Taking The Bull By The Horns.....Or Not!

I have been a little slow posting on here lately because my laptop has packed a sad and refuses to connect to the Internet and it is nigh on impossible to borrow my daughters when both her and her brother are in the middle of exams.  I draw the line at posting on the IPad because I just find that an exercise in frustration.

This weekend was a long weekend in Canterbury, anniversary weekend.  Friday was what we call Show Day.  It is when the country comes to town.  My youngest still likes to go so along with 70,000 other visitors we spent a good part of the day wandering the various exhibits and admiring the animals.  The massive bull above was one such animal.  A lady asked me, while I was having my photo taken, why I didn't step a bit closer......um....because I value my life!

Now this miniature horse was more my size and even matched my new blouse!  My youngest son walked around this section for ages and patted everything that could not wriggle away from his reach. 

Any ho, corn dogs were consumed, along with bacon and egg sandwiches fresh from the barbeque and we managed to leave before Prince Charles and Camilla arrived in mid afternoon.  We all agreed it was a great day out and we look forward to next year.

Now, for a bit of technical information.....

The blouse is version two of Sewaholic Alma.  This time in size 6.  It is still a little on the large side and I could have gone to a 4 but the fabric is a really soft flowy rayon so the looseness is more of an asset than liability.  The only change I made was to add about 3-4cm to the length of the blouse because I like mine slightly longer than the pattern indicated.

I bought the fabric at Fabric Vision on their $6 sale table only to find it on the $3 sale table before I had time to make it up ...grrr!  I have enough left over to make something else out of it, but I think my daughter may have claimed it!

Because I didn't have matching overlocker thread I used Sew

Busy Lizzie's technique of  putting the facing and interfacing pieces right sides together.  I made a small seam along the edge and then turned the pieces right side out.  I then ironed the interfacing to the facing.

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You would think I would be all new techniqued out by now, but alas, no.  I had room for one more, maybe two!  I used French seams for the shoulders and the side seam.  It helped to combat the thread issue and also gave the side seams some durability and stability on such a flimsy fabric.

But wait, there is more.  To finish the blouse I attempted my first Hong Kong seam around the invisible zipper.  I am quite impressed with this blouse.  I could even wear it inside out if I so desired.