam so it doesn't just appeal to girls! They sat transfixed for the entire film and both want to watch it again. Izzy's only complaint was that the original Lalaloopsies only make a short appearance in the film and she wanted to see them for longer!

If you would like to win a copy of the DVD and a Lalaloopsy doll, you just need to follow my blog and leave a comment below telling me who the DVD is for. I will put the names in a hat and pick 3 winners at random in a weeks time. Please make sure that I am able to contact you easily. Closing date is Sunday 2 June at 7pm.

Good luck!

Abakhan £20 Challenge - 3 skirts, 1 dress and a flower headband!

Abakhan is a fab website which sells a whole range of sewing and crafting supplies. They challenge me every now and then to see what I can make for a budget of £20 and I get to choose lots of lovely things from their website. It always takes me ages to choose because there is just so much choice and they pretty much sell everything! This time around I chose some pretty polycottons for only £2.65 per metre and managed to make 3 skirts, a dress and a flower hairband for only £16!

I choose 4 different polycottons all with pretty floral designs - a metre of each plus some elastic and some gingham trim. I must admit I didn't really have a clue what I was going to make but I knew I would find some fab inspiration on Pinterest.

Inspired by a tiered skirt tutorial I had pinned from this fab tutorial on the Simple Simon blog, I made this lovely version using 2 of the fabrics. It was really easy to make and looks so pretty. Izzy was very happy with it!

particularly as it passed the twirl test!

 

I wasn't sure what to do with the leftover fabric pieces initially but then realised that I could actually make another skirt by swapping the colours of the tiers so I made a slightly smaller version for my friends daughter Jessica.

 

It seems twirling is very important to little girls

I was very kindly sent some old vintage patterns recently so I decided to give one a try and make a little dress too.

This was a bit more challenging and reinforced the fact that I find proper old fashioned sewing patterns and instructions so much harder to follow than the photo tutorials you get on blogs nowadays. Its clearly something to do with the way my brain works! I was pleased with the finished result though. The fabric looked so pretty with the co-ordinating gingham trim.

and finally I decided to make a slightly different version of the tiered skirt. This one also has an elasticated waist but has only 2 layers. I kind of made it up as I went along!

 

I also made a co-ordinating hairband with little flower detail. The hair band pattern can be found on the Happy Together blog

I was really pleased that I managed to make so much for only £16. That is pretty good value for money. Pop over and have a look at Abakhan. They are great for all sorts of sewing supplies and also have stores you can visit (unfortunately none are near me!).

I'm also going to use my 3 tiered skirt as my entry for the Pinterest Challenge this month!There is still time to enter if you hurry!

Friendship Bracelets

The lovely people at Find Me A Gift often send Izzy little things to try out and review. She gets very excited when they arrive in the post as they are always lovely crafty things. This time we received a lovely Friendship Bracelet Kit.

The kit comes in a cute tin with lots of different coloured threads (96 metres in 12 colours!), some safety pins and a 'how-to' book with easy to follow patterns and instructions for 5 different friendship bracelet designs. 


This is a lovely kit and very reasonably priced at only £5.99. It would make a great present. I think it would suit slightly older girls better though. Izzy is only 7 and she struggled to follow the instructions as she had never made these bracelets before so it would probably be better for girls aged 9 plus. We decided to make some bracelets together and ended up trying out some very simple plait designs which Izzy loved and was then able to do by herself. Older girls would easily be able to follow the instructions for the fancier designs which looked very pretty. I tried but was all fingers and thumbs!

I spotted a few other nice crafty things on the website too....

This would be great for Sam. His favourite thing ever is junk modelling and this kit gives you connectors which attach boxes together. Make and Do Robot Kit

Izzy would love this. She is just starting to learn to knit with her grandma

Hello Kitty Knitting Kit

Pop over and have a look for lots more gift ideas. They also have a facebook page here

We have a winner...

The winner of the gorgeous embroidery book is.............Fiona! Congratulations - the book will be in the post to you shortly. There is another gorgeous craft book giveaway on the blog next week so watch this space.

Lots of new fabrics arrived this week. You can find these on the website right now! www.sewscrumptious.co.uk

Type by Julia Rotham

Holiday Sweet Treats by Julia Wisbrun

Girl Friends by Ann Kelle

 

Doggy Dog by Pink Light Design

I couldn't resist using some of the new fabric for the piped cushion workshop I attended at The Makery in Bath on Sunday. It was so much fun. The staff at The Makery are just so lovely. Cerys and Jessie were so helpful and we all came away really thrilled with our finished cushions.

I went with my cousin Jill and her friend Kelly who also made fab cushion covers

It was so sunny when we finished the course that we couldn't resist a little sit in the sunshine with some wine and nibbles to celebrate our achievements!!

Lots of charity dresses have gone off this week. 200 to Zimbabwe, 40 dresses, 30 shorts and 43 bags to Ghana, and 209 dresses and 15 shorts to Ethiopia. Lots of photos soon hopefully.