Book Review: And Sew To Bed

If you’ve been reading my blog for the last couple of months, you’ll probably have seen the various nightwear projects that I’ve made from the book And Sew To Bed by Caro London (not to be confused with this book of the same name by Vanessa Mooncie – although this one looks nice too!). As I’ve now used a few of the patterns, I thought I’d write a more detailed review of the book itself to share with you.

The book includes 30 sewing projects for nightwear and accessories, for both women (S, M and L sizes, for UK sizes 10-18 – I’ve used M for all my projects) and children (ages 3-4, 5-6 & 7-8) – 12 patterns for women’s nightwear, 4 girl’s nightwear, 2 boy’s nightwear (the “boy” patterns could probably be used for girls too, but the “girl” patterns are definitely girly), and 12 accessories (ranging from a headband, to a jewellery roll, to pillows). In addition to this, there’s a section at the back of the book with instructions for the techniques used, such as French seams, using bra sliders, piping etc.

There are tear-out pattern sheets included for 18 full-size patterns. You have to trace the patterns, and the sheets are a little bit confusing because there are a lot of different lines overlapping. Each pattern is drawn in its own colour though, and personally I haven’t had any problems with tracing, but I read a couple of reviews on Amazon from people complaining that the sheets were too confusing. For the projects that don’t have a pattern, there are instructions for the size of simple shapes that you need to cut.

Pyjama trousers

I’ve now sewn up three different projects from the book (pyjama trousers, dressing gown, short pyjamas), and the instructions have been fairly clear and easy to follow, if sometimes a bit brief. As some of the projects reuse the same methods, and also the techniques from the back section, the instructions will quite often refer you to other pages rather than writing out the same sections repeatedly. I can see why they’ve done this, and it probably means that you end up with more projects in the book than if everything was written out in full for all of the projects, but flipping backwards and forwards between pages can get a bit annoying, and I think there’s a risk that doing this will lead to missing out steps.

My least favourite thing about the book is the diagrams used to accompany the instructions, which I think suffer from the same problem as lots of craft books by seeming to focus more on trying to be pretty than being clear. Yes, the book needs to be nice to look at, but there are photos of the finished projects that can do that job, so I think it would be better to stick to line drawings for the diagrams as sewing patterns would.

Summer pyjamas

Those are really just niggles, but I thought I’d put them out there in case any of them would be deal-breakers for anyone thinking about buying the book!

There are plenty of positives about the book. There are a nice range of different styles in the women’s section (4 nightdresses, 4 pyjama sets and 4 robes/dressing gowns), with nothing too complicated but still a few interesting details. The patterns come together really nicely and the instructions are clear and generally easy to follow. It’s also pretty good value for money if you compare it to how much you’d have to pay for individual patterns to make all the projects included in the book. Really, if you’ve got this book, then you’re probably not going to need to buy any other nightwear patterns ever (provided that you stay within the slightly limited size range obviously!).

Dressing gown

All in all, I probably wouldn’t want to give And Sew to Bed to someone who was completely new to sewing, but I’d be happy to recommend it to anyone who has a bit of confidence in what they’re doing, and there are still plenty more projects that I’m planning to make from the book - looking through it again to write this review has reminded me quite how much there is in there!

Summer pyjamas

This week I've managed to be sensible with my sewing, and make something that I actually definitely need, instead of something that I just want. What's more, this project cost me next to nothing - never a bad thing! Here are my new summer pyjamas....

(You'll be glad to hear I'm not modelling for you today - the shorts are just a bit too short for me to want to do that! Also, sorry about some of the colour differences going on between the photos, this shade of blue seems to be particularly tricky to photograph accurately!)

So how did I manage to make pyjamas almost for free? The pattern is the third one I've used from And Sew To Bed (my pyjama trousers are here, and summer dressing gown is here), which I got for Christmas from my sister, so that cost me nothing. As for the material, it's the leftovers from my Sureau dress (I just had enough to squeeze out all the pieces, yay!), so although I did have to pay for it at some point I think I've already got my money's worth out of that piece of material from the amount I've worn my Sureau dress, so I'm counting the material as being free too! Plus it means there's one less thing in my growing material stash, which is probably not a bad thing.

The set is pretty easy to sew up, but with enough interesting details to still keep it nice and not boring - like these pretty pintucks on the camisole top. The pattern also includes instructions for adding lace edging along the neckline and around the bottom of the shorts which would make things even prettier, but I didn't have any and was being impatient and didn't want to wait till I could get some, so I left it out, and I think my set looks just fine without it. 

The camisole is slightly wider at the bottom than I had expected it to be based on the photo in the book, but that may partly be down to the material I used - the pattern recommends lightweight cotton, whereas mine's probably somewhere between lightweight and mediumweight and not particularly drapey, so maybe the wideness at the hem would be less pronounced with a different material.

The camisole straps are secured using a bra loop and slider set, which is nice because it means they're adjustable and I think makes the finish look a bit more professional. The instructions in the book weren't 100% clear on what should be attached where for the slider, and the diagrams are also not the best in the world, so I ended up getting out one of my bras to check that what I thought I needed to do was definitely right - thankfully it was so maybe the instructions were OK after all!

The shorts are just a shortened version of the pyjama trousers that I've already made, so that made things nice and simple for me. The back of the waistband is elasticated and then there's a drawstring at the front, which you're meant to make fabric ties for. At this point I decided to have a rummage in my little stash of ribbon and see if I had anything that might be suitable, and happily came upon this length of blue ribbon. Not only was it pretty much the perfect shade, but there was exactly the amount left that I needed for the drawstring - obviously it was meant to be! 

All in all, the pyjamas are comfy and cool to wear, which is the most important thing for summer pyjamas, and have some nice little details thrown in to keep them pretty and interesting. So, I think for something that cost me almost nothing, this project has got to be a winner! And now I might get back to the pretty dresses...

Duvet Cover to Dressing Gown

Last week I decided to be a little bit sensible and sew something that I actually needed, using material that I already owned, as a quick break from getting tempted by all the pretty dresses, shiny new patterns and colourful material. Although what I made is still pretty and colourful, so it's all good. Here's my new dressing gown...

This is the second pattern I've made from the book 'And Sew To Bed' by Caro London (the first was my pyjama trousers), it's the Wrapover Short Dressing Gown. For some reason I felt a bit weird at first about posing for blog photos in a dressing gown, but then I decided that it actually covers more than some clothes so I should just go for it. But not subject you to too much of my pasty, milk-bottle legs, and definitely take the photos inside...

As you might have guessed from the title of this post, the material I used was actually originally an Ikea duvet cover. I bought it a couple of years ago, and it has already been used for some smaller projects (pre-blog) and there's a decent amount left still so I think I'm doing OK for the money I paid (which I'm sure was less than the current price of £20, which is still not bad!). The great bonus about using the duvet cover for this project was that the check used for the reverse of the cover gave me a ready-made contrast print which matches the colours of the rose print perfectly - yay! Here's a close-up...

You can also see one of the cute little gathered pockets here. Constructing and adding these was probably about as complicated as this got (i.e. not that complicated), so it was a pretty quick project to sew up, after all there's no need for particularly accurate fitting with a dressing gown really is there? You might not want to do this as a first sewing project because the instructions are a little brief, but they're still clear and fairly straightforward so shouldn't be anything to trouble people with even only a very small amount of sewing experience.

It would also be a good project to do if you wanted to practice a bit of top-stitching as you have to top-stitch all along contrast on the front/neck band, cuffs and pocket band, as well as all along the belt. My top-stitching isn't always the neatest in the world, but I took it slowly and I'm happy with how it turned out this time.

It's also a good chance to practice French seams, as they're used on all of the seams on the main material. The contrast strips are all attached and then folded back on themselves to enclose the raw edges before top-stitching too, so that combined with the French seams means the inside all looks nice and neat too!

There's not much else to say about this one I don't think - it was a nice simple project, which turned out just how I hoped it would and has given me a nice new dressing gown for the warmer weather. I'm planning on making one of the other patterns from this book soon, and once I've done that I'll write a full review.

Anyone else ever made anything from a duvet cover?

Cosy pyjama trousers

While a nice new pair of pyjamas is usually a good Christmas present, this year just gone I decided it would be more fun to be able to make them for myself so I added the book And Sew to Bed by Caro London to my wish list, and being as this wish list was not so subtly emailed to my family, I was a lucky girl and the book was there waiting for me on Christmas morning!

And here's my first completed project from the book - a cosy new pair of pyjama trousers. They're the trousers from the classic pyjama set in the book, and they've already been getting a lot of use!

They were fairly simple to sew, and as I pretty much stick to wearing skirts and dresses in everyday life, this is probably about as technical as I'm ever going to get when it comes to sewing trousers for myself. 

The insides are all finished with French seams, and the waistband is part elasticated and fastens with fabric ties, so they're nice and comfy.

I was amazed that the buttonhole feature on my sewing machine decided to cooperate when it came to making the holes for the waist ties. The last couple of times I tried to use it (for cushion covers in my life before dressmaking) my machine refused to do anything at all, but this time they both worked completely fine first time - yay!

The material is a cosy and colourful brushed cotton that I got from Calico Laine but they don't seem to have any of it on their website anymore. 

That's about all I have to say about this project at the moment, but I'll probably write a more detailed review of the book once I've had a chance to make one or two more of the projects - there are lots of lovely options so I'm spoilt for choice!