Sunday, July 14, 2013

Miss Lemon wardrobe files: 7. Whites & pastels



If you asked me whether Miss Lemon wore white and pastel colored outfits in the series I would probably say no. She wears more often strong, primary colors, and a lot of these make only a brief appearance, or the jackets in combination with other dresses. When watching the series I couldn't even remember the pretty suit below!

Off white belted suit and pale yellow jabot blouse
This is a belted summer suit with red and green dots fabric and decorative wooden buttons. It has no collar and the belt has a wooden buckle. The jacket is worn with a long, straight skirt of the same fabric. There are pockets placed above the breastline and the hips of the jacket. The jacket has no collar and has a low placed, hidden closure in the front.
Interesting feature: the two decorative buttons at the back of the neckline.
  

   

   

Pale pink satin blouse with cording
Two scenes behind the typewriter. That is what this blouse gets with the beautiful neckline. The long sleeved satin v-neck blouse has gathering at the shoulders. The neckline is embellished with surface cording.


Pale pink blouse
A basic, long sleeved blouse in a soft fabric. Here worn with a basic black skirt.
  

White blouse with pintuck collar and jabot
This is a fresh white blouse, we get to see the most. Miss Lemon wears this jabot-collared blouse quite often, in combination with different jackets. It even returns in one of the later series, after a few years of absence of Miss Lemon. At first glance, the collar seems to be ruffled but if you look closely it is actually pintucked! Also the sleeves have the same pintuck-ruffle finish.


   

   

Grey-white blouse 
this blouse has pintucked and pleated details along the button tab, with scalloped edges. It closes with small, fabric covered buttons.
   

Pale pink suit 
A jacket and dress combination that reminds me of Jackie Kennedy's famous pink suit. Obviously, because of the color, but also because the jacket looks boxy, with very little shaping. The jacket closes with three big white buttons, just above the hips. We don't get to see the matching dress worn underneath, but it has a V-neck and an asymmetrical row of white buttons along the neckline. The dress has a slightly flared, long A-line skirt.
   

   

   

Pastel flower suit
This summer-y, pastel flower suit appears just once, when Miss Lemon wears it to a date and runs late for work. Both the jacket and the skirt have simple lines which compensate the busy fabric. Like all of her white suits, also this one is collarless and there are no visible buttons.
   

  

Pale lavender jabot collar dress
Miss Lemon takes all of her 'girly' clothes out of the closet and wears this dress when she introduces her (one-time-only) love interest to Poirot. This dress has a lot of details: long, gathered sleeves and a frothy jabot collar. It has a high, fitted waist. Two plisse pieces of fabric are sewn down below the shoulder line and hang free just above the high waistline. (You can spot the same lavender colored lines running down the skirt) Unfortunately we don't get to see the skirt part of the dress, but as far we can see it is fitted around the waist and probably has the usual flared A-line skirt.
    

       

Beige belted jacket
A collarless wool jacket with princess seams, tie belt and a rounded neckline. The matching straight skirt has pleats in the front.
   

  

  

White summer suit with belted jacket
Another versatile belted jacket with dropped shoulders and pleats in the back. The deep v-neck has no collar, only a decorative topstitching along the front edges. The belt closes with a metallic buckle. Long A-line skirt. This jacket is often worn in combination with different dresses.
I spotted a 'blooper'! The two pictures below belong to one scene. Miss Lemon wears her orange dress when she arrives and steps out of the car and then suddenly we see her in the favourite pale blue dress inside the building! The dresses switch once more in the next shot.
   

   

White satin blouse with scalopped collar
This blouse appears just once, at the end of series 8. The otherwise plain blouse has a scalloped edge collar and Miss Lemon wears it with a brooch.
   



Next up: the green outfits!

Correction in 'cabbage rose' crochet pattern!

Since I am busy with corrections and new crochet projects, suddenly I realized  that I made a mistake in the 'cabbage rose' pattern! Well, not really a mistake, but it could be confusing since the meaning of the crochet terms differ in US and UK descriptions.
The pattern is now updated, in the first version I used the UK abbrevations (dc for sc and ts for dc). The right US version is here!

Picture taken from www.simplycrochetmag.co.uk

Saturday, July 13, 2013

Correction: orange dress added to the red Miss Lemon outfits

While working on another post for the 'Miss Lemon wardrobe files' I discovered that I forgot to mention an orange dress when discussing the red outfits. This one is added now here!
To view all wardrobe file posts click here or on the picture on the right.

Thursday, July 11, 2013

Quick little projects: Crochet 'cabbage' rose brooch



I was looking for a pattern to make a brooch for my mom, but I couldn't find any that I liked. Sometimes I wonder how this is possible with all of the blogs, websites on the internet...
Actually I did find a few of which I liked the shape but there was no pattern. The patterns which looked okay didn't look like the rose I imagined. They often use double crochet stitches to make the petals which I found too 'flat'. After a couple of hours of trial and error here is the pattern I came up with:

ch = chain
sc = single crochet
dc = double crochet
Sl st = slip stitch

Edit: The pattern is updated, in the first version I made a mistake to use the wrong abbrevations (dc for sc and ts for dc) Below is the correct US version.


Picture taken from www.simplycrochetmag.co.uk

Yarn used: Phildar 'Phil coton 3' (thickness: 50g=121m)
Crochet hook: metric size 2
(suggested knitting needle size on package: metric 2.5-3)

Rose petals (US abbrevations!)
Chain 61 
Row 1: starting in 5th chain from needle: *sc, ch 2, sc in the same chain as the previous sc; ch 2 skip 2* finish with 1 sc in last chain
Row 2: chain 5 and skip picot of previous round *in space of 2 chains: 2 sc, chain 2, 2 sc; ch 2 and skip the picot of the previous row* finish with 2 ch and one sc
Row 3: starting with first space *in space of 2 chains: 1 sc, 7 dc, 1 sc; 1 Sl st in picot of previous row*

This is how the 1st row looks like:


The 2nd row:


3rd row:


Circular base for the back (US abbrevations!)
Chain 4 and join with a slip stitch to make a circle
Round 1: ch 3, 11 sc in circle (=12 sc)
Round 2: ch 3, *alter 2 sc and 1 sc* in the stitches of the previous row. (=18 sc)
Secure last stitch with a Sl st to the first one

   

Roll the finished rose up:
Create a base by sewing the first 7 petals around the outside of the circle. (We work clockwise from outside to inside on right side) This is how the back looks with the first row of petals:


Make the next round of 6 petals:
   

Make the third round of 4 petals sewing onto the circle base and pull thread through the base of the last 1.5 petal + side of the last one and gather it a bit to form the middle of the rose. Pull the petals onto the base in the middle with a few stitches:


Secure thread and finish the brooch by attaching a safety pin or sew rose onto garment, hat or bag!


  

Tuesday, July 9, 2013

Bathroom progress in new house...



We started about a year ago with the renovation of our new 1950's house. We are still not moved in, but we are getting closer. The last obstacle is the bathroom which is tiled for about 50%. Unfortunately the walls aren't straight, we even had to redo the wall behind the shower and toilet because it was done badly. Can you believe that a few months ago we've even paid someone, to get it done the right way?! I believe that by now we are able to do everything ourselves. It jut takes time...
In the meantime more and more stuff gets temporarily 'lost' between the two houses, like my sewing stuff. This means that in my free time I have to concentrate on knitting and crocheting at the moment, next to my Miss Lemon series. Sorry for the absence of sewing projects lately!
  





Me doing the wall tiles:
  

My mom and sister visited from Hungary and they brought an old lamp shade for our new kitchen! The glass shade was a gift from my mom to my grandma somewhere in the 1960's. It survived all those years and fits perfectly in our pistache-green kitchen!