The next few weeks....

I've spent the past 2 days in bed.

Mr D is back from his world trip (business not pleasure), but he brought back a delightful 'put you to the floor' cold.

I say 'cold' because it didn't meet the flu test ("if there was a reese's mini on the floor next to the bed would you get out of bed to get it?" If the answer is yes then I don't have flu.....of course, you have to adore reese's minis as much as I do for this test to work. If you don't, please feel free to substitute 'reese's mini' with ''cake', 'cup of tea', 'beer', 'attractive looking young man/woman' etc. Trust me, this is the best determiner of whether it's flu or just a bad cold).

Aaaaanyway, this means that I'm behind with this week's Sew Weekly Diamond Jubilee challenge.

Here's the progress so far....

Yep, that's the beginnings of a crown and yep, I shall be channeling my inner Catherine Walker this week. Actually, I've been doing some research on Catherine Walker, but I shall save my findings and why I love her for my post on Sew Weekly which will be up sometime next week.

And those of you who follow my Absobloominglutely tumblr or my instagram (tempestdevyne) will recognise THE jacket that Melchett and myself queued up early one Saturday morning for 50% off sale at our local Goodwill thrift store/charity shop. It still had the label on it saying it was originally $60....I got it for $4.99. I am one very happy thrifty bunny.

Having spent 2 days in bed though I need to regroup and replan.

I was going to do some beading on the jacket....that needs to go out of the window. I MIGHT take a page out of Maya in the Moment's wonderful glow in the dark corset-like t-shirt though and use some tulip paints. I was also going to use the burgundy velvet curtain I also got in the Goodwill sale to make a long skirt with train.....but the velvet is very creased and has some stains, it would be fine as a backing (I used some of it to back/line my purple faux fur stole last week) but the flaws will show up too much in a skirt. In theory I should get it properly dry cleaned first, but as it only cost me $2.99 the cost of dry cleaning it would far exceed it's worth.....and I don't have time for that. So I'll have to find a Plan B skirt....a quicky.

My 2 days in bed are also annoying as this was one of the week's I'd planned to get ahead of schedule. We're off on our hollibobs soon (vacation) which will mean 2 weeks away from a sewing machine.The challenges coming up in the next few weeks are:

• Diamond Jubilee - something inspired by a past or present royal
• TV character - something inspired by a tv character (nooooo, really? This cold really is making me state the bleeding obvious)
• Vacation wear
• On-trend 2012 summer trends
• Red, white and blue

2 weeks away from a sewing machine whilst keeping up with this schedule is going to be 'fun' but what's life without a few challenges?

I'm going to be clever/cunning one week and am using the fact that the 'sew' in Sew Weekly doesn't necessarily have to mean creating a new garment with a machine (I'm going to be trying my hand at some on-trend folk embroidery beside the pool ;)). You're also going to see a big floppy 70's style sunhat to match my tie-dye rainbow chevron maxi-dress from a few weeks back.

OK, I need to shut up now and go get sewing before this energy spurt subsides.....wish me luck everyone!