I bought scraps of a nice wool fabric a while ago, with the plan of turning them into a skirt. Decent-sized pieces that had been pinned in the shape of a ladies’ suit on a shop window mannequin. I was picturing a scrappy, patchwork-y skirt, pieced together from differently shaped parts.

I quickly realized I’d need to bind all the edges, or the fabric would fray with all the handling. I struggled to find a bias tape that would work with the fabric – the tapes I looked at were too red, or too purple, or too muddy brown. Then I found this linen bias tape which I thought looked decent. But now I think it was a mistake – it’s too bright and sticks out too much. Should have gone with one of the darker colours after all.

Next problem – the bound edges were all stiff, which I hadn’t expected. When I started assembling the pieces, the fabric didn’t drape any more but sort of stood stiffly.

And the pieces I cut weren’t any good, either. I didn’t achieve a patchwork-y look at all. I didn’t want to bind and sew too much, and didn’t want to waste fabric, either, because I didn’t have very much of it. So I made the pieces quite large. Put together, they just looked boring.

At this point I can’t see any way of rescuing this and making anything I’d actually want to wear from what I have in front of me, short of undoing absolutely everything and starting all over. And even then I’m not sure I could fix all the problems. This is no fun at all any longer, and while I don’t like throwing away things that could be something, I’m not going to force myself to work on something I won’t enjoy. This goes into the recycling bag.

Found some merino wool jersey and tried sewing a basic top of it. It worked just as well as the cotton jersey I’ve been sewing simple tops and dresses of. Thicker, but it still fit under the foot of the sewing machine. This was less fun than knitting a wool top, but a heck of a lot cheaper and faster.

The new light fixture is so great. I put stronger lightbulbs in there than I thought we’d need, and now I’m glad I did so. I can sit and sew late at night, with black thread on graphite fabric, without even straining my eyes or wearing glasses.

Having made three casual summer dresses all from the same pattern, making one more with sleeves (for cold season, office use) didn’t feel difficult at all. Now I wish I’d taken a close-up photo of the fabric, though. It looks nice from this distance but the colours and the pattern are stunning up close.

I was going to sew but Nysse felt like asserting his territorial claim over the materials on the dining table.

Not bad! Took me most of the weekend, but it came out pretty nice. Incredibly soft and comfy, almost makes me want to cuddle with it. A few slightly uneven seams here and there, but nothing that anyone will notice without a very close inspection. My top-stitching is never as even as I’d like, and it was extra tricky with a floppy fabric that would not stay as folded.

I could probably have had it finished in half the time if I hadn’t decided on flat felled seams. But they’re going to feel so much nicer, and be more durable as well.

The internet, by the way, is full of tutorials for felled seams; there are endless numbers of sewing tutorials out there and felled seams are a popular topic, I guess, because they look so professional but aren’t actually difficult. But those tutorials all stick to the basics and I couldn’t find a single one that covered more advanced topics – such as, how do you sew the meeting of two felled seams? I don’t know if it’s because no sewing expert has written about it, or because Google has gone to the dogs. Which it definitely has; it used to be possible to force the search to include every word in my query but now Google just ignores what I type and goes for the most popular results. “Hey, I know you typed something else, but how about you read this thing instead, I think you’ll like it better.” No, I don’t.

Where my felled seams meet, they sort of fall all over each other and get a bit tangled, but it’s all hidden anyway so that’s OK.

Why do my felled seams need meet each other, anyway? A simple dressing gown just has some straight armhole and side seams, right?

That would have been true if I had just followed the pattern. Unfortunately the pattern I bought looked good on the sketch but that turned out to be an “artist’s impression” only, and reality was different. Like the “artist’s impressions” of proposed new city squares that are all sunny and have trees in little containers and happy young people walking around, and by the time reality arrives the trees are gone and in their places there are garbage bins.

In the sketch the dressing gown was clearly wider towards the bottom and had a nice wide overlap in the front. In reality the body was all straight lines, which was the one thing that I did not want. I am never going to trust another pattern from Svenska Mönster again.

The way the pattern pieces fit on the fabric, I couldn’t easily make them wider, so I added extra pieces in the side seams. (I’ve now learned that the technical term for these is “godet”.) The result is maybe not as sleek as it could have been, but it definitely fits me better. If godets were good enough for the tunic of the Bocksten Man, they’re good enough for me as well.

It was rather satisfying to have filled my need for comfortable summer dresses, so I’m bravely embarking on the next project.

For years now I’ve wanted a nicer light-weight dressing gown. My current one is shiny and glossy and looks almost unworn after fifteen years of use – but it achieves all of that because it’s 100% polyester and feels like plastic against my skin. And it’s too short – I can walk around in it, but not lounge on the sofa without feeling half-naked.

It’s one of those problems that simmers in the background and never becomes urgent. I’ve ordered two potential replacements from a second-hand marketplace; both came with their own problems and ended up donated to a charity shop. Mostly due to fit: standard dressing gowns are straight in shape, which makes them gape around the knees as soon as I move around. And the problem remained.

Sewing those dresses was maybe not the most fun I’ve had, but the results were good. How much harder can a dressing gown be? Last week I went fabric shopping again, and found this beautifully soft double gauze. It caught my eye as soon as I entered the store – the light-weight summer cottons were displayed right on the counter – and nothing else could compare. Of course it turned out to be more than twice the price of the other gauzy cottons… Now the result will have to last me another fifteen years. Although since it’s cotton rather than polyester, it might actually wear out with time.

Two more dresses based on the same basic pattern as the first one, gives me a whole three everyday summer dresses.

I tweaked the pattern slightly each time, so the dresses got closer and closer to what I like. Slightly slimmer around the upper body; slightly lower neckline. Too bad I don’t need any more, now that I’ve gotten the pattern tweaked the way I want.

The older I get, the pickier I get. Or perhaps more charitably, the better I know my own likes and dislikes.

I’ve been trying to buy new everyday summer dresses for several years, but can’t find anything that’s to my liking. All I want is simple sleeveless knee-length dresses in cotton jersey, with a minimum of fuss. No ruffles, gathers, drapes, panels, cutouts or anything. When the weather is hot and I’m all sweaty, I want no extra seams touching me. But the current fashion is all about fussy details, and besides, jersey dresses currently tend to either be mini-short or maxi-long.

I’ve got two comfy home dresses that I actually like, both about 10 years old. In desperation I’ve bought two others – because it’s hard to get through a hot summer with just two – but they’ve both got scratchy “stuff” so I only end up wearing them in emergencies.

As usual, necessity is the mother of crafting. I bought several bolts of nice jersey fabric at the crafts fair in February, as well as some basic dress patterns.

I haven’t really sewn much clothing before. Plenty of curtains, sofa cushions, dress-up costumes etc, but nothing that actually needs to fit. One can get away with all sorts of hacks and shortcuts when sewing a wizard hat in polar fleece – but not with a dress.

The pattern looked like the clothing patterns I remember my mum tracing from Burda Moden magazines in the 1980s. Except the Burda pattern sheets had tens of items all on the same sheet, so you had to trace the ones you wanted, whereas these modern ones are apparently meant for single use. I couldn’t make myself cut up my pattern, though – because what if I want a different size or something – so I traced it onto some old plastic shopping bags.

The scary thing about sewing, as compared to knitting for example, is that once you cut, you can’t undo it. With knitting you can just rip it up and reuse the yarn, but that doesn’t really work with fabric. I like my undo buttons.

To properly sew in jersey you’re supposed to use an overlocker, rather than an ordinary sewing machine, but I’m not going to spend thousands of kronor on a sewing machine when what we have works perfectly fine. I just zig-zagged everything. The seams don’t look as professional as overlocked ones, but they’re stretchy enough to be functional, and nobody is going to inspect my seams up close.

Getting a basic dress cut out and assembled – two short shoulder seams, two long side seams – took a couple of hours. And then all the hemming and finishing took the same again. The pattern even had neckline banding. The whole thing came out looking pretty smart.

I couldn’t think of a good way to photograph the finished thing, so I’ll have to take a selfie of me wearing it when it’s warm enough.

PS: The blog archives remind me that I have actually sewn two skirts.

Lining attached, piping trimmed, top-stitching added.

Now I need to think of something to put inside it.

Learning point for next time: a padded lining takes up space, so for a perfect fit, it should be smaller than the outer walls.