Challenging Myself

Somewhere around the beginning of the year I decided that 2009 would be the year I learned to sew knits/stretch fabrics. I've got a good machine now (still no serger), and the two of us should be able to handle the learning curve.

It was with this goal in mind that I just spent $100 (not in the budget this month!) on rayon/lycra fabrics at EmmaOneSock.com: 2 gorgeous prints in sufficient yardage to make a dress of each (or skirt + top, which will not be worn together), plus a coordinating solid for trim and/or a top:


This mini-splurge was inspired by today's Vogue pattern sale. I seem to be in dress mode, plus I can't resist the interesting skirt:


There's only one problem. I can't possibly stitch on, or even cut, this (indulgent) fabric without a couple of practice runs. So now I have to go find some super cheapo but reasonably similar fabrics to mess up and make muslins from. Which I really don't have time to do. Have I mentioned we're probably moving soon (late May, early June)?

Why am I increasing the stash BEFORE the move? Duh!

Plus, I just spent a horrific amount of the morning on this... must go get some real work done!

I know, I know...

... I said I'd post photos of all those new skirts I made. It hasn't happened yet. I haven't even taken any pictures yet. We're having such dreary, drippy, gloomy weather, not to mention some horrific computer problems this past week (virus, hacked websites, lots of time offline while it all gets cleaned up and put right). It's nice to have a bunch of new skirts in the closet, but it hasn't been warm enough to wear them. I've been living in yoga pants, fuzzy slippers, and my polarfleece pullover. Seriously. 10:30am and it's still only 64 degrees in Hilo. It's supposed to be spring already, when's the sun gonna come out?

Wearing What I Made

Returned Thursday night from the Left Coast Crime conference in Waikoloa. I'm pleased to say that I wore something that I'd made 4 days in a row + one restaurant dinner, and received compliments on most of them. Even better, the garments were comfortable to wear and I felt I looked great in them.

What I didn't manage was to get any photos of me in them. Good news, the sun is out this morning (for the first time in about 3 weeks -- or that's what it feels like, anyway) and I hope to do a quickie fashion show with hubbie behind the camera and post a list of recent triumphs.

First, though, I gotta iron everything again: it's all crumpled from being in the suitcase.

Skirt Week!

I made four skirts last week! Gosh, I feel productive and clever.

Well, four and a half, but I'm not counting the one that's in the UFO pile. Three of those four are Burda 8280, two short ones and long one. I also made an above-the-knee blue twill with lime green rickrack in the panel seams... self-drafted. The trimmed seams was an impromptu decision, but turned out wonderfully.

Am eager to show them all off, but there is not one single decent place inside this house to take an indoor photo except one corner of the front hall and then only on a bright day. I'm waiting for a break from gloomy, rainy weather (we get a lot of that in Hilo). The few times the sun has come out, hubbie hasn't been around to take snaps. Tried to take some myself but the only full-length mirror is the closet doors in the bedroom, and the large picture window on the opposite wall means it just doesn't work. Which explains why I so often post snaps of my creations on a hanger rather than on me.

I did wear the Amy Butler "mod" print skirt one afternoon... only to WalMart, a less than exciting debut, but it's as comfortable to wear as I'd hoped, and is sure to become a much-worn favorite. One of these days the sun will come out and I'll corral DH to snap some pics as I model new creations.

Until then I'm taking a break from sewing. I'm off to the Left Coast Crime writer's conference (held right here on the Big Island this year, hurray!) in Waikoloa next weekend, and have some prep to do for that (now that I've cranked out a few new things to wear). Promise I'll post some pics when I've got 'em. And I'm gonna start posting to Pattern Review as well when I have some decent photos.

When I get back from the conference I've got some UFOs to finish up, and some Kaffe Fasset fabric to get creative with. There's probably at least one more Burda skirt in the stash, and I've been eyeing the Amy Butler "Anna" Tunic pattern in the dress length. This whole "sew some clothes" thing was sparked by the realization, over a year ago, that my favorite tank dresses for around-the-house wear on hot summer days were wearing out and I had nothing to replace them. Here we are on the verge of warmer weather again, and I've made a lot of things but not the garments I still need the most. That's gonna be the project goal for post-conference spring sewing.

And then I'll have to clean up the sewing room, which doubles as our guest room. My parents are arriving for a visit on April 2, so I've gotta clear the mess out of the way and set it up nice and pretty for them. The more fabric I use up this month, the less I have to put away...

Burda 8280 - skirt #3

More gloomy-day photos, will update when I've hemmed this, wear it, and get DH to snap a pic on a sunny day. Here the hem is still pinned. Thread I used for seams is just a smidge too dark for hemming, am leaving this unfinished until I can get to the store for a better color match.

I didn't have enough fabric for much wiggle-room with the motifs. This is the front, where the pattern goes across the skirt as it does the yardage.

And the back, where I had to do a mirror-image. I would have liked to have done both sides the same, but when you pull from your stash you gotta work with what you've got. There's even a teeny bit of sun damage on this one, here and there, but I'm probably the only one who will notice it.

Best thing... I discovered that I have a sleeveless linen top that is exactly the same shade of blue! Which makes an outfit! Yippee. Or it will be, when I get the right color thread and stitch that hem up.

I made a faced waist on this one, BTW, but am not thrilled with it. A cleaner look, if you want that, but if I ever lose enough weight to be willing to reveal the waists of my skirts this will need to be completely recut to fit, so for me it's a non-issue.

This looks better on than on the hanger ... look forward to having a better photo to show off.

Burda 8280 - skirt #2

I tried this pattern again over the weekend, adding just a bit more room where I needed it. This is an Amy Butler "Daisy Chain" fabric. As soon as this fabric line came out I knew I wanted to wear something made from this, and ordered 2 yds of it. I thought it was going to be a dress (Butterick 5179) but ended up just using it for the border of that one, which left enough of a piece to make this skirt from, too.

I think this will be my new favorite skirt. I will confess I haven't worn it yet. Just finished hemming by hand last night, but today is cool and gloomy (68 feels downright cold when you live in Hawaii!) so I'm gonna wait for a warmer day. Wish I had a better pic, too, but that gloom makes for crappy photos, and Hubbie isn't around to take one of me wearing it. It has a bit more flare than shows up here. Will update when I've got a better one.

Anyway, this fits well, and is a breeze to sew, especially when you don't do a fussy job with matching the print on the seams, as I've done in other versions (Nigella twill coming up!). I made a bound waist, rather than the facing the pattern calls for, and used two smaller darts where the pattern has single more generous ones. Big triumph: my first invisible zipper in the center back seam! Practiced on scrap first, and only sewed one side of the zip in backwards once, so fairly smooth going. I'd show you a photo, but hey, it's invisible, so you'll just have to take my word for it that it's there.

So looking forward to wearing this... hope the sun comes out soon.

New Look 6682

The thing about this pattern is I didn't pick it out. I ordered New Look 6688 (a blouse) online, and received this one in the mail instead. Gee, all that lacing and ruffles: so not my thing.

I offered to return it, but the nice folks at Simplicity said no worries, they'd send me the correct one (which they did, very promptly) and to keep this with their apologies.

So, in a moment of metaphysical pondering ("everything happens for a reason") I thought maybe some great seamstress in the sky was hinting I ought to give this a go. And, once I rummaged around in the stash, I thought it might be just the thing for one of the many Amy Butler prints I've indulged in the past year or so, but haven't made anything from yet.

I made View C, that's the one on the right in the middle row, above. It's got a tad more shaping at the bottom than the plain-jane version, without the frills.

The waist is unfinished here. I'm showing this pic to illustrate how RIDICULOUS!!! the ease on this pattern is. The waist size on this skirt (at this point in construction) is 6.5" -- that's six and a half inches -- wider than the waist measurement for the pattern size. Yes, it's supposed to sit "1" below the natural waist," but sheesh. I don't know about your shape, but I have plenty of curves and even I don't spread out that much that fast.

Check out that photo again: where's the waist??? Had to admit I saw this coming. It's a six-panel skirt, so no darts, and gee, that waist taper on each panel piece just didn't look like it was gonna add up to much. And it didn't.

Other sewists have commented on this problem at Pattern Review. Which is severe. It's not like there's a waistband to hold this up. How hard is it to figure out that if you have a "no waistband" design, it should be a snug fit at the waist so it doesn't fall down around your knees? If this had been, oh, 2" bigger I could have skipped the zip, stuck some elastic at the top, and called it a pull-on.

The fabric looks good in this pattern though, so that turned out okay. And, after I went back and tapered in the top 10" of every panel seam except the one with the zip, it fits... better. The tapers I made to get the darned thing to stay up don't match my natural tapers very well, but I'm not going to redo them.

Another issue I have with this is that I added 2" to the length, and it's still not as long as the design should be to really look good. Simplicity/New Look, in my opinion, often miss good proportions by just enough to be clunky rather than as graceful and stylish as they could be. The model in the envelope photo doesn't look thrilled with it, either, like she's thinking "Gee, guys, this isn't your best effort."

Another peeve: the flounce in the back is not as well proportioned to the skirt length as it looks like it is in the line drawing:

Anyway, this one is now done. I finished the waist with a quilt-type double-fold binding, which worked fine. And I'll wear it, now and then. But I don't love it, and doubt I'll ever make it again.