There isn’t much of a reveal here, since it was pretty much all together last post, but the quilt for my dad is finished.
I quilted in the ditch along all the major lines and then went to town with some VERY rough and ready free motion spirals and things.
I may not be very good at it, but I really do enjoy free motion quilting.
I outlined the figures in the central panel, again rather roughly. Wait, we were calling it “rustic”. 😉
Some of the quilting is light and some dark. Wise decision? Not necessarily. Anyway, I basically spent Saturday quilting.
Saturday afternoon, I attached the first pass of the binding, in time to go out for pre-Valentine’s day dinner and a movie with the husband and children. Yay me!
That left me with three whole days to leisurely hand-stitch the binding second pass.
It didn’t take the whole three days, but I did take my time. And snipping threads. So many threads!
The last corner, where the join was, isn’t as tidy as the other three. In hindsight I could’ve put the join along a side where it might be less visible and had all the corners match. That’s probably a tip in a quilting book somewhere.
I am so insanely pleased with how it turned out, warts and dodgy quilting and all. It’s finished size is about 1.5 x 2m, not a full bed size but a respectable throw.
See?
Now it just has to hang at work for three whole months (darn craft projects)—but I will have it back in time for a Father’s Day gift, if I want to go that route. I am debating what to do with my scraps. I could probably squeeze out a pillow-case or two if he does end up using it for his bed, but I was really hoping more for it to be a couch throw. (Y’know, downstairs where I can see it. 😉 ) I could make matching cushion covers for the couch. Or a tote bag for my mom. I really should make something for her… 😂 I’m a bad, bad daughter.
Who made a frickin quilt!
Also, ah, if it’s my daughter who’s crazy for this outfit, why is it me I’m making the coat for?
My fabric of choice is a dark blue piled stretch cotton the strange powers that be at Fabricland saw fit to call “stretch velvet.” It’s a terrible excuse for velvet, but a perfectly lovely no-wale stretch corduroy. It is definitely heavier and less drapey than the movie fabric, which from the poster at the top looks like maybe a faux-suede or some kind of suit-weight fabric. For a Canadian Hallowe’en, though, heavier is good.
All that soutache applique was both fun and terrifying to do. I’m kind of glad it was firmly in costume-land as it kept me from obsessing too much over perfection.
I did a lot of piping, although I wish I would’ve piped those back princess seams. I didn’t pipe the edge of the collar, in an attempt to preserve whatever nonexistent drape it might have, but since it still has no drape I kinda wish I’d done that too. It is currently pinned into place to secure the folds, and I’ll probably tack them down.
I bound my seams with bias binding, as well. When I could remember. I made bias-binding with the heavy satin I used for the lining/collar, overlocking one edge. This was a) fast and neat, and b) nicely finished the edge, which tends to fray on satin bias binding, because satin has intense fraying super-powers. Only the skirt is fully lined. I say “only” but the skirt has easily three times as much fabric as the top bit. Maybe five times. The skirt is lined in the same duchesse satin as the collar (minus embroidery). Goodbye project budget! It certainly would’ve been easier to attach the skirt neatly with a lining. As it is i bound the back seam and it took some unpicking and handstitching to get everything where it should be. The skirt is LONG, by the way. I took a full 2″ hem and it still brushes the floor if I’m in flat feet—and I’m 5’7″. If you are shorter, check the length and save yourself some fabric. 😉
A day after I finished my 
Probably not much to say here—I went over the dress deets in the post on my first version.
This version is fully lined, whereas the Kanji dress I onlylined the bodice. Not much difference to the final dress, although it does make the skirt a little more substantial.
I lowered the neckline in a smooth scoop. And then apparently took all my pictures from the side so you can hardly see. WTF.
I love adding piping but I’m not the best at making it mesh with the clean-finish methods I was using… maybe need to do some further research, there.
The zipper went in so nicely, though. Quilting cotton is a beautiful thing sometimes. And the lining fabric, which is this super-soft cotton shirting that seems to have the world’s tiniest twill weave ever. Love it.
It’s the method described in “The Basics of Corset Bulding” by Linda Sparks (mainly used because that’s the book I have. 😉 for making an alterable corset. You construct the front piece with the busk and the back pieces with the grommets, first. Then the other pieces are sewn together, and the seam allowances stitched open to make bone casings. But this time, I put in the bones around the grommets in the back, and then tweaked the fit—finalized some seams and added bones, and tweaked a little more—and so on until everything was just right. This let me get the fit I like, the shape I like, AND end up with a super comfy corset, so I’m pretty stoked.
For fun, I added small sections of cording in the front. I think a bigger or firmer cord would’ve been a good idea, but they were fun.
My sister-in-law shot us amidst gorgeous autumn leaves, which are lovely and natural and not really suited to an outfit that demands wrought iron and gaslight, but I wasn’t willing to go further than the next-door park on that particular morning, so I’ll take it.
That’s the same white pintucked (not made by me) blouse I wore 
The camo coat wasn’t actually the best topper for the outfit—it kinda swamped the corset & hip decor, though it looked cool from certain angles. I have enough of the faux suede left to make a matching jacket; I’m thinking something cropped and faux-military would be fun. Maybe in another year?
My first thought was a version of view C with the hood, but after trying out the little flounce at the waist I decided to skip it. It’s cute in theory but a little too much ruffle right at the waist for my liking.
The fabric is a “wool blend” lightweight coating (or possibly a heavy flannel) that’s only 10% wool—eyeroll—but I sure do like the look. Plus the colour scheme will work really well (if boringly) with lots and lots of the other things that I have made. To make it a bit warmer, I underlined with some heavy flannel from stash, the same stuff that I used for the 
Running with the inspiration of the lace-bedecked original, I also got as much of this black cotton cluny lace as I could fit in the project budget.
And I had just enough to go to town, covering not only the front and back yokes, but getting bands at the hem, waist, and sleeve hems as well. With only the tiniest sliver to spare!
You might find this a bit unbelievable, but this is the only coat I have with a hood. It’s not quite big enough, from my point of view, to look good up, but it’s just right for wearing down. And I’m sure if I wear this far enough into the fall (assuming I can wear it, when the chips are down) I’ll test it out for warmth. At a certain point in the Canadian winter you give up on caring about what things look like.
Basically, I botched the plaid matching. Since it’s such a simple check, I guess I thought I could kinda wing it and, ah, no. Not a good idea. I should have spent much more time reviewing/researching. Or just thinking. Gah. All the different seam-lines (yoke, waist) didn’t help either.
And I stretched and eased and fudged and tweaked and made it work, kinda, but, there was a price, which was that I had to trim off some of the centre front bodice. And that I lost what had been a vertical stripe match from left side to right side, in order to match bodice and skirt. Maybe not the right call in hindsight, especially since this meant I also lost inches, where you don’t really want to lose inches in a fitted coat that I was already making down a size. Which means the whole damn thing is tight, bordering on way too tight. Not what I wanted in a brand new coat. And you can see the awkward pulling across the front, especially above the bust, where there just isn’t as much fabric as there should be.
Otherwise, I was pretty happy with my fit alterations. I started with a size 10 in the shoulders & bust, grading to a 12 at the waist, and squaring the shoulder down to the size 6 height. I did a petite through the armscye (but then forgot to take anything out of the sleeve cap, which led to a bit too much ease there, oops. My fabric was forgiving enough to accommodate it, but I wish I’d remembered in time to just trim it off. I’m glad I didn’t go with the straight 12 though as the shoulders are still a little boxy. I should have lowered the dart point a little bit, but the pulling above the bust bothers me a LOT more than the high dart.
I do like the two piece sleeve, although I did need to taper it in a couple of inches at the wrist—the bicep width is great, though. After comparing it with the sleeve for my Springy Coat, I added only 3cm of length, but then I lost about half of that trying to get the stripes to match up between my under and over-sleeve, and it’s still long enough. Which means that’s a very long sleeve to begin with, since it’s not unusual for me to add 3″ of length, not 3 cm. I wish I’d been able to keep the full 3cm, though—somehow with turn of cloth and everything it wound up about the same exact length as the Springy Coat sleeves, which are just a little shorter than I’d like. (Keeping in mind that I am obsessed with overly-long sleeves. Probably the length would be perfect for a normal person.)
Oh, yeah. It comes with pockets! They are obscenely tiny. Make them bigger. BIGGER.
I do enjoy my lace, even though it adds to the business of my busy fabric. I used two rows to cover the yoke parts, and just had to piece in a tiny bit right along the shoulder-line.
I think that’s it. I like the pictures. I love how it looks on the hanger. It just remains to be seen if tight is actually TOO TIGHT.
The hood looks perfect when it’s down. Just the right amount of fabric to sit nicely.
All in all, I think I will be happy once the plaid-related trauma fades…
Anyway, I bit the bullet with Butterick 4249 by John Kloss. Incidentally this also reminds me of Daughter Fish’s 
So, um, tent-y it was. I should’ve taken pictures, but, um, no.
I made a couple of adjustments to the construction. The pattern had faced armholes; I used a band instead. I interfaced the sides of front opening with a fusible knit. Both of these were very good ideas. I cut the neckband on the cross-grain (pattern piece called for it to be on the lengthwise grain, not that that would have helped a whole lot with this stretchy fabric.)
Anyway, pretty happy with this, despite all the surgery and limited tent-osity. This was the last sewing of my vacation (I kept doing family stuff. Jeez. Darn family, getting in the way of important things), “finished” in the afternoon after we put Tyo on a plain for Vancouver Island, but before I had to go to my first shift back at 5:00 pm. So at least I got to wear a new dress back to work. And then on my first full day back it was nasty and rainy, so I did get to wear my 
Tanit-Isis Sews 