I finally used the fabric I printed on. This is dress d-3 from Isbn 4776203219. It’s the same pattern as the one on the cover of the book.

It’s such a sweet looking little dress. I love how the little gathered area at the back looks,

the fake bow too,

and especially Isabelle in it. She looks so cute.

But notice something? It’s a wee bit short. I think I didn’t interpret the drawings correctly. I thought it looked short when I cut the pattern out but I stupidly kept going and cut into my precious gocco fabric. You know the fabric that took me so damn long to make. The fabric that actually caused me pain in the making. Yeah that fabric! And Alan thought it looked a little short too but he didn’t mention that until ummm TONIGHT!

That isn’t the only problem. It is also messy inside. Who cares you say. Nobody will look inside. But I do and I know it’s ugly and messy in there!! I know!

What happened was, I couldn’t quite figure out the directions from the picture. I attached the straps on the front so they’re hidden from inside but I didn’t do the same for where the straps attach on the back. I just sewed them in messily. Well not messily. They’re straight but you can see them. So I tried it on Isabelle and uh oh, a little tight to put on, the bodice was loose once it was on her, and the straps were too long so you could see her chest. Ah ha! Now I saw what needed to be fixed.

That happens a lot when I’m sewing. I don’t understand it until I get to the actual making of the outfit. So that’s why in the picture the back is gathered. Elastic! So I put in some elastic which gathered it up nicely so the bodice wasn’t so loose. Then I shortened the straps so you don’t see her chest. And waa la: pretty dress on the outside, ugly mess on the inside.

But the tight getting on part. What’s the fix for that? Ah haa!! Light bulb moment right now. Go a size up and do the whole elastic and shorter straps thing and then it’ll fit! DUH! But I guess that doesn’t fix the tightness for this dress. Oh well. For the next time I make this dress then.

Ok more pictures. Granted they aren’t much better than yesterday’s but it’s been windy here and my allergies are kicking my butt. My poor nose is so sore from all the blowing. At this point I don’t much care, I’m so miserable.

Ok, so the fabric I goccoed on. Here was the master I used. I’ve been bummed that I didn’t buy any red riding hood fabric from Superbuzzy. So I’ve been thinking about making my own fabric for a couple of months now. I told my sister and Olinda and was quite excited. I wish I had mentioned it on here because then maybe someone could have told me how crazy I was. How insane thinking I could make my own fabric with my little gocco which is only what…about 3″ x 5″ print.

But I wasn’t thinking about that. I just wanted my own little one of a kind fabric made by me. So the look I was going for was a polka dot sort of. I wanted it sort of subtle. And Alan would keep saying, it’s so small you can’t really see it from far away. To which I would reply, well that’s what I was going for.

And I even tested it out how I wanted the stamp to go. Turning this way and that, two different directions because let me make it as hard as possible for myself. And looking at this picture now I don’t know what I was thinking. There’s a diagonal pattern going on there that I DO NOT like.

So everything went wrong. My first screen didn’t burn correctly. I don’t know if my lines weren’t dark enough or if I didn’t push the top down right but one wasted screen and two bulbs. Then I didn’t want to stamp on our hard floors so I had Alan put some cardboard in the bedroom. That was a mistake. The cardboard had creases and it was soft and not easy to print on. And then when I started stamping I wasn’t doing it straight and not as close as my pattern test, I couldn’t remember where to stamp my design (I should have printed out my test), and on and on with the wrongs. I stamped on about 2 yards of 100% cotton fabric. I also bought some linen to try printing on but didn’t even get to it. When I was done with just those 2 yards my arm was sooooo sore. Yes it was just a major disappointment all around. But…BUT I do have some stamped bits I like. Some.

Next time, that is if I want to tackle fabric again, I think I will design one big drawing and just do a big design like Alan told me to originally. Or hey even better maybe my drawings on little onesies and tshirts like I thought about ages and ages ago.

And because my gocco on fabric was such a bummer. Here’s something to cheer me up. Isabelle “helping me clean”.

There hasn’t been much sewing going on here lately. But instead lots of thinking about sewing or I should say fabric. Mainly preoccupation with printing on fabric. Here’s a peek.

Oh can’t see it? Sorry. I just love when Isabelle inserts herself into pictures.

How about this picture? Better? Ah sorry…only a little. Losing light and too much Isabelle around.

This was a test on fabric using my gocco. It didn’t turn out as I wanted. More on this another time when I can get better pictures.

And on a completely different subject. I read this post on Flickr earlier. So I went ahead and clicked on the profile to see the pictures. Hilarious and totally unexpected. Or I should say I FIND IT hilarious. Ten minutes after looking at it the first time I looked at it again. Still making me laugh.

I finally tried my Gocco out last night!! It took me long enough. Everything I wanted to make was on fabric and I wanted to try on paper first so there it sat unused. I finally took Christine’s advice and just bought some index cards and did a test run, something that I didn’t have to worry about being perfect and just something simple. And I love it!! It was so easy. Mostly everything worked perfectly from the get go.

I wanted to test to see if a print from my inkjet printer would work so I printed out a little scribble and then drew my design around it with the Riso pen that came with the Gocco. Then I burned my master and applied the ink. Alan chose brown, or kaka brown as he called it saying I would probably use kaka brown the least. (But oh no, I just realized…I have kaka brown hair. I would totally use kaka brown all the time if I were going to make drawings of us!! Well anyhoo…)

Then I started printing. The inkjet printed part worked! But I didn’t want to print that part so I just covered it up with a little post it note which worked fine. I really didn’t think about lining anything up which DUH I should have. The design was very tight and close to the edges. I didn’t pay attention when I made my master so the index card didn’t line up to any of the lines on the Gocco. I tried using a sticky to align it but it was right on the edge so it didn’t work really well. I basically just eyeballed it. So print, print, print. Some of them were centered right and some weren’t. But that’s what happens when you eyeball stuff. I used up all 100 index cards.

Then when I was done I didn’t know what to do with my master. I wanted to save it and I vaguely remembered reading on Flickr Gocco pool about storing it in the freezer. But the problem. Flickr was down last night! I couldn’t look it up. So I didn’t know what to do. I just panicked a little and stuck it in the freezer. If it’s ruined that’s ok. It was so easy I’ll just make a new one!! I love it! I fell asleep with Gocco thoughts in my head.

And on a completely different subject. Here is silly Isabelle trying to sit on a balloon. She was doing this as I was trying to post so I just had to take some pictures and share.

Oh how could I forget to mention this? I got this during Alan’s vacation. The whole photo emulsion thing with screen printing was just too intimidating. Now that I have a print gocco what shall I make first? It came with the fabric stamp. Shall I make onesies? What to do, what to do?

Actually I think I should start with paper first before doing fabric.