Me-Made-May 18 Wrapup

Me-Made-May is now over!  Mid-May musings can be read here and this is the final analysis.

I can say I enjoyed it, especially the “Gee, you look smart” comments, to which I replied “Thank you. I’m doing Me-Made-May”.

The month of me-mades can be seen on Instagram here. Here are some highlights:

Finally wore the Aquascutum suit (finishing the last 10% took the longest!).  Read about it here, here and then here.

Celebrated the royal wedding wearing a brown babycord me-made skirt.

A coat from my pre-children life. It’s Max Mara wool cashmere, and I always felt wonderful wearing it. I put it away when my children were born because I didn’t want it vomited on, but I think I’ll start wearing it again (the new baby is now 7).  Me-knitted alpaca mobius neck tube and corduroy skirt.

Last summer’s favourite dress still being worn, with the free hat pattern.

Me-made corduroy trousers and a shirt from Pattern Magic (tying a bow D).

So, looking at the month’s outfits, what did I learn?

• Rubber boots go with most outfits if worn in an outdoors country setting. When worn with a skirt, one feels like the queen (Hèrmes scarf optional).
• Outdoors also allows one to wear a hat, important if one has been going “no shampoo” for the past four months and only looks half reasonable with a ponytail.
• I like a pop of orange (my favourite colour) but dusty pink is THE colour for me.
• Enjoyed wearing my favourite sleeveless summer dress a while longer by teaming it with long sleeves and tights…and rubber boots, if outdoors.
• I lack smart trousers.*
• High necklines and scarves work well for me, but if the scarf it too big my head looks like an egg on a nest.

*Yes, part of my Me-Made-May pledge was to make a great trousers pattern. I started on this towards the end of May, and discovered that what I really need is TWO great trouser patterns. One for classic, smart trousers (the type my Grandma would have called “slacks”), and a jeans-type trouser pattern with a closer fit. I’m nearly there with the classic trousers and will start on the jeans one soon (but not this week, maybe next week).

Photography: someone asked me what I do for a camera. It’s pretty basic really, I use an Olympus camera ($89 from Target) and a secondhand Hanimex tripod (which you can see the shadow of in some of my photos). I require every advantage with this setup. I try and take my piccies in the first or last 1.5 hours of the day when the light is better. I rarely use a flash, and if I have to take a picture indoors I do it by a window. Outdoors, I favour fence lines, of which there are plenty, or other diagonal lines to draw the eye into the picture. I try different angles and find that sometimes a closeup headless picture looks better. People (ie me) always look better smiling, and with some sort of energy or movement, be it jumping on a trampoline or just a windy day.

Cheers!