Here’s a few more of the fully finished jeans. I wound up hemming them the full length; the physical inseam measures just over 33″. It would be perfect for a boot-cut with flats, too short for a boot cut with heels, and is maybe a teeny bit long for skinnies.
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Jalie jeans #2: Black and silver
Almost done! Just need rivets and hemming (which will wait until at least one more wash, I think.
I don’t know why I can’t stand to wait until after I’ve hemmed these to take pictures and post. It’s like my subconscious considers hemming superfluous.
Anyway, here they are: black jeans with bright silver topstitching, Eye-popping. Maybe not the best choice considering my mediocre topstitching skillz. Ah well. I shall be more restrained for my next pair. I just loved the contrast.
You already heard about the issues with the waistband. All fixed. It still came out narrower than the first
Jalie jeans front: no fly gapage!
waistband, a little too narrow in my opinion. Not sure how that works except that maybe the turn of cloth ate up more width in this pair? Anyway, next time I will either widen the pattern piece or use 1/4″ seam allowances. The narrower SA’s are probably not a bad idea for the waistband, anyway (reducing bulk, yadda yadda)
Getting pictures of these sucked, especially without a handy slave child around to take the pictures. My sweetie would probably do it but he would make fun of me in the process ;). I wish I could find my tripod… I tidied up a few weeks ago and have no idea where I stuffed it.
Other than the too-narrow waistband and the usual issues with my topstitching, I’m pretty happy with these. They feel right. For the next pair, I am going to try lengthening the centre back seam for a bit more rear coverage.
Full length jeans
This fabric was actually a 20% stretch, and I still wound up taking in the size Q about a cm on each side, so I think I should probably just narrow the pattern by that amount, as well. I’m a little torn about the length. If they were a boot cut, the length would actually be perfect. Skinnies, on the other hand, don’t need to be quite as long. And these mostly behave as skinnies, although
Doesn't show the jeans very well, but I liked the pose. So Nyah!
they’re actually straight-legged from the knee. I used someone’s suggestion (I forget where I read it, sorry) to extend the pocket lining pieces to the centre front to form the fly interfacing. I’m really happy with how this worked—keeps the front nice and smooth and no fly puckering! I still can’t insert a fly properly to save my life. It looks so simple when Sandra Betzina does it! But at least no one else will see.
So anyway, one more item down (yes, yes, except for the hemming) on my list for Self-Stitched September. Now, time to work on the kids’ jean jackets!
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First ever knit top!
Wow, that was fast. My very first knit top. Two pattern pieces, four seams (two of them not even an inch long), a little bit of time messing around with edge finishes… and voila! A top cute enough that my hubby insisted I wear it agan this morning.
Based, as you may recall, on Ichigogirl’s cowl top/dress pattern. I narrowed the shoulders, though in hindsight I should have widened the neck. This is a very deep, drapy, almost V-neck cowl; I think if I make it again I’ll try and reduce that… right now I have to be pretty careful when I shift around that, ah, all of me stays inside the shirt. I made the entire front double, since my knit is very thin and a touch sheer.
The part I was afraid of about sewing with knits was finishing edges without stretching them entirely out of shape. I
knit top---rear view
would have to say I think my fears were justified, at least with this fabric. The back neck is… less than perfect. I tried to do a double-fold band there and… well, I’ve never had much luck with getting these to look good in wovens, so I don’t know why I thought it might be any different in a knit. It is, shall we say, a little wonky, AND stretched out (I have some hopes that it will un-stretch a tiny bit once it’s washed. We’ll see. I did manage to do a nice, scalloped rolled hem along the arm-holes, which looks cute and didn’t stretch out that much, but I don’t think really matches the rest of the top. I haven’t hemmed the bottom yet. Trying to decide whether to do another scalloped edge or just a flat hem. Also now that I’ve worn it a bit it’s stretched out and is bagging at the back, so I’m debating bringing it in at the sides…
But, anyway, semi-wearable and self-sewn, so that’s a good start, right?
In other news, my hubby declared that he really likes this fabric. Will I make him a shirt from it? Sure, dear. (I’m picturing a nice long-sleeved T-shirt. He always has a hard time finding ones where the sleeves are long enough… we’re well matched that way. Our poor kids)
Will I make him a button-up dress shirt from it?
Um, what?
So, yeah… he wants a typical button-up shirt made out of a super-stretchy, drapy knit. I think he is insane. The question is… can it work? Maybe with an underlined yoke and cuffs and lots of stay-tape at the seams? I’m having a hard time picturing it, though…
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Danielle Dress!
Ah, the Danielle Dress in all its glory! Oh happy day! Of course you’ve already seen photos of the dress with everything but the final hem, so it won’t be that huge of a deal. Ah well.
It has taken a LONG time to get this post up, due to lack of awesome pictures worthy of this awesome dress. Lots of fuzzy ones, ones that don’t show the hem, ones where I’m making a wonky face… you get the idea. These still aren’t them, but they’ll have to do for now. My usual photographer (AKA daughter) is spending the month with her cousins!
It occurs to me that this is my first fully-lined dress. Also my first “everyday” (as opposed to costume) dress.
A quick recap on the construction… the fashion fabric is some kind of crinkly chiffon (possibly crepe?),
Danielle---rear view
very thin, in a bold black and white print (I don’t usually go for prints) that has been in my stash for at least five years, since I made a tiered dance skirt for my older daughter out of it. I underlined it with a plain black cotton (from my old duvet cover, the same stuff I used to underline my girls’ coats) to give it a bit more body, and lined it with a very plain, very cheap black lining fabric. While I cutting I committed the major sin of not cutting the centre front on the fold, so I had to improvise and add a third pleat and centre front with a black inset of the same fabric as the “waist” band. Since I now had a seam allowance at the centre front, this meant I had to fiddle with the other pleats a bit to maintain the skirt width, but I think it worked out all right.
To keep the chiffon (which was a b*tch to cut out, by the way) from sliding around on the underlining, I
More Danielle!
hand-basted all the pieces of the shell together. This was probably the single most time-consuming part of constructing the entire dress. On the other hand, it was handwork, so I could do it in the livingroom with the family instead of ditching them to sew, so I get less (though not no) hassle for it, and not once during the actual construction did I want to shoot myself in the head due to my slippery, misshapen chiffon fabric pieces, as I usually do when working with this kind of fabric.)
My cutting wasn’t as precise as I would like (as usual), partly due to the chiffon, partly due to sloppiness. Precise cutting is definitely one of my Areas to Improve, although I’d like to say this dress was quite a bit worse in that department than most of my recent efforts. Cotton and denim (which is of course cotton too) are really dreams to cut out. My biggest goal was to get the front pleats to line up with the front darts (and to not totally ruin the darts). I was not 100% successful, but managed adequately. The darts are at least more symmetrical than most of my previous attempts, though I’m still not 100% happy with them, either.
The lining was fairly rushed and fudgetastic. I didn’t do a separate waistband for it (I meant to make the skirt longer to compensate, but didn’t, but due to sloppy/generous cutting of length this didn’t actually matter. My goal was to make the lining slightly smaller, which I achieved a little too well, but at least my zipper doesn’t get caught in its fabric (!) and the outer shell doesn’t look strained.
I didn’t want to finish the arm-holes by hand, so I wound up releasing my shoulder seams so I could machine-stitch the lining to
Hand-finished hem---the large stitches you see are actually the hand-basting I neglected to remove since it was on the inside. You don't see ANY of the actual hem stitches.
the arms and neck and then reverse it, then hand-finished the shoulder seams. This is easy, but somehow when I do this the shoulder seams never match up as nicely as they ought to… the front is always a little too narrow for some reason. There’s probably a better method out there, but I’m too lazy to research is right now.
The zipper was a bit of an experiment. I’ve read the standard method for inserting them (and this was a standard, not an invisible zipper), but I’ve never had great success in this department. Usually they end up catching on the fabric around them, at least a bit. I was attracted by the idea of installing it by hand, but also short of time. In the end I sewed it to the lining by machine (carefully well back of the zipper teeth) and then picked it to the outside by hand. It looks great, at least on the outside. My hand stitches show on the inside (perhaps with a little more thought or paying more attention to some tutorials, I could have avoided this, but I was in a rush at this point). I also finished the hem by hand, which is lovely when you have an underlining to catch the stitches on, and I’m quite happy with that,
Hand-picked zipper
though there is one spot where I accidentally caught the fashion fabric and it shows. I could fix it, but I probably won’t bother. I just hemmed the lining by machine. I really should pick up some finer machine needles… the ones I have are a bit too thick and the lining fabric puckers.
On the whole, the dress was a smashing success. It fitted well with minor alterations (though the bust is still a bit generous for me… I suspect I need to narrow the front and then make the darts smaller). I did end up taking it in almost an inch on each side at the back seam, so perhaps I could have cut the size 34 instead of the size 36. The only disappointment? I it’s a bit too fancy for everyday, and who knows when I’ll get to wear it again?
Shoulder seam---not a great match up.
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What an incredibly crazy-busy weekend. Not bad in anyway, but very busy. The first weekend in at least a month with no sewing done.
Fortunately, I have pictures of the gambeson to post finally. Apparently it is serving its purpose very well, though there are a few places where the outer fabric didn’t get caught properly in the seams, despite my best efforts. All in all, pretty nice though.
Jason's gambeson. With totally-non-period fedora.
There was no pattern for this. The materials consisted of an Ikea curtain, a white twill tablecloth (really nice!) and a gross old polyester duvet for the filler. I took his measurements and had him rip/cut various squares and rectangles for front, back, and sleeves. We tacked these together in their layers, pinned it together, and started fitting. At the beginning, it looked pretty much like he was wearing a large blue pillow. By the end, we had something that actually aproximated the look of a rather boxy shirt-pattern. I guess this is akin to pattern-draping, right? It’s much easier to do on someone else. Maybe I do need to bite the bullet and make a duct-tape double.
Side view. The sleevelets stick out like that when the arms are at the side, but when extended forward are flat. It seemed like the only way to get them to fill the gap and still provide enough freedom of movement. And he thinks they look kinda cool. And we can always change them later.
Once we had the pieces approximately the right shape, I set Jason to marking the quilting on the inside (in pen… you don’t want to see it.) We toyed with the idea of hand-quilting, as I mentioned, but went with machine. Because Jason’s sewing machine skills are limited (as yet) I did most of the quilting. I’ll make him pay for that at some point ;).
There were some glitches. The sleeves wound up being too narrow at the upper arm, so we inserted triangular gussets at the underarm (not padded, fortunately). They also seemed to be about 5″ too long, so we trimmed them down (from the narrow wrist end). He changed his mind and decided the body should be thigh-length rather than hip length, so we added the bottom panel (took some figuring out how to get the back slit attached properly. I’m actually kinda proud of how that part came out. When we got it actually put together, it was revealed that the sleeves were really about two inches too short (one slightly worse than the other). Oopsie. We were already not planning to attach them directly to the body, but we wound up needing the little leather cap-sleeves to bridge the gap and replace the missing length.
The back, showing the rear slit (for riding, theoretically). The lining shows a bit along the edge where the crude quilting leaves a fold of the lining fabric. In my ideal world we'd bind the whole thing in black. Maybe someday.
Despite the general wonkiness and costume-grade-ness, there are a few points I’m quite proud of. The quilting on the collar is a thing of beauty; by dint of pulling the bottom layer and pushing the top I managed to keep the fabrics feeding evenly (though the stitch-lengths are awful). I did a pretty good job on the black binding, which is pre-packaged bias binding; I sewed the first side by machine and hand-finished the other side, which made a very nice, tight effect once I figured out how to do it neatly (the first cuff was a little wonky). Ok, that might be it. Jason did the leather sleevelets all by himself, and the strapping and attaching of the buckles. He’s quite happy with it, and it seems to have served its purpose admirably. Next he wants to make a surcoat. He will be doing a lot more of that by himself, I promise.
I am a little torn, though. I like making something from scratch. It’s the attitude that started me sewing, just looking at pieces of cloth and going ahead and DOING. But, it’s also the antithesis of the kind of precision and craft I’m trying to cultivate toward producing everyday-wearable garments. I’d rather avoid the little glitches than fix them.
I did start cutting out the Danielle dress. Still need to cut out the sleeves and “waist” band (contrast fabric) and underlining. Hopefully make some more progress this week as we have kids’ birthday parties next weekend and I won’t get anything done then, either. And I’d really like to wear it (assuming wadders can be avoided) to my friend’s wedding reception the weekend after.
Oh, and a quick fitting redux: it was finally hot enough here to wear my (still un-hemmed) capris. Yay! And… (surprise, surprise) with wear, they’re stretching out. They seem to be doing it more slowly than most of my other stretch jeans (this fabric is so weird) but right now I could happily take them in at least another centimetre on each side. The waistband also stretches more than I would like, but it also seems fairly resilient so it’s not bugging me as much as some of my less-elastic jeans. Next time I do a fitting I just need to remind myself that the jeans whose fit I like, when they’re unstretched, I have to jump up and down to get into.
I really want to make a pair with my new black denim, but I’m holding off until I can pick up a new double needle—denim weight, 1/4″ spread on the needles (I must be a sucker for the double needles) and some more top-stitching thread. I know the top-stitching is tricky enough without the double needles, so maybe that’s just asking for trouble… but although I’m reasonably happy with my manual topstitching on the jeans, it’s just not as crisp as the double needle would be. If, y’know, I can do it without destroying the needle. Or my eye.
I know what I’ll do to bring these ones in a bit in the leg. My daughter’s friend has the coolest detail on the back of a set of her jeans, a fold taken out and topstitched down, with a rivet at the top end. Hers run from below the knee, but on my carpis I could do that from the bottom of the pocket…
Anyway, enough rambling? More sewing!
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Newest JJ... still slight puddling at the back.
Almost done with this pattern? Well, almost. Sorta. I still haven’t *nailed* it yet, although this version was a lot closer. At least in terms of construction.
Black JJ with silver buttons.
I added 1 cm to each centre front piece this time, in an attempt to avoid the bust gape and get the front princess seam falling in a slightly better place (it tended to fall inside my bust point, which is not quite right). This accomplished my aim, but at the expense of some fit; the side seams were edging back and the whole thing was quite big when I tried it on, and the side-seams were riding a little far back. I took the side-seams in (curving from very little at top and bottom to 1.5 cm at thewaist, and I could have taken it in more… there’s probably still about 2 cm of extra ease. Apparently what I needed wasn’t extra room along the whole front, but just at the bust. So I guess I should take 1 cm off the side front (to match the 1 cm I added to the front) and then do a small full bust adjustment (!!! me!!!). Who’d’a thunk? And probably shorten the waist a cm or 2, which I think would get rid of the last of the back puddling.
Black JJ---Back
Construction-wise, however, this shirt is a thing of beauty. The fabric is 100% cotton with a subtle woven-in stripe that looks like cross-stich up close (I adore it… and I have lots more!) and it was delightful to work with. I actually got the collar attached properly (meeting, not overlapping) at the centre front) and neatly. I made one more slight alteration to the ruffles, tapering them at the ends, and I like the effect very much. I think I could still narrow them slightly… they seemed perfect on the sheer blouse, but a little big still on this one, maybe because the fabric is heavier? I bit the bullet and hand-finished the inside of the collar and sleeve cuffs, and hand-rolled the bottom hem, and if I get really ambitious I’ll overcast the raw edges on the inside. The machine did manage to make a disaster of the bottom buttonhole, but the others are perfect. I adore my little silver buttons.
Work it, work it!
I could spend a lot more time dissecting the shirt,but really, I’m pretty darn happy with it. I can still see myself making one more version of this shirt (in opaque white)… but maybe I’ll have to change it up with the ruffles or something. And then figure out a long-sleeved version for winter…
(An interesting aside… as a smaller-busted girl, I have spent the last ten years or so largely braless aside from nursing and athletics, once I got over the excitement of actually getting to wear a bra and realized that most of them didn’t fit very well and weren’t comfy. This doesn’t bother me in the least… but with the addition of a couple of non-stretch JJ blouses to my wardrobe, I realized something. My usual staple tops are snug knits. These actually provide a bit of support in and of themselves. Not much, but enough to feel… comfortable. Without that, in these woven blouses… well, a bra just feels welcome. Interesting. no?)
Low camera angles courtesy of my mini-tabletop tripod.
Jalie 2908 capris!
Yay!
Pair number one is complete! (minus hemming and rivets. Details, details.)
These are capri-length for summer (since I only have one other pair of capris). I used Becca A’s from Pattern Review’s alterations for making an even lower low-rise (thankfully her daughter and I are close to the same size) which worked perfectly. I also wanted a contoured waistband, so I used the one from the Burdastyle Ellen pants pattern (because it was free). This also worked out well, although it still ended up with a bit of gaping… I think probably from stretching during sewing as it fit perfectly when I was trying it on in advance. I converted it into a single-piece band and narrowed it a bit.
So… aside from my usual sewing blunders (I still haven’t quite figured
Jalie capris---front
out the zipper insertion… I got the zipper facing the right way this time but then sewed the fly shield on the wrong side, and the zipper wound up sitting way back from the centre front, which I think isn’t quite right) I’m pretty darn happy with these as a first pair. My attempt to pre-curve my yoke panel worked fine (there was no gaping at all at that stage of the try on, just after the waistband was attached). I think I have finally understood why the original yoke comes so “straight”… it’s very easy to take it in, but it would be somewhat harder to spread it out evenly if you have a flatter bum… so they drafted it to the “flattest common denominator”… at least, that’s my theory. I tried them on right after I sewed the outer seams, and wore them for a few hours to gauge the fit, after which I took each side in about a 1/4 inch. This improved it nicely, though it wasn’t that bad before; I think most of my issues with the “feel” of the pants have more to do with the fabric (which really isn’t very nice. Next time I will splurge on the $18/m fabric.
Original pocket pattern...
... which didn't work out so well in practice
There were some hiccoughs in the production. I spent quite some time drafting a lovely ankh pattern to topstitch on the pockets… and totally butchered it when I tried to stitch it down. Partly I’m not very good at machine embroidery, partly it was the stretchy fabric (perhaps I should’ve interfaced the pockets)… anyway, that was a bust, so I reverted to some boring straight lines. Oh well. I did make the pockets mini (the same size as my daughter’s) and I like the way they look on my less-than-oversized bottom. The
Not-quite-couture hand finished buttonhole
interfacing helped with the “flabby” feeling of the waistband immensely, but thickened it up enough that my machine balked at doing the buttonhole… so I hand-finished that, which is the first time I’ve ever tried it. It’s definitely not as nice as all those couture hand-finished buttonholes I’ve seen photos of ;). I originally failed to heed Becca A’s advice and cut a size Q yoke (same size as the rest of the pattern) rather than a size R as she suggested, and it was too small (since the lowering of the rise widened the seam… I am brilliant, aren’t I). So I had to re-cut that too.
The topstitching thread, as expected, was a little finicky. I found that most of its tantrums happened at the start of the seam, and could be avoided by holding
side view... gaping at the back doesn't really show.
Back view: boring lines on pockets.
on to the top thread so that the end didn’t get sucked down into the bobbin and do weird things, but it was still a bit of a crapshoot. And I managed to shatter my double-needle (perhaps I’m cursed with those) when I went to do a test stitch with it and had the stitch still set to zig-zag. The needle hit the presser foot. The waistband turned out a little bubbly and bulgy, and the fly is still a little gapy; I’ll have to try a couple more fabrics so I can figure out whether that’s me or just the flabby fabric pulling funny.
(artistic photos by my daughter… sorry about some of the wonky angles 🙂
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No pics of them on the kid (yet… maybe after I wash them) but here’s the final details:
Jeans front finished---rivets and belt loops!
The rivets went in quite well (it’s much easier to hammer metal stuff in now I have a concrete garage floor to work on!). They did need to be shortened, but they seem to hold well (I’ll get back to you about whether they’re STAYING on in a few months). I experimented with not shortening one, and regretted it—it went together and didn’t damage the caps, but the inside cap kind of skewed off to the side, so the inside and outside caps are offset. You can’t tell from looking, of course, and it feels solidly attached… but not desirable.
The belt-loops as measured were kinda long, but that’s fine. I put them on after the rivets… before would have been smarter. I was going to sew them right by the edge of the front pocket, and couldn’t because the rivet was in the way. Not that their current placement is a problem,
Back---finished. Cool belt loops!
but note to self for the future. In the back, I criss-crossed the centre back belt loops. I like. 🙂
Oh, and I finally located and tried out my double needle for the belt-loops and hems! I bought it last fall, just to have a double needle, despite my disastrous results the first time I tried to use one (the bobbin threads got tangled and when I tried to raise the needle one of the tips was getting bent funny and snapped off. This was about five minutes into my first attempt to use it). But for whatever reason this time—better thread, auspicious alignment of the planets—it gave me not a hint of trouble this time. I did take the advice I read somewhere to put the spools on so they spool out the thread in opposite directions (eg. one clockwise, the other counterclockwise). Maybe that made all the difference. No idea. Anyway, aside from the fact that the double needle I have wasn’t purchased with jeans in mind and is a bit narrower between the two tips than the rest of the top-stitching, it worked perfectly. I did the hems with it (the zig-zag from the bobbin makes it stretchy, too, even on a regular straight stitch!). I wound up doing two rows of the double stitching on the belt-loops (the zig-zag underneath does a really nice job of finishing the triple-folded bottom surface), and I was worried that they were too uneven, but once cut into the short lengths they looked fine.
So, verdict? Definitely some loving-hands-at-home going on in the details. But, perfectly respectable from a distance (even I don’t notice the offset pockets unless I look for it) and the kid loves them. Considering her lukewarm reaction to her jacket, I am going to declare these a success. Which is good because I cut out my pair last night…
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Kid's jeans (first try on)
So, I took the plunge. Well, in miniature. Just putting the finishing touches on a trial pair of jeans… for my daughter. A little torn—on the one hand, they’re very cute, but on the other hand, there’s enough booboos in the construction and fitting issues that I’m a little dissatisfied—more with myself than with the pattern, however. Oh, and the plaid flannel in the cut-outs is the same fabric as the pocket lining, and was a pair of my hubby’s pyjama pants long, long ago. So glad I kept those scraps!
On the plus side:
Are these not the coolest pockets EVER, I ask you?
much less chance for me to mess up, especially along short lengths. All in all the topstitching, though not perfect, is a LOT better than my last attempt. My “edgestiching” blind-hemmer foot definitely shows its limitations along longer seams, although that may be as much shoddy construction of the foot (the screw that adjusts the front extension is really loose, so it jiggles out slowly as you go along… this is just as much a problem for blind hems as for edgestitching).
Negatives:
Kid's jeans: front (finished except for belt loops, hemming)
Kid's jeans: back (finished except for belt loops and hemming)
(sorry about the colour in the last two pics… the camera didn’t like having the black couch in the background. Also the jeans are rather rumpled in the last couple of shots because she won’t take them off long enough for me to hem and put belt loops on.)
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My daughter showing off
This is a dance shirt I made three or four years ago now for my older daughter. The idea is loosely based on an Indian choli, a kind of cropped, sometimes backless blouse worn with skirt or sari or whatever (depending on the region). They’re popular in tribal bellydance, and a little more modest than the traditional bellydance bra top. I have about a zillion of my own, made to various patterns, which maybe I will talk about at some point, but this one seemed like it would make for a nice quick post.
I drafted the pattern for this shirt based on her measurements; kids’ patterns are SO nice to draft because you don’t have to worry about bust shaping. There’s a theme or principal in “folk” clothing where you try to be as economical with the fabric as possible—most pieces will be rectangles, triangles, or trapezoids. This makes sense if you have to spin and weave your own fabric—you don’t want to waste ANY of it. It comes at the
a choli (a kind of backless top popular in bellydance) designed by my daughter
expense of fit, of course… but that’s the nature of the beast. The other upside, however, is it makes the patterns dead easy to draft. My daughter chose the kimono-inspired sleeves for this shirt (and made up her own pose). Since you can’t see it too well in the photo, here’s a rough technical drawing of the shirt: as you can see, nary a curve in sight. The triangles under the arms are actually square gussets.
Sewing is what I do when I'm cheating on all my other hobbies...
Tanit-Isis Sews 