I wasn’t flirting with her. I didn’t even mention that I work in propane!

I've been dealing with it in the best way that I can - sewing, when I have the energy; spending time with friends and binge-watching comforting TV programmes. At the moment, that's Made In Chelsea, which, I don't want to hear it from you if you think that show is stupid and trashy. It is trashy, but it's not at all stupid. If you're too good for it, well, good for you, but I think it's fabulous. Nic got into it fairly recently (I think he enjoyed the return of Francis Boulle in the South of France episodes) so we went back to the start and I'm watching it all with him. We're up to the end of series 5 at the moment so right now it's all about whether or not Spencer and Lucy Watson (she's definitely one of those people who you have to call by their full name. It's not Lucy. It's Lucy Watson) are going to get together. It's brilliant.

The downside to watching so much Made In Chelsea is that it just makes me want to drink champagne like, ALL. THE. TIME (heh, what's new) but the good thing is that watching all of these rich and beautiful children living their strange, purgatorial lives is a little bit affirming. They may be drinking champagne and hanging out in beautiful places all the time, but they all have to spend time with people they hate on the regular. I am glad that is not my life. I would be friends with both Lucy Watson and Binky, though. And dear old, beautiful, stupid Ollie, with his Natalie Imbruglia in the 90s haircut.

So anyway. That's a little insight into my life, recently. I have been doing things other than just watching TV, I swear. But the TV-watching is funnier to talk about.

I'm still struggling to get photos of recent sewing projects because my own face is bugging the shit out of me. BUT, I did get some photos of a dress that I made over the summer. I made this dress to wear to my nephew Matthew's christening in July, out of some Anna-Maria Horner fabric that I bought from Kerry when she was doing an instagram destash. 

I bought the fabric in the spring and sat on it for a little while before deciding what to do with it. I had just under two metres, it's a quilting cotton and it has an obvious directional print. I wanted to think about what to do with it. I'm not sure why exactly the Anna dress presented itself to my mind, but it did. Also, I remembered that I had the perfect zip in my stash:

Because of the aforementioned fabric constraints, the Anna skirt wasn't going to work, so I subbed in the pleated skirt from New Look 6776. I've combined these patterns before and it works pretty well.

Here's a little close-up of the bodice - not sure why my hair is going so weird!

I like this dress a lot. The colours are so beautiful - I love the combination of the warm golden yellow with the pink of the roses. The only minor criticism I have is that it's a quilting cotton and it is on the stiffer side, so the little kimono sleeves really stick out! It might not be that noticeable to other people, but I can see it. I think they'll be less pronounced after a few more washes, though. 

You can see the sleeve issue here on the back and also my no pattern matching which, to be fair, wasn't really an option because of the amount of fabric that I had. I do love that lace zip, though!

This was a good dress for the occasion. My sister asked me to be my nephew's godmother, so I wanted something smart enough to wear to church, and I think this delivered. It also went really well with my pink Kate Spade bag, so I was all set. The weather was beautiful the weekend I was home for the event (I also had a family wedding that weekend - I sewed a dress for that too, which I'll have to try to get photos of) so this was pretty perfect!