Lots and lots of little bits of paper

Playing with paper (MMM day 24)

As I continue to try and fail to shake off the dregs of this cold, I’ve been messing with paper, seeing how far I can push my blastula-stage pattern-drafting skills. As part of the greater goal of the Springy Coat, I wanted to test a two-piece sleeve and a tall-standing collar. For whatever reason, I find it more satisfying to try this on an (at least attempted) actual garment.

I’ve been considering making a cropped jean-jacket for myself pretty much since last summer when I made my children jean jackets and discovered that I could, with a little wriggling, actually get into Tyo’s. At the time I had considered just trying to grade up (and shape) the Burda kids’ pattern I was using, but, now that I have this fitted, cropped jacket bodice, well, why not use that?

Of course, jean-jackets aren’t traditionally princess-seamed. So I needed to approximate the darted block that the princess-seamed version would’ve been derived from. This was not a particularly scientific process, which mostly involved tracing out the pieces adjacent to each other, using the gaps as the legs of the dart, and estimating an apex which may or may not turn out to be in anything like the right place. Ah well. Once I had that estimated, I should’ve made a muslin of the darted bodice (which would be useful for all kinds of things…) but I didn’t—I skipped straight ahead to marking off the seam-lines for yokes and panels and doing my best to incorporate my darts into the taper between the panels. I even drafted a front-band/facing (granted not until after I had all the other pieces pinned on my fabric and realized it was missing, but still.

I don’t think I want to admit too much about my process for drafting the two-piece sleeve. There’s plenty of instructions on how to do this out there, and Claire was even generous enough to email me hers, and I still just went ahead and winged it. The finished product looks kinda generally similar to the sleeve I used for my winter coat, so I’m hopeful that it will work.

Jean-jacket pieces

Hopeful enough, anyway, that I went through my denim stash, and eventually settled on the same light-weight, sparkly denim I used for the kids’ jackets. There was just around a metre left, which as it turns out is just about enough to lay out a cropped jean-jacket pattern on, leaving enough left over to make the bottom band which I haven’t actually bothered to draft a pattern for yet (I still have trouble with rectangular pattern pieces… it always seems easier to just measure. Except for pieces to be cut on the bias, anyway…)

I settled on some red bias-tape from stash for binding the seams (I know a jean-jacket should be flat-felled, but I like the flash of colour from the bound seams), red thread for topstitching, and the last remnants of red cotton from my very first JJ blouse (which in tun was the remnant from a dance skirt a few years back) for the under-collar and pocket lining. I probably could have squeezed the undercollar from the denim, but I like the contrast of the coloured undercollar. Since the red is basically a cotton gauze, I interfaced with some super-light knit interfacing, which gave it a better body, except for the pocket-lining part, anyway.

And I started merrily sewing away. Seam were bound, tops were stitched, and I would probably be there still, rather than writing this post… except that my pocket flaps have gone AWOL.

So until they surface, I guess I’ll be tidying my kitchen.

In Me Made March news,

MMM 25, with accessory.

more unglamorous shots from a singularly unglamorous week. Yesterday, pictured at the top of the post, and was another day of not-leaving-the-house-trying-to-keep-my-lungs-in-my-chest. Today the children have no school (boo) but student-led conferences (which is like parent-teacher interviews but less fun), so I had to make myself a wee bit more presentable.

Not especially successful cowl top

Ellen Pants

Winter Coat

Oh, yes, and in the photo from yesterday I’m wearing my very first Jalie Jeans, which just shows how far down the wearables list I’m getting ;)… they’re stubbornly refusing to disintegrate on me, but they are definitely off the A list, mostly due to poor topstitching, although the fabric (which I never liked, but it was cheap) doesn’t help. And of course my Kimono Lady Grey, which you’ve already seen umpteen-bajillion times. I really need to make myself more sweaters. Don’t worry, that’s in the works too, but first I need to get all these little jackets out of my system…