Me Made May round up and learnings

Better late than never!  I made it through all of Me Made May and met my pledge in terms of wearing me mades - taking photos was another story (well I have to have something to work on for next year!).  Going on holiday mid month definitely helped as I was able to wear the more summery me mades that I wouldn't have had a chance to given the crappy British May we had (although don't speak to soon but June's been OK so far.  Shhhhh).

I have flexed my design muscles and created you an infographic of my month (OK I googled and found www.infogr.am which is really easy to use!):

Me Made May 2013 | Create infographics

Fun huh?  I love an infographic - probably goes with the job!

Looking at the above, it definitely shows that I should make more knits - they are my default wardrobe staple to throw on with jeans.

I also need more separates (which I knew beforehand).  I thought my me made wardrobe mainly consisted of dresses but they do tend to get worn less often, so luckily I made a few extra knit tops beforehand! 

My wardrobe saviour was my 5 (yes 5!  It's a great pattern and free download so don't judge!) Maria Denmark Kirsten kimono tees.  I wore them on 8 days of the month.  I was also surprised how many Burda items I wore, given that I'm not usually that complementary about them.  Maybe once I get better at sewing I'll mind less about the terrible instructions!  But as someone pointed out on the Flickr group I am massively focused on indie patterns.  I hadn't realised that before!  I guess I prefer the styling and the more consistent (or at least in line with measurements) sizing.  Also I read so many blogs and a Vogue pattern number is harder to remember than Laurel or Alma!  But I only wore 1 big 4 item - and that was my Mad Men dress which was a heavily modified NL 6000.

The only me made items I didn't wear were my Brave Peony (still languishing in needing new zip hell), my Macaron (I need to reinforce the area around the zip before I feel happy wearing it as it's looks pretty messy), my grey Tira (still fabulous but the fabric feels quite wintery) and my Gertie polkadot skirt (got left at the back of the wardrobe when I brought the me mades to the front - oops!).

As a result of trawling the Flickr group and seeing other people's blog posts, I have bought a few new patterns which I hope will help address some of the gaps in my wardrobe.

I have seen so many lovely versions of this and it seems like a great basic skirt.  I have almost finished my first one with another couple of versions in mind!

Another great basic - the Renfrew tee.  I know I'll be the last sewist ever to make one of these but it's a versatile patterns which indulges my t-shirt habit.  Just need to find some great jersey!

There were fabulous versions of this dress popping up the Flickr group, notably from Sew Hopeful - check out her gorgeous bird print version on her blog.  She's been super-helpful on Twitter and advised me to use a drapier fabric than I intended so I'm going to use a charcoal grey knit from my stash and see how I go.

And I preordered Cabarita when Steph put it up for sale.

I've loved seeing her versions on her blog so looking forward to making my own!

Long post, but thanks to the lovely Zoe for organising Me Made May, the helpful and welcoming ladies in the Flickr group and all your fab comments.  It's been fun!