My take on the Peplum top.

Hello people in cyberland. Hope you had a great day today. I had an absolutely lovely one. It rained heavily through last night and I had the most lovely sleep imaginable. A lot of mothers confirm that they hardly sleep at all once little ones come along. This is especially true for me. I can't even remember a time when I enjoyed sleeping most nights. I think the entire family had a good one because even the littlest person in the house slept in. Despite a great deal of uncertainty at the moment, I am immensely grateful for all that is wonderfully good and unexpectedly pleasant in my life. Today was not much different from the rest. I spent the day with my daughters, my sister, my cousins and my parents. Completed one sewing project and started another... this time, an item for my sister. I have enough fabric and ideas to keep me busy for a good long while. I'm happy to see that with each little sewing challenge, I'm getting better at this craft. Some days you wake up smiling and not knowing exactly why. When this happens just go with it and enjoy your day.

Today I'm going to be showing a top that I have been making for some time now. It has taken me a couple of months to complete because I have gone through the works trying to get it just right. I am just now warming up to peplums. I used to think the cut was too girly for me and not quite my style, but pairing a peplum top with skinny trousers seems to work really well with my boyish frame. I like it so much that I've already planned to make another one as soon as I finish with what I've already started at the moment. This top is cut from 1 meter of Hitaget African cotton print cloth in lime green, yellow and orange. I copied the top half of a dress I have and combined it with an oxbow shaped  pattern which I adjusted to form the pleated peplum, making it fall a bit lower in the back. Once I had put in the facings around the front, arms and racer-back, I put in a band at the waist, added the peplum with four pleats in the front and four in the back, then I worked on the zipper. Putting in the band and the zipper turned out to be my biggest challenge as the zipper kept puckering up in the back. I had to take out the zipper, undo the band and shorten the back pieces, then I reassembled all the pieces again. Once it was done to the best of my ability, I wasn't sure weather or not to hem the peplum edges. I left the top alone and was beginning to think I wouldn't get to wear it at all, until my mom suggested that I get the hemline finished with zigzagging in a matching coloured thread. This I did and here are the results, paired with dark orange skinny trousers from H&M, and tan lace-up heels from InWear.

African print peplum top in lime green, orange and yellow.

African print peplum top matched with H&M skinny trousers and lace-up heels

Simple two-strand twists updo

Simple two-strand twists updo