An update

Just before I came down with the nasty cold I'm fighting off right now, I finished Simplicity 2472; the temperatures also dropped and I couldn't even think about wearing this dress. I wanted a really simple pattern for the knit print since I didn't want to worry about matching circles and I didn't want chop the print too much either. It can't get any simpler than this pattern! I know it doesn't have hanger appeal but it does look cute on. I'll take pictures of me wearing it later, when I feel better...



I also decided on McCalls 5752 for this knit print that I found at Joann's about a year ago. I think it will look good with this design.


In looking through my stash I found this beautiful twill from Michael's fabrics. I usually don't buy this color, but it came in a bundle and the quality is wonderful. I really need a neutral spring jacket so now I'm searching for a pattern.

I'm really looking forward to next week, the kids are off and I don't work thanks to working for the school system. I hope I can shake off this cold soon because I have plans!!

Look what showed up in our backyard a couple of days ago! This is the first time we see a pheasant visiting, the colors were just beautiful!


I wish to those who celebrate a good holiday!

Burda WOF 1 2009 106A Dress

While I was working on my coat I was dreaming of making dresses and I made a list of what I wanted to make. This is the first one, a knit dress with v-neck and sleeve flounces. I was going to show this dress styled for spring/summer, but I'm cold so out came the tights and boots. I have a couple of belts that I'm also planning on wearing with this dress, but today is a "fat" day so no belt.



This was very easy to put together,it is a knit after all, right?. I love that is very versatile, I plan to wear it fall and spring, since the simple lines and neutral color can be the background to many colorful accessories. The fabric is a cotton/lycra knit I bought through a coop. It has enough body to work nicely as a dress, no clinging going on.





I can see from the back picture there are some folds around the back, but I think this is not uncommon on a dress with no darts, I also might have overcompensated when straightening my back for the picture.



As far as techniques used...stabilized shoulders with Seams Great, interfaced hem as explained in Easy Guide for sewing tops and t-shirts

Modifications to pattern...Used 38, 40 to 42 sizes (shoulders, chest and waist/hips), lengthened bodice by 1 inch.

On to the next dress!

A gift from my mom

I'm sure I have mentioned before that my mom is fantastic with a crochet hook. I like to crochet but she loves it and not with the thicker yarns but the ones you could consider thread weight. I am lucky to have two bedspreads, tablecloth trim (yet to be attached to said tablecloth), curtains hanging in my house and quite a few garments in lace crochet.

Although I'm not a lace girl (my wedding dress was completely devoid of any lace and so was my prom dress), I love lace crochet. So since mom loves to make it and I love to wear it, she made me the cardigan you see above (sorry for the headless picture, my photographer was not in the mood, and believe me you did not want to see my face).

I have commissioned a couple of other pieces that will make their appearance on my blog in the future :-)

Fad classic vest

Thanks everyone for all the wonderful comments you left about my coat. I am very happy with the outcome!

This design by Wendy Bernard has been very popular and with good reason. The pattern stitch is easy to memorize and it is very pretty. I originally wanted to make it in cotton but I had this beautiful Brooks Farm Solana worsted weight yarn that I bought at the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival last year, and I thought it would make a nice fall/winter vest. Besides, the festival is coming up again soon (May) and it makes sense to use at least one of my purchases.

Because the variation of colors in the yarn you can really see that the vest is done knitting back and forth up to the neckline and then all stitches from front and back are joined in the round. It is more obvious in the back.



I need to remind myself to stand up straight, oh well...

Burda WOF 9/2005 102 Coat

Can I tell you how excited I am that the coat is finished? Let me count the ways...Seriously, I'm thrilled with this coat! The fabric is the most luxurious I have ever experience, no itchy wool here. The fabric is a (I believe) wool/cashmere/camel blend, which I bought at PA fabrics back when there was an outlet a couple of miles from my house;they had this wonderful sales where if you bought over a $100 worth of fabric you payed for half, yeap those were the days.



My very last struggles had to do with the hem and back vent. After I had bagged the lining and got it all through the sleeve, I tried it on and the hem was doing all sort of weird things. I had to rip the hem stitches to see what was going on in the construction. It turns out after I attached the wigwam according to the instructions in a Threads magazine, I neglected to actually sew a hem, duh!! Once I corrected that I sewed the hem by hand this time and all was well. The way my lining is going around the top of the vent does not satisfy me, but at this point I will let it be until the coat comes out next season to be worn. Even after reading tutorials I'm having a hard time visualizing how the lining should be attached to the vent, so I need to put it aside.

I'm also thrilled with the silk lining which came from G street Fabrics. It reminds me of the old fashion linings I used to see in my grandfather's and my father's jackets; all their clothes were made by tailors, those were the days.



What I learned during this project:

1. Bound buttonholes

2. Welt pockets with flap

3. Padstitching undercollar and lapels

4. Tailoring techniques in general, as I have discussed in previous posts, including using hair canvas.

5. Applying wigan to hems

6. During collar construction, adjusting for turn of the cloth.



As far as changing the pattern, besides adding all the tailoring, I cut the under collar as a two piece cut on the bias. Of course I had a lot of help from the Great Coat Sew Along as my muslin was analyzed by Marji.


Anyways I know you have heard plenty about this coat so I'm sure you are glad to see it finished too! I will have a brand new coat to wear next season.

Green!

Yesterday I got to spend the day in Washington DC with my family. We went to the Botanical Gardens, the Native American Museum and a brief visit to the National Gallery. I love going to the museums in the winter! We got there around 10:00 am and parked across from the gardens, no crowds at the gardens and lunch at the Native American Museum was delicious and with plenty of room to sit and relax.


Primeval

The best part of the trip, I was surrounded by the color green for a few hours! I really needed that dose of tropical weather. As a bonus they had at the gardens a special orchid exhibit, so not only did I see green but a variety of bright beautiful colors too!





Teenager at rest


Ignore my goofy look and notice that I am now the short one (at 5'6") in the family, DS1 on the left is 15, DS2 on the right 12.


The obligatory shot at arm's length


I'm holding off on showing you the coat, I'm so close to finishing!

Another knitting FO

During our power outage I also finished this Drops Cardigan 97-5. The yarn,Silk-Tweed from Garn Studio I bought when one of our local yarn shops closed a year ago with no ideal what to make with it, until I found this pattern browsing the Garn Studio site.



This was a very easy pattern, the yarn feels kind of rough, like raw silk, but I liked how it knitted up. I ended up with a cute vest, which is pretty warm, and reduced my yarn stash :-)

Vogue Knitting Tunic

This is the first time that I make and wear a knitted garment from a current magazine!

This was a really easy pattern, mindless really, but I loved the pattern. This is one of those instances where I was more interested in the end result more than the process. I really, really wanted this dress and I wanted to wear this winter because since it is so trendy who knew about next season.


I used Knit Picks City Tweed Yarn in Jacquard. I lengthened the bodice to fit my longish torso and I also lengthened the hem. This was finished during the long 3 days without power we had last week, it helps that one of my hobbies only requires human power.

This is not a dress to wear when you are looking for body definition, and I'm totally okay with that. I wore the tunic today for work and it was soooo comfortable and warm!

Here is another picture to show the underarm shaping. Another progress report on the coat later!

Double welt pockets with flap and bound buttonholes

I have finished with two of the techniques that I had challenged myself to learn while making this coat.

I finally decided on making double welt pockets because I figured out after practicing what Burda magazine was trying to say. They inserted the flap in between the coat front and the top welt to give the look you see in the pictures. They were nerve wrecking to construct but I did it! I'm so glad I overcame my fear. The flaps I made following Kay Y, the Sewing Lawyer's tutorial, which works beautifully.

The bound buttonholes were a piece of cake after the welt pockets. I watched Sandra Betzina's Foolproof Buttonholes. She does a wonderful job showing you this easy method which Summerset, from Pin and Needles also explains in her tutorial. I bought the DVD a while ago and I still think it is a great investment, Sandra has a way of empowering you that I love.

Now on with attaching the collar.


Yes it is still snowing here. For this blizzard we have had power which we lost during the first blizzard. Two and a half days and two nights with only the fireplace to heat the house was rough. I did finish one knitting project and almost done with the other.

Clio

Clio, our beagle, is afraid of cameras (actually the camera flash, and also thunder, lightning, wind, flashing lights on the school bus, snow plow...you get the picture),therefore we have very few pictures of her.

The above was taken by my 10th grader who is taking photography in school. I don't know how he managed but I'm glad he did.

I'm able to share this picture with you because at Christmas I got the scanner I have been wanting and I'm learning how to use it.

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I took advantage of the start of our snowed-in weekend (expecting up to 30 inches!), and worked on the welt pockets. They are done!!!! They look really good and so do the flaps. Tomorrow I'll follow up with pictures, just hope that we don't lose power. Of course if we do I'll just have to switch to knitting and reading.

It's starting to look like a coat!

If felt wonderful to sew seams...and I'm happy with how the it is coming along. I like having the seams marked, even though it is very labor intensive to thread trace. All the pieces are fitting in so nicely.

I also made a sample of a double welt pocket. I decided to follow the directions in Tailoring:The Classic Guide to Sewing the Perfect Jacket. For me it had the clearest instructions and pictures to go with it that made the perfect sense to me. I am really pleased with the way the pocket turned out and I will use this type and method to make under the flaps on my coat.

Practicing the welt pocket

The above show my first attempt ever to make a welt pocket; I'm glad I finally did it! While it doesn't look perfect, the width is not even across the welt, this is easily fixed, I just wasn't extremely careful when folding the welt. There is no bunching or pulling at the ends, which makes me happy. This is a single welt with the flap sewn on top. One thing I like about it, that if the welt is not perfect to my eyes, it will be covered up by the flap.

I want to do a little more reading about the technique, since I have made one I think it will be easier now to see what the tutorials are talking about.

Two outfits for the same interview

So, out of the blue I get a call from the public school system (World Languages department) for an interview for the position of long term substitute for Spanish class. I already have two part time jobs that keep me pretty busy, but I figure it wouldn't hurt to go to the interview. Anyways I get to the high school for my 8:40 am appointment to be told that they are very sorry but they have me schedule for the following morning. They apologize I say ok and leave. So now I have been seen in this first outfit so I have to come up with another for today. This time around I decide on a more casual outfit, because from what I saw there I would still be overdressed in comparison (and I was).

Anyways outfit for day one is the skirt and jacket from Simplicity 4500. I wore a RTW long sleeve-t.

Outfit for day two is New Look 6429 which has been made and reviewed so many times I never bothered to review it myself. While I wear it a lot because it is very comfortable the torso length for some reason is short on me, so the band which is attached falls too high and really makes me crazy every time I look in the mirror. I made it so long ago I don't know if I lengthened it but I always do. It was cold today and the neckline is a little low, so in the spirit to be sort of conservative I wore a turtleneck with it.

Ready to padstitch

I finally had some time this weekend to work on my coat and you can see how far along I am in the pictures. I am now ready to padstitch, I actually started late last night. Once that's done I'll finish shaping the coat front(applying tape to the lapel and securing the hair canvas).

Next I'll practice with bound buttonholes. It seems it would be easier to do them now before attaching the side and back, but all tutorials I've read wait. Is there a sound reason for waiting? I hope my more experienced readers can enlighten me ;-)

To a healthy day

Wednesday night my poor DS the youngest came down with (what I hope) a 24 hour stomach flu. By 6:00 am on Thursday it had been so bad I called the doctor's office to be told that I was looking at taking him to the ER for dehydration, so I had to be on the lookout for signs. I'm thankful that he was able to keep enough fluid down to avoid that trip.

I was never any good at pulling "all-nighters" when young, at this age the warning "do not operate heavy machinery" certainly applied. Come to think of it, "handling light machinery" also applied.

Enjoy your holiday (for those of us in the US) and stay healthy.

The weekend and a couple of hats

I made these hats for my nephew. It was nice to start and finish a project in a short period of time, I'm used to having a project on my needles for months. If you are interested here are the links for the patterns:

Snowflake hat
I used leftover Plymouth Encore yarn in worsted weight

Fair Isle hat
This pattern only uses two colors but I wanted to use several. I also repeated some of the patterns all the way to the crown. I bought the yarn for this project, Berroco Comfort DK which is really soft and washable.

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On Saturday I spent my morning with Cidell. It was a last minute thing and great fun. I met her at her ballet class to observe and then we got together for coffee. We hardly talked about sewing but we had plenty to chat about, imagine that! :) I also got to ride in Nigel (her new car), what a fun car! I planned on taking her picture next to Nigel, I even had my camera in my bag, but somehow it didn't happen, oh well.
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Not much happening as far as sewing, I hope to have some progress to show on my next post.

Thread tracing in progress

Well I was hoping that this post would say "thread tracing done", but no such luck. Anyways I have done the majority of it. I am taking extra care in marking pockets and buttonholes, I want to make sure these come out as nice as possible.

I really had to squeeze all the pieces of the coat in the cut I had, I only have left scraps that will be used for the welt pockets and bound buttonholes. No waste with this project!