Monday, 30 January 2012

A gather day out

Today was a good day for gather. After a "we are grown up and responsible really" meeting at the bank, we decided to do what we do best and go fabric shopping! Although being the responsible people we are, we didn't buy (yet!) but instead just wondered around the biggest fabric warehouse we've ever seen getting all excited about the possibilities for our first dress pattern. As we were restrained for the moment, there's not much to report back on the fabric front so instead I'll leave you with a few pictures of the wonder that is a massive textile emporium of loveliness...!


Tuesday, 10 January 2012

A progress update and some fabric inspiration

A belated Happy New Year to you all!

Us gather girls had a somewhat frenzied Christmas break - a family wedding on the 23rd, a poorly toddler and a very poorly cat meant that the sewing machines went untouched for the whole festive period... I think a break is actually no bad thing sometimes, it means we're both raring to go now! And we've got something rather exciting to be sewing up too: our first dress pattern! We're currently testing all the pattern pieces - seeing how they fit together and making any small adjustments. The dress has a few different sleeve options so we've got quite a few versions to make up, nevertheless, it's a hugely exciting time for us and we're both pretty chuffed with the results so far. As soon as we're happy with the final pieces, the next step will be to get them all graded, in preparation for the real pattern testing. There will be more information regarding testing to come, keep an eye out on here or twitter if you're interested in helping us out with that!

Now we have an actual dress form to work with our minds are naturally turning to fabrics and prints. Here are some of the prints that are currently inspiring us, a little taster of what's possibly to come!

Andover
Premier Prints
FreeSpirit
Andover
Timorous Beasties
Hanna Werning
Joel Dewberry
Joel Dewberry
Timorous Beasties
Liberty
Andover
Timorous Beasties

Monday, 9 January 2012

All we want for Christmas...

With Christmas only 5 days away (5!), we thought it high-time for a roundup of what's on our wish lists this year. Of course it really is FAR too late to be ordering any of these goodies in time for the big day but anybody who really needed to know what to buy us has obviously already got piles of fabulous gifts wrapped and ready. Ahem.


Send a photo of your abode to Holly's Houses and she'll make a rubber address stamp from a beautifully drawn illustration of your home. A reason (if one is needed) to get back into letter writing again.




A blue bike! A BLUE bike! Is any rationale needed? The beautiful Birdie from Bobbin Bicycles.


Customisable necklace from Return to Me. You get the necklace and yarn and it's up to you to design and make your own. How fab is that?!


Gorgeous screen printed bag from Bookhou on Etsy. A good way to carry the knitting around methinks.


Silhouette Cross Stitch kit from What Delilah Did. A nice little project to keep your hands busy while watching The Muppet Christmas Carol for the umpteenth time...


So, that's it. We're off to frantically panic buy the last (first?) of our Christmas presents and eat our body weight in mince pies. We got a busy time up ahead with lots of things planned for gather in the new year, so keep coming back here to find out what's going on and/or follow us on twitter @gatherkits. Merry Christmas!