Bed-azzled

A few weeks ago I had been excavating the guest bedroom/sewing room so that my amazing exDiL could stay.  

I accidentally found a "Mrs Tweedy's Chicken Pies"  pillwcase,  from a single Chicken Run duvet cover set that I'd bought back when I was making bunting for DH's 60th birthday.   I had the brilliant idea of turning it into a kingsize duvet for the guest bedroom.  I even thought I might be able to "whip it up" before exDiL arrived.

The idea was simple.  Cut the seam off each of the two long sides,  and attach pieces of a sheet which would widen it to the new size.  

How difficult could that be? 

Well, let's just say that I didn't get it finished in time.   It should have been simple.  If I had had more faith in myself,  then it would have been finished in time. 

I did manage to finish it the day she left, but it needed washing so I wasn't able to put it on the bed.  Then  a  couple of weeks later Miss Teen came to stay, and she has her own duvet cover at our house, so it still didn't get used.  

I had been waiting for it to be on the bed to take a pic,  but Miss Teen's duvet cover is still on there as she's likely to stay again soon.

So why am I writing about this now?

Yesterday, I was determmined to finish the job by making pillow cases.   I had one case which came with the duvet cover,  and I needed 4.  So, I attempted to make 2 plain blue cases,  and then I cut the printed one in two two pieces, and gave each piece a bit of backing.

The first, plain, pillowcase was whipped up in record time.  I'd even included a little envelopey bit to keep the edge of the pillow enclosed.    

The second, plain, pillowcase was OK (but not great). Too cocky.

For the two patterned ones, I didn't have enough blue sheeting in single pieces tp make a back (the pillowcase is remarkably wide), so I had to sew some together to make a big enough piece .     That part worked OK.

And then I had to put them together.  The first one was OK,  the envelopey bit was on the printed fabric.  The second one...  I spent ages farting about to get theenvelopey bit perfect.  I used an existing hem on the fabric to make sure it looked beautiful, and I spent ages making sure I had it the right way so that the hem on the inside would also be correct.

Eventually I had it all square and clipped together on my ironing board, and I sewed it.  Beautiful straight edges, lovely job!.    

And I realised, too late, that I had put printed bit the wrong way round so that the printed bit is on the inside.  Or, if the printed bit is on the outside,  then the underside has an overlocked seam across it!  {RollsEyes}

To compound my error further,  I didn't check the direction of my cross seam when I sewed the sides up,  and the dratted exposed overlocker seam is attached in a different direction at each side. This wouldn't have been so noticeable, if I had bothered to change the cream top thread, but I didn't. So the mistake is GLARING because the thread is differnet on each side, so its obvious there is an issue.

I might try and iron it to flatten it, and handstitch one side to hold it down. 

I could try and cover the whole length with ribbon or something, using my coverstitch (did I get that tape foot?  Hope so, as that will come in handy).  

In the meantime I stuck them in the wash, and  now they are hanging on the airer.  I may or may not get round to trying to hide my mistake, but I suspect it will be another last minute fix.

I'm not sure what has happened to me,  there was a time when nothing less than perfection would do.

I'm going to count the "cover" and the "4 pillowcases" as two separate makes. (but not as 5 makes).

Total crafty things this year: 45

Sewing based makes: 
123) Inner pad for foot muff; make cover for foot muff;  trim down Superking Duvet to KS and recover edges;
456)Cushion cover for Miss T; Gift bags for Miss T and GDK;
7)Dressing Gown;
8-10)Cat Duvet, Duvet Cover and Pillowcase;
11) Cushion cover for living room;
12-15) Sleeveless tops (x4);
16) SBCC top
17) Overlocker chicken
18) Curtains for nest boxes (4, but counted as 1 make)~
19,20,21)Boxers for DH (test pairs for sizing - counted as 1,  and then 2 pairs)
Abandoned muslin for LoveNotions Willow Wrap Dress (not counted in total makes)
22)Apostrophe Patterns Joggers (jellyfiah and space)
23)Apostrophe Patterns Flared Joggers (black, with big red roses)
24)Boxes for DH (3 pairs using black cotton lycra with patterned fly)
25)Shorten the hems and sleeves on 4 of Mum's day dresses (count as 1 task)
26) repurposed  old tee shirt as cover for mini cushion
27) Burrito rolled bag (from Jane's July Zoom)
28) Replace waistban on massively oversized maxi skirt
29) Salvage DH's Firestorm tee shirt (using stretchyfix)
30) Yet another Heartlight skirt (July) feathers scuba, great pattern matching, good fit on waistband
31) Convert single duvet cover to king size
32) Convert 1 pillowcase to 2,  and create 2 additional plain pillowcases to match

Learning activities:
1) Scanning pattern pieces; 2) Making movies; 3)Babylock demo day; 4)Gathering using my overlocker;   5) Euphy training (circles,using elastic in looper);6) Gail Yellen's binder course; 7) Inkscape 1; 8) casting on;  9)purling; 10)casting off

Non sewing based craft makes: 
A) Painted bisque butter dish and had it fired

B) Knitted Infinity scarf, first attempt (pinks)

C) Painted bisque small jug (hen names) and had it fired.