inadvertent fashionista

In spite of my fondness for both Ugly Betty and Project Runway, I am a long, long way from being a fashionista. When I redrafted the Jalie 2908 jeans to remove the boot-cut tapering I knew I wanted them wider than I'd muslined, and rather than fuss with leg width at that point I simple ruled a straight line down from the widest hip-point (outseam) and inner thigh (inseam) to the hem. That's a wide leg for a jean.

But I didn't care. I figured I'd get the pockets and zip and crotch seam done, then baste up the legs and fine-tune the width. Then I tried them on, and whaddaya know. I like 'em wide. They seem to suit me. So I left them that way. I don't care if my jeans are in the same galaxy as "on trend" so long as they fit and are comfortable. I figure I've been ignoring fashion for decades, no reason to start grasping at trendy now.

And then I saw these...

... 3 pages torn from the Garnet Hill catalog that landed in my mailbox a few days ago, and which I flipped through this morning. Those are various twill and chino pants, not jeans specifically, but close enough. At least one pair was on a page headed "trend spotting" or something like that. Prices: $68-$88.

Let's see, I got 6 yards of the blue stretch mystery fabric for whatever $1.99/yard  -20% +tax comes out to, and have so far made from it one muslin, one pair of very wearable jeans, and have enough left to maybe make a pair of capris, or certainly a skirt, should I ever get around to that.

There are those who would include the value of my time, too, but let's not go there. Assigning a dollar sign to play time is just plain wrong.

Jeans progress and a fabric score

Stopped in at my LFS to get some kind of jeans-appropriate button(s) the other day and discovered they'd gotten a new shipment of "designer" remnants in. They have a large table of this stuff in the back, piles of flat-fold miscellany, often mostly crap, but some gems in there if you dig deep. Most pieces are 1-1.5 yards or so, some up to 3 yards, mix of wovens and knits, sometimes lace and other "novelty" items. You never know what you will find.

I found this:

Cotton-lycra jersey with some but not too much stretch. Due to camera issues, I scanned this in; about an 8"x10" sample of the 1-1/8 yard piece that I got for $3.76 inc. tax. It will become a top of some kind, don't know what yet. A bit on the hippy-dippy side, but I'm cool with that.

I also got 1-5/8 yards of the most luscious pewter-colored rayon stretch velvet you have ever seen. OMG is it yummy. A small splurge, at $12.20 for the piece, but whatever I make from it will be worth it.

Discount Fabric Warehouse consistently offers a world's-best collection of aloha prints and tropical barkcloth and upholstery fabrics at very reasonable prices, but their garment fabric selection is (for my needs and taste) mostly "miss." So when they get good stuff in I like to show my approval by handing over the AmEx. This time they had a TON of nice stuff, including many textured and embroidered silks/silk-imposters. I was tempted by many, but would have to change my entire lifestyle in support of that kind of wardrobe, so got out the door with only two additions to the stash. And a fistful of zippers in fun colors for future use.

In other news from the sewing room today, who knew that making jeans would be so much fun?! Okay, yes, many participants in the PR jeans sew-along have posted exactly that, but I didn't expect to be one of them. My hopes hovered at the level of getting through the process without bruising my forehead too badly banging it on the sewing table in expected bouts of despair and frustration. But seriously, folks, I'm having fun. Something about completing each step and holding it up and thinking, "hey, this is starting to look like real jeans" is irresistable. I still have to do the waistband and belt-loops, and (eeep) hems, but am already itching to start on a second pair.

Disclaimer: when I say I get a thrill from seeing my efforts morph into something that looks like "real jeans," I am taking some liberties with language. Especially when applied to my top-stitching, which is, um, not at all professional looking. It's downright wonky in more than a few places, at least two of which can be blamed on Cosmo, who is fascinated by the sewing machine and prone to leaping onto the sewing table in pursuit of moving parts at inopportune moments.

Here's a peek at my lined waistband (in progress) and belt-loops strips (also a bit wonky). Not that I care: my pleasure in producing something that looks (to my starry eyes) like "real jeans" is completely outweighing any pride in craftsmanship, or lack thereof:

I've used my various-sized scraps of this Amy Butler print for so many different projects now that I've almost used it up. The pockets are this print on one side, and a different, coodinating one on the other because I didn't have any large enough pieces left to make complete pockets.

By using the scanner today I got a nice, sharp, high-res image of the weird, two-wrong-side fabric I mentioned previously, so here's a closeup of that:

This fabric is so stretchy across the grain that I didn't dare cut the waistband on the bias as the pattern calls for. This is a lengthwise strip: that ridged texture runs across the width of the fabric, rather than vertically as you see it here. I'm actually on the verge of liking it.

 

Inaccessible...

... my photos, that is. I got a new USB cable for the digital camera and tried it out this morning. Alas, the camera is still invisible to my computer. Which means the problem is inside the camera somewhere. I don't know if it's the kind of thing that can be fixed, and if so at what expense. I'm going to turn the problem over to Mr. de Hilo, who is in charge of all technical details around here. Perhaps he can come up with a solution. Probably it will be easier/cheaper to just get a new camera.

Too bad we're closing in on the end of the month. I've spent way too much already on fabric, cat toys (and food, and litter) and have two more vet bills to pay before little cutie's vaccinations are complete and he's been neutered. And next month I'm travelling for two weeks, with many fabric store visits planned, plus other incidentals, including hotel rooms and meals for the several nights I won't be at Mom and Dad's. And then there's XMas to shop for (yes I'll make some things, but the AmEx will get into play, too). So I don't see where there's any new camera in my budget. Maybe if I ask Santa for one.

In the meantime, I took some pics this morning of my custom-jeans-pocket stitching and my clever lined belt-loops strips. The belt loops are the sort of fiddly little detail that is really not worth doing and a lousy use of my sewing time, but I couldn't help myself once the idea popped into my head.

Since pics are still in the inaccessible, I'll try to entertain you with my pocket-stitching line drawing. The outer line is the cut size of the pocket piece, with inner top-stitching line also marked:

I made this up to size in Illustrator (that's an "Americana" font capital V, converted to outline), flipped the arcs but not the V for the other side, printed them both out, pinned the paper to the pocket fabric and stitched right through the paper. Slowly. Very slowly.

Worked great, after I'd spent about 90 minutes fussing around with every possible top-stitching/bobbin thread combination, several different needles, and every tension setting on my machine, before arriving at a workable combination.

Anyhoo, so far so good on the jeans. If I could retrieve photos from my camera you'd see how laughably un-professional my top-stitching is. Not that I care. I consider these a practice pair, although if they turn out to be comfy I'll wear them anyway.

I need to do some "real work" for a bit, then I tackle the fly-front zip install.

two wrong sides?

Couldn't capture this in a photo, but perhaps you've encoutered something similar: a fabric with two wrong sides.

I'm muslining the Jalie 2908 stretch jeans in a too-stretchy something I picked up for 1.99 to test the pattern with. It's an icky pale blue, light-denim weight but not a twill; the weave on one side looks exactly like the "wrong" side of real denim. The other side looks exactly like the wrong side of something else. What, I don't know.

While cutting the fabric I changed my mind several times as to which side was the "right" side, and finally decided there wasn't one. I picked a side and decided to go with that. Today, basting up front/back for a quick try-on, I went the other way.

Not that it matters. One glance in the mirror was enough to convince me that light-colored stretch anything is not a good choice on my butt, especially in a jeans fit. Unless I wear a tunic over it, which is a possibility. I wasn't going to stay in them long enough to find out, though, as it's too hot in the sewing room for trying on pants for more than a nanosecond.

I wish I'd remembered to cut the muslin with extra-wide side seams. "Boot cut" and I are not friends, so I straightened out the taper, adding some width at the knee and bringing in the flare to a straight line. The end result would be fine if I were slimmer through the hips, but as things are now the narrow leg makes my wide parts look even wider.

On the whole, though, not bad for a first muslin. I'm already thinking these could be cute at capri length, under a tunic. If nothing else, it might be worth finishing these pants for those days when I don't feel like working out. I could put them on instead of my exercise clothes and admire my rear view for a dose of instant inspiration.

Speaking of pants, I finally got the Marrakesh pants pinned for hemming. It took about six tries, spread out over ... how long has it been? 10 days? Felt like for-frickin'-ever. Anyway, as of this morning they are pinned and ready to hem. As soon as it cools off enough to plug in my iron I'll press them and try to remember how to use the blind-hem foot on my machine.

I've heard that every blog post needs a picture, so here's my little cutie enjoying one of his favorite toys. This box had one open end for pantry use, and when he became fascinated with it I cut a large hole in the other for greater play possibilities. He likes to "hide" in there (sticking out both ends) before pouncing.

Marrakesh Pants Progress Report

Finally moving on from the muslin stage: whoot! Here's my fabric for MPant #1 (assuming I love them and make more than one pair; not a sure thing, but I'm choosing optimism):

There's a bit of flash glare going on here, but you can see I'm using a teal cotton chambray (warp threads are bright teal, weft are black), which may or may not work well for the pattern in terms of weight (similar to linen) and drape (minimal). I chose it because I dearly want a pair of loose, light-weight pants to wear here in the winter, when it's often too cool for a short cotton skirt (but not cool enough for jeans) in the middle of the day, when I'm most likely to be out and about. I originally justified the purchase of this fabric (from Fabric.com last year sometime) by the thought that this color would be great on Mr. deHilo and that it might be nice to make him a shirt someday instead of just sewing for myself all the time. (Snort: who was I kidding?)

The pocket and waistband lining is a cotton that's been in the stash for many years, that I've been snipping away at for various quilt projects. It's a Liberty (Wm. Morris repro?) knockoff, nothing pricey. It will make me very happy to walk around with butterflies in my pockets, even if no one else knows they are there.

The pieces are now all cut out, and I will begin construction as soon as I finish this blog post and have one more mug of coffee in me. I would have started on the sewing yesterday evening, but I got distracted by something else (all Shelley's fault), which I will ramble about in my next post.

I cut the seams off my last muslin, traced the pieces onto lengths of butcher paper, then added seam allowance. I'll use the original pattern pieces for pockets, etc., my pattern for pant front and back. Here's a brief recap of fitting adjustments.

1) Back crotch curve:

These are close to the pattern 16 through the hip (I moved the HP piece a few inches up, so it doesn't cover my pattern lines). As you might be able to see here, I added about 2" in height at the center back waist, changed the crotch curve slightly, also extended crotch point a little. After all the tweaking, it came out closer to the original than I'd expected.

2) Front crotch curve:

I changed this curve more than the back, to a much gentler slope, That HP "J" shape did not fit me at all: weird pooching going on there on the first muslin. Took a few tries to get it right. Added to the height here as well, but not as much as at the back. I also added a distressing amount to the inner thigh. Maybe in a future version I will divide that extra more between front/back pieces, but this seems to work okay. Maybe in a future version I will have worked out more and not need all that inner-thigh pudge room. My front ended up at about the HP size 14 after tweaking excess from the hip.

3) Hip curve:

I'm happy to say it did occur to me I ought to make sure the outside pocket shape fits my hip curve, which it does. That's nice. Unfortunately, I forgot to add to pocket height when I cut them, so these may sit up higher than I'd like. If necessary I can nudge the pockets down a little by minimizing seam allowance at top and bottom. I doubt it will be a big issue.

The other adjustment I made was to correct the leg width. Somehow through the lengthy muslining process I'd managed to reduce the wide leg quite a bit. That's because my learn-to-fit-as-you-go method involved much trial and error, and at a couple points I tried resewing the out- or inseam to help correct the hang of the leg, when (as I eventually figured out) pulling up at the side hip works better. Anyway, as I was drafting the new paper back/front pieces I redrew the outseam from the hip point down to be perpendicular to the hem, and matching the original pattern leg width. I may decide that's too wide, but I can always taper in.

So, I'm ready to sew baste these up. I plan to baste the front and back together and try on one more time before adding the pockets, waistband, and fly front. More updates to come...

Inching along

OMG I got no sewing done at all, this week, in spite of waking up every morning determined to fit a few minutes on something wardrobe-related into the day. The thing is, I'm deeply into some important-to-me (but dull to you, so I won't go into details) work projects that I long to complete, and that's been keeping me busy until it's too late in the day to attempt sewing without a too-large risk of stupid sewing errors. I've ended up collapsing on the couch to watch such intellectually challenging shows as Wipeout, which is good for a few belly laughs at hapless contestant expense every time. I find the compulsion to laugh at pratfalls fascinating, and the more laughs I can fit into the day, the better.

So, onward: here's where I'm at with the Marrakesh pant:

I ran out of actual muslin some time ago, this is rendition #2 from a sacrificed set of old cotton sheets. Believe it or not, I think I almost have a muslin that might possibly result in a good-enough-to-wear fit. I say "almost" because I have not dealt with the elastic/drawstring casing at the waist. What I did was cut a very tall front/back leg (literally about 6" extra at the waist) so I could do the thing where you tie elastic at the waist and pull the muslin up/down here and there until something looks right. I tried to get the elastic at where I'd like the pant drawstring/elastic to be, then took a black gel pen and marked at the bottom edge.

You can see in the photo above that the center back seam on my almost-fitted muslin is about 3/4" higher than the side seam. I am going to have to firmly remind myself, when I cut my fashion fabric, that as wrong as this looks it is right for me. The good news is that after making several muslins, each from the last without reference to the paper pattern, it looks like the back waist casing is a pretty close fit to the pant I've ended up with.

Not so much on the front, though. I'm going to try the front waist casing at the size 14 length and see how that goes:

Next up, cut casing pieces from some one of the previous muslin-fails lying around here somewhere, and sew those on for a final (please God let this be the last one) fit. I've read all kinds of reminders that when fitting pants it is imperative to include the zipper and fly at the muslin stage, but the thought of doing that makes me want to put a gun to my head. Seriously, I've been fooling around with this pant for about as long as I can stand. Dealing with fly extensions and a zipper is just too much. Plus, the waist isn't exactly "fitted" on this one, so I'm going to wing it.

I'd really like to get this next step done today, so tomorrow I can try to figure out length (my muslins are cropped to flood level because having to roll or pin up the bottom was driving me nuts) but it's about as hot and humid and sticky as it gets here. Where's a cool and drizzly day when I need it for comfortable sewing conditions?

Speaking of which, on recent cool and drizzly late afternoon I looked out the window of my home office and saw this fabulous double-rainbow (part of it, anyway; I grabbed my camera and climbed up to the top of the empty lot next door to capture the whole gorgeous thing):

What I saw from my house was more like this:

Frankensizing

(warning: another long and rambling post that may be of little interest to anyone but me...)

I spent a good chunk of yesterday "muslining" the HotPatterns Marrakesh Pant ("straight leg, relaxed fit" with one of those HP combined elastic-drawstring + zipper waists: sounds forgiving, right?).

Some of the reviews over at PR suggest that this pattern is not for pants newbies, but the fly front, faced pockets, etc., do not intimidate me. It's true that after muslin #2 I and ended up with a worse fit than I'd started with (resulting in some profanity and a creeping sense of despair), but none of the style details have anything to do with that.

I am not giving up, however. Here in Hawaii I can get away with wearing skirts every day in public, and yoga pants (at home only) in cooler weather, but pulling that off during my October mainland trip will be difficult. I dearly, dearly wish for at least one pair of medium- to light-weight pants that fit, and since RTW will never deliver on that dream, I have no choice but to keep on until I can make them myself.

After walking away from utter failure yesterday, I regrouped and spent an hour or so browsing sewing forums for advice and re-reading my two pants fitting books...:
~ Pants for Real People, which is highly praised but did not deliver good results yesterday; I got caught in a feeback loop of pulling up at the waist to resolve problem A, which made the cr.curve too high, recutting which resulted in problem A again. After going through that two or three times it was clear I was heading for no improvement in fit but with a waist at the armpit and the pants hem somewhere around my knee. I do appreciate the "real people" approach, but none of the real people in the book are shaped anything like me. Heads-up folks, some of us pudgy middle-aged ladies carry our excess in a very curvy bum, not so much the belly and hips (not as slim as they once were, but still a long way from huge).
~ Easy Guide to Sewing Pants, from Taunton Press, now available as PDF download, which is quite detailed, with many diagrams of how to change a paper pattern. More photos/diagrams to help identify the problem to which those pattern fixes refer would be helpful.
... and the Threads magazine article (#142 July '09) on fitting pants to a curvy figure, which so far has been the most helpful.

As frustrating as the unsuccessful muslins have been, I now have a significantly improved understanding of my fit issues, and that's an important first step. Here are some problems and hiccups I've encountered:

1) "Choose your pants pattern size by your hip measurement." Um, okay. I'm exactly halfway between a 12 and a 14 hip on the HP chart for both waist and hip measure. Based on my Kyoto skirt experience (and even a passing glance at my hip profile in a mirror), however, I know I'll need extra butt room. I decided to go one size up and cut a 16, figuring I could trim if/where necessary.

2) But wait, let's take a gander at the crotch length measurements. I am "long in the hip" (more distance than average between a low crotch and a high waist), but had not realized that on the HP chart my crotch length is between size 18 and 20, and cr. depth a solid size 20. My "center front" (floor to waist) BTW, is a whopping size 22! Gee, do you think maybe that's why the incremental pattern adjustments my resources recommend were not delivering a good fit? According to a flat measure of the HPMP pattern, the size 16 back crotch length, point to (low) waist, is 2.5" too short for me.

I'm not going to try a larger size because the only successful revelation of the muslins so far is that they hang better if I take at least an inch off the outseam (bringing the pant leg down to somewhere around a size 10). Going further up in size seems likely to deliver so much extra fabric at the back of the thigh (already an issue) that it won't be worth any hip/crotch improvement.

3) In the absense of one of those flexible ruler things to capture the full glory of my curves, this morning I followed an online tip and twisted up a coil of aluminum foil, pressing it firmly front and back. I don't expect it's truly accurate, but take a look at it overlaid on the pants back from my original HP size 16 muslin (no adjustments yet):

As you can see, I am not exaggerating when I say my butt is "curvy." My curve is so far off the pattern I'm not even sure where/how to line it up; either way it's somewhere between fascinating and appalling. When I am slimmer this profile does shrink some, but the basic shape remains unchanged. Where this JLo-worthy shape came from is a mystery, BTW: I am the product of a solidly WASP gene pool in which the most exotic contributing element is a scant touch of French from way, way, way, way back.

However, this does help me understand why the unaltered muslin is snug in the butt while I can pinch a half-inch or so extra out of the hip (two fitting issues that seem as though they should be mutually exclusive, a situation that utterly baffled me yesterday).

Anyhoo, now that I've taken a break to write up this post and play with the photos, I'm going to give the "Threads" slash-and-spread method another go and see how I do. I'll post more pics when I'm a little closer to a wearable solution. Wish me luck.

the Summer of No Pants

I've signed up for the Summer of No Pants skirt-sewing challenge over at Marigold's delightfully-named blog, "Hideous! Dreadful! Stinky!"


Not that I need any encouragement to sew up a few more skirts. Or reason to wear more skirts, since I am a daily skirt-wearer, and frequent skirt sewer, anyway.

What I find funny about this is that I am supposed to be learning how to sew pants this summer.* You wouldn't know it by looking around my sewing room, but I joined (and appear to have dropped out of) the spring-summer jeans sew-along over at PatternReview. I managed to trace a pattern and then bury it under a pile of other stuff, and that's the sum total of my progress so far. Much as I'd like to have pants that fit sewn up by, say, early October, it very well could be the summer of no pants around here.

* The original goal was to learn how to sew pants last winter; when that didn't happen I pushed it to a summer 2010 goal. Mostly what I've done so far is accumulate enough fabric to make at least six pairs of pants, which is about five pairs more than I need.

Mini-Wardrobe Storyboard #1

Sewing thoughts this week have centered around what I could make for the upcoming "mini-wardrobe" challenge over at Pattern Review. It requires sewing 4 coordinating garments (for 4 "looks") in a month, which might or might not happen, but I'm looking at this as motivation to get crackin' on using up some stash. Here's what I've got in mind so far:

For tops, at least one knit, maybe two. If I do the McCalls, I'll shorten it to tunic length, use the solid as contrast trim. The McCalls isn't designed for stretch knits, so I don't know if it will work, but I know how I can find out:

For bottoms, I'd love to make a pair of "summer-weight" pants from my teal chambray (which I'm more likely to wear in the winter here, when a chilly day is 72 degrees; given my sewing speed it's not too soon to start them now for wear in the fall). The Vogue skirt from white denim is the kind of thing I wear every day for errands-runs to the Post Office and health food store. The knit tops will go nicely with both:

That's today's plan. It's subject to change (hence "storyboard #1"). I also have a blouse-weight turquoise linen that would play nicely with this group, so I might make the McCall tunic, if I can cut the contrast neck band from what's left of the chambray.

I know I already said this, but hey, look: it's ALL from stash! (fabric, patterns, I even have thread/zippers, etc. on hand)

How awesome is that?