sara

Sara is a lovely little girl who recently turned one. She is the daughter of one of my dearest friends (from way back in high school days) who, with her two beautiful children, is certainly one of my models for motherhood.

This little jacket is made from the 100 per cent silk egg-shell coloured knit that I bought for $1.50 back in January at the Strathbogie Summer Festival. Usually I unravel second-hand knits in order to re-knit with the yarn but I loved the texture of this one so much that I decided to just use it as a fabric instead. It was quite tricky going with the sewing at times - parts of the garment are very thick and the silk hardly holds together in its knitted form when you cut it. So to start, I outlined each of the pattern pieces to be cut from the fabric with a very small stitch on the sewing machine. Then I was able to cut the pieces out without worrying about them unravelling. There were a few seams where both the machine and the overlocker skipped a bit, particularly where those bobbles are.

The lining is taken from a Thai silk skirt that I bought at Savers in Brunswick - $7.99 perhaps? As the silk knit fabric was quite loose, I chose the black to go underneath and give definition to the stitch pattern.

The pattern - and this is a proud moment - is one (albeit very straightforward) that I drafted myself from Winifred Aldrich's Metric Pattern Cutting for Children's Wear and Babywear. If you want to try some pattern drafting I recommend this as a good place to start.

This is another of the items that I presented as part of my refashion display at the Stitches and Craft Show. A 100 per cent silk jacket for a child for under $10. Oh, and did I mention that it's machine washable? That's my first test for fabrics that I reuse - they go through the wash on a cold cycle, possibly in a lingerie bag if I'm feeling very kind. That way I know that the finished product (assuming that my hand work holds up) is up to the same treatment.

Happy birthday Sara!