August 16, 2011 · 10:08 pm

Oof-Da

Vacation

So, now we’re home, it should be back to life as usual, right?

Erm. Not quite yet.

You see, memory is a finicky thing. Much as we swear that we’ll never forget the little things, they still get fuzzy as the years go by. I no longer remember which of my children was born at 4:00 am vs. 6:00 am.  I don’t remember whether Syo walked at nine months or ten (either way, it was far too early…)

And I didn’t remember quite what it was like to have pre-schoolers in the house. So when my stylish sister-in-law asked if we could watch her girls (yes, the ones I occasionally sew for, currently aged 4.5 and 3) for a couple of days while she and her hubby take their first-ever post-child vacation, I blithely said yes. She took my kids all freakin’ July, people. It was the least I could do. Especially since we shanghaied my father-in-law to provide “childcare” for us for the rest of August.

So, yeah. I have a serious infestation of pre-schoolers. And while they’re both past the everything-goes-in-the-mouth-first stage, there’s such a lot of, well, chaos. Syo, freshly turned eight, can whip up a jug of orange-juice from concentrate without me having to do more than wipe the counter after. Syo assisted by the three-year-old niece gets orange goop all over said counter, floor, stack of mail, and the orange-juice has bran flakes in it when finished. And they don’t know that the sewing room is a no-play zone. Same with the furnace room. Same with—ARGH! WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU NEED YOUR BUM WIPED? WOULD YOU JUST GO PLAY OUTSIDE NOW? NO, WE DON’T HAVE A PADDLING POOL! WHY ARE YOU CRYING NOW????

Ahem.

So I’m feeling just a wee bit like I’m running around like a chicken with my head cut off. >_<

On the plus side, I did retrieve my Janome from the sewing-machine hospital, and she seems to be working again—at least, the flywheel turns freely and there was a nice little piece of fabric decorated with some gorgeous stitching stuffed under the needle when I picked it up. I haven’t had a chance to actually set her up and give her a run (see previous paragraph).

So instead I’ll show you a couple of glimpses of stuff that was in-progress when I left, lo these many moons ago. Ok, two weeks back. That’s, like, forever in internetland, people.

A handsome cuff

Of course, there’s Serena’s jacket. I really need to get cracking on this one.  But doesn’t the cuff look nice? I should’ve used more interfacing, though. When in doubt, add more interfacing. Ah, well.

Collar: a diptych

And there’s Tyo’s shirt. Here’s my nice collar. I had to show you both sides so you could see how (not) awesome my stripes are. I managed to cut one of each piece on-grain. Obviously this is one of those situations where you (I) should cut your pieces individually. Or match the freakin’ plaid. Either of which I was too lazy rushed  to do. However I did swing it so that the nice-looking side of the collar will fold out over the nice-looking side of the stand, which is why they’re on opposite sides in this flat view. Having just tried it around her neck, I may have to junk the whole thing and cut out another anyway, as this one’s going to be a bit snug. Perils of using a pattern that’s technically too small even if it is the right chest measurement.

Tyo's shirt back

I’m pretty happy with how the back is looking, though.

Hmm, have I even mentioned this shirt properly?

Tyo wanted a shirt. Way back before she went on vacation. She picked out the fabric back in the spring, and then found a pattern (7171) off the Lekala site. Their sample size is for a child of 120 cm height, which Tyo is far beyond, but the chest measurements were the same, so I went for it (with considerable lengthening of the sleeve). As I mentioned, the collar is small, so I may end up regretting that.

Technical drawing of the pattern

As you can see, instead of buttons, I’ve opted for loops of elastic on each side, which will be threaded with black velvet ribbon. Because everyone loves lacing, don’t they? You can also see my clever use of bias to avoid all semblance of having to match my plaid. Except at the side-seams, but I wasn’t even thinking about that. Figuring out how to finish the seam where the little loops are inserted was a little, ah, mind-expanding. There was seam-ripping, and possibly even a little swearing. I wound up basically doing a

You can perhaps see how I flared out the bottom of the side-back and centre-back pieces a little bit. This will hopefully accomodate Tyo’s generous derriere. I’m a touch stalled because I need to go back over the Men’s Shirt Sewalong before I get much further, to do the cuffs and plackets.

And I don’t multitask well (at sewing or at anything else) so I really need to just hunker down and finish Serena’s coat. Before I do anything else.

Dammit.

I want to make my Lonsdale…

EDIT: Just got a call from the MIL that Niece #1’s tests just came back positive for strep. And Syo is already showing the same symptoms she had… Life just keeps getting better. >_<

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August 14, 2011 · 10:36 pm

A Sewing Interview (Part II)

As soon as I got my mom’s interview made up, it was obvious that I needed to pop the same questions to my grandmothers. Since neither of my grandmothers are computer-users and I’m the world’s worst snail-mailer, this took some doing: getting my mom to print out the questions, having a cousin ferry them out to the farm, and finally being able to pick them up while on my current bout of holidays. But anyway, here is the first, coming from my mother’s mother, who grew up the daughter of the shopkeeper in a small town in southern Saskatchewan. She married a farmer and went on to have four children to sew (or not) for. Just for reference, she was born in the 1920s, grew up during the Depression, and was married and had most of her children in the 1950s. Once again, my interjections are italicized.

Were you exposed to sewing in the home growing up?

Yes! My mother made a lot of our dresses for school & our “Best dresses” for church or special occasions, with hems that could be let down as we grew taller. (no slacks in those days)

How did you and your peers view sewing? What about the older generation?

It was expected for girls to learn to sew a little, and our mothers expected us to learn. (This is where I wish it was an in-person interview. The next question would be: did you enjoy sewing, did it provide a creative outlet, or was it just another household chore?)

How and from whom did you learn to sew?

My mother. (No Home Ec in the one-room schoolhouse, I guess)

On what kind of machine(s)?

Eatons pedal (a treadle machine. If I’m not mistaken, she still has it stashed somewhere.)

Where did you get your fabric, patterns, other supplies?

We ordered some of our fabric from the Eatons or Simpson catalogs. Sometimes cut down an older, larger dress etc. We also could buy patterns. Patterns could also be sent for to (ordered from) Eatons or Simpsons or sometimes from some patterns advertized in the newspapers.

What kind of finishing/techniques did you use?

We trimmed collars etc. with lace, rickrack, bias tape, etc. Made tucks and pleats and ruffles. We also made our own nighties and pyjamas.

Did you learn much about fitting?

My mother taught me. Her mother, my grandmother, was a seamstress in Ontario. She would go from one family to another, sewing for the whole family. She would stay at their place for a few days or a week or so. She had her own portable sewing machine. They gave her meals & a bed to sleep in. On some patterns you had to shorten or lengthen the bodice to the waist line etc. or widen it. (Wow, this is so neat! I had never even heard that before. Hmm, I will have to do some more digging to see if I can come up with a time period for that…)

Did you at any point feel like part of a sewing community, or was it a solitary activity?

Most of my friends sewed a little. Blouses and dresses etc. During the war the Ladies Aid would get together and make & quilt quilts for the refugees. We also knitted socks and mitts for the soldiers.

What (if anything) inspired you to sew in the first place?

It was expected that you learn to sew. I sewed my own wedding dress and dressing gown (which I still have). (must get some pictures of that…)

How has your interest in sewing changed over the years?

I sewed for [my daughters] as they grew up making pleated skirts, slacks, dresses, nighties, etc. (My mother informs me that most of this sewing stopped by the time she was about nine. At this point, in the early sixties, Grandma had four kids, lots to do, and it had become easier to buy ready-made clothes than make them.)

When did you stop sewing (or did you?)

I still sew, but it is patching overalls, hemming tea towels, making curtains and sewing up seams.

Anything else you’d like to mention?

Flour bags made of cotton were washed and hemmed for tea towels. Five bags opened up made a sheet for your bed. They made nice pillow cases if embroidered with flowers etc (P.S.) I still have some. Sugar bags (100 lbs) made small table cloths with embroidery corners or centers. I now use an electric portable. (My mother think Grandma still has some of these stashed around the house… I will have to go hunting next time I make it to the farm…)

PS: I am home at last from a delightful couple of weeks Back Home (if you get the distinction). Hopefully there will be sewing in the very, very near future. In the meantime, I apologize for the long silence…

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August 4, 2011 · 2:23 pm

The Mini Minnie Dress

Fyon's Mini Minnie Dress

I firmly maintain that Minnie Mouse has no monopoly on red with white polkadots, any more than Miss Piggie has a monopoly on pink. Nonetheless, this is the thing I have heard second-most-often about this dress, in either of its iterations. Sheesh. Fortunately, the most-often-heard thing has been random, awesome compliments. And despite being first on the list to make the Minnie Mouse crack, my ever-sweet husband has also requested specifically that I wear my version several times, so it must be a winner. Sigh.

This is the version created for my four-year-old niece, who requested it last month, with much batting of eyelashes and many applications of  “Auntie, I love you!” Let’s just say that as long as the cute holds out, she should do well in life. You may have to click through to the full size version to see the polkadots on this one. They are small, but I promise you they are there.

Young Image Summer 2011 patterns

The pattern I used as a base is Y1109 from the Young Image Magazine Summer 2011 issue (third down on the left in the image above). You can browse through the whole magazine here, but it won’t let me link to a specific page; there’s a good view of the dress on p. 19. It had the right general lines, in particular the centre-front bodice panel.

I made the size 104, the smallest for this pattern; my niece is 106 cm tall, although her bust and hips were a little narrower than the 104 called for. Still, I’m glad I used the 104 rather than a smaller size (had one been available)—the amount of ease is fine but definitely not excessive.

Naturally I couldn’t just make it up as is. So this is not really a fair review of the pattern or the magazine, although I did use all of the pattern pieces provided. The instructions are, well, distinctly translated, and in so many languages it can be a bit tricky to figure out where the information you want is; it’s mostly segregated by language, but not entirely. Also, the pattern pages are only marked in two languages, neither of them English (my guess is Dutch and German, but I confess I didn’t actually pay attention), so be prepared to do some translating. That being said, they’re not nearly so over-crowded as Burda pages and each pattern has its own colour, so that part was not bad at all.

Dress back

The pattern calls for a rear zipper in the bodice (not extending into the skirt as far as I can tell), but I opted for buttons, instead. You do have to add seam allowances. They may tell you that somewhere, but if so I didn’t find it. I just figured that all the European pattern magazines (maybe European patterns in general?) don’t have seam allowances, and an examination of the size/shape of the pieces will confirm that.  If I’d been less pressed for time I would’ve read up a bit more on how much to add for a centre button placket, but I was in a hurry, so I winged it. It’s not exactly ideal. I should probably have drafted facings or used a self-lining (which I think is what the pattern calls for), but I didn’t. And I’m balls at understitching, so my white cotton lining peeks out a fair bit. Ah, well. I also put the straps on the wrong side, I’m pretty sure they are supposed to angle with the shoulders, not puff up the way they do, but they look cute anyway.

Underskirt for dress for niece.

The skirt in the pattern has a slightly-gathered, shaped upper portion and a ruffled lower portion. In the photo (page nineteen of the magazine, again, but I can’t do a direct link and I don’t have the physical magazine with me to photograph), the dress has quite a deep ruffle on the lower part of the skirt; it looks much shorter on the technical illustration, which I found rather confusing. There’s no pattern piece for this, which is fine as it’s just a rectangle, but I couldn’t find the information on how deep it should be, either, just how wide it should be at the different sizes. My original dress had a simple dirndl skirt, so I did that for my niece’s version, too, but I used the pattern-piece provided, plus a lower ruffle tier, for the underskirt. I was winging it for the length at that point—I did a quick comparison with some dresses from Tyo’s closet that I thought were in the right ballpark length—overshot, and wound up hacking about four inches off the top of the underskirt. Ah, well. It all gathers to the waist, anyway ;). For extra flouff, I gathered some tulle onto the underskirt. I should’ve used more. I also couldn’t use my favourite gathering technique, the zig-zag over a supplementary thread, as my zig-zagger was frozen at this point (she’s in the shop as we speak), so that was a wee bit annoying. Yes, I used the gathering foot, but getting the precise length was not happening so I wound up hand-basting and gathering it that way anyway. *headdesk*.

Dress

Instead of little ruffles on the centre front panel, I made an altered, double-length version of the CF piece to create the ruching. Gather it to the side-front pieces, construct bodice as usual.

Buttons closeup

I was a little concerned about the button-placket not extending into the skirt. After all, even on rectangular little children, you want to be able to open it a little below the waist, right? So after some cogitation, I decided to add in an extra-wide continuous lap placket at the centre back to finish off the button placket. Of course, for these to work properly you really have to fold the outer edge of the placket to the inside, which I completely forgot to do. So it’s a bit wonky in that area. Fortunately it’s pretty much hidden in the gathers, anyway. And cute ladybug buttons make up for all manner of flaws.

I have been having some fun being the sewing fairy, I must admit. I have been refusing to sew for my adult relations (well, unless they come to visit me for fittings, which, considering we live 600 km away, is a bit of a deterrent), but this summer I dared to hand down a couple of pieces. My stylish sister-in-law had greatly admired this sundress last year when I wore it, and after thinking about it, I decided to give it to her. I still like it a lot, but it feels like a lounging-by-the-lake (or in the back yard) kind of dress, something she does a lot more of than I (which is not to say she is lazy, quite the opposite, but she is currently at home with small children in a house with no AC, rather than spending her days in an overly-cooled lab like I do). Rather more recently, I made a tunic cloning a RTW one that I absolutely love. I liked the clone, too, but it was a bit too short through the body. So with some trepidation, I handed it over to my going-on-fourteen-year-old-niece. I am absolutely terrified of trying to sew something for anyone in this age-set without their direct input, but figured it had a better chance of working for her than for me and was reasonably stylish reasonably recently, and she steals lots of clothes from my stylish sister-in-law (I should perhaps clarify that my stylish sister-in-law is the mother of the four-year-old who received the Minnie dress, but NOT of the fourteen-year-old), who I feel pretty comfortable about guessing styles for. Anyway, she claims she likes it and as she’s only 5′ 1″, the length issue is rather less on her. So we’ll see. I still need to make the longer version…

Oona, this one's for you

Before I left on vacation, I did bring home one more piece of thrift store fabric: this crazy border-print. There’s only about a metre, but it’s very wide. Whatever it gets made into will obviously be dedicated to Oona of the Carnival Stash.

Whew! I must now return to hanging out with my in-laws, soaking up the sun, and wrangling somewhat obscene numbers of small children. Gotta love vacation…

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July 27, 2011 · 2:46 pm

Madly off in all directions

The Scissors Family

The crunch is here and as usual I’m not ready.  Precious minutes are trickling away when I could be Accomplishing Things. So, I’ll keep this brief.

Sewing World called and the psycho-god scissors were in (pictured bottom right). My willpower shredded under their seductive snipping, and they came home with me. Cutting with them is almost like… hmm, maybe I won’t go there. Let’s just say cutting may no longer be my least favourite part of sewing. The blades are very short, something on the packaging it touting equal length for blade and handle as being important for some reason. Oookay, if you say so. All I know is they cut like… mmmm…. ok, just give me a moment (fans self). The most comfy for the hands are still the old blue ones, though.

Fabric: for niece's dress (left) and my Lonsdale (right). Yes, a print!

I bought fabric.

I started a dress.

It’s neither Lonsdale nor for me. *headdesk*

Dress in progress. Not for me. Obviously.

Underskirt for dress for niece.

It’s for my four-year-old niece, who very cleverly spent most of the two days I was down there at the end of June telling me how much she loves me, and also how much she loves the red sundress and wants one just like it. Sometimes not even in the same sentence. It’s based off a pattern from the Young Image magazine (I added the front ruching), but as usual I’m off in my own little universe so the finished product will be “inspired by” at best. Also, can you spot my goof in the picture?

I’ve made a bit more progress on the coat, then got stalled because I needed more trim. Because 4m of three different kinds of trim was obviously not enough, and I’m a complete idiot for thinking under any circumstances that it would be.

And, I’m going to feel really guilty that I have a home-made present for my niece and not for my daughter whose birthday is on Sunday.

*headdesk*

And I really want to start my Lonsdale…

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July 25, 2011 · 10:15 am

Slow and steady…

Blinded by the lining

Progress has been made on Serena’s coat. In fact, if I hadn’t kinda-sorta said that I would have it done by the end of the week, I’d be extremely pleased with myself. As it is, I’m still half-ass panicked. The coat construction itself isn’t the issue, it’s the embellishment which eats up time, both physically in terms of stitching it on and mentally in terms of thinking about designs—how much? How intricate? How many different materials? At the moment I’m trying to constrain myself to gold-twist piping and lots of flat upholstery braid, but it’s hard. Give me a few months of this and my latent bellydancer would bling this coat out to the nines.

Which is why I should’ve done the basic work back in the spring and then spent the summer in leisurely construction/embelishment, but anyway. That ship has sailed.

Muslin #2 (with collar)

After the fitting I basically made up a whole ‘nother muslin. If I thought I could’ve hunted Serena down for a last fitting I would’ve, but she was out of town, so I tried it on my dummy, really liked the adjustment over the rear (I added 2cm to each side of the rear princess seam below the waist) , decided that the sleeves still needed more poof, and started cutting.

And fusing.

Happy fusing fun.

Lots and lots of fusing. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to thank Sherry enough for introducing me to the concept of fuse-tape. I lurve this stuff. Anywhere you might use stay-stitching.

Ready for ripping /sigh. At least the grommets aren't terrible.

Anyway, at this point I have the lining basically constructed, the shell lagging slightly because I had to run out to get grommets for the lacing and now I need to do some ripping (even with the heck fused out of it, stretch corduroy is still prone to creeping; I should’ve marked better).

Oh, and I made the collar.

The collar was rather scary. It needs to stand up, so lots of interfacing was required. Pepin has instructions for drafting a stand-up Elizabethan-type collar in Modern Pattern Design, but they’re a bit confusing (In particular, she advocates spreading 1/4″ per slash while only illustrating four slashes. This is not enough.) Still, it got me on the right track, and a series of paper tracings later I had a workable pattern. Fortunately for me, it was actually perfectly possible to pin the paper pattern in place on the dummy and get an idea of what I needed to tweak next.

Collar innards

Stitching wire into casing

I also wanted the edges of the collar to be wired, for stability and moldability—who knows if it’ll look best straight up, or with the corners rolled back, or whatever. So I hunted around and found some medium-weight wire in the old jewelry/beading box, a half-package of quarter-inch bias tape (one of those thrift store finds that you’re never quite sure how you’re going to use as it was rather grubby), and set to work stitching the wire into a casing around the trimmed-down edge of my interfacing piece (which consisted of the “muslin” drapery fabric collar plus some hair canvas). It’s not at all pretty, but it’s attached and now the collar’s constructed everything should be pretty much held in place anyway. I folded the ends of the wire back on themselves and encased them in little fusible-interfacing booties, so hopefully there’s no danger of that working through the fabric.

Collar exterior

Then I hand-stitched my wired interfacing piece to the collar outside, which was already piped and embellished. Once it was in place I topstitched along some of the embellishment again, just to hold it in place extra well. Overkill? Possibly. To finish it off I slip-stitched the lining fabric to the inside. For this jacket, I am using interfaced lining fabric in place of facings, as the lining is as much for show as the shell fabric, especially in areas like the collar and tails.

No other great insightful comments at the moment. Halfway through Saturday my Janome machine grew crankier and crankier and eventually stopped turning. The engine whirs, but nothing goes around. This sometimes happens when thread is jammed in the bobbin, but there is no thread, and even un-threading the machine completely does nothing. I can still force it to stitch with the hand-wheel, but it’s difficult and doesn’t feel like something I should be doing a whole lot of. I’m thinking a visit to the sewing doctor is in order, /sigh.

Most of what I’ll be doing this week can be done on the straight-stitcher, but of course now it’s not working I keep coming up with things I need a zig-zag for.

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July 23, 2011 · 8:36 am

Fortunately, unfortunately

New Fabric Scissors!

Fortunately, I got some fun new sewing stuff in the mail this week. I was especially excited to try out the Seam-Gauge Guide.

Unfortunately, when I went to try it, my fabric scissors were nowhere to be found.

Fortunately, this motivated me to clean up my sewing room.

Unfortunately, I STILL couldn’t find them.

Fortunately, I’d been thinking of getting another pair anyway, since my old ones no longer cut to the very tip, which makes notching difficult.

Unfortunately, there’s not a lot of time in my week-days lately to trot off to the fabric store.

Fortunately, there’s a shop called Sewing World on my walk from work to the train. They sell sewing machines, sewing gizmos, and notions, albeit with a bit of a focus on the quilter.

Unfortunately they’re usually closed by the time I leave work.

Fortunately, one morning this week I managed to get in early enough to stop on my way too work.

Unfortunately they have about eighty bazillion different sizes, styles, and price-points of scissors to choose from.

Fortunately, the lady working was willing to pull out about a dozen, mostly Ginghers, and provide fabric samples for me to snip up.

Unfortunately, the best-quality Ginghers have metal handles. This makes them very pretty and sturdy, but sets off some nerve damage in my thumb.

Fortunately, she pulled out another kind that cut even better than the Ginghers.

Unfortunately, they were really large. This wasn’t a problem for the blade length so much as that my fingers flopped around in the handle. Maybe they’re men’s fabric scissors.

Fortunately, the lady promptly called up her supplier and ordered in a couple of pairs of the same kind in a smaller model.

Unfortunately, they won’t be in until next week at the earliest and I need scissors right away. However, I didn’t want to buy an expensive pair when there was a pretty good chance I’d be coming back for the freakin’ sweet crazy ones in a week or two.

Fortunately, there were some “Featherweight” Ginghers, which while not as awesome as the regular Ginghers, were still pretty sweet, and most importantly, have a plastic handle and are much cheaper. So I have new fabric scissors!

Unfortunately, the plastic extends along the blades, making an odd lump, so that even though the seam allowance gauges still stick, they angle downward too sharply to really work, plus the magnetism isn’t quite as strong so it would get knocked off easily.

Fortunately, I might even have time to come to my senses about the price of those godlike scissors by the time they’re in stock.

Although I wouldn’t bet on it.

And in the meantime, I have new scissors anyway! And they snip! So my notches will (hopefully) no longer resemble irregular blobs somewhere in the general vicinity of where they’re marked on the pattern. Hooray!

PS: writing in that “fortunately, unfortunately” format is kinda addictive. I find my thoughts now composing everything as a series of fortunate and unfortunate happenings.

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July 20, 2011 · 9:56 pm

Fitting Serena

Tailocat---Fabric and sketch

Continue reading →

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July 18, 2011 · 8:38 pm

Something small

Lace panel from thrift store

In between unpicking the skirt from the halter sundress and procrastinating, I did actually (almost) finish one rather small piece. You may (or may not) recall a large piece (several metres) of starched white cotton I found at the thrift store back in June. It was the kind of lovely, plain, basic fabric you rarely find at the thrift store, so I would’ve picked it up just for that, but one end had also been worked with the most amazing panel of handmade lace I’ve ever seen.

Now, admittedly I don’t know much about lace-making. I have no idea what techniques are employed, except that it looks to have been done by hand, with gorgeous patience and precision. I assume this is some kind of heirloom stitching taken to an astounding extreme. It’s one of those pieces that makes you wonder about the person who had the fabric before you, though. What kind of piece was this worked for? Was it meant to be the yoke of a shirt? Part of a Christening gown or something? Why would someone put all that work into making the lace, and then never make the final garment? (The shape and positioning on the fabric suggests garment to me, but I suppose I don’t really know even that).

Anyway, obviously it needed to become something that would showcase the beautiful lace. After some hemming and hawing, I made my decision, and cut out a second version of my sundress bodice, with the lace in the centre front panel. I toyed with the idea of putting a coloured fabric behind, to show through at the lace, but the white cotton was too sheer to hide it, so I just lined with another layer of the same fabric.

The top. Unfortunately this was the only shot where the light didn't totally wash out the lace.

It still needs straps. I had some cut out and pressed and ready to go, but somewhere between bringing it upstairs to do the handstitching I mislaid them. It actually stays up remarkably well, with that large shirred back, but I’ll feel much happier with straps anyway. I used the facing piece to make the little “collar” top, which I really love, although since I forgot to add a seam-allowance to the CF, it wound up not reaching quite to the side-seams. I hand-stitched the bottom of the bodice front together for a nice finish that doesn’t show on the front. I maybe should’ve put some interfacing strips along the V-point in the front, as it’s a bit wavy and floppy, but it’s not awful.

It looks good with shorts, but wouldn’t it be perfect with a full, puffy skirt? 🙂

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July 17, 2011 · 5:27 pm

Sometimes you just have to walk away.

Hmm

McCall's 3415

I have a feeling this dress is going to spend a little while in the Magic Closet.* You know when you reach that point when you’ve unpicked a seam so many times the whole thing just starts to look mashed and no matter how well you re-stitch it it’s still going to be a bit wonky? Yeah. I’m there.

That being said, I think once I’ve had a little bit of space I’ll quite like this dress. We just need a bit of time.

Front view

So, after all y’all’s** sage advice last week, I put on my big girl panties and unpicked the skirt (yes, removing zipper in the process), and made Alterations.

Specifically, I lopped 15 cm (about 6″) off the top, re-cutting using the top of the pattern but blending out to a wider width quite quickly (maybe a little too quickly…). In my paranoia over having enough ease I actually made the skirt a bit wider even at the top, electing to ease that in.

Side view

This fabric doesn’t ease so well, did I mention? Well, I mean, it does—there’s no pleats in the seam—but it sure shows the puckers. Not even going to go into how many times it took me to get the zipper straight and smooth and matching up, either. On the up side, I did get it smooth and relatively straight (and relatively invisible!) eventually, so I shan’t whine too much. And I did a slightly better job stitching on the bodice lining on the inside this time, although with all the grading and clipping and fraying from being unpicked so many times it still doesn’t look peachy. But I think I have the theory down, anyway.

Back view

There are still some issues with how the back hangs—I think somewhere in my alterations the grain got a bit skewed—but at least it’s not straining over my hips and making my belly look like a stuffed sausage anymore. (It actually looks way better in this pic than when I’m just standing straight.  I miss the pockets, though. I wonder how much more work it would be to put them back in, now there’s enough ease for them… (walk away, Tanit, walk away…)

Hem facing

Having removed six inches in length, I didn’t really want to lose much more in the hem, so I put back the hem lace I’d been planning to use and dug out a package of teal hem-tape from one of my thrift-store scores that’s probably been in its package since about the time this pattern was new. I actually really like using a bias facing in curved hems like this. It works a bit better if you “circle” it first—iron it while stretching it into a curve.

Hem facing

Plus after thirty-odd years in the package it really needed to be ironed. Fortunately the skirt is quite narrow, as it was only a 1.85m package, and I had to discard about eight inches at one end where the tape that held the end in place all those years had turned yellow and marked up the fabric. I had just enough. The hem facing is a fair bit darker than the rest of the dress, but I think it’s a fun flash of colour. And it gives me the feel of a full, yummy 2.5″ hem without losing more than about 2 cm in length.

Having said all that, I have to admit something.

Halter styles are something I have a problem with. Meaning, I like them. I love the exposed back, I love how they look on other people and on pattern illustrations. But somehow when I see them on myself, I always feel line-backer-ish. Like they just emphasize the breadth of my shoulders. I keep making them because I really like the idea. And I keep thinking that next time, it’ll look “right.” There probably should be a name for this kind of stylistic insanity. On the other hand, I am actually liking the photos a lot better than I like the reflection in the mirror, so perhaps its one of those things where my brain exaggerates what I’m seeing beyond all reason.

Anyway, I’m hoping that some time in the Magic Closet will help me forget about most of my issues with the dress. Although the halter one’s probably there to stay. Next up: jackets in summertime. Unless the Lonsdale pattern arrives, anyway ;).

*You know. Where self-made pieces go to wait out the period while you forget all the stupid mistakes and messes you made.

**I don’t actually talk like this, but it sure is fun to write sometimes. Also my town is infected with cowboys at the moment, so it would be surprising if I didn’t have at least a few symptoms.

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July 16, 2011 · 6:03 pm

All I need now is the Lonsdale…

Patterns! Thank you, ElleC!

It was a good week, mail-wise, if not sewing-wise*. Several really awesome things came through, but I’ll stick to the sewing-related ones.

Very sweet (and tragically blogless) commentor ElleC send me a delightful package of her own Value Village pattern finds. More 70s Simplicity than you can shake a stick at (including more maxi-dreses!)! And that retro black-dress pattern is the Simplicity take on the Audrey Hepburn dress Her Selfishness copied, lo these many moons ago (It might be fun to compare Selfish’s pattern to the Simplicity one, someday when I’m in an LBD mood…). But I’m especially, super-duper, stoked about the men’s “Designer Jeans” pattern front and centre. Copyright 1981, from a design house I’d never heard of in Edmonton, Alberta, it looks guaranteed to be pure cowboy. The legs are straight, not flared (I checked carefully 😉 ), although I have a feeling they’re not very roomy. Good for me, less good for my hubster. There’s also two versions of the instructions, both of which are really nice, although I still haven’t managed to figure out what the seam allowance is. Sadly, the man has informed me that he wants the jacket I promised him more than anything else. He doesn’t seem to grasp that my jacket motivation now that real summer is here is somewhere below zero. Blergh.

Building Patterns

Equally thrilling, this pattern-drafting book arrived. I actually won it back in May after commenting on a giveaway/article on Burdastyle.com, but it probably got shipped out right around the time the postal strike got serious. Anyway, it’s here, now, and came with a cute little note from the author herself, and it looks like fun although I haven’t had a real chance to dig into it. It’s definitely text-book weight, anyway!

All I’m waiting on now is for my Lonsdale Dress pattern to arrive! Tasia shipped them out last weekend, so hopefully sometime next week…

Anyway. I am trying to spend my weekend sewing, rather than blogging (so I might actually have something worth blogging about later), so I’ll leave you with that.

 

*this not getting home from work until 6:30 thing really chokes my mojo. Bleh.

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