July Newsletter

Scottish holiday, new dresses and why I've been a little MIA

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Hello and welcome back to the Slow Natured newsletter! I just want to begin by apologising especially to my paid subscribers for my absence this month. Sadly, we had a very unexpected bereavement in the family which changed our plans for the month quite significantly. As I’m sure many of you will know, when life throws such a blow it can be difficult to stay on top of all the things you’re supposed to and so I’m afraid there were a couple of posts that didn’t happen this month. I am however, looking forward to sharing these posts with you in August and am excited for all the things to come.

This month has been a bit of such a strange mix of wonderful highs and quite terrible lows but as I said in a recent instagram post, I think that is simply the condition of life. There is never only darkness, even in the saddest of times there is light to be found and often in the happiest of times there is a little sadness hidden somewhere. It is much less about avoiding all the bad parts of life but instead accepting them and deciding to respond to them in the best way you can. And as always, creating with my hands and growing in my garden has brought me much needed distraction and moments of simple joy this month. So without further ado, let’s dive into what I’ve been up to this July.

This Month I Have Been Knitting…

Early in the month I finished my April Cardigan, a simple and relaxing stockinette stitch pattern from Petite Knit. Made in Drops Lima, a blend of alpaca and wool fibres, I wasn’t sure I would actually get much wear out of this until later in the year but I was pleased to wear it a little on our trip to Scotland this month. It is an incredibly soft and warm cardigan and I made it cropped so it would work well with all the dresses in my wardrobe. I managed to find these beautiful handmade ceramic buttons that went perfectly in my stash and I am looking forward to getting more wear out of this in the autumn.

The rest of the month has been spent working on my vintage jumper which you may remember from my last newsletter. I am very close to finishing this cute make and can’t wait to show you the finished results soon.

This Month I Have Been Sewing…

I managed to whip up two dresses this month to take on my Scottish summer holiday. My husbands family live in Fife and so this was definitely not my first time prepping for a Scottish summer. Last year had been very cold and miserable so I hadn’t held high hopes and chosen to make myself at least one more maxi dress that I could wear with leggings underneath if needs be. However, I was pleasantly surprised by the gorgeous sunshine and warm temperatures we were treated to.

I wore this new dress to Scone Palace as I knew the Dioresque print of the fabric would look perfect in photos with the palace backdrop. Scone recently hosted a lunch for Dior before their Cruise 2025 show at Drummond castle and back in the 1960s they hosted a Dior fashion show. And so I knew it would be perfect as I had first been attracted to this toile de joey style fabric due to all the beautiful Dior dresses I had seen in a similar print. I used my favourite Indigo dress by Tilly and the Buttons hacked with Anthea Sleeves from the Anthea Blouse by Anna Allen Clothing. I think it worked out perfectly and I am loving having this new dress in my wardrobe.

I had sunny days on the beach in mind when I made this second dress. If you watch my YouTube channel you may remember I picked up the beautiful red 100% linen fabric at The Stitch Festival back in March. As soon as I made my first Nell dress out of thrifted curtains (watch the video here) I knew I needed to make another in this red linen. I decided to go for the knee length version this time with little patch pockets and I am so pleased with how it looks. Paired with espadrilles and a pair of sunnies, it is the perfect summer dress.

This Month I’ve Been Reading…

You may remember in a post all about what is on my bookshelf this summer, I shared how I wanted to read Jenny Packham’s beautiful book How To Make A Dress: adventures in the art of style. I am so glad I finally got round to it. This book is so well written and such a beautiful mix of memoir, storytelling and insight into the ins and outs of a British fashion atelier. As some one who has always had a passion for fashion design and clothes, it was such an interesting read. I would highly recommend it and it would also make a great present for the fashion loving book worm in your family!

This Month I’ve Been Watching…

I was a bit sceptical when America’s Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheeleaders documentary dropped on Netflix. It wasn’t until so many people on instagram recommended it that I thought maybe we should give it a watch and I am so glad we did. Having grown up in the UK, cheerleading and all it entails is a fairly unknown phenomenon to me which only made this documentary even more fascinating. I really enjoyed watching it and learning about these incredibly female athletes, which is exactly what they are and I hope this documentary gets them the recognition as athletes that they deserve. If you’re looking for something not too hard going but interesting to watch this month this is the one.

This Month I’ve Been Visiting…

As I mentioned, we were able to take a weeks holiday in Scotland this month to stay with my husbands family. It was a great week off and just what we needed but one thing I particularly enjoyed was my day visiting all the thrift shops in St Andrews. I have been into a couple before but this is the first time I did a proper thrifting session and I was totally blown away by how much good stuff there was. And, it was a lot cheaper then the charity shops around the Cotswolds I can tell you! If you want to see more of my trip including what I bought, you can check out my latest YouTube video here.

This Month I’ve Been Loving…

The unexpected good weather on our holiday was such a joy. We were able to eat outside most days, take lovely long beach walks, take our friends and their little boy down to the estuary to skip stones, eat fish and chips on the beach and even swim in the sea. I had hoped for sunshine and warm temps but I was so surprised by just how good our week was. It was a real lift to the spirits this month and exactly what we needed.

I hope you all had a wonderful July and I look forward to sharing more handmade, homegrown and slow posts in August.

Much love,

Rachel x