Monthly Archives: August 2010

August 19, 2010 · 7:54 am

Kasia—fitting

Or, A Window To My Insecurities

Kasia: front

I hate fit photos. I have a really hard time making myself take them—straight on, rear view, side view, with no posing or angling or

Kasia: side

twisting to give me the illusion of a figure I don’t have. Also, as usual, any kind of a waistband at my waist makes me feel like an absolute blob. (I am trying very hard to remind myself this is just a feeling and does not necessarily reflect how I actually look in the item) But, for your amusement, here they are.

Obviously the waistband needs to come in a bit, chiefly at the centre back. Big surprise. Also, despite my grading of the waist up a size, the curve of the hips is still a little generous (aka poufy. This hip-pouf is the reason I originally abandoned high-waisted anything), so I will need to take that in. It’s

Kasia: rear

especially obvious in the rear view.

Other than those fairly minor tweaks it’s looking not bad. I think the length will be nice once it’s hemmed. (This is also outside the comfort zone for me… I traditionally wear my skirts really long, like full length, or really short. For functional reasons, this mostly means I don’t wear my skirts. However, the one skirt in my wardrobe that actually gest worn on a regular basis is just above knee-length.)

I have some issue with my zipper insertion (don’t I always?) but since it doesn’t show I’m not overly bothered by it. Now I’m debating how much topstitching to do (all there is right now is around the hip panels). Emphasize the waistband, or the vertical seams? (or both?) Invisible hem or topstitched hem at the bottom? I’m sooo tempted to peg the bottom sides in a bit, too, but I’m trying to resist, as it really looks fine and if it’s too narrow to walk in, I won’t wear it.

Then there’s the issue of how much ease I need in the waistband. Ease at the waist has always been tricky for me. The amount that feels comfortable (i. e. doesn’t leave me feeling like I instantly gained 20 lbs) is very little, which tends to produce rolls when I sit down. Now, muffin-top at my hips bothers me not at all, but rolls at the waist drive me nuts. But so does a loose waistband.

Funny how your feelings about how you look can be so disconnected from how you actually look, hey? Looking at the pictures, I actually don’t mind the skirt. There’s even some curviness at the hip there (aside from the poufy part) that is the main draw of a pencil skirt; though not seeing my bellybutton above a waistband is very disorienting. Wearing it, I feel big as a house. Pregnant. Like I’m driving a minivan. (Yes, driving minivans makes me feel fat. Something about the way they maneuver…)

Hopefully some careful fitting and lots of awesome photos later will help me take care of that.

Well, I hope that was an interesting window into all my little figure-insecurities. Now, I need a cup of tea.

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Tagged as in progress, kasia, whining

August 18, 2010 · 9:48 pm

Slow and (not so) steady…

Kasia skirt front, showing one of the inner panels

I thought I’d have more progress to report on the Kasia by now. I had hopes of prancing around in it by tonight. Alas… things come up. I did at one point today have the side-seams stitched together enough to try it on (so far so good… the waistband will be the make-or-break, of course), then I had to pull them apart to add the waistband. Which is really confusing, by the way, since it’s in about seven different pieces. Two of which are the same piece (centre front) in different layers. I thought skirts were supposed to be easy? And then I had to drive out to Fabricland to get more topstitching thread—more of that famous silvery-grey that I used on the black jeans and the kids’ jean jackets. It’s a pain in the butt to sew with, especially since using some normal “jeans thread” on the last pair of capris, which was much better behaved, but I love the bright silvery colour, and I didn’t want denim-gold topstitching on this skirt. Although it is denim, I’m looking for something that reads a bit classier than “jean skirt.”

I’m not totally sold on the colour of the contrast inserts (it’s the same sparkly denim from the kids’ jackets) but I like that it’s much lighter-weight (better for gathering) than the striped denim.

Sadly, the Cupcake Goddess’s tutorial on sewing a skirt vent came a day late for me to put one in the back skirt, so a slit it will have to be.

Next trick… get the sides all sewn up and figure out if I need to make any sway-back adjustments to the waistband. Shouldn’t be hard with all the seams in it, but here’s hoping it won’t be necessary.

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August 17, 2010 · 2:54 pm

Buttonhole Elastic

Because I’m not accomplishing much of anything today, here’s a random post on that miracle of modern children’s clothing… Buttonhole Elastic!

Now, I first met buttonhole elastic when I was pregnant with my second daughter. It featured prominently in the two pairs of maternity pants (real maternity pants! This was a Big Deal!) that I bought that pregnancy. As first impressions go, this was not a big win. The buttonhole elastic is threaded through the back of the waistband, emerging via a buttonhole somewhere around the front hip, where it attaches to a button. You can adjust which of the many buttonholes along the elastic is buttoned, and thus adjust the waistband.

Really it didn’t work so well. Partly because who really wants a bunchy, elasticized waistband at the back of their jeans, and mostly because you can make the waistband of maternity pants as adjustable as you want but when the waist is wider than the hips, the pants are still going to fall down. (I think the current trend for mat. pants is very long, wide knit panels at the top, reaching up almost to the underbust. I haven’t been pregnant in over seven years so I can’t comment on how any of these work, although it seems a lot nicer than having a jeans button poking through your shirt right at your swollen belly-button.)

But, a few years later I noticed them cropping up in the back of kids’ jeans.

Buttonhole elastic threaded through waistband

And it has found its niche!

Elasticized waistbands and kids go together at the best of times—comfort almost always trumps stylishness (for the younger set, anyway), and considering the range of widths vs. lengths in kids, as well as the rapid changes within an individual child, an adjustable waistband is a wonderfully practical idea. An additional bonus for my booty-licious older daughter is that the drawn-in waistband at the back provides better fit for her J-Lo-esque backside.

So when I first made her the Jalie Jeans, back in May, I purchased a ton of buttonhole elastic and made the buttonholes (and attached the buttons) before sewing on the waistband. Amazingly forethoughtful of me, seriously. And then she tried them on—and they fit pretty much perfectly as-is, so I never bothered installing the elastic.

Re-sized jeans!

Well, fast forward three months and, of course, jeans that were perfectly fitting in the spring are WAY too small. Fortunately, I have two daughters, so all that work is not for naught… but the seven-year-old is still a fair bit smaller.

Finally, the elastic comes into its own! These are size K jeans on a size I body (so two sizes too big)

Alright, she probably won’t be wearing them quite yet, as they are also WAY long. But if she

Rear view---elasticized waistband

wants to, she can 🙂

Now, back to tracing up the Size M pattern for the older daughter…

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Tagged as alteration, jeans, kids' clothes, kids' clothing, too much talk

August 16, 2010 · 6:33 pm

How to take cute pictures of a sucky coat

Burda Jacket... almost finished

Ok, the pictures aren’t even that cute. It’s not totally finished… not sure at this point that it will be, except for bloodymindedness and so I have something to wear during Self-Stitched September if (when) it gets too cold for my jean jacket. Note the hands on the hips in the first photo, creating the illusion of fit. Note how it’s pulled around to improve the rear fit in the second photo; this makes the front look super-doofy.

So, what are my issues?

Well, partly it’s fit. I never did get the shoulders *really* figured out. If I take them in, it’s too narrow in the

Burda jacket, back(ish) view

shoulders. If I let them out, there’s that bump that you see in the photo. And somehow when I put in the lining, the whole thing shrank (go figure :P) so that it doesn’t even overlap nicely in the front (without pulling at the shoulders). Instead of the lone visible button at the top and two hidden ones lower, I might just put in a low button, since that’s the only part that closes nicely.

And partly it’s my fabric. The jacket was designed for faux-leather, and my wool is MUCH thicker than that. I think this thickness is the main problem with the collar, which is sort of heavy and ugly without anything being obviously wrong with it. I think someone with perfect tailoring skillz could have made a nice fitted jacket out of this wool, but I suspect that someone of my calibre should’ve stuck with something a little more basic. D’you think a sleeve-head or a shoulderpad would help?

On the up-side, the sleeve length is dead-on. And it’s super, duper warm.

Kasia skirt pattern

And, just to show that I’m truly a sucker for punishment, I printed out and assembled the Kasia skirt pattern for my next project! I’m going to grade it out from a size 36 at the hip to a size 38 at the waist and hope that gives me enough ease… I measured the pieces and according my calculations the finished size of the 36″ waistband should be 28″, which is technically the size of my waist but wouldn’t be comfortable at all. But one size up should be adequate.

Just for the record, I haven’t worn an item of clothing with a waistband at my waist, except for one Christmas skirt that fits like a dream, since I was a teenager.

Oh, and here’s a picture of the jacket before I put the sleeves on, inside-out to show all the

Interfacing

interfacing. This was all as directed by the pattern, but maybe it wasn’t such a good idea on my thick, thick wool. You can also see very clearly that rogue shoulder-seam.

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August 16, 2010 · 11:21 am

We interrupt your regularly scheduled jacket mangling…

To bring you… a tailor’s ham!

Home-made tailor's ham

Based on the Burdastyle tutorial, it is one half wool, one half cotton twill, stuffed with cotton scraps, and a bit funny-shaped and triangular, not to mention lumpy. I’m not convinced the scrap-stuffing is going to be firm enough in the long run… we’ll see. I feel like a rice or barley stuffing might be a good alternative to the sawdust I don’t have ready access too. I’m not sure what the store-bought ones are stuffed with these days (feels light and plasticky, though). However, it was a lot better to try and shape the jacket shoulders than just the edge of the regular ironing board. I’ve been meaning to make one of these for a while (basically ever since I saw the Burdastyle tutorial), as I’m too cheap to buy one. Next on the list will be a sleeve roll…

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August 16, 2010 · 7:34 am

Jacket Suckitude

The sleeves on this jacket are driving me nuts! Is it me? Is it the pattern? Is it my punishment from the fickle Sewing Gods for daring to try to make a—ulp—petite pattern?

Part of the problem comes from the shoulder seam, which runs well to the rear of my actual shoulder. Actually, the neck-side of it is perfect. But for some reason it angles backward at the outside. (I had noticed this in the muslin but thought it was due to me distributing the fullness of the sleeve cap poorly. Now I suspect that this is WHY the fullness was all concentrated to the back. Also the shoulder seemed a bit too wide, especially at the front, and I’ve now tightened the curve of the front princess seam a bit. I am dangerously close to the kind of billiard-ball alterations that turned my Lydia Disaster from a well-constructed top that didn’t happen to fit me into something suitable only for my 10-year-old’s scissors. But wool is considerably more forgiving of stitch-ripping than a cotton knit (I’ve now had sleeves basted in at least five separate times, by machine and by hand… I like by hand, it only takes about 2 snips to rip it all out). I’m hoping if I give up on the shoulder seam as a reference and mark my actual shoulder point, I’ll have some better luck. I hope so. I sure love this fabric.

Seriously, though, this is a pain. I have pretty easy-to-fit shoulders. They’re a little broad (not for this pattern though!) and square, but they’re straight and even. No forward-shoulder alterations here. And I’ve set in plenty of sleeves before, even in jackets, with none of these problems.

Man, I wish I had a dress-form.

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Tagged as alteration, Burda, jacket, jackets, oopsie

August 15, 2010 · 10:06 am

Fools rush in…

oops... a jacket.

Where wiser seamstresses fear to tread.

This is a jacket from my new Burda mag. This jacket, actually. Minus pockets, on account of I don’t really like patch pockets on coats and I’m too lazy to learn to do the welt pocket on the left breast right now.

Yes, THAT jacket.

Yes, I went ahead and cut it without doing a proper muslin or anything. I am not in the right headspace to be tackling this, by any means. I haven’t read up on my tailoring in a few months. I haven’t gone through my sole sewing book for whatever tips may lurk within. Most of all, I’m not feeling patient, although I am working on it.

I traced off a size 18; this is the Burda petite size equivalent to my regular size, 36. The arms of the pattern

front of lining/muslin

are long to begin with, but let’s face it, I’m no petite. I measured the pattern pieces, and my own arms (this is always touch-and-go as it varied by where the shoulder/sleeve seam falls), and added an inch for good measure. Plus a 4cm hem allowance, so really I should have plenty to play with.

I cut out the lining first and sewed it up quickly to test the fit. The bodice was surprisingly good, although I’m not quite sure there’s going to be enough overlap in the front. Odd, since that should be the one dimension it actually fits me in. Here’s a few shots of it, though they’re mostly terrible. The darts actually fall in a really good place for me (which never happens). The bodice length is awesome (Ok, an extra half-inch somewhere probably wouldn’t’ve hurt, but I like a short jacket so I’m not going to bother). The fit at the curve of my (sway) back is great, too.

Back of lining/muslin. Something is WRONG with those shoulders.

Something is WRONG with the shoulders. It’s like all the fullness is gathered behind the shoulder, pulling the shoulder-seam back and making it poufy at the back there. I think I got the easing in the right place according to the pattern, but it does not look right at all. I think it’s just a problem in how the ease is distributed, though (as opposed to how the pattern is cut.) Also, I sewed the side pieces in backwards, which may have thrown off the armscye a bit.

Don’t ever try to use your lining as a muslin. It’s way too slippery and hard to get right—and then you won’t know which fitting issues are genuine and which just come from your own screw-ups. And then you pretty much have to pull it all apart to sew the facings in anyway.

Also, Things I Learned Tracing My First Burda Magazine Pattern

even if you remember to leave space for the seam allowances, leave more, they are LARGER than you think.
try to get all the pattern markings, including the seam numbers, down when you first trace it. You WILL need this info, and going back and finding the pieces again on the pattern is a PITA.
However, you will miss some markings. Go back and add them as soon as you realize it.
Burda uses little lines instead of notches. Draw your notches in (or out 😉 ) because you will forget them, otherwise. Don’t forget to do this at the seam allowance line, not just the stitching line.
the information is there. It’s just not always where you think it is.
look up how to sew a mitred corner.

Ok the last one probably isn’t very widely applicable. That’s all the instructions say for finishing the rear vent.

Anyway, I have a bit more interfacing and a LOT more reading to do. I have a feeling there will be a fair bit of basting and fitting for this one, especially around the shoulder area. But if I end up with a nice fall-weight jacket for Self Stitched September, I’ll be swimming, right?

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August 13, 2010 · 11:09 am

My first Burda Magazine!

My First Burda (Magazine)! (I'm not manic. Really. I'm not. Ok maybe a little.)

Last night a little bird took me to a newsstand in town that actually carries BurdaStyle magazine. For the low, low price of $10 Canadian, I am now the proud owner of the August issue! (And then I got home late and had to go to bed without reading it!)

On the upside, it has lots of cute little jacket patterns that call for about 1.5 m of fabric (the same amount I have of my grey herringbone). On the downside, most of these seem to be in petite sizes. Now, I have a shortish body so I might actually be able to pull off a petite bodice (might)… but how much am I going to have to lengthen the arms? Although some of them look pretty long already…

Cute petite jacket. Are the go-go-gadget arms really long enough?

There’s also this really cute kids jacket my oldest daughter would totally rock:

Totally seeing my 10-year-old in this.

I can’t say any of the pants are especially appealing to me, although they’re probably good basics (and I am still in the market for basic patterns). There are several cute skirts, but we all know how often I wear skirts. There are a few cute tops, but a lot of them are big, floaty blousy things that look lovely on the models and I would feel like a whale in.

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Tagged as BurdaStyle, plans, too much talk

August 12, 2010 · 3:11 pm

Not So Awesome

New Jalie Jeans Capris

But they’ll do.

They’re finished except for the studs (which I won’t put in this time until at least one more wash). Nothing special, but considering my spectacular fail on the pattern front, I’m not going to complain as long as they’re wearable.

I’m still having issues with the waistband gaping at the back (probably not helped at all

Rear View

by the pattern goof), so I think I’ll twiddle with the waistband pattern piece a bit. I’m a little scared of how much worse it will get after I wash them. Also I think I should go back to the original width of the waistband pattern piece (I had shaved it down about 2cm) as I think I actually like the wider waistband better. This one’s wider than my last (I used the same pattern piece but 1/4″ seam allowances instead of 1 cm), so it’s a good width, but wider would be nice, too.

One of these days I’ll do something actually interesting with

Belt loop and pocket detail... OMG is that pocket ripping?

the jeans I make. Maybe for the next black pair. I may go back and put a little slit at the seam in the outer side leg just below the knee, too, if I get ambitious. We’ll see. In the meantime—another boring, not entirely quick piece. Now to pray for good weather in September so I can actually use them for my SSS wardrobe.

Front Fly---good installation, less good topstitching.

OMFG, the back pocket’s ripping loose! Did I remember to tie those topstitching strings or did I… just… cut them. Yup, I think I just cut them. *facepalm*

There’s the fly, which is my first actual proper fly installation. The topstitching’s not so good. I think my buttonholes are getting a wee bit better, although still nothing like the amazing tailored ones I see pictures of. Also a cute 10-year-old invaded the picture.

Well, for my first finished project in two weeks, I’m not going to complain. Any more.

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Tagged as capris, finished projects, Jalie, jeans

August 11, 2010 · 6:30 pm

I F#%@ed up

Adjustment intended to raise the centre back of my jeans.

So after the last time I made up the Jalie Jeans, I decided the back really was too low and that I should raise it. So I took my pattern and slashed and pivoted to raise one side.

Observe, please, my adjustment.

Those of you who are keener observers than I will realize that the side I expanded is the side seam, not the centre back seam. Therefore it does nothing to the centre back, and plenty to throw off the side seam. Aren’t I brilliant?

I think I’ll be able to make it work by shaving off the top of the yoke, but man… I am severely choked with myself.

On the other hand, by following Debbie Cook’s tutorial step-by-step, I managed to install my first “perfect” fly. I really don’t do well with video tutorials like the Sandra Betzina one, oddly. I think I find it harder to keep my place in the process, or I miss steps as my mind wanders.

Redemption is a perfect fly?

Unfortunately it’s adorned by some of my least-perfect top-stitching, but ah well.

chalk-transferred pattern

I rather like my pocket design. I don’t have any real transfer paper, so I improvised with sidewalk chalk on a sheet of regular paper. It was rather messy, but worked well enough for my simple pattern, and it seems to have all come out. I also experimented with one of my few fancy stitches.