Life has been very busy here this month with report writing and all manner of other things that had to be done for work and I just haven’t had the time to blog very much. Hence this post about the workshop that actually happened 5 weeks ago!
Over the May half term Little Miss and I went back to England to spend some time with family. Imagine my delight then a few months ago when I saw that the lovely Sophie of Huxterkids was running a sew your own jumper workshop on the Friday, the day after my arrival back in England. For quite some time I’d been planning on getting my sewing machine back out and doing some sewing again, so this was just perfect timing. I scurried away and booked the course just as soon as I had booked the flights and checked that Mum could look after Little Miss for the day. Then I began eagerly counting down the days. Now, I truly believe I was meant to go on this course that day. A few weeks before the course, Sophie messaged me and explained that I was the only one that had booked on the course with it being on a Friday. Initially she was a little perplexed that no one else had booked on it as her courses are usually well visited. It was only then, she realised that she had actually put it on the Friday when she had meant to put it for Saturday. She then couldn’t change it to the Saturday due to other commitments. When Sophie discovered all this she apologised profusely that I would be the only one attending but she was still happy to run it as long as I didn’t feel uncomfortable being the only one there or she would happily refund me the money. To tell you the truth I jumped at the chance of one to one tuition and was so pleased I had been given the option, most companies would have cancelled due to a lack of demand and I’m so grateful that she didn’t.
On the day I set off form my parents and drove the 40 minutes to get to Sophie’s studio. The studio is in a beautiful converted barn in a courtyard of other converted barns housing small business. What a lovely setting, one I’m sure I would have appreciated a little more had it not been a gloomy, grey day and chucking down with rain!
Now, I will admit I was a little bit nervous as it had been a while since I’d touched a sewing machine and I was a little apprehensive about being the only one as I’m not generally very good at small talk and can find conversation difficult if people aren’t on the same wavelength. I really needn’t have worried! Sophie was the perfect host, made me feel totally at ease and we discovered that we had a lot to chat about through a shared love of crochet. She made me a cup of tea and I set about choosing the fabric. Little Miss and I had already had a peruse at the fabrics online(did I mention I was making the jumper for her?) and had chosen the fabric for the main body of the jumper but still needed to choose a co-ordinating fabric for the sleeves, cuffs and waistband. Once the fabric had been chosen, it was on to cutting out the pieces and beginning to assemble the jumper.
This was the bit I was nervous about, having not touched a sewing machine in 2 years. Sophie was very patient and gave me as much or as little help as I needed at each step of the way, showing me some handy hints and tips for working with stretchy fabrics and attaching the pieces together.
We stopped for a yummy ‘picnic’ type lunch, provided by Sophie, of crusty bread, olives, meat and salad and then set back to work. All that was left to do was to add the collar, cuffs and waistband and voila, the jumper was complete…
As you can see from my face, I was pretty pleased with myself…
Thankfully Little Miss loved it too and has been wearing it with pride…
All that is left to say is thankyou to Sophie for a lovely day and for giving me the confidence to get back on the sewing machine. If any of you would like to book on one of Sophie’s huxter workshops, you can find the link here or to see her fabulous range of made to order clothing, follow this link. But beware, once you have started, you may not be able to stop yourself!!
Karen x x
