[You might want to grab a cup of tea/coffee before starting to read this – it’s a bit long]. At the beginning of the year Karen asked us to put our ‘Sewlutions’ in a jar and see how many people kept them. My solution probably seemed a bit trivial and silly for someone who has been dressmaking for more decades than she cares to remember. It was just ‘to make friends with my sewing machine and use the automatic buttonholer function on it’. Why? Because although I have been dressmaking since Noah left the ark for the past decade or so I have been preferring to sew by hand. I had become interested in couture methods and tailoring and found I wanted to enjoy the process rather than focus on the product. These are some of the items still in my wardrobe.

As I said way back at the beginning of the year, I had been inspired by Carolyn and Yoshimi to want to make a complete hand-made wardrobe and I knew I would never do it by hand before December came and went! So back to my Sewlution. I set myself the task of sewing a handmade wardrobe of everyday things I would wear as much by machine as possible and use the buttonholer on my machine [never used before!]  Have I done it? Well here are just some of what I’ve made, all at least 99% machine made and not a handmade buttonhole in sight;-