A cautionary tale

See my jeans.




See how close I was to finishing? Topstitching, belt loops, cool fabric for the lining, buttonhole, the works.

I say "was", because as it turns out, following the Craftsy class instructions to stabilize the top edge of that waistband with twill tape means I can barely pull these previously well-fitting jeans over my backside. And the front won't quite overlap as well as it was supposed to. Which means that I now have to undo my entire afternoon's work. Which was actually an afternoon off from my retail job, so it's way more work than I would have gotten done otherwise. I'm so upset!

 I checked, and I do have enough of the denim to cut a new waistband and lining. So I guess that's better than unpicking every single stitch of this. Though I am quite sad that I'm going to lose that waistband lining--that and the pockets was all I had left over from using this fun print to cover a scrapbook awhile back. 

I'm not sure if that means it's always going to be gapping in the back, since now I'll have to use two pieces of stretch fabric vs. one piece of stretch plus one slightly bias non-stretch. I'm afraid to try the twill tape again. But I still feel like I'm going to have to stabilize the back somehow so it's not always riding down on me.

So how would you keep a curved waistband from gapping out in this sort of situation? Have you ever had a completely demoralizing sewing disaster close to the end of a project?

I guess the moral of the story is that girls with curvy butts should take fitting advice from teachers who state they have a flat butt with a very large shaker of salt. If you need me, I guess I have a hot date with my seam ripper.

I may have just ruined my pants.

This is my rather sad attempt at a welt pocket. Which, frankly, looks awful and won't lie flat at all. Especially in the corners. Since I already cut the slash, I'm not sure how to salvage this. I could maybe widen the seam allowance and make the welts more narrow, but it may be too late.

Needless to say, this is why welt pockets are on my check the technique list. I've never managed a good one yet.

Murphy's Law of Sewing

I guess everyone has these projects from time to time. You manage to finish something super-complicated, everything comes together beautifully....and then you try to make something that's supposed to be easy and everything goes wrong.

This project, for me, has been the top from the Hummingbird separates, which I'm making as part of Steph's 30-minutes-a-day sewalong. (There won't be pictures for most of this post, because my desktop is also not speaking to me at the moment and refuses to turn on. It's probably just as well, given how things are going.)

This is how it's supposed to go:
Day 1: Determine your size, gather your supplies, and trace the pattern.
Day 2: Cut your fabric.
Day 3: Test the knit stitches, sew together one shoulder seam and the neck binding.
Day 4 (today): Sew the second shoulder seam, the sleeve bindings, and the side seams.

This is how my shirt is going:

Day 1: Determine my size, gather my supplies, discover that I have no invisible zippers that are the right color to go with my skirt fabric, or even remotely close. Also, I'm completely out of hooks and eyes, as of the wedding dress. Get together the rest of my supplies anyway, make a mental note to try to get to Joann's soon, and trace the pattern.

(Pic from Twitter)

Day 2: Spend about an hour turning my fabric every which way, consulting the sewcialists on Twitter, pinning and unpinning and repinning to figure out how on earth I should configure this knit print, and finally throw in the towel and go get ready for bed.

Day 3: Finally decide to seam both the front and back down the middle, add seam allowances, spend about another hour pinning and unpinning to try and get the motifs to match up as much as I can, cut the remaining pieces, sew the front and back halves together to get caught up, go to press the neck and sleeve bindings only to realize that they won't work because the knit is only a 2-way stretch and I cut it the wrong way to try and make the pattern look nice, recut those pieces, press them in half as much as the fabric will allow me to, decide that I should actually practice my flute while my husband orders pizza for dinner, call it a day.

Today: Sew one shoulder seam. Pause when looper thread breaks on my serger in order to rethread. Realize that was actually only half of the shoulder seam and I didn't interface it entirely. Fuse interfacing gook to my iron in attempt to fix this. Start to sew shoulder seam again. Realize interfacing is sticking to my presser foot, and restart the seam on my serger. Go to sew on neck binding. Realize that there is absolutely no way on earth that this length of neck binding will stretch to fit this diameter of neckline. Recut it for the third time, this time with one end on fold. Start to stitch. Decide seam allowance won't leave me with a usable binding, since the edges are curling and in danger of developing runs in the fabric. Make that more narrow. Try to press it under. Stick more bits of shirt to other interfaced shoulder seam and have to peel off. Decide I really need a pressing ham. Decide to just press the neckline under entirely wherever this super-thin knit wants to fold and topstitch. Do so, then remember that I won't get it looking right if I don't sew the other shoulder and finish it in the round. Wrangle that into place, with a very messy edge at that one shoulder where I had to pick it out. Remember belatedly that I meant to reinforce that stitching, end up catching the shoulder seam in multiple places and have to rip all of that out. I hope I didn't make holes. Husband calls to let me know he's finally on his way home, giving me an excuse to throw in the towel. Even though I'm only done through day 3.

After all of this, the shirt had better look good.

Also, I'm not blaming Steph at all for this, because her pattern is well-thought out and the directions are explained well. It's probably just a combination of rushing into a project before my sewing room is even entirely unpacked, recovering from wedding/honeymoon travel, waking up early every morning because the bedroom is in dire need of blackout curtains (which I have fabric for, but I'm afraid to wash it in that washer that already ate my shirt with that much yardage, so I have to wash it at my parents' house), and just trying to settle into the routine of newlywed life.

The skirt will go better, right?

Yesterday was not a good day.

So far, I'd been feeling pretty good about my rate of progress on the dress. I got the nude organza sewed onto the back on Tuesday, though I'm holding off on the shoulder seams for now, and spent probably a solid 7-8 hours over the course of the next two days carefully hand-tacking the allover lace to the main fabric on the front of the bodice, cutting around motifs to try and make the seaming as invisible as possible, etc. (I'm so glad I've got my seasonal unemployment going on right now, or there's no way I'd get this done.) I made it all the way to the point of being able to add lace to one of the side front pieces. And then, after a couple of hours fussing with one flower in particular, I had this sinking feeling...

So I held it up to myself, and sure enough: I had a flower centered right in the worst possible place it could be on the princess seam. And this was after spending quite a bit of time pinning, unpinning, and even getting a second opinion to make sure I avoided doing this.

I tried unpicking as little as possible and just shifting that particular flower as much as I could, but it was a no-go. So I spent much of yesterday evening undoing nearly two days' work, and panicking over the thought that I might not be able to avoid doing this again because of the large-scale motifs, and "what if I have to buy new lace I don't have options around here and none of my usual fabric websites have anything that would work right now and I designed the entire dress around this lace!" It was not a good night.

Now that I have it all unpicked, I think I've found an alternate placement that will help me avoid this. I'll have to cut a new piece of lace, but the original one can be salvaged either for a side front piece or just using the motifs on the skirt, as originally planned. It's a good thing I went with dupioni for the main fabric, as I think a less textured silk probably would have been wrecked in the process of undoing the lace and then I would have lost all of the bodice work, too. So now I just have to make up for lost time...

learning experiences

Remember this project?

As of tonight, I'm calling it quits. It is one skein of yarn away from being completely frogged. I was attempting to work on it while watching some tv with Doug earlier tonight, spent two entire episodes of Community trying to fix one spot where it looked like I'd accidentally added a stitch several rows back, made it look completely terrible, ended up crying a little out of sheer frustration, and then deciding I was done with this project. Really, seeing how I started it back in April, and only got through two skeins of yarn in what was supposed to be a relatively easy knitting project, especially compared to the Camille shrug, I should have known something was off with it.

Now that I'm a little calmer, I'm thinking that this was probably for the best. The shape of it was kind of tent-like, and I've been having to work so hard to try and make it a shape that I'd like better, when I probably would have been better off just starting with a project more suited to the shape and style of tops that I like better. Also, the lace panel would have meant that I'd have to layer it. And since summers around here tend to be hot and humid--last summer was a record-breaker in that department here, and this one is not far behind--the less layering I have to do, the better. So I'm going to finish unraveling it, and give the yarn a rest.  And from a learning perspective, I did successfully add shaping without instructions, even though I'll never know now how it actually would have fit. And I did start teaching myself to do continental-style knitting, which I think might help with the wrist issues. I'm feeling fairly comfortable with it for knitting, at least--it remains to be seen how this goes with purling!

I'm not sure how much time I'll have to knit in the next several months anyway, since I'll have The Dress, plus a few other crafty wedding DIYs to take care of, if you're interested in hearing about those as I do them! But if I do have knitting time, I think I'm going to concentrate on finishing up a few in-progress things--I have a scarf about halfway done to use up the yarn from my Counterpoint Hat, and a cowl I was making for a friend to use up some of the leftover yarn from the Cadence sweater. If I have time to knit after that, I'll just work on some handwarmers and things of that sort. Doug likes to keep his house on the chilly side, so I'm going to need those little knitted accessories!

And hopefully, once the dust settles from all of this, I'll have a better idea of what to do with 6 balls of purple hemp yarn.

another finished jacket

This is the jacket #120 from the 3/11 issue of BurdaStyle (one of the last magazines I got from them.)I finished this up on Thursday night, and I've worn it twice already! This pic was from yesterday afternoon, courtesy of my boyfriend--we went to his place to hang out and watch a movie after a late lunch (or early dinner) with his family. The furball is one of his two dogs--this one has absolutely loved me from day 1, and likes to hang out close by whenever I'm around!

I'm happy with the fit, and since the color is pretty close to a dark denim, I think it will be fairly versatile in my wardrobe! Here's some more detail shots:

My one detail that I'm not entirely sure I like is the collar. I think that it pressed out fairly well for corduroy that I was afraid of crushing, and I like the shape of the upper collar and the lapel width. I guess I just wish it didn't have that huge gap where the collar stand is...the brown cord jacket had that same feature, and I'm undecided about whether it just looks weird or not.

I am very satisfied with the interior finishing job! I went ahead and serged all of the lining insides to keep it from fraying and weakening the seams. This is done with a modified bagged lining--I didn't want to leave the seam between the jacket and the peplum just kind of billowing out, so I used that seam as my handstitching one instead of leaving a gap in a side seam. I used some instructions from a Sew Stylish magazine I had lying around, and they worked brilliantly! So consider that technique checked.

Look how nice and clean that machine-finished sleeve hem looks. (And in this case, I an all in favor of as little hand-sewing as possible!)

Incidentally, I have about a yard of this floral fabric left, so I need to figure out what to do with it. I'm thinking maybe a simple sleeveless top, but I'll have to figure out what pattern since the Sorbetto doesn't really suit me, and I'm a little afraid to use the Pendrell again after what happened with the leftover raincoat lining!

On a more positive note, I think the buttons may be one of my favorite things about this jacket. I cannot believe how absolutely perfectly they go with the lining! And though I had to unpick one that got crazy long, I did get some good practice on all-manual all-the-time buttonholes on my machine.

I've sort of started my knit dress, though that's really a technicality. So far, all of my sewing time on it has been spent wasting using the scraps to try and get my serger to make a nice seam. The front looks basically perfect, but the back side isn't quite working and the seam does tend to pull apart and show the stitches when any pressure is put on a seam. So I basically have to go over it a second time with the regular sewing machine. According to the book I was looking at, I need to tighten the tension on the left-hand needle, because the stitches are pulled too much in the back. But if I do even a little, those stitches just don't catch at all and it looks worse on both sides. I know it's not the needle, because I changed it to a fresh one, and I'm pretty sure it's not the thread this time, since I've got my nice sewing machine thread in the needles right now. The other thing is that part of the threading for that particular needle just won't stay in place, so I'm not sure that doesn't have something to do with it. I guess my plan of action is to next call the repair/retail shop where I got the darned thing from in the first place, and see what they suggest. (And if I have to get it fixed AGAIN, ugh.)

I don't get it.

Dear internet crafting community: 

I meant for this next post to be about sewing. But then I only had enough time yesterday to sew about half of my lining together--I also meant to sew more yesterday, but then I got rear-ended on my way home from the grocery store and that kind of killed my evening. (I'm fine, except for a little soreness in my back, and my car looks to be fine other than two puncture wounds in the bumper. But it still sucked up my time. And will suck up at least a little more, since I need to get my car assessed to make sure the damage is only cosmetic.)

So this post is going to be about knitting again. More specifically, knitting issues that are making me want to pull my hair out! One of my current projects is the Onyx sweater by Heather Dixon. It's a really interesting pattern that has fun texture contrasts, and a nice opportunity for me to practice cabling when I get to it. I know how to do short rows now, which is also new to me. The part of the pattern that I just don't seem to get is any time I have to join two sections together in the garter stitch. Because this is what it does:

I don't know why or how, but every time I do this, it turns into stockinette stitch on me instead of the garter. Which I just don't understand, because I'm only doing knit stitch. No purling. This particular area is where I was trying to knit across the second section to join the right and left sides of the front together. This is exactly what happened when I was trying to go on the opposite side of the invisible cast-on before. Then, I fake-solved it by adding another row of knitting going from the opposite direction of what the pattern called for, and it was fine. I can't do that here, since I need to start from the inside and work my way out from another half of the side. I tried dropping stitches and fixing them with the crochet hook, but that was a disaster and I ended up having to rip it back entirely to the split joining point. I also tried flipping the stitches around on the needle, but that didn't work either. So it looks like my options are to either find directions for this sort of thing, which has not succeeded in either Google or any knitting book in the house, or to switch to purling for the entire left side of this. Which is going to be a pain, confusing, and potentially impossible with that "knit one front then back" increase instruction.

I finally gave up for the night and did a little gauge swatching and some work on a long-neglected scarf instead. (I'm still not quite at the point where I'm comfortable with breaking out the sewing machine while my boyfriend is around, and Thursdays are generally our weeknight to hang out. Thinking I need to get over that, since my distinct lack of sewing time as of late is getting to me.) Even so, it's really irritating me that I can't figure out how this is supposed to work. So I humbly ask you, which is any of you reading who has more experience in knitting than me--what's the deal here?!

Frustratedly yours,
Becky

a case of the blues

 First of all, thanks for all of the lovely, encouraging comments on the shrug! The latest update there is that the sleeves are sewed together and it's back on the needles to knit the last bit of ribbing.

And thanks also for the feedback on the word verification. I did get a gentle reminder from a blog-less friend of mine who regularly comments that not all anonymous commenters are bad (at least the ones who leave a name and a real comment), and have since switched it to no word verification but full comment moderation so I could allow for that sort of anonymous commenting. I'm still a bit concerned that I've been getting extra pop-up windows since I initially turned the verification off, and I am still averaging about one spammy comment a day, but at least I can easily mark them as spam and delete them. (Carolyn, to answer your question, what I meant by the pop-up windows is that I'm getting additional open windows when I did not click on anything to bring them up. Usually it's more annoying, for things like Amazon.com (except I'm not sure it was legitimate, because I certainly did not open a page for baby clothes!), or for a "click here to claim your prize" type thing. I did get a pretty nasty one the other day, though, and so far my virus scans have turned up nothing other than tracking cookies. Gtt.)

Computer issues aside...Now that the shrug is almost complete, my attention is drifting to other knitting projects. Namely this sweater that one of my online friends and I are making as a mini-knitalong. And, as it turns out, I have a lot of new techniques to learn here. So far, it's been invisible cast-on, and short rows, and that's just on the first page! (And here I thought this would be easy because basically everything is in knit stitch with no purling!  And, of course, I've already had to start this one over once. We're taking this at a snail's pace since we both have real life stuff and other projects going on, so even though it represents about 60 rows, and a lot of them are short, it's a month's worth of work that I'm trying to redo here. The problem came with said invisible cast-on. When I joined it together and got to the end of the second section we'd decided on, I looked back and realized that oh, wait, this looks wrong. Instead of that nubby garter stitch look, suddenly it had a smooth stockinette look for about 3 rows right around where I did that invisible cast-on. So obviously, I did something wrong.  I attempted to stick the needle in right before that section started and rip back to there, but that didn't work so well. So I just decided to rip the whole thing out and start over, since those two sections didn't take me very long in actual knitting time.

And wouldn't you know, even that part didn't go well!  I kept ending up with these weird loopy knots like this, where I was having to shove the entire ball of yarn through there just to rip out the next part.

And then I realized that I was supposed to rip it out in the opposite direction that I'd been knitting it in, I was doing it backwards, and that was why it was being so uncooperative. Palm, meet face.

So I've got it re-knit up to about 6ish rows before I'm supposed to switch back for knitting from the opposite side of the invisible cast-on. Hopefully it will go better this time, since I tried a different technique for the cast-on in the first place.

I'm having better luck with my blue corduroy jacket, which, oddly enough, is pretty much the exact same color as my yarn. This picture is a little outdated-- I meant to write this post a couple of days ago. Since then, I've added the sleeves, and stitched the two layers of the peplum together. I took a chance on just going ahead and sewing it together as is, with just a bit of a smaller seam to attach the sleeves to the body, since the brown jacket was so easy to fit and it was also a Burda pattern. My gamble is paying off so far, since it looks like it will work just fine from my couple of times I've tried on. A rather fitted jacket, to be sure, but I think it has to be with the peplum. And since this is a rather lightweight corduroy, I'm thinking of this more in terms of a spring/fall layer than winter warmth. (Besides, apparently I'll have a sweater in exactly the same color, so I can just wear that when I want blue then!) So this is moving along nicely, and I think I'll quite easily make my goal of finishing it before the end of the month.

The one thing I need to figure out: In the interest of new techniques, I'd like to try bagging the lining somewhat. I think it will be easier than usual, since I had to cut the inner peplum from the lining fabric and therefore I'm planning on just hand-stitching the lining down at that lower seam. So all I'll have to sort out is the sleeves and sewing the lining to the inner facings. I know I have some resources to figure out how to do that lying around here, so I'll just have to look into it. I was thinking about trying a bound buttonhole as well, but I think I already screwed up my chances on that by sewing the facing in. Oh well.... I wanted to work on my machine buttonholes more anyway. (The jacket is actually supposed to have snaps to close, but I've decided to go with the buttons being functional instead of purely decorative so I can leave the jacket open when I want to. The snaps look kind of funny when I do that, IMO.)

I do have a blog award I recently got that I need to share, but I'll do that on the next post, since I'd like to actually have some time to sew this afternoon! (There's also going to be a low-key giveaway, so stay tuned!)

So why did I start knitting again?

Another pictureless post. I just need to rant.

I thought this sweater was going better this time. I spent basically every free hour I've had this week re-knitting everything I did since this knitalong started about a month and a half ago. And then tonight, I got to the decreases. And for some reason, the second body and sleeve section has way more stitches than the first. So I have to rip things out. Again. I've taken it back 3 1/2 rows so far and it's still wrong. And my yarn is starting to get all fuzzy and stick together, and I can barely get the needle in there to undo the stitches because I knit so tightly. And if I have to rip this out and start it a third time, I'm going to be REALLY upset.

I'm honestly beginning to think that maybe I wasn't ready for something as big as a sweater.

So why did I decide to give knitting another go?

Oh, yeah. I wanted sweaters.

Grr.

Bad news first

Two things:

#1: The bad news is that my local Barnes & Noble has either stopped carrying BurdaStyle, or they haven't gotten the November issue in yet. Which is a shame, because based on some previews I've seen on other blogs, I'm actually interested in picking this one up. There's this kimono-esque shirt and this kind of intriguing blouse that I could see myself making (the kimono shirt in particular), and this formal dress that falls into the category of "I wish I had an excuse to sew this." I'll check again next week, but I may have to wait and hope that those are some of the patterns that the BurdaStyle site is willing to share. They didn't have the latest SewStylish either, which was disappointing. I guess I could have looked at Threads, but I also needed to stop at the grocery store and didn't want to take a lot more time. So kind of a letdown on the sewing front. The good news (for my interest, not for my wallet) is that they did have all three of the knitting magazines I was thinking about picking up. So I got the latest KnitScene (love that magazine), a copy of knit.wear , and the special Jane Austen Knits issue that Interweave recently came out with. (I am also a sucker for all things Jane. And based on my initial flip-through, it looks like there's some potentially interesting articles too, all about things like how they dyed fabric back in the Regency era, a profile on a sewing pattern company that focuses on historic garments, etc.)

So in summary, bad B&N trip on the sewing front, great on the knitting one.

#2: The bad news is, I think I'm going to have to start the sweater over entirely. After ripping out about 7 rows and re-knitting some over the last few days, I discovered that the mistakes apparently go back further than I'd thought, because there's this one section where I still didn't have the right number of stitches to follow the pattern, and had to keep trying to compensate. It's a bit of a mess. Also, when I tried it on, this thing is off-the-shoulder huge. I think the neckline stretched while I was waiting for step 2, because it was always a tight fit around that circular needle. So as much as I hate to do it, I think I may have to just start again. I'm debating whether it should be one needle size down.

The good news is, with all of this handling of the yarn I've been doing over the last couple of days, my hands are feeling no ill effects. So I think I can now safely say that my wool sensitivity does not extend to alpaca. (Now if only they'd make alpaca fabric as a substitute for wool...)

Finally, a new FESA project!

I meant to post this yesterday, but I didn't have time to take any pics until well after dark, and I just could not get an un-blurred one of the skirt as a whole. So Monday it is. I'm wearing this right now. This probably isn't the best top to be pairing it with, but I usually tend to wear things un-tucked and I wanted the fun waistband details to actually show. I'm also wearing this with my black military-style jacket, since it's kind of cold now, but obviously then you can't see the skirt so well.

Since the weather here completely unseasonably sucked on Saturday, effectively cancelling any potential plans I had, I stayed indoors and sewed all day. And finally finished this skirt. (Though I really wasn't expecting it to take as much of the day as it did!)So here's my quick n' dirty review of Burda 4/09 #101: I'm a little disappointed in the fit of it-- I pin-basted the skirt when I was working on it last week and marked where it fit perfectly, but I guess the fabric stretched, because after it was all sewn together, it ended up a little loose. I think it would be more comfortable if it sat just a little higher on my hips, but I can deal. Now that I think about it, it might help if I tack the very top above the buttons. That doesn't have to be functional since it has a side zipper, and I'm thinking that when I had it pinned, I must have had that part pinned a little more snugly because the buttonholes weren't cut yet.

I do love the color of it, and the suede-like texture. And the pockets, though I wish they'd press a little flatter at the top. I'll keep trying. (They are rather useful in that they're the perfect size to fit my phone!) I like the style of it too. And I think I would use this pattern again, though with some definite tweaking in the fit. I'll just have to find things to tuck into it to show off the waist details. Maybe my Sorbetto? I wish I had a shorter grey cardigan to throw on with it...

I probably would have gotten this together a lot faster, except I lined it and that added quite a bit more time to what otherwise would have been a fairly simple skirt. For one thing, I drafted the lining myself. And, well, when I draft things, it never goes right. All I did for this one was to overlap the pattern pieces to take out the seam allowances, trace, and then take a facing-sized-minus-seam-allowance chunk out of the top. Even so, the lining ended up too big and I had to chop about 2" out of each piece. I'm glad I finally got it working in the end, because I think it makes the skirt so much nicer to wear. And perhaps easier, given that the fabric seems clingy. Plus solid-colored things are more fun with print linings, IMO.

In knitting news, I've hit a bit of a snag on my Cadence sweater...

.


I was working on the last row of the chart last night, and most of the pattern looks like this. (Which, as far as I know, is what it's supposed to look like.)

But then I discovered that two of the diamonds look like this. Which, at least to my eye, is pretty obviously wonky.

I have this great book called Knit Fix (or something along those lines) that taught me how to fix a mistake in the pattern vertically, that has already saved me frustration on several occasions. Unfortunately, the concept doesn't seem to work quite as well for fixing things with decreases. I think I made this one worse.

So I'm waiting to hear back from Kristin (the "Knitter" for Newbie and the Knitter) on if there's a good way to fix this....but I may have to just unravel this. It's kind of discouraging, and something that's a little difficult to reconcile myself to to from my seamstress perspective. Yes, I mess up my sewing, but there's usually a way to, in the immortal words of Tim Gunn, "make it work". It's very rare that I have to just toss the whole thing and start from scratch, you know?

I'm honestly thinking that it might be easier to just unravel the whole thing and start over, rather than unknit stitch by stitch to whatever row in the chart I started screwing up here. I'm assuming the chart may go faster now that I've knit my way through it once, and unpicking this will take hours. I'm not even sure it's possible to do it and get the right stitch count, with all of those yarnovers and knit 2 togethers and stuff.... I'm too new at this.

So, while I wait for that, happier sewing thoughts instead. Today's non-work projects (other than my continued hunt for a new part-time job with more hours--thus the reason I'm posting during the day so much lately) include switching out the last of my more summery clothes, because I've been digging something out from under my bed every day lately just to find something long-sleeved to wear. But if I have time, I'm hoping to make some refashion progress. And I'm thinking the next thing on the sewing table is going to be that knit print I pulled out for my FESA. Though I probably won't be able to touch that until Wednesday.

Maybe it's not quite as done as I thought...

Figured since I had some pics of it, I should show how the dress works in real life! This was at a friend's wedding I attended today, along with three of my long-time friends. I think it looks pretty good in the pics, and I did get several compliments on the dress. But I did discover that there's a bit of an issue with it, that I need to figure out how to fix. Preferably without having to disassemble the entire thing.

So here's the deal: since the fabric is a 2-way knit (which the pattern did specifically call for), despite the fact that it fit on Wednesday when I finish it and it has just been sitting rather securely on Donna with her textured fabric-grabbing blue coating until this morning, the dress got a bit stretched out on the top again. I guess the somewhat fortunate thing is that I noticed it before I left the house, and was able to make it work for today by pinning it to my bra in several places. (The very front is fine, but it's sagging out a bit under the arms again, and the weight of the skirt pulls it down in the back so that the bra shows when it's unpinned.) I should probably get some pictures of that, but didn't think too before I changed after getting home earlier this evening. I'd like to make this a little more easy to wear, so I don't have to go using a half-dozen safety pins every time I want to put it on. So here's what I'm thinking my options are:

a. Use the scraps to construct a kind of half-camisole sort of thing to wear underneath, and leave the dress alone.

b. Sew some elastic into the sides and back to create a sort of "waist stay" effect, which would hopefully still be comfortable but keep it from sagging.

c. Deconstruct the bodice and take the sides in more. Since this would involve removing topstitching/ facings/a lining/the elastic it took me about 3 attempts to get in/possibly part of the skirt, re-gathering, and re-stay taping, obviously I'd like to avoid this if possible. It would probably honestly be easier to just remake the dress entirely.

So I figured I'd tap into the collective genius of the sewing blog community and see if maybe there's some other options I've missed, or anyone who's had a situation like this with an idea for how to fix it. I'd definitely appreciate any help you can give me, because I am so ready to really be done with this project!

Good news, bad news (and a random question)

The good news: The test shorts are basically done. I finished sewing in the waistband facing today, did the button and buttonhole, and hemmed them.

I like the way the facing turned out--I was able to use up a nice chunk of a "fat quarter" piece in my scrap bin. I think I got these Celtic knot pieces in my Christmas stocking several years ago, and I'm finally finding ways to use them! I decided to hand-stitch it in, because I figured it would look nicer than topstitching it from the other side.

The fit is pretty good. Not too many wrinkles in the front...

...and though this picture is terribly blurry because the lighting in here kind of sucks for photos and I was holding the camera behind my back and taking the picture in the mirror, hardly any wrinkles at all in the back. And no gapping at the waistband! This is huge for me!

But the reason these aren't the final photos yet is this:

I had an unforeseen problem with the welt pockets: I underestimated my hips. :-P I wasn't expecting them to pull apart quite this much, and frankly, the inside of the pockets just looks bad. To the point where, as it stands now, this is only wearable with the longest shirts I own, and I don't think that would necessarily look good with such a long pair of shorts. I think I can salvage these so I can actually wear them (I mean, shorts that fit!)-- I have fabric left, and I'm going to try hand-stitching a patch into each of the pocket linings so that the outer fabric is showing instead of the wrong side of the pocket lining fabric. But this also means I have to rethink my pockets a bit before I can do the pants. So here's what options I'm looking at:

• I can change the placement of the pockets, perhaps moving them a bit more off my hips and more onto my thighs. (But then, my upper thighs do tend to protrude a bit too, as I learned from the many, many jeans muslin fitting issues I had. So this may just move the problem elsewhere, rather than fix it.)
• Theoretically, I could change the pockets to horizontal welts. Except that would pretty much kill both the lacing and the pleat, which is what makes these pants awesome.
• I could eliminate the welt altogether, at least for side pockets, and instead just do regular side-seam pockets. Right now, this is looking like the safest, and therefore the most likely, option. And if I really want to do the welts, I could add a back horizontal welt pocket or two.
• Theoretically, I could also eliminate the pockets altogether. But pants without pockets are dumb, IMO.
• I could leave the pockets as is, and cut the back side of the pocket out of the linen so that all you see But I don't think that will eliminate the gapping problem (unless adding the pleat adds enough fullness back in that it closes it up.) Part of whether I consider this is going to depend on how my patch job looks, I think.
• I'm not sure that widening the welts themselves will help. That might just make it harder to sew in.

So perhaps the lesson here is that curvy girls shouldn't have vertical welts on their pants?  I'm sure there's got to be a way to make this work...

Ok, random question time. I'm thinking it's about time that I did another blog giveaway. So I'm wondering, what sort of thing would you all like to see? Something handmade by me? A book? A gift certificate? Some kind of craft supply? I know the focus has changed a bit this year--still primarily a sewing blog, but I seem to have picked up some knitting bloggy friends since I picked that up. I'd love to hear your thoughts!

I hope this isn't a craft fail in progress.

I started sewing my black and white blouse today--seemed like a good way to spend an afternoon that I did not have to be teaching band. (Reaping the benefits of standardized testing, ohhhhhhh yeah!) I'd had visions in my head of this coming together super-fast and having almost an entire new shirt to show for this afternoon. But no...it's being complicated.

First, there's this. I must have screwed up somewhere along the line with the FBA I did, because while I had a nice amount of room there, the dart ended up being rather low. (I'm not sure why, since things seemed all right when I was tissue-fitting the pattern.) It looks fine here, but there's a reason for that....you see how small the armhole is?

This is how wide I had to make the shoulder seams to get those darts in the right place--an entire inch beyond the seam allowance! I also had to take the sides in somewhere in the 1/4"-3/4" range (most at the waist, least at the top and bottom.).

And then chop these bits out of the neckline and armhole to make it functional again.

So then the mandarin-style collar was too long, so I ended up cutting this much off of that to make it work....only to remember after I cut it that I'd completely forgotten to factor seam allowances into that measurement. So I stitched the sides with a 1/4" seam allowance to compensate as much as I could. Guess I'm going to be trimming the neckline even more to compensate for the rest.

I'm going to have to see what's up with the facings after all of this--I haven't touched those yet. Hopefully I trimmed the armholes down enough for the cap sleeves to still work--though I have a bit of an advantage on that part, at least, since I picked the view that has just a cap rather than a full-circle sleeve.

If this blouse turns out well after all of this winging it I've had to do, I'll be shocked. And if I ever use this pattern again after all of this, I'm moving the bust dart up at least an inch before I cut a thing.

I really like this fabric, and I was so excited about trying the underlining technique in a more casual project now that I actually know how to do it right. So this is all kind of bumming me out. I don't want to end this post on a downer, so here's some happier things in my crafty world:

#1: The knitted wrap is almost done! At least as far as the knitting goes. I estimate that about 10 more rows should do it as far as using up sufficient yarn goes, while still leaving enough in the ball to do the last two all-knit rows. We'll see how my estimation goes. I'm going to try to finish it tonight, rather than beat myself over the head with this blouse some more.

#2: New magazines! I stopped at the bookstore on my way home from teaching last night to see if the April BurdaStyle was something I wanted to acquire. (It wasn't. Absolutely nothing jumped out at me when looking at the line drawings. There was one jacket that was ok, but I already have more jacket patterns than I'll probably ever sew.) So instead, I picked up the spring SewStylish and the summer Knitscene. Which just may contain my first attempt at a real sweater, once I finish the two summery tanks I have in the queue, because this cardigan is cute and it doesn't look terribly difficult. So it might be a good first attempt at sleeves. And, knowing how easily I get cold, layering options might also be the best way for me to go!

While I'm on the subject of knitting, I have to give a shoutout to Brinn, who very kindly commented on my last post to tell me how to raise the neckline on the tank top she designed that I want to knit. Very sweet of her!

#3: New fabric! And new yarn! Yes, my Fabric.com order came in.

So these are my apron fabrics, all washed up and ready to go. The flower print is actually much larger than I anticipated, so it's a good thing I was going for a more funky, colorful aesthetic! (To give you a sense of scale, the coin on there is an American quarter.)

And the bird fabric I picked up for the Crescent skirt (also a larger scale than anticipated--did I just not read the description or something?), along with the linen/acrylic blend yarn I got to go with it. Now that I see them in person, I'm not as convinced that the two things will go together--the greens in the fabric are a bit more of a yellow shade than I thought, and the yarn is more of a blue-toned green. But who knows--maybe they'll still work. If nothing else, I checked the yarn against my sunflower skirt, now that it's out from its winter hiding place under the bed, and it goes quite well with that. And if all else fails with this skirt, I can always pull out my basic white t-shirt.

Hmm...this does not bode well.

First of all, to answer a couple of comments on the last post: Thank you! The back actually isn't as complicated as it looks, aside from the strap assembly--it's basically a lot of gathering. And yes, Gail, I was already planning on doing a hand-picked zipper. (Both the pattern and the class specifically call for it.) But thank you for the suggestion regardless!

Moving on...

I spent the afternoon and evening with my best friend, who happens to be an avid crocheter and is completely thrilled that I'm attempting a yarn craft. So, of course, I worked on knitting while she crocheted and we chatted and watched a few episodes of Doctor Who and such. Which led me to this....

It took me several failed attempts, a demonstration from my mom, and several more failed attempts to get this started. The good news is, once I got a few rows into the ribbing, the double-pointed needle thing got a LOT easier, and I was actually able to make some decent progress tonight.

The bad news is, I think I may have to start over anyway--it's hard to tell from the angle of the picture (best I could do while wearing it), but this thing is huge around my super-skinny wrist. So I suspect that doing the called-for increases at the hand area will just make this entire thing annoyingly loose overall. And since it is knitted in the round, I'm thinking I won't really know where a row begins if I only partially rip it out. :-(

I'm thinking that my best bet would be to try decreasing the amount of stitches some after the ribbing--these are meant to be long fingerless gloves, and the ribbing is a pretty good circumference for my forearm (despite the fact that I also realized I was supposed to do the ribbing one needle size down. Oops.) So I don't want to decrease the overall number of stitches right from the beginning.

Any thoughts from the knitters who might be reading this?

On the plus side, I have figured a couple of things out with this:

• I now know how to actually get the double-pointed needles to work. At least, once it's started.
• I also know I can make ribbing without too many headaches.
• I think I've figured that I like working with bamboo needles a lot more than I like aluminum ones. I tried both this afternoon, and the stitches just slide off of the metal far too easily, which meant I kept dropping lots of stitches. I was having the same problem with the single-pointed needles, and ended up using the bamboo for almost the entire scarf and the entire dishcloth. So that's good to know, right?
• And I know I like the way this yarn looks knitted up!

So at least I can chalk this up to good practice...especially if I have to rewrite this pattern to fit as I go! Though Cassie and I were chatting and she thinks I do have a bit of an advantage over her when she was first learning crochet-- even though the abbreviations are still all practically Greek to me, at least I know how to follow a pattern, thanks to a couple decades' worth of practice in sewing! (And that also makes me a lot more comfortable with the idea of having to change it.... I just wish that didn't involve starting from scratch!)

Thank you, Mood!

As those of you who are on BurdaStyle know, they sent out a code early last week for a discount on fabrics (except for the stuff like the silk jersey, boo!) But I still got three pieces and wanted to show them off. I got two yards of each, so I think that should be enough to do pretty much whatever I want.

Yeah, so you know that thing I was saying about needling to start sewing more solids than prints? Well, they had cotton jersey prints that really caught my attention. Obviously, that is my weakness...

With the stripes, I'm going to have to be really careful what I make out of this. (Donna's modeling it on somewhat of a bias, which is how I think I'm going to have to end up laying this out.) But I loved the colors, and it's so soft. So maybe a nice basic top.

I am trying to branch out on my usual color scheme-- you know, the one where nearly everything I make tends to be some shade of blue, green, black or brown. This one still has brown in it, but warmer colors than what I usually tend to go for, so it should work nicely! I'm thinking maybe a wrap top for this one...though I'll have to be rather careful how I lay this one out too, now that I'm thinking about it!

The only thing I don't like about these knits, really, is that they're both a much lighter weight than I thought, and therefore somewhat see-through. So I'm going to have to either come up with something that's automatically layered, or make sure I sew styles that call for a camisole underneath.

Now, this last one really is branching out for me...

Yeah. Cherry/tomato/fire engine red. (And here I thought the rusty brick color in the Ayden shirt was stretching it for me!) This is an organic cotton twill, and I'm thinking a basic pencil skirt for this one...I have a couple of thrifted shirts with mostly black backgrounds that I was thinking would look really good with red. (And this would also probably look nice with the previous knit--see, I'm thinking outfits now!) And no way am I wearing red next to my face, because it would look simply awful on me. Especially with my freshly-henna'd hair. Plus I really enjoyed reading Sunni's pencil skirt sew-a-long posts, and it's inspired me to give it a whirl.

I was pleasantly surprised at how quickly they arrived--just two days after I ordered it! And, being used to Joann's fabrics, it was nice to find some stuff in natural fibers! So we'll see how they wash and sew up, but I would definitely be inclined to shop there again. (When stuff is on sale, anyway!)

Of course, first on the menu is my Burda jacket! (Which I have no pictures of yet, other than this one from the magazine.) I worked on sewing the muslin together today, and am so glad I'm doing a test version! I already had to take it in a bit all around, and figured that I'm also going to have to add some length to it because I like the place that the unhemmed jacket is hitting. On the plus side, I already raised the neckline a bit when I traced the pattern out, and I think that's going to end up looking really good. On the down side, I'm having a lot of trouble with the sleeves--they're not going in smoothly no matter how I pin them in. (Truth be told, I'm not entirely sure I didn't put them in backwards, but I've tried it both ways and it's not working either way.) The other problem I'm having is that once I put the sleeves in, it felt too small across the back. So I think I'm going to have to add to the back some-- I haven't tried letting the top of the center back seam out yet, but I think I may need to do that and/or add some fabric to the armhole edges. But I'm not sure how that's going to work with also needing to take some ease out of the sleeves... any suggestions? I'm beginning to think I definitely need to add a book on fitting to my sewing library!

Me vs. the flowery explosion, part 2

And the saga continues! As you can see, taking the sleeves off did help a lot. (As long as you ignore the tank top I'm wearing underneath. Too lazy to change.) Now it's not so much "bad girls of the Regency era" and a bit more 60s flower child, which is a little more like what I had in mind to begin with. Still not the most flattering fit on me, I have to say...I feel like it looks boxy and huge, and I kind of wish the sash was a darker color. But the orange would have been too much to match, and that weird coral color would have come off too pink in any solid I could have found. (It really is more of a reddish coral color, but I probably would have had to go with a salmon. I am not a pink girl, as anyone who has been reading this blog for any stretch of time knows, and this fabric was a bit of a stretch for me to begin with!)

If I cut it to about this length, though, it might not be so bad...

The armholes are still a bit of an issue-- I had trouble showing just how gappy they are when the shirt is on, but you can see the ripples. I do think I probably need to take it in there at least half an inch. Also thinking that the easiest bet might be to just suck it up and bias bind it like the pattern called for in the first place. Though maybe if I use some more of that seafoamy green, it won't be such the shocking pop on the sash.

Not sure if I'm going to get to playing with it today-- I'm just feeling really tired and headachey this afternoon, I spent the morning running errands, I've got a total experimental biscotti recipe in the oven that I decided to try spur of the moment (I had to turn it on anyway to make cookies for my dad for tomorrow, at his request), and I'd already decided to grill dinner tonight. I'm not motivated to work on my jeans muslin, either. So I think once the biscotti are done, I'm just going to cut out my next sewing project, since that's relatively brainless compared to tweaking fit. (Besides, cutting is one of those things that I need to take advantage of having actual motivation. One of my least favorite parts of sewing.) And then just play video games the rest of the day. Because I got myself a Wii this week, and it's Saturday, and I can, darn it!

But I am hoping that I can finish this top, the jeans muslin, the next project (a maxi-dress) and maybe a reconstruction that's been simmering in the back of my mind all summer, by the end of the month. I have a secret project for July, which I can't actually start yet. And it would be nice to get these couple of things taken care of first!

Arrrrrgh!!!

Talk about frustrating....

Well, here it is....the sister-of-the-groom outfit from hell. This dress is better than the first, of course, but you can see that it still has some issues with the fit.

And then there's this wrap that I thought I finished tonight...
I used the Weekend Designer wrap pattern. But it does NOT work with the velvet at all. Too floppy despite my interfacing, too bulky, too BAD looking. So I guess I'm going to have to take some time tomorrow and try to salvage this into a capelet or something. Seriously...why do I even try to work with nice fabrics?

I guess this outfit is just jinxed or something...even my shoes have been an issue. I have an unusual size due to my unusually wide feet, and so I mail-ordered the shoes almost two months ago. Got them fine, the width was fine, but the shoes were cramping my toes so I sent them back. And then didn't hear a thing about them until a couple days ago, when I emailed them to find out the status of the order. The shoes are out of stock. So now I have until Saturday to find a pair around here, and probably the only day I'll actually have time to look is Wednesday. Aaargh.

And the dress saga continues...

I did get the dress cut out on Sunday, and mostly sewed together on Monday. As you can see, this is already a huge improvement over the last attempt. I'm trying not to be bitter that I'm doing much better with Joann's-brand polyester shantung that cost me a total of about $15 than the now-possibly-useless silk charmeuse that probably cost me around $50.

It's still not perfect, though... while most of it fits (and looks) much, much better than the silk version, I'm still having trouble with those blasted side darts. Despite hand-basting them together by hand and several tweaks to the slant and depth of them. I'm still getting those points at the end. So this is leading me to two conclusions: a) if all goes well with the skirt fitting class I'll be taking over at Pattern Review over in a couple weeks, I should probably look into taking a bodice-fitting one as well as the pants one, and b) perhaps in the future I should stick with princess seams instead of double-darts whenever possible.

This whole thing has been a really discouraging experience, honestly... I can't help feeling like I shouldn't be having this much trouble with such a simple pattern. I keep telling myself that it's because it's one of those really tailored, classic silhouettes, and my style generally isn't so classic. And I know a big part of it is that I went for a higher-quality (and far more expensive) fabric than I tend to go for and it failed in spite of making a muslin. I don't like feeling like I wasted that money. And it really doesn't help that getting this wedding together has been a very frustrating and not very enjoyable experience for my entire family. Right now, I just want nothing more than to get it over with. So I just need to finish this (hopefully tomorrow...today ended up getting eaten up by handwork and further attempts to get the darts to lie better), and then maybe this weekend I can get the wrap taken care of. And then I need to find something to sew that's just fun... I'm debating between just whipping up another article of clothing, or holding off on that (since I start the skirt fitting class pretty much right after the wedding) and starting on some of the sewing for my room. Which has the bonus feature of not having to be fit on me. :P

This dress is made of FAIL.

I was afraid this would happen...My biggest concern with this pattern was that the fabric would be too lightweight to hold up to the more structured sheath dress. Sadly, these fears proved to be quite founded. Exhibit A, to the left: the fact that it never really ironed right in the first place.
Exhibit B: As you can see, the side darts are still being problematic. As in, they went all wonky and went at a really bad angle and are apparently trying to be batwing sleeves. That part of my anatomy doesn't need wings, thankyouverymuch.


Exhibit C: The neckline. It was just bias-cut enough to stretch out, and I could not get it to work with the facings. Nor would it press flat.

My one consolation: Even though it looks horribly wrinkled in this picture (did I mention I don't like pressing silk?), I did achieve the perfect invisible zipper. Even the seam below it--no gap or bump. This is a first for me.

So needless to say, I will not be finishing this dress. I'm wondering if I can at least salvage the bottom as a skirt, or if it's too lightweight for that too. Maybe a skirt lining. A very expensive skirt lining. Also needless to say, I don't think I'll be working with silk charmeuse again anytime soon-- had I known I'd have to go with a more structured pattern, I would have gone with shantung or something sturdier. As for the sister-of-the-groom dress, I have time for one more attempt. My mom is currently at Joann's with a sample of the silk velvet I dyed for the wrap (which I considered just finishing the dress and wearing that the whole time, but the neckline will still show and it still looks horribly messy) to see if she can find me a sturdier fabric to make it out of-- I don't have time to go myself, since Cassie's coming over as soon as the football game at our alma mater is done (which could be pretty much anytime. Have I mentioned lately that my mom is awesome?) So my plan is to wash it tonight, and cut it out tomorrow, even if I have to sit on the living room floor at my grandparents' house and cut it out during our family gathering, because I don't have teaching on Monday night and if it doesn't work then, I'm just going to have to suck it up and go shopping.

Right now, I really hate this wedding.