My first Japanese craft book

A spontaneous lunch-time trip into town in search of origami paper yesterday ended up with me finally purchasing a much-coveted Japanese craft book.

"Little Girl's Dress Book" ISBN 978-4-579-11091-9

I've been eyeing this one for a couple of years, ever since I saw this delightful picture on 6.5st's photostream. But the price put me off a bit and I didn't get it. I considered buying it through Japanese Amazon but never got around to it and couldn't justify the cost especially as I would have bought a few books at once to save on shipping!

But yesterday, I had to have a quick browse through the Japanese language sewing section and the little girl on the cover just called out to me. "I'm cranky because you haven't bought me yet!"

I figured I'd contemplated it long enough, so I splurged and bought it :)

I love how the models aren't all smiles like a Kmart catalog.


I love the simple designs - there are four basic dress patterns, embellished differently (sleeves, ruffles etc.)


I can't wait to get sewing for Elora, after I work out what size to make and how to interpret the patterns.


One more exciting thing to share with you this day - I enrolled myself in a community college sewing course! I wanted to do the Dressmaking course, but you had to know all the basics and finishing techniques from their other two courses first. I've enrolled in the not-so-basic one. I figure that I do have a general idea of the theory and basics of sewing. I'm very excited about this. It doesn't start for another 6 weeks so in the mean time I'm going to try and do some more sewing to get my basic skills up. Yay!