Time for new challenges

There are exciting times ahead as I recently made the decision to give up my paid job and concentrate on my little 'Sew Scrumptious' business. The decision was mainly for family reasons and will enable me to be at home much more with the children. Its also an opportunity to focus on something that I love doing and will mean that I don't have to sew into the early hours of the morning anymore. Hurrah!  I am very excited but there is still lots of work to do. I've had lots of orders already from friends so have been enjoying my first week of sewing at home rather than rushing off to work every morning. I am in the process of uploading lots of new goodies to my folksy shop whilst working on a new website. I've started with my bibs and Nintendo DS cases but have lots more to photograph and upload over the next few days. Thought I would share some of my favourites so far.

Rocket Rascals Baby Bib

Butterfly Baby Bib

Cowboys Toddler Bib

Owls Toddler Bib

Helicopter Bandana Bib

Nintendo DS Case

Nintendo DS Case

I have also decided to develop my blog and do lots more sewing related things with it! My plan is to have lots more tutorials, sewalongs, swaps, reviews and general fabric related activities on the blog and to hopefully encourage people to sew! Watch this space over the next few weeks for some big changes! To get me kick started I am attending the Britmums Live blogging conference this week-end in London to get more hints and tips on developing my blog. Exciting but scary as there will be hundreds of bloggers there. I'm hoping to catch up with some of the Pinterest Team as there are also exciting changes planned for the Pinterest challenge too! Any feedback on the blog would be great. What would you like to see more of?

I have another exciting challenge too! The lovely people at Abakhan fabrics have challenged me to show how much can be made from £20 worth of goodies from their website. I love this sort of challenge as it really makes me try new things and step outside my comfort zone. This is what I chose from their website (it took me ages to decide as there is just so much to choose from).

I finally decided on 1 metre of red poly cotton, 1 metre of blue polycotton, 1 metre of a pretty floral fabric, some ribbon, elastic, bias binding and some clear PVC fabric. A bit of a random selection and all under £20! So my challenge is to see what I can make from these goodies. How many things do you think I will be able to achieve? I already have several items in the bag! Lets see if anyone can guess the exact number. All will be revealed at the end of the month!

Working for myself will also allow me to develop the 'Dress a Girl' Charity project further. This continues to go from strength to strength with lots more dresses arriving daily. I can't keep up sometimes!

3 dresses from Caroline. Spot the vintage Holly Hobby Fabric. Gorgeous!

6 dresses from Karen. Check out the pretty little bows. So lovely.

14 beautiful dresses from Joan. All of which had a little surprise or 2 in the pocket! The cutest hairbands, hair clips, finger puppets, pencils, soft toys etc. So thoughtful. The children will love them!

23 fab pairs of shorts from Ruth. Lovely to have something to send the boys!

along with 17 gorgeous dresses from her friend Mary. So sweet on the washing line!

The Rickmansworth U3a Craft Group group who sent a fantastic 43 dresses. All fabulous! Huge thanks to  Janet, Hilary, Jean, Pam, Brenda, Sylvia, Janet, June, Pauline, Sue and Patsy. Brilliant effort!

Love these dresses from Lynda who dyed some white pillowcases to make these pretty purple dresses. Great idea. I love the way they have turned out. So pretty. Will have to try this myself I think.

I made 2 dresses for the feature in Simply Homemade magazine. One from fabric and one from an old pillowcase. Keep forgetting to add them to the total

 and Janet emailed me to let me know that 8 of her lovely dresses are going direct to Uganda with a friend. She very kindly emailed some photos to share.

 Phew! Total of dresses is 1699 and 185 shorts.

Its Pinterest Challenge time!

Its that time again! Time to make something you have pinned on Pinterest and link up to the Pinterest Challenge. This month it is hosted by the lovely Kerry who blogs as Simply Outnumbered. You just need to make something, blog about it and link up. This months prize is fabulous. £50 to spend at Abakhan. They stock a fantastic range of fabric, craft and habadashery items at brilliant prizes. Pop over and have a look. Kerry will choose someone at random to win this fantastic prize. It could be you!!

I have had this little earbud pouch pinned for a while now. Its so cute.

Source: erinerickson.com via SewScrumptious on Pinterest

and this is my version. I made this tonight and it didn't take long at all. I really like it.

It would also make a great little purse for carrying small amounts of money around. This would be great for Izzy as she could put it on her bag. I always worry that she will put her purse down and lose it when we are out.

I've just found out that there is a heart shaped version too! Will definitely have to give this a try.

Source: erinerickson.com via SewScrumptious on Pinterest

You have 5 more days to pin, make, blog and link up here. Good luck!

I'm too old for this!

Yes I actually went out dressed like this!!  An 80's night out in Bristol to celebrate the end of term (I'm wearing the sun visor). I didn't get home until 4am!! It was a great night but I was so hungover the next day that I think I am just too old now for this clubbing lark!! Great fun though. We rocked the neon look thanks to Primark.

We have been loving the jubilee celebrations here. Izzy and I made a crown for her school jubilee party. We got a bit carried away and went for a replica of the Imperial State Crown We like a challenge!!

We went to an amazing jubilee/birthday party yesterday where my very talented friend Elena made this beautiful Jubilee cake. Amazing!

 Sam was rather taken with this pretend horse and sat on it for ages!

Lots more dress action this week. The lovely Margaret and John came all the way from North Wales to collect 2 big boxes of dresses and shorts for Uganda. We sent 150 dresses and 155 pairs of shorts which will be going to Uganda very soon. Fantastic effort from everyone involved. Can't wait to hear about where they end up and hopefully share some photos. Thank you Margaret. It was lovely to meet you both.


Huge thanks to all the following people who have sent dresses and shorts this week. 


These fabulous dresses and shorts came from Fay and her mum. An amazing parcel (or 3!) to receive. 17 dresses and 16 pairs of shorts. All gorgeous!

The lovely Mo sent another 2 pairs of shorts

Jo (AKA Twiglet) sent another 3 dresses to add to her huge collection for 'Dress a Girl'

I received these 2 lovely dresses from Angie who told me that her 11 year old daughter Emily had made them for me. How fantastic. Thank you Emily. They are fabulous!

Cheryl sent these 2 gorgeous dresses. So pretty!

Caroline sent 11 gorgeous dresses. All very pretty. She also very kindly sent a donation of £20 towards postage costs. This is very generous and will come in very useful. The only costs I have for this project are  getting the dresses around the UK to people taking them abroad for me. Often we can arrange collection to save money but sometimes I have to post them so this will be very helpful. Thank you Caroline.

Pauline sent more goodies. This time a pair of shorts and 5 lovely dresses to add to her collection.

Sue sent a beautiful red spotty dress

complete with cute little rosettes on it. 

The very kind Marian hand delivered 40 dresses and 5 pairs of shorts! All absolutely gorgeous. Huge thank you to Marian, Val, Elizabeth, Glenys and Jay and so kind of Marian to drive them over too. Thank you!

and the lovely Nicole who makes gorgeous children's clothes as 'Wind the Bobbin' sent 3 beautiful dresses and a gorgeous skirt. You can see more of her lovely work on her facebook page here.

Wow! The total is now 1602 dresses and 162 pairs of shorts. AMAZING!