About Me

Hi,

My name is Jennifer, but I answer  to Jenny and Jen also!

I'm nearly 49 years old and live in country Victoria, Australia.  My husband Neale and I have been married for nearly 29 years and we have 4 children - 3 (Thomas 26, Morgan 25 and Hadden 21)  who have left home and the fourth, our 19 year old daughter Laura, who is currently studying at university in Melbourne.
I work full time as an administration officer for a cleaning company, and have been there for 6.5 years now.

I've been sewing since I was about 7 years old - although in the past 6 years,I have sewn nary a thing, just mending!  Up until then, I was sewing nearly daily.
I completed a certificate 4 in Fashion at a local technical college in 2006 ,where  we were taught how to draft patterns, sewing (of course), pattern grading, dress designing, pattern markers and a couple of other subjects.  It took me several years to complete the Cert 4, although I  was attending classes full time, there was a lot of work to complete at home and with a young family and Neale studying full time also I found it difficult and just worked through it all slowly.

I'm also an avid reader and always have  a book in hand.I tell you, working full time certainly cuts into my reading time!

Sewing  machine wise I have -

*Elna Stella TSP (my parents gave this to me for my 18th Birthday
*Elna Diva (must've bought this in the late1980's)
*Elna Pro4DE overlocker(I bought this in 1990/1991afterI returned to work part time when our first 2 boys were babies.
* Brother PE200 Embroidery machine
* Brother  2340cv Cover stitch machine (bought late 2007 just before the great sewing slump began!)

I have amassed quite a collection of reference books covering sewing, design, pattern making, grading and fitting etc and still have quite a few more on my Amazon wishlist!

I am a pattern addict - even more so since I discovered the BMV website and could order patterns from the USA far more cheaply than I could buy them here in Australia.  I'm so easily influenced my the many blogs I read and tend to buy the pattern that is reviewed etc!! I have about 600 Ladies patterns and about 200 patterns for children - mainly girls.I still maintain that if anything happens in the future to the big pattern companies - I'll be alright!!

I am also a fabric addict - with a very nice collection which is stored all throughout the house,  the garden shed and storage locker we have. One can never have enough fabric! Now to start using it!

I prefer garment sewing and plan to sew mainly clothes for myself & Laura.I went through a period of not wanting to sew for myself until I  lost weight - but have  figured that this idea is  not sane or sensible.   I still need to lose weight (am aiming to look totally abfab at 50 next year!), but I still need/want clothes now.

Jen