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Basic Tees, Make It Perfect

.Basic Tees – a new pattern for you!.

Hi all!  Things have been a little quite around here lately…and my house has been messy…that only means one thing – I’ve been busy working on my latest pattern and am all ready to share it with you today!

 
An indispensable starting point for everyday dressing, Basic Tees is a pattern you will find yourself using again and again.  
 
 The classic long or short-sleeved tshirt is a wardrobe staple that you can’t do without.  The easy style of Basic Tees allows you to express your creativity and create one-of-a-kind tshirts that suit every occasion.  
 
Featuring a straight style for boys and more fitted body with gathered sleeves for girls, as well as options to include short-sleeve overlays and contrast hems, Basic Tees is the ideal foundation for thousands of outfits!

Basic Tees is another Make It Perfect pattern designed for use with knit/stretch fabric.  If you are a newbie to sewing with knits, I highly recommend a simple tshirt pattern as your starting point.  They are quick and easy to make and something that your kids are bound to get a lot of wear out of.  

The pattern comes with lots of tips and tricks for sewing with knits, but my number one tip is to use the best quality fabric that you can afford.  All of my failed attempts at sewing with knits have happened when I have been using cheaper quality knits.  Good quality is much easier to sew, washes and wears better and gives a much nicer finished result.  These tops were sewn using gorgeous knits from Crafty Mamas – the solids are all Stella and the stripes are Hilco Campans.  Crafty Mamas now offers free postage within Australia and great International postage rates – gotta love that!

There is heaps you can do with the Basic Tees pattern…instructions are given to create a plain tee or tee with short-sleeve overlay and contrasting hem and neckline as shown above but, of course, these are just starting point suggestions – you can mix and match fabrics and decorate with applique, freezer paper stencil, buttons, ribbons, iron on transfers, etc. and easily come up with a whole cupboard full of tees to suit your style!

Once you sew one, you’ll be itching to make more (trust me, I’m up to my 10th tee this week!) my kids wear long and short sleeved tees every single day so I know I’ll be sewing lots more in the future!

Big thanks to my beautiful photographer, Chelsea (check out her work – she is amazing!) and the GORGEOUS models she rounded up for me.  They are the cutest kids ever – chooks, books, rain, cute kids…what more could I ask for?

 

Take a look at my new website for more information on Basic Tees.  As always, copies of the pattern will be avaliable soon in retail stores – or you can always ask your favourite store to order a copy in for you.

GIVEAWAY

I’d love to give one lucky winner a copy of Basic Tees – leave a comment on this post to be in the draw!
(Please make sure you leave an email address with your comment.  Giveaway will close Wednesday 17th August and winner will be drawn at random).

August 12, 2011
Make It Perfect

.Want to come to the Melbourne Fair for FREE?!.

Do you realise that it is only SIX sleeps until the Melbourne Craft and Quilt Fair?  I didn’t, until yesterday.  Yikes!  
Lucky I’m orgainsed this time and don’t have as much to get ready as I did for the Sydney Fair.  And just like I did with the Fair in Sydney – I’ve got another FOUR ENTRY TICKETS to give away to four lucky winners!
If you’d like a chance at winning a ticket, leave a comment on this blog post, or a comment on the Make It Perfect Facebook wall.  I need to be able to get in contact with you if you win so make sure you leave an email address.

The giveaway will end at 8pm on Sunday night and I’ll be in contact with the winners to arrange getting tickets to them.

Please only enter if you are able to use the tickets (i.e. if you can go to the fair yourself or have someone that you can give the ticket to!)

And after my slackness with no photos from the Sydney Fair, I did manage to scrounge a few off some friends…
…with sweet Yana…who was the lucky winner of one of the entry tickets in Sydney!
…me and my banner (thanks for the following pics Bec!)
…Elissa from Kelani Fabric and I in her amazing stand!
…catching up with special friends – Kate (with baby Grace) and Bec!
See you next week Melbournites!!!
July 22, 2011
Other

.June Cool Shops! Fashionable Fabrics.

Fabric lovers – have you visited Fashionable Fabrics lately?

Fashionable Fabrics is a lovely fabric boutique filled to the brim with fabrics from your favourite designers.  Fashionable Fabrics sent me some gorgeous cotton voile and cotton lawn fabrics to use for my review.  If you haven’t used voile or lawns before, I highly recommend them – especially when making clothing.  They feel amazingly soft and drape beautifully.

I made another Shearwater Kaftan from some Anna Maria Horner voile.  I love the summery colours and light weight feel that voile brings to this top.  This one is going with me to Sydney next week so if you want to see it in the flesh, come along! 

 

 
 
 
Fashionable Fabrics is easy to navigate around, with the store being broken into handy sections to help you find what you are looking for faster.  You can browse by New Arrivals, Home Dec fabrics, Japanese fabrics, Patterns and Books, Trims and Notions, and more!  Here are some of my favourite fabrics…

 

 

 

 

 

 

How about some FREE FABRIC for two lucky winners?  Simply “like” Fashionable Fabrics on Facebook and you’ll go in the draw to win a $25 gift certificate to use towards anything in the shop!

(Giveaway ends Sunday 19th June and winners will be drawn randomly.)

Important Fashionable Fabrics Links:
Shop
Facebook
Twitter
Newsletter Sign-up
June 14, 2011
Other

.June Cool Shops! Vegie Smugglers.

I know that you are going to LOVE this week’s Cool Shop – Vegie Smugglers…
 
 
 
Wendy Blume is the extremely talented author of Vegie Smugglers – a self-published cookbook aimed toward busy families who still want to eat a healthy, balanced diet.  Like most Aussie Mums, Wendy found it a daily struggle in the kitchen trying to come up with healthy meals that would satisfy her two fussy eaters.  Out of her desperation – and I’m sure after hearing many other Mothers complaining about the same problem – Vegie Smugglers was born.

Not only did Wendy come up with 60 + delicious recipes to feed your family, she was also  responsible for the photography and graphic design of this beautifully presented book.  What a clever Mum!  Vegie Smugglers is bright and colourful, filled with gorgeous mouth-watering photographs – in this case, self-published does not mean tacky.  The book is top quality.  

I own a heap of cookbooks, but for the majority of them there are only a handful of recipes that I might actually cook.  When I first received a copy of Vegie Smugglers I flicked through it and gave pretty much every recipe the “thumbs up” – not just for me, but I also thought that I could coax my children into trying most of them too.  (In our house, the “trying” part is always the hardest, once they’ve had a taste usually they like it!)

Vegie Smugglers is broken up into convenient sections from quick dinner fixes to freezable meals to sweet treats.  

The introduction of the book includes handy information about the nutritional components of vegetables (see picture below) and essential kitchen tools and skills.

 
I love the thoughtful details that Wendy has incorporated into her book – a “Rate It” and “Comments” section for you to jot down your thoughts or perhaps variations for next time.  She also includes a “For the Adults” variation for each recipe – a simple extra addition to make the meal a little more special for the adults you are feeding.  I have friends who cook two dinners a night – one for the kids and one for the parents, a waste of time and energy to me, so it’s good to have recipes on hand that will please everyone.

 In short, this book gets the big tick of approval from me!  We have tried a few recipes so far (although none of them have been photographed because I never seem to have time to pull out the camera during that busy evening meal time!) and they have all been delicious.  Next up, I’m looking foward to trying the Beetroot Tzatziki – it looks delicious and I have some fresh beetroot waiting to be used up.  Vegie Smugglers retails at $24.95 and can be purchased here.  (Word on the street is that Vegie Smugglers 2 is in the making – go Wendy!)

Wendy is genrously giving one lucky Make It Perfect reader a chance to win a free copy of Vegie Smugglers!  Simply “like” Vegie Smugglers on Facebook and leave a comment on this post.  
(Winner will be randomly chosen on Sunday 12th June.)

 
Important Vegie Smugglers Links:
June 7, 2011
Other

.Giveaway Day!.

THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED – THANKYOU FOR PARTICIPATING!!

Welcome readers old and new to my Sew, Mama, Sew Giveaway Day post!

 
If you are new to my blog, I am happy to have you here!  The Make It Perfect blog is where I share the craftiness going on in my life – mixed with my favourite recipes, showcasing some of the Cool Shops out there and a few personal bits and pieces.  
 
Make It Perfect is also the name of my sewing pattern range – featuring a whole heap of modern, fresh and funky clothing sewing patterns, some of which are shown below…
 
 
And because I like to keep myself busy, I spend a little bit of my spare time creating pretty, vintage-inspired jewellery and accessories for my Citrus Pop stores on Madeit and Etsy…
Okay, now that I’ve introduced you to my goodies, let’s get back to the giveaway…
 
One lucky winner will score themselves…
FOUR of their favourite SEWING PATTERNS
+
A $20 GIFT VOUCHER to spend on CITRUS POP products!
 
To enter, simply leave a comment on this post.  For extra entries, feel free to become a follower of my blog or “like” my Facebook page.  Easy!
(Giveaway ends Wednesday 25th May and winner will be drawn randomly.)
May 22, 2011