Rae, a drop of golden sun...

Yeah, I made two more of the Sewaholic Rae skirts, in two very different fabrics. Since I already briefly talked about the construction before, this is more to show how they ended up-- and also my monthly post for Gillian's #betterpicturesproject!

This month's assignment was to find a new spot to take photos, ideally 5 minutes or less from your house. Admittedly, the thought of setting up a tripod somewhere while lugging around Hobbit's car seat (and quite probably listening to him scream the whole time, since the car seat is one of his least favorite things EVER so far) was not very appealing to me. So my big brave move was out to the back yard! I've avoided it so far, because we're in a central townhouse, and pretty much all we ever do with the yard is mow it and let the dogs out to do their business. That, and that tan strip behind the trees just happens to be one of the busiest highways in the state. But the lighting really is better out here than in my sewing room, and Doug was kind enough to take some pictures for me. Which is much easier than running back and forth between me and the tripod. I just may have to reserve my outfit photos for weekends for awhile, that's all.
I also experimented with setting the camera to portrait mode. I think it turned out well, and the bonus was that keeping it on a more automatic setting made it really simple for Doug! So I'll save the more manual settings for when I'm the one behind the lens, I think. (Mastering that really is something I'd like to do sometime, but I think that will be better for trying to get artsy with the kid photos and landscapes while traveling.)

I guess I should say something about the actual sewing, right? This particular skirt is half a refashion. Several years ago, I made a dress for my brother's wedding that was a complete and utter disaster from start to finish. Once the wedding was over, I promptly threw the dress into my refashion bin, along with an extra yard and a half or so of the same fabric that I purchased later, with the intention of turning it into something else. I was originally thinking maybe some kind of longer, fitted, belted vest. But that never came to fruition. I've finally redeemed it with this skirt, though. The fabric itself is a polyester shantung, and I was able to cut half of the skirt out of the original dress. I didn't have the extra piece on my original stash list, since it was out of sight in the bin and I'd honestly forgotten it was there. But I have about 2/3 yard left, so I'm estimating I used half a yard for the other half of the skirt.

Pardon the slightly derpy face here-- I'm including this one because it's one of the best for showing the skirt detail. I had forgotten how absolutely awful this fabric frays, so I French seamed the whole thing. And since it's polyester, of course it didn't really press all that great, so I also ended up topstitching over all of the seams to give it more of a flat-fell look. Honestly, the effect makes me think of nylon parachutes. But since I'm coming to terms with the fact that my generally casual lifestyle doesn't necessarily fit the shiny fabrics that I often adore, I think it's for the best here, because it definitely helps the skirt look a lot less formal than I originally intended the dress to be.


I can also say that this skirt was for the Monthly Stitch's August theme of twos, since this was my second Rae skirt that month. (I finished it on August 31!)



The third skirt sewed up a lot faster, since I made it out of quilt cotton and could just serge all the seam edges to finish it off! I kind of like this artsy black top that I bought for our Paris trip last fall with this particular print, and will definitely use this combo again when it gets its out-of-house debut. (I was waiting until I got pictures, mostly because I didn't want to have to iron it again first.)




A closer-up view of the print. Why, yes, that is a print designed around Van Gogh's lesser-known "Exploding TARDIS". And this little Whovian is rather psyched that the colors just happen to fall into the realm of the palette that I'm overall attempting to work with for my future wardrobe cultivation. (Especially because yellow/gold is one of the ones I've been meaning to add more of.)



Finally, even though this is an attempt at better pictures, and I'm fully aware that the flash went off and left a weird shadow behind me, it seemed fitting to continue the tradition of golden retriever photobombing!

the March round-up, and April/May plans!

I'm really liking these monthly round-ups. Since I've been mostly doing finished project posts lately, it's a good way to keep tabs both on my stashbusting attempts and the longer-term projects/quickies that don't necessarily need individual posts.

Projects finished this month: 6 total. There was the diaper bag, the skirt and matching baby pants, the top I blogged the other day, and 2 more baby projects.

Project #1, with backstory: The bulk of the clothes I've gotten for Hobbit so far have been courtesy of my mother-in-law, who keeps finding people who are getting rid of baby boy stuff and snagging it for us. For the most part, it's been like-new or very gently worn, so I think we'll be able to use most of it--though I did send a stack of newborn onesies to the thrift store, because they were specifically labeled 5-8 pounds. Given the weight updates I've been getting at my ultrasounds, and the weights that both Doug and I were at when we were born, he'd probably fit those for a week, tops. And I also passed a few things on to one of my best friends, because neither Doug nor I cared about keeping the sports-themed clothes (they never have hockey anything on them and he doesn't care about any other sport), she and her husband actually like football and stuff, and she's due to have a boy about a month and a half after me--instant friend for Hobbit! Yay! She had a girl for her first baby, so all she really needs for this one is clothes, and I don't mind sharing. Anyway. There were also a few things that I thought were generally cute, and mostly in good condition, except for some obvious staining around the necklines. I had a little mental battle between my cheapness thriftiness and not wanting to dress my kid in clothes with mystery stains that he didn't make. Then I remembered that I can sew, and therefore I can still get some use out of this stuff!

So I took these cute-but-stained pajamas, and this organic cotton onesie that was in excellent condition, but a little boring. And I cut the frog applique off and hand-stitched it onto the onesie--I wasn't sure how well my machine would navigate those little tiny openings, since the side seams were already closed up! (The only before picture I have was on my phone. Yes, that's Doug playing with toys in the background--if you follow me on Instagram, you know all about my excellent thrift score on a box of K'Nex over the weekend!)

Ta-da! Much cuter onesie, in about 20 minutes. And I still have other unstained parts of the original pajamas left--maybe I can hack the legs and sleeves into a little hat or something?

Project #2: Since hockey apparently doesn't count as a sport in the minds of people who design fabric for baby clothes, I'm having to get creative. After all, if I can make geeky stuff for the baby, I should accommodate Doug's interests too, right? So I used some fabric left over from the one hockey bib that I made a few months ago to make a project that I promised I'd do.

He mostly gets flak for being a Pittsburgh Penguins fan, since we live in Flyers country, but his other favorite team is the Colorado Avalanche, and it's a lot harder to find pre-made anything for that team for some reason. Even on the internet. But I did find some quilt cotton. So now our kid has Avalanche pants. The pattern is Simplicity 1330, slightly adapted because I didn't have the right size elastic and partially because I didn't want to bother putting the elastic in the bottom of the legs. The waistband came out huge with the length they said to cut, too, and the casings weren't cooperating well with my wider elastic, so I also cut a few inches off. Hopefully they'll fit him ok--these are supposed to be 6-12 month. Otherwise, super-easy--I had these cut and completely sewn in an afternoon.

Stashbusting totals for the month: About 6 1/2 yards used up. I still need to figure out what to do with the rest of that Avalanche fabric, since I have maybe 1/4 yard left. I also bought 1 yard of quilt cotton from Jo-Ann's, because it was another hockey-themed print, and I don't see those often. Still, used more than I bought. So yay! Total for the year so far: 27.75 yards down, just under 360 still here.

The in-progress stuff: The good news is that the newborn and small-sized diapers are completely done! I just need to finish up with the mediums, and my mom got a good chunk of that done. So I just need to finish with leg elastic and snaps. It's definitely easier (and less boring) doing that sort of assembly-line sewing with someone else. As for my Lord of the Rings-themed quiet book, I haven't made as much progress on that, since a nice chunk of the time I'd normally be spending on that was spent on diaper snap installation. But I have finished up to page 5 of (I think) 11, aside from machine-sewing the backing page on two of them, and am working on the 6th. So I'm about halfway there.

How I did with March's goals: Well, the diaper bag is done, and I managed to make 2 pieces of clothing for myself instead of one, so I did well! I haven't actually started that massive cooking project yet, save making a massive grocery list and at least figuring out which recipes to start with. But that is definitely on the agenda for this month, since I decided that it would be better to wait until closer to the time that we would actually be eating this food. Less freezer burn that way.

April's plans (and beyond): 
 

I mentioned this sewalong in my last post, and since everything I'm sewing right now fits one of the three categories, the timing is perfect! I'm not entirely certain what order I'll end up making things in, so I'm just going to list all of the sewing that I'm hoping to get done before June by category, and see what actually happens.

1) Baby Clothing
Not 100% sure of my plans here yet, though I do have some things set aside and some ideas.

• I have a few knit scraps pulled out that should be just enough to make a baby t-shirt. I'm also planning on freezer paper stenciling it since both fabrics are plain--with a geeky reference, of course! 
• I do have two more partially useable free baby clothes that could also get the refashion treatment. 
• I also have a couple of patterns lying around that would be fun to try out. Including one for adorable soft-sole baby shoes, and a button-down shirt one that I recently acquired. I even have an old work shirt of Doug's hiding in my refashion bin that I can use for fabric, and I think it would be cute (and free!) to cut down Daddy's old shirts for little boy clothes!
• And I guess finishing up those diapers can count as clothes, right? I mean, he has to wear them...

 
 2) Baby Accessories and Other Items, such as quilts, toys, burp cloths, bibs, etc.
I should be solid on bibs and burp cloths, mostly thanks to my mom!

• But I do want to make a portable changing mat to go in the diaper bag, since I have fabric left over from that. 
• I have a scrap quilt in-progress, which I'm planning on just using as a throw-on-the-floor play mat, but that's probably lowest on my priority list right now. (A, he won't be able to sit up for awhile, and B, that might be an ideal project to work in 5 minutes of sewing here and there shortly after he's born, since it's all stitching strips onto blocks.) 
• The quiet book definitely counts as a toy, and I did get some suggestions about maybe turning the rest of that Avalanche fabric into a stuffed toy, via the Stashbusting Sewalong group on Facebook.
• I also have leftover towel fabric from when I made a baby gift (for the same friend mentioned earlier) a couple of years ago, so I'd like to see if I can squeeze a hooded towel out of it. 

3) For Parents

• I have one more nursing/maternity maxi I want to make, as mentioned in my last post. I think that, for ease/speed of assembly, I'm going to just mash up the Tiramisu bodice, which I've already made twice and I know has some room for expansion, and the already-altered Simplicity skirt pattern from the black dress.  Which means that I'll probably do the invisible zipper nursing alteration trick again, so maybe a tutorial post will happen?
• As mentioned in my last post, I may give that Megan Nielsen pattern another go, with a few tweaks, since I'll need something sleeveless for the hot days too. 
• Given the colors of either project, I can also use the scraps to alter a not-quite-nursing bra that I picked up recently. The straps are the type that can snap closed in the front, so it just needs a little tweaking. 
• I also need to make myself a nursing cover. I'm pretty sure I know which stashed quilting cotton will be sacrificed for this cause, I just need to do it. 

Hopefully this isn't too overly ambitious. But I'm determined to cram in as much time with my sewing machine as I can now, because I suspect it'll be hard to do for awhile!

The last little unblogged bits of 2014

The good news is, I think I'm finally starting to get better. The constant nausea is going away, at least, but it's kind of hard to tell--just when that started letting up, I got slammed with a virus 2 days before Christmas! The doctor at the clinic called it "flu-like", and while I wasn't actually having stomach issues from it, I did have to spend the next 3 or so days fighting off fevers. Since then, it's just felt like a nasty cold. And hopefully without going TMI, when I'm really stuffed up, I easily get nauseous anyway. So I still haven't had a nausea-free day, but I'm hopeful that it's coming soon. At least I'm slowly able to start expanding my diet again--I can actually drink water and a little tea now, and I've been eating fruit in the form of smoothies. I may even be able to start cooking dinner again soon, and while I know that takes up time, when you've been living off of chicken noodle soup and cheerios for a few months, that's pretty exciting!

All that to say, I wasn't able to do much sewing for those first couple of days after I finished up at my retail job. Because that ended the day before I got sick, and I was feeling so progressively lousy that day that I couldn't even finish cutting out one of the projects I do have to show. But I did get that done on Monday, and then sewn up yesterday.

I'm going to start with some knitting today, since I recently finished this fairly quick project. The pattern is called "Magic Hat", and it's supposed to be so stretchy that it can fit a variety of sizes. I used some leftover bamboo-blend yarn that I already had, and knit this up in the 4-12 month size, since Hobbit will probably be about 5-6 months old when he or she will need a winter hat. I also didn't quite use up all of the yarn, and I'm rather tempted to see if I have enough left to add some Yoda ears! But the yarn is so drapey, I'm kind of afraid it wouldn't work.

The hat looks a little cone-head on the table, so I had to improvise on a model. My parents gave us a few Christmas presents for the baby, including this little stuffed German shepherd. So its ears seemed to be enough to make the approximate shape. Cute, right?







I do have a little sewing to show. I stitched up this first one back at Thanksgiving, but never posted it here. Just a quick refashion--my mom was getting rid of some unwanted pants, so I picked the zipper out of these corduroys, scooped out the front and stitched up what was left of the fly, and then added this stretchy panel. I know it looks kind of distressed brown in the picture, but these pants are actually black. I have another pair all cut up and ready to sew, save the panel, in navy blue. Hopefully I can knock that out soon, because I literally have two pairs of "work" pants (both black), and two pairs of jeans right now. And that's it. I swear I bought 3 pairs of jeans, but the one pair seems to have vanished without a trace!

And then yesterday's sewing project was these burp cloths. I promised Doug I'd make some hockey-related things, so I found this flannel print that has the logo and colors of one of his two favorite teams. I managed to use up about 2 yards of flannel on this, between the one yard of Penguins fabric I bought, and the solid black that I partially got for this and partially to back one of the geeky bibs I made earlier in the month. There's a total of 9 burp cloths here, and I know my mom has a stack of others for us, too.

I do have one more bib to sew up, since Doug also really wanted to help make one! So he cut one out yesterday and I'll be sewing it. I also need to fix a pair of pants for him ASAP, but then I'm hoping I can start sewing some clothes again! 

I did some quick looking over my spreadsheet to see what my final tally was for stashbusting this year! It looks like I started 2014 with about 340 yards in...and ended with 375. Oops. Granted, I did just buy about 20 yards of stuff to make diapers with, which will get used up in the next several months and accounts for the bulk of the overage. On the plus side, it looks like I sewed up close to 72 yards this year. And I did manage to use up about 27 pieces of fabric altogether. I think that's pretty good, considering that I spent the entire last third of the year unable to do much at all, between traveling and pregnancy sickness!

Sneak peeks and foiled plans

Does anyone else feel like the summer just got away from them? How the heck is it the end of August?

I've been quiet on the blog front, but I've actually been sewing quite a bit, and now have a backlog of about 3 larger projects and some accessories to write about, all DragonCon related in some way or another. So for the most part, I figure that by this point, it's better to just wait and show them off in the context of their respective costumes. I shouldn't have any trouble getting some photographs there! But I have been posting little bits here and there on Instagram, so I figured I'd share a few previews.

 #1: I refashioned a shirt for an Amy Pond costume (from Doctor Who). The shirt I found was almost perfect in its plaid pattern, but I had to pick off this embroidery. Amy's way too proud to be Scottish to walk around with a US Polo tag on her shirt.













#2: I made a bag to carry around, too, because I've been wanting to make myself a bag to use for carrying on airplanes and day trips with Doug anyway. Also, I had TARDIS fabric, thanks to Doug's Christmas present to me last year, and wanted to make sure it got used! This is just the flap and a piece of the lining, but hopefully I can get a few decent pics of the bag while I'm there.

#3: One costume I haven't been able to show any pieces of yet is my minion costume (from Despicable Me). These overall shorts are bloody awful and completely unflattering on me, but they were also the only ones I could find at the local thrift shops that weren't made for toddlers. And I was NOT going to take the time to sew overalls from scratch. But I did create this patch for the front.









And for my foiled plan: I was actually pretty much done with major costume stuff by last week, so I decided to see if I could squeeze out a project that would work for both the Sewcialists' Tribute Month and The Monthly Stitch's birthday "cake" month. My plan was to convert the Cake Patterns Red Velvet into a tunic top that I could wear with my skinny jeans. I still think the idea has merit, but after I traced the pattern pieces out, I discovered that the knit I intended for the bodice is too narrow, by a lot if I wanted to have any chance of matching the stripes. So I guess I'll have to use this piece for something more sleeveless. That idea's been put on the shelf for now, though I may revisit it with some of my knit stash when I feel less crunched for time.

For now, I'm in the middle of knocking out a Sorbetto that I'd had on my original summer sewing list anyway, so I can add that to my list of clothes to take to Paris. (I need to get on that!) And I also need to start working on my next big project pretty much right away, because a winter coat could take awhile, especially given that I'll be away a good chunk of September. But DragonCon is only two days away now, and so I need to finish packing! After work, anyway.

they've been chopped

For all of the refashioning that I used to do, I really hadn't done any in awhile. Over the last couple of years, I've been super-focused on stashbusting and making from scratch, so much so that I forgot how fun, and how instantly gratifying, transforming something that's already around can be. It's a whole different group of problems to solve, and a good challenge.

I have two refashions from May to show today. The first is one of my all-time favorite dresses, that sadly wasn't zipping at the top anymore.
Remember my Titania dress? I was so proud of this one, since I basically designed it and hand/draped it myself. Though, to be honest, the top wasn't holding up so well. Since I was more or less winging it, the insides weren't finished so great, the fabric was starting to sag around that slit in the front, and gaps were starting to appear where the ends of the binding met around the sleeves. I still love the fabric, and that hand-pleated skirt would have been the hardest thing to let go of. So naturally, I chopped off the top and made this dress into a skirt.

Aside from one random Instagram, I didn't take the time to do too many in-progress shots this time. So what I did was to pin a length of grosgrain ribbon to the midriff panel, leaving an extra-long tab at one end, stitch it, flip it, and use that to make a waistband. The extra-long tab was used to make an underlap, which has a couple of hooks and eyes and snaps and things sewn to it. Aside from that, the only thing I did was to shorten the zipper in the center back.



And here's the result! It feels a little weird to me since I'm not used to skirts that hit at my natural waist. But with the fullness of the chiffon bit, this skirt makes me think of ballet. I feel like this will be a lot more versatile as a skirt than it was as a dress, since I can also dress it down depending on my top and footwear. So all in all, I feel like this was a success.













As for the second project, this one had a preview during Me-Made-May. I bought a few pairs of jeans at the thrift shop near the end of the winter, because I had a couple of pairs shrink or wear out completely (to the point where they had to be relegated to work jeans--yes, I have a separate set of jeans that I only wear to the garden center, because I don't care if they get messed up by dirt or paint or whatever other random things I have to get into there--or just gotten rid of completely), and I knew I wouldn't have time to make jeans anytime soon. Yay, spring. One of the pairs I bought fit me adequately well through the waist and hips, but they were just a little too short to look good with regular flat shoes. I don't have a before picture, so just think flared jeans that were awkwardly hitting right around my ankle.

Here's the after--I was intending to make it more of a skinny jeans silhouette, but discovered while I was working with it that the fabric would be much happier with a straight, slightly tapered cut. There wasn't any stretch to the denim, so it made sense. All I did was take the side seams apart up to about the knee, pin them down the length of my leg (much to Doug's amusement, since I was also wearing them inside out at the time), sew in the zippers, and re-stitch the hem. The zippers ended up being unnecessary in the end, since I can pull them on and off easily without unzipping them, but I like the detail that they add. I do still plan to make some more jeans, and am hoping to tackle some skinny jeans this month because I do need them before DragonCon. Because of reasons.

I do have to say that I was really surprised at how easily these jeans came apart! The nice thing for refashioning purposes was that each side of the outer leg seams was individually finished on the serger, so I didn't have to unpick a bunch of serging. But if I unpicked it in the right place, the seams came apart quite quickly, and the hems pretty much entirely unraveled with the tug of a thread. I would have thought the quality would have been slightly better, given the Tommy Hilfiger label on them!

And, since it's Friday, I'll leave you with a silly outtake picture. Silly dog can't resist an opportunity to photobomb me!

Tie me up! Untie me!

Going with the random song inspiration for this post title...one band that my brother really likes that he introduced me to is called mewithoutYou, and while the song isn't a happy one at all (which is why I'm not linking to it), the title certainly fits this dress. I finished it on Saturday, but didn't have a chance to do the final pressing until today. And since I also didn't have a chance to clean anything and I'm feeling a little under the weather, everything will be modeled by Donna for now. Hopefully I can break this one out for MMM, provided we get some nice warm days.

It doesn't really look like much here. Just a basic tank of a dress. Those funny little protrusions around the hips are the side sashes, which are super loooooooong and drag quite a ways on the floor when standing like this.

And this is all of the various ways of wearing it that I've come up with so far. Going from left-to-right, then top-to-bottom, the first 6 pictures are options that were given in the pattern, minus the second one is off-the-shoulder in the pattern and I can't simulate that too well on an armless dummy. The second half of the pictures were me playing around with other options--row 2 to the right is the front and back of a more asymmetric look, while the last 3 of the bottommost row were me experimenting with another wrap look and doing some different things in the back. I guess I'll have to wait and see how these various looks work on me, but I'm curious to hear what your favorites are!

I didn't have a whole lot of work left to do on this, so I also did some minor reconstruction projects while I was watching tv with my boyfriend that day.

I made this shirt back in college, and it's served me well. But the sleeves were a bit too short to be comfortable for me, since I was constantly having to tug it down over my wrists. I've been thinking for at least a year that I should just hem them shorter, so I finally bit the bullet and did it.

I also had this dress, which I purchased from ModCloth nearly 2 1/2 years ago. I wore it to a friend's wedding, and haven't worn it since. It ended up being shorter on me than I'm comfortable wearing on a regular basis, especially to church (which is where most of my dresses tend to come into play.) But I still liked the style and especially the color.

So, though I felt slightly bad because it was also a bit pricier than I usually go for, I re-hemmed it to a shirt length. And I think I'll get much more use out of it this way. The first picture is as is. For the second, I took the part of the skirt that I'd hemmed off and turned it into a sash, so I have that tied around the waist. And for the lower two pictures, I was experimenting with my elastic belts, both of which were (appropriately enough) also purchased at ModCloth. I think I like the self-tie and brown belt looks the most so far.

As for my Palette Challenge, I haven't really started the jeans yet (saving the handwork for my usual Thursday night dinner/tv time with the boyfriend, since he doesn't mind me doing crafty things while we watch shows), but I did get the blouse traced out of the BurdaStyle book last night. And I did get part of the blouse cut out today. It's just stripe-ish enough of a fabric to slow things down. So hopefully I can find some time to finish that off before the weekend starts.

more complicated than it looks

One of my goals for this month was to complete a refashion for a skirt that I'd already dissected. I actually finished this one last week, but didn't get around to writing it up on here until now.

 I made this skirt several years ago--I'm going to guess somewhere in the vicinity of 2005. Definitely pre-blog era. It was inspired by an Anthropologie skirt (what else?) that looked like this:

(the "North Country" skirt)

I liked the asymmetry, and the leather-over-petticoat look. But of course I couldn't drop over $300 on a skirt--every formal dress I've ever bought or made cost less than that! Embroidery isn't my forte, so rather than do a straight knockoff, I got that embossed-looking suedecloth and made it out of that and a remnant of some home decor fabric. The skirt served me fairly well for several years, but it had some issues:
1) The bias cut combined with the heavier suedecloth fabric meant the waistline kept stretching out, to the point where I'd have to take it in every couple of years.
2) The sheer part on the lining had a tendency to snag on whatever tights I was wearing and cause them to pill, due to a rough selvedge and some bad seam finishing on that lining. Which was especially bad, since the style of the skirt pretty much relegated it to cold weather where I had to wear it with tights of some sort or I'd freeze.
3) Also due to the style, I literally only had about one shirt that this looked good with. Not very good for putting different outfits together.

So since I had to take it apart to fix the waist (again) anyway, I decided to just rework it entirely while I was at it.

So this is the new version of this skirt. And while it might not look it, this was a little more complex than just a chop-and-hem job!

I had this wide-yoke skirt pattern that I've used before (also pre-blog). So I cut a new yoke piece out of the top of each half of the skirt....

...and the lining from a scrap of cotton I found in my bin. (It looks pretty wrinkled, and I probably should have interfaced it. But I didn't, because I cut the yoke a little smaller than I'd originally cut the pattern--it had ended up kind of loose at the waist. To offset the stretching of the still-bias suedecloth, I did cut this on the straight grain, but was afraid that interfacing it as well would make it not fit.)

Like my faux tag? It's the only way I can tell which side is the back!

I cut the lower portion to match on the sides, then sewed that back together along with the side seams.

Check the Technique update: I did re-sew in the invisible zipper on this one. I honestly don't think it's the best one I've ever done, the lower part of the seam is a little wonky. But I guess it was to be expected, because of how the end of the zipper is finished vs. the drape of the fabric. So I'm not checking it off the list yet, but I am working on it.








A second technique I played around with that I hadn't done before was using petersham ribbon to finish the hem off. To simplify things, I decided to play up on the suede look--thus the topstitching at the bottom of the yoke, and I wanted to machine-hem it too. But I also wanted to avoid that annoying ridge that sometimes shows on the outside with a double-folded hem, so this was my attempt to use the ribbon to cut down the bulk. And a rather successful one, if I do say so myself! The ribbon curved nicely to match the hem with a little help from the iron, and not a pucker in sight. I know it's not the ideal thing color-wise, but this was all I had. And in a way, it's a nice tribute to the cream sheer bit that used to be a part of this. (Which I do still have that piece, and I have plans for it!)

I finally had some time to sew tonight, after nearly a week of not being able to get to it. So I have made more jacket progress. But that will have to wait for when I can take pictures in daylight.

One last comment on the word verification issues: I finally figured out a solution! I removed my address from the comment moderation alert form, so I won't get an email every time some spambot wants to post. (Which seems to happen a lot to me for some reason. And here I thought this was a clean, family-friendly blog...) So if it takes longer for your comments to show up, that's why--I can't do things so quickly from my phone without the emails! So far, this solution seems to be working. All of the spam showed up in the right place on the dashboard for easy deletion, and no annoying emails.

Ok, I feel better now.

 This was the view outside today. How very monochromatic.

And I needed a break from the raincoat anyway, even though this would have been a really good day to have the finished product!

This was one of the tops I found on my thrift store run over the weekend. There were a lot of things I liked about it--the colorful embroidery, the funky hemline...

But I wasn't a huge fan of the shoulder ruffle. So I decided to take care of that today, now that the first step (washing and pre-shrinking the shirt) was done. Besides, the machine was already threaded with the right color anyway!

It was a pretty simple fix. I just picked it apart, and repinned it so all of the raw edges were on the inside, and then sewed it back up. And I ended up taking it in a couple of inches on each side of the top, too.

And I ended up with this much cuter tank top, which I am looking forward to wearing once the weather gets warm! (Or maybe sooner with my big chunky brown hoodie sweater, if I get really tired of winter clothes...)

So I'm feeling better now. I don't have to delegate this to the reconstruction pile, I got to make something cute and summery to throw in winter's face, and I actually finished a project. The latter being what was getting to me the most. So with that done, I was able to psych myself up to go back to the raincoat.

I sewed on the belt loops tonight, and worked on underlining the front. A complicated process, since I could neither pin nor baste one of the edges. I think topstitching will be in this coat's future.

But I did go ahead and baste it, well inside the seam allowance, on the raw edges. I was considering just leaving the front without it, but I think I need it to give the eventual buttons and buttonholes a little more stability. Especially since I've been using the leftovers of this as interfacing anyway, as well as underlining.

So this is kind of what the coat looks like now, sans sleeves and without the front properly finished. I have to figure out the lining issue before I can do that. And, well, probably iron this thing if I can. It's gotten kind of wrinkled from being folded up in a bag along with the rest of the pieces, unfortunately. (Also, please ignore my closet. Having the curtain drawn back was the only way I could hang it to try and let it unwrinkle some.)

Two things:

#1: Figured I should update on the knitting. Here's where it's at, around 37/54 rows of the back. (I know the picture looks a little weird and ghostly, due to the white quilt back that I had it sitting on....but hey, you can see the details!) Aside from it being at the point where I can't knit this and watch tv or listen to music with lyrics that grab my attention because there's too much counting involved, I think it's going pretty well! (I'm really, really glad I had the Cadence sweater to practice those diamond-like patterns on.)

#2: In the interest of stashbusting, I went through my two bins of clothes that I had to reconstruct in some way or other, and ruthlessly culled out about half of it to take to the thrift store. So now I have it down to one bin. One very full, overstuffed bin that is still hard to fit on the shelf. But at least I was able to move it to a lower shelf, so I don't have to stand on a chair and potentially throw out my back every time I want to grab it. Yeah, I need to get on actually making some of those. And now if I see anything really cool that needs some tweaking when I visit Goodwill this week, I can justify it!

That''s all. For now. Back to sewing.

back in the saddle...

My holiday seems to have been filled with surprisingly little crafting! Though most of it is due to necessarily putting things on hold. I'm going to have to go pictureless for this post since my desktop monitor seems to have gone into a coma, and that's where I store my photos. (On my laptop now.) But I'm starting a few new projects now, so here's what I'm kicking off 2012 with...

1. The winter raincoat. This is still very much in the muslin stage. I'm making a mock-up out of the flannel that I'll eventually be underlining the lining with to check the fit, and I wasn't able to finish cutting it out until today because I somewhat underestimated how much I would actually need (I think the flannel was more narrow than I'd anticipated after washing/drying) and was just short enough that I couldn't squeeze in one sleeve piece. So I had to go back for one more yard, and wash/dry that. I won't actually be sewing on it this afternoon since we've been having some power flickering issues. It's pretty windy here today. (Thus the monitor coma.) So I'm leaving my machine off for now, but maybe I'll start actually basting that together tonight.

2. In the meantime, I'm playing around with the beginnings of my first Anthropologie-inspired recon of the year. I've been eyeing this one for the last couple of weeks....
This is the Attapeu Jacket. There's a crazy amount of detail in this one, and so I'm not planning on doing a literal copy of this one like I more or less did with the pants from last summer. But the idea of something bright and colorful is really appealing to me now that we're firmly in the clutches of the blahness that is Mid-Atlantic winter, and I have a couple of pieces in my reconstruction pile that could make a really fun shirt version of this. I'm planning to post this one more step-by-step than I've gotten in the habit of doing, so you'll probably be seeing a lot more of that soon!

3. The Cadence is currently sitting on a bunch of towels in a bathroom, blocking. So hopefully that will be dry in a couple of days and I can actually wear it! In the meantime, I'm going to go to the local yarn store this afternoon before I start teaching and (hopefully) pick something up for that shrug I mentioned in a recent post.

So that's me....what are you doing for your first project(s) of the year?

Reconstructing a reconstruction

About 3 years ago, I took a velvety dress from Goodwill and chopped it off to make a quick top to wear for Christmas Eve services. I've barely worn it since--I was never fully satisfied with the look of it. So I finished re-reconstructing it last night--I've been slowly poking at it in between sewing Christmas gifts, painting ornaments, and knitting away on my Cadence sweater.

I accidentally deleted most of my in-progress photos before a party, so this will have to do. Basically, I took off the black ribbon, and then cut the shirt around the same point because of course there was a mark from the stitching. I had to take in those princess seams a bit too on both the top and bottom, because it was still a bit on the overly loose side.

I cut some strips from the remaining portion of the original dress, used the newly-taken-in top portion as a guideline for how wide to make each segment, and did some gathering where I joined them to add some interest/conceal the oddness of having a princess-seamed waistband. (Incidentally, don't look inside the shirt here--it's not finished well at ALL, but I'm not going to let it bother me for this one.)

I think it's an improvement over that black band. And done just in time for when I need a solid green shirt for Sunday. No pictures of it on me right now--I've been condemned to glasses for the week, since I somehow managed to scratch my eye or something from sitting at the computer with my contacts in and blinking funny. And I'm ridiculously nearsighted, so either I'd be squinting funny, or just look funny period. (I hate the way I look in my glasses, honestly.)

Next up on the sewing agenda: the raincoat! My plan is to trace it out today, since I'm having one of those off-from-the-part-time days and only have a couple of lessons to teach later on. And I'll be test-fitting it with the fabric that I'm actually planning on underlining the lining with. It's less wasteful that way, and I don't feel bad about marking up or piecing together bits of flannel that won't be seen.

I'd also like to work some more on the sweater, since I'm about 3-4 rows away from finishing the decrease section. I think I'm going to try it on after that, and then start working on the sleeves so I can make sure I can get those long enough to fully cover my arms before I determine how long to make the torso. I'm hoping to knock it off quickly, ideally by the end of the year, because I'm thinking ahead to yet another cousin's wedding that will be coming up at the end of March. I don't have to sew a dress this time, thankfully, because I think this one will fit the occasion and season just fine. But I would like to knit a shrug to go with it, since the end of March is still kind of cold for sleeveless. I'm thinking this one, which I've been eyeing ever since I bought that magazine just after I started knitting, in black. I just need to figure out what sort of yarn to use, since the called-for yarn is way too expensive and not in black anyway. I'm kind of eyeing this--I've had to handle 100% cashmere before and it was ok, though not great, so I think I can take a chance on 5%. And the silk will make it a bit warmer too. And I know I'm good with cotton. The price is still a bit higher than I'd like, but at least black is a very versatile color for my wardrobe, so it's not like it would just get worn once. But I'm going to sit on that for a little bit, and see if I can find some time to run to the local yarn store and see what they have. After all, I still need to finish Cadence first.

Derailing the plan

So apparently I'm going back to work next week, which is a week earlier than I was told. I guess that's a good thing....I'd be more enthusiastic if I didn't spend hours at a time scrounging for things to do every time I'm there. So that's going to leave me with a lot less time to do the things I'd planned to do, like mending.  But I did get several more things done over the last couple of days, which I'll get back to in a bit.

The main derailment of the plan, though, comes courtesy of one of my friends-- I was helping her reconstruct a dress for a holiday party yesterday (pics may come later if she allows it, once she finishes it), and while she was at it, she invited me to the birthday party she's going to be throwing for her boyfriend in a few weeks. It's a Mad Men-themed party, so the dress is basically early 60s cocktail. I don't know about you, but since I don't really spend a lot of time with vintage fashion like a lot of other sewing blogs I read, I don't really have anything suitable just lying around, you know? (Besides, when I go 60s, it's usually more the boho-hippie end of things!) I'd never actually watched an episode of Mad Men until last night, since she and I put it on Netflix while we worked, but I'm always up for a costume party! I want something I can wear again, though...

So, since I'm on limited time, I'm going to go with a pattern I already have on hand: the Licorice dress from the new Colette book.

 

 

(Picture from the Coletterie)

I figured it has sort of the look, and it has sleeves, which is definitely a bonus for December. I just hope it turns out ok, because my fabric's not ideal according to the recommendations. I have about 3 yards of that Casa satin stuff that anyone who's ever browsed the fancy fabric section of Joann's should be familiar with, in a forest green. It's leftovers from the dress I sewed for my masters' degree recital, because apparently I severely overestimated how much fabric I'd need for the very full skirt. I also have about a yard of this pretty green brocade that I made the top out of. I can't seem to find a picture of me actually wearing it on my computer--I guess this was when I was transitioning from my old film camera to my digital--so I just threw the dress on Donna:

Man, I hope I still have those recital pics around somewhere. Anyway.

What I'm thinking is to use the satin for the bulk of the dress, and then the brocade for the neckline bit and tie/belt/whatever. (I'm strongly tempted to get one of those belt kits from A Fashionable Stitch for this one! Even though I haven't used the first one I got from her yet, because I haven't gotten to the raincoat.) But I am concerned that the satin is a little heavier-weight than it sounds like it should be. So I ran out to Joann's this morning to see what I could find. Basically what it came down to is that all of the prints I liked were too late 60s or modern, all of the ones that looked like it might fit the look of the floral-print dresses I saw in the show were kind of ugly, and the one print I did like that would fit the look was basically a black polka dot on ivory. But it was a taffeta-type fabric, which is even stiffer than this satin. And if I was going to have to go for a solid color, I figured I might as well bust the stash I have. So instead of buying new fabric, I sprang for the nice Bemberg rayon lining and got a little extra, thinking that the dress itself appears to be structured enough that the satin will probably work, and if I underline the sleeves with the Bemberg too, it might soften them up a bit. Here's hoping it works.

Also, I do have a couple of mending updates that are actually worth showing, since they're more along the lines of refashionings:

I have this jacket that I picked up from the thrift store earlier this year, because it fits me almost perfectly and I love the color and pleat details. One of the buttons on the sleeve was actually broken though--basically, there was about a quarter of it left. I hid it by leaving it unbuttoned for several months, but finally went ahead and just replaced the buttons. There wasn't a spare, so I had to replace them all, and since Joann's didn't have a large enough quantity of any button remotely close to the right size, I had to make my own.

So here it is with its new fabric-covered buttons....

....which are more fun than those brown ones anyway.

I also had this long, never-been-worn, tags-still-on-it denim skirt that a friend passed along to me because it ended up not fitting her.

(Check out the detailing in the back!)

This is the after-- I didn't get a pic of it before, but it ended up being too big on me. So basically, I just took in the sides a nice chunk and re-did the topstitching.

(Took it in that much, to be exact.) So it fits much better now, and I'm excited to actually be able to wear it!

Now, off to trace a pattern....