Sivi Dan

♫ ♪ Videosex - Sivi Dan

Here is one simple, but special dress.. The fabric was a gift from Mokosha.. It was sitting in her stash for a long time, and she didn’t know what to do with it.. The fabric was too dark for her taste and she thought that I might like it.. Lucky me :) I loved the fabric at first glance.. It’s hard to see at only one look all the elements someone doodled for this design.. There are dark hair girl and her eyelashes, a tree, butterflies, roses, stripes, faces, hands..  True example of horror vacui on the fabric.. Only problem was length of the fabric – only 1 m!! The fabric is some kind of viscose.. I wanted to make a dress for autumn.. Pattern #133 from Burda 12/2012 proved to be the best choice for busy prints.. It was my fourth time that I’ve used it (1, 2, 3).. One half of 1 m fabric I saved for the skirt, and from the other half I made the bodice and the sleeves.. There was not enough fabric for long sleeves, but I didn’t want to leave them as ½ sleeves.. I added pieces of about 15 cm to the sleeves so now they are covering my elbows.. Thanks to busy print, that seam is barely visible..  The skirt is just a gathered rectangle.. 

I love all the versions of this dress pattern that I’ve made and this one is also perfect! I had a plan to do a photo-shoot with Mokosha, but we both had problems with our good cameras and had to settle with “idiot”..  The result were blurry photos..  I’m showing you only these two photos bellow so it wouldn’t be like we wasted all that time for nothing.. Behind the camera for the “good” photos above was my favorite sister Dina..

I’m hoping it won’t be too much of a torture for you to read more.. It’s time for Blog hop.. Talented Marie of Imaginary Animal asked me if I would like to participate in Q&A.. After hearing that from someone like her I felt so special.. Marie is a true artist, with love for sewing, knitting and has an eye for photography.. My favorite thing about her is that she designs textiles (my dream job)!

Here are my answers:

Why do you write?
I started writing, or better said showing the world what I’ve been making in last couple of years because I needed something to do in my life.. Making things was not enough.. It was time to join the sewing community.. After finishing studies of archaeology, for some time I was busy being on fieldwork and everything was fine.. At some point it all stopped and I had too much of free time.. That was the trigger I needed to put myself into virtual world and start posting my projects on Kollabora.. Before that I was only a silent observer for years.. It all proved to be a good way to practice my bad English and communication skills..

What are you working on?
I would like to make some outerwear for Autumn.. I really need jacket and trench coat.. BUT I’m off to some archaeological excavations, which means no sewing, only knitting..

How does your blog differ from others of its genre?
Well, unlike other ladies whose work I love to see , I use mostly patterns from Burda magazine.. Indie patterns are nice, but way out of my price range.. When you live in Serbia you learn to improvise everything.. If you have enough imagination and good sewing skills you can make whatever you want..

How does your writing process work?

I never liked writing.. Combine that with the fact that English is not my native language, a lot of things I would like to say I lose in translation.. That’s why my texts are kind of boring to read.. I’m trying to balance that with many photos of garments I’ve made so you could see how it actually looks like..

I’m passing the blog hop torch to Mahaila and Ivana..

In my years as silent observer of sewing community, I fell in love with Mahaila’s work.. If you like to see something different you should check her blog – Fickle Sense.. She’s all about DIY, eco fashion, sewing with self-drafted patterns, screen printing.. Her biggest project so far was her wedding.. She managed to make her bridesmaid’s dress, the groom suit, her wedding dress and even invitations and decorations! Isn’t she a super hero?? :D

The first thing that comes to my mind when I think about Ivana aka Mokosha is cakes! Okay, I love her sewing style, but she totally bought me with sweets :D That's the privilege of being her real life friend ;)