New Sewing

Back before school started, we went shopping for clothes for the 7th grader. The feet are now man-sized and those skinny jeans purchased in December could not even be pulled up all the way. On the way out we spied a nice jacket, perfect for the soon to be cooler mornings. It had a superabundance of pockets, a zippered front. Nice; but $50. bucks___ and made of some pedestrian broadcloth. I piped up with the words that have undone dressmakers since the flood: 'I can make that!' (for you newbies).

I knew I had a piece of a fairly sturdy denim-like dobby weave in a inky navy that had been aging in the larder since the days of Natural Fiber Fabric Club. I showed it to him. "That's nice." he said. I sketched all the pockets it could have. Pockets on the shoulders? "OK!", he said. One shoulder or both shoulders? "Both". I was off. I knew not to show him the Lutterloh schematic I was using for a kid's jacket, those drawings are from the 1980's and would have probably been scorned by 12 year olds of the time.

Sewing was very straightforward. I didn't need to make any adjustments to the pattern except for the desired length, the child is basically a pole with shoulders. I may have made the sleeves a mite longer to anticipate growth. There was however, putting in six pockets, two bound buttonhole pockets, two chest pockets with flaps and two shoulder pockets with flaps. There was the trip to find a separating zipper and the specific care to be sure the flap opened up on the … which is it? right or left side?… the other side anyway.

All the while the weather did get cooler and I wanted needed to get on to a similar duty jacket for myself. I'd looked at the one I'd had, a copy of a barn jacket in a mustardy color with plum velveteen collar, and sent it off to Goodwill. I may have had it 20 years. While I sewed on those pockets, and tried to work out some topstitching scheme, I wanted to figure out what to wear that wasn't a heavy sweater or overcoat.

I finished the little jacket in time for Maker Faire, a bright, crisp morning. We were all excited to go, but when the moment came, the 7th grader refused to put the jacket on. Not only was it unsatisfactory to wear to Maker Faire, it didn't pass muster for 7th grade either. I was---- what's the word? oh yeah--  crushed.

After awhile, my head cleared and I just decided this was the inevitable moment. While he appears oblivious to "fashion" and we have been spared any yearning for expensive sneakers and label heavy vines, he does not care to be seen about in something his Mama made. The Dad was privy to the reason for the rejection however. Apparently, the color was "too dark", and the jacket had a quality… too… neat? Whatever, it seemed like something a g--l might wear. Kiss o' death. And why weren't these opinions expressed early when the Mama asked for them? He said he didn't want to break my heart.        awwwwww. 
Well, that's about right for a 7th grader as far as judging foreseeable outcomes goes, no?

So it's months later and we're actually in the store on the Black Friday after a movie. It was calm in the store we were at and we were on a mission for necessary unmentionables, which can't be put off. While waiting on line I sent the child over to check out a 50% off rack for anything he might fancy. He came back with another little jacket, pocketed to a fare-thee-well, zipper down the front, of possibly less substantial fabric than the first one, now marked down to $25. Let me say__ had it been marked at that price from the beginning I'd have bought it, because it wasn't worth a cent more than that, even allowing for a reasonable markup.  I looked at it in his hand while the boy read my mind out loud. I told him to get it if he wanted it, whereupon he put it back, came home and put on the jacket I made for him.

Summer Dress (es?)

This linen was destined for a long sleeved shirt.

So much of sewing intention is shaped around the climate. New York summers have been such that they can be recalled with dread in January. It didn't take much to can that long sleeved plan and go for a simple sheath. I had 2 yards, the fabric was about 50" wide, lets go.

I didn't have success with the simple sheath pattern I fell for last summer. Butterick4386 showed me all sorts of ideas and promised to turn into my very own TNT pattern. But I did not like the way that puppy looked made up and on me, even after I added an iron on monarch butterfly to it.

I learned something though. The boat neck isn't my best friend. I need to shorten the upper chest area and maybe between underarm and waist as well because the dress didn't hit where the remains of my waistline is… or isn't. That's progress though.

This time around I used my sloper to draft the pattern. I raised the armhole for the grater coverage needed for a sleeveless dress. I also dug out a THREADS article "Curved Darts Flatter Every Figure" (issue# 107). I re-shaped the bodice darts, making them s- curved. I didn't even shape them as much as I could have and still got better results. This technique is a keeper. I kept the big pockets they're hard to see with the print, though.

The construction was eccentric because I relied on my experience putting things together. I also approached the dress like a drawing, without knowing where it would end up, I made decisions as I went along. Read: I didn't figure out how to put this together beforehand and some procedures cancelled out procedures I might have used later, if I thought about it. I drafted facings for it, then thought I'd like to bind the neckline with some contrasts. That worked out well, I like that kind of fiddly work sometimes but then I had to stay stitch the armholes, clip and press the seam allowances to the inside and slip stitch the dress and facing armholes together, then sew up the side seams. A slit neck opening on a dress I saw somewhere caught my eye and I altered my facings to suit. Then I thought I might not be able to get into the dress after altering for the more close fitting darts. Back to THREADS magazine to check whether I could use a side zip closing. That would have required more forethought though, and I hadn't planned for deeper side seams. I read that 23" was the minimum neck opening length for pulling something over your head. I had more than enough. I turned out the button tin and found the green flower shaped button, started to make a spaghetti tube to use as a loop fastener, then remembered the "Cool Corder" tool I fell for at a long ago "Knit-Out" in Union Square. It took less than ten minutes to get the thing working and spit out a short length of i-cord for the loop. At the last minute, I added the purple button over the green button so the flower could have a center.

I want to keep going and make more summer dresses.

Impulse Sewing

I caught a vapor and made this skirt. The fabric is some wild stuff that probably went for drapes at a museum or hotel. It is just that outsized, crewel wool embroidery on what seems to be a loosely woven cotton. It has been in the stash sediment for perhaps 12 years. I never knew what to do with it, didn't have that much to work with, yet I couldn't throw it out. The story of the fabric addict. Anyway, when the vapor hit, I knew. Skirt. Have been thinking of outré skirts lately and hope to explore more along this vein. This is my first go at it.

I used my skirt sloper, overlapping the side seams of front and back pattern. There's only a back seam and I lined that up with the selvage. I put in an invisible zip. Because the embroidered parts are so very dense in places, I made all the fitting darts wherever I could. They are not centered, some are squeezed together, of all different sizes, I flew fast in the face of whatever the books tell you to do. It took me back to my sewing for Barbie days, when we wrapped the cloth around our Barbies, cut away what we didn't want, took it off and sewed it up. Such a liberating experience!

There's a name for that… what IS it?

Why'd I go there?

Because I knew that if anyone looks at this skirt at all, they are only going to see these gargantuan flowers.

The fabric has to be some home dec stuff because the crewel embroidery is quite scratchy. Drapes don't get a lot of rubbing I guess. I lined this, putting the lining together in the usual way, side seams balances darts. I used another, plaid home dec scrap to make the narrow waistband (thank you Margaret!). It's green.

If I made this again I'd take it up more to fit the waist. I tried it on Looshilala, bless her, because I hate trying on anything, but this didn't take account of the squeeze effect of pantyhose.

Cost: $0.ºº, the fabric was practically a dumpster dive, another reason to be totally cavalier with the project. ¡Bwahaha-haha!

Mini Wardrobe

So I started with this blouse from Ottobre Woman 5/2007. I like this issue a lot.

Having made Ottobre tops before, I've come up hard against the truth: they are drafted for a taller woman than I am. It says so right in the magazine: she is 5ft. 6in give or take. I'm 5ft.4in. I used my recently re-done sloper to figure out where the differences were with a simple pattern.



The personal sloper lines are shown in black. The two places I lined up the patterns are the neck/shoulder point and the waistline. The distance between the shoulder and underarms are far apart. It was the same with the back pattern piece. I began to see what made the previous garments so uncomfortable once they were made up… after I'd checked the circumferences and matched them up. As drafted, this extra length in the upper chest made the blouses restrict arm movement. The collar bands and collars were also strangely too long! It was frustrating.



You can see the difference in the Ottobre sleeve outline (Orange) and the sleeve cap I drafted from the front and back sloper armholes as is done in the Mrs. Stylebook pattern magazines. After this step, I slashed the sleeve up the middle and spread it to give me 2in. more room in the bicep.

You can see the blouse on me at Pattern Review Back to the sewing machine.

I've been looking to replace the go-to black nylon purse I was not clever enough to buy two of when I had the chance. I bought it at the 99¢ store; that's just how devoted to fashion I am. It's main attraction is that it is not too big. I don't want a purse that wears me or that I have to fumble around in to find things. I thought I'd found in Walmart (sorry to drop names) a cute replacement with rainbow polka dots but it would not accommodate a wallet, keys, sketchbook and pens, cell phone and lip balm. That's when I discovered yet another thing that has vaulted onto the list of things up with I can no longer put: Purses with Black Linings. I can't see into a black purse that's deeper than six inches.

Butterick 4147 has the selling point that I could see myself using each of the bags included. I made view E, a design I've been curious about. I think it is made to stay on the shoulder better than just a straight strap. Constantly hitching something into place (like a shoulder strap) is another thing on the aforementioned list.

I used a home dec suede cloth. Found it on line, on sale, I no longer remember where. I liked that there was a pocket to hold cell phone or iPod on the strap. It can also be worn across the body.

For a good portion of the sewing, I marched my sewing machine along turning the wheel by hand. The fabric is thick to begin with and sewing through three or four layers of it, interfaced, was not going to happen quickly. My machine has a device that makes it stop dead in it's tracks when it encounters to too much to sew through. I was using a size 110 needle, thinking that's what upholstery fabric called for. It was a little easier with a smaller, size 90 needle but sewing slowly is the answer here. This fabric is dense and not easily punched through. I made the stitch length longer and when topstitching was called for, longer still. I used gold, top stitching thread used for blue jeans on top, regular gold colored thread in the bobbin.

For the lining, you're asked to use the same pattern pieces as for the front, back and sides. What I used was more home dec, a yellow and white striped remnant.

Here you can see the extra pocket I added. I knew there would be a problem using another sturdy fabric for the lining, how could it fit inside the bag if the pieces were the same size? That was an issue, and unless the bag is turned inside out, the lining bunches up to fit. Another thing to consider is there are some tightly curved corners in this pattern, too tight to press flat. I trimmed them and mashed them a bit with the iron but the fit between lining and bag wouldn't be satisfactory if this were a jacket. When I first put some items in the bag then pulled them out, the lining came along with so I did some back stitching down one long seam opposite the zipper, feeling for the suede cloth seam allowance underneath the lining. I continued this stitching along the bottom seam line as well. Now it stays inside.
Here's an example of one tight corner, this is the main part of the shoulder strap, it has to be smooth here. With the difficulty of sewing on the interfaced suede cloth and the narrow radius of this turn, I stopped and marked the stitching line. This was also the place to go slowly. Another method would have been to baste along the seam and then sew.

Two 12" zippers and two 1" D-rings are all the hardware necessary. For you purse mavens out there I stumbled on a new trimming store in the garment district. Botani Trimming inc. I do mean new, it looked like they were busy filling hundreds of little drawers when I showed up. They have a large selection of much nicer D-rings than I was interested in as well as all kinds of zippers and buttons.

The pocket flap closes with Velcro but maybe I'll add this Sculpey button. I'll try the messenger bag next.

It's a Housedress!

Thanks to my dear Madeline for this wacky fabric, of indeterminate vintage (1970's?) I used to test New Look 6863.

It worked for me. It has become easier for me to think through making new patterns from my sloper than to take a pattern out of the envelope and pin it down, wrestling with it to correspond to the sloper, figuring out, with the multiple sizes where seam lines are, etc. This is a pattern it would have been simple to just copy but I want to have the skill to alter a pattern as an option. I referred to Nancy Zieman's "Pattern Fitting with Confidence", which re-states material from "The Sew/ Fit Manual, A guide to making patterns fit by pivoting and sliding".

I started by comparing my sloper to the pattern. I lined them up from first the shoulder then the waistline. I decided to use the center front waistline to start my adjustments. I'm 5'4" and that 1 1/2" to 2" difference between me and the pattern companies' models isn't all in the legs. Some of it is in the shoulder area, from nape of neck to under arm. It could also be from under arm to back waist. I think it makes a difference. Things hang from the shoulders but the armholes are anchor points, garment length must be accurate there. It wouldn't do to use that lengthen/shorten tuck positioned in the bodice under the armhole if the discrepancy isn't there. Can you picture the dress with too deep armholes, keeping you from raising your arms, that has you always tugging the waistline into place because you compared your back waist length to the pattern's and shortened it? I think I made that dress___ more than once. This problem would be more pronounced in something with a waistline seam, not this dress.

Looking at the pattern, I cut a size 14 at the shoulders, extending to size 16 directly under the arms tapering out to add about 1 1/2"at each side seam for a total of 3" more width at the hemline. I also added 1/2" to the front waist length alone after I compared my front neck to waist length to the pattern's, making allowance for a C cup.

I traced another sleeve, making it elbow length. In the sleeve cap area between the notches, I followed the size 14 line, extending at the underarm to size 16. If you don't do this, the armhole of the bodice will be larger than the sleeve cap. When I sew this again I'll shorten the sleeves, the length was awkward (you notice I'd already started folding them up) and giving myself a little more ease in the sleeve width. My fabric wasn't particularly stretchy. When it's hot enough to wear this light weight knit, I don't want to feel anything on my arms.

I added the pockets without the drawstring and added 3" length at the hem. I've lived through miniskirts__twice, which is as much as any sane woman ought countenance in my not at all humble opinion. I can't say what men should be permitted when it comes to miniskirts.

On Pattern Review, Sheila457 inspired me to make this dress. Do check out her review here. She uses a beautiful border print that shows this dress doesn't have to be a housedress at all. She also has notes on the neckline construction related to the stretchiness of your fabric choice.

I put this little bit of turquoise rick-rack at the neck here for no good reason other than it matched. I also included the little ties in back which nailed the it into the housedress category. That house dresses are marked by cuteness confuses me because there is nothing cute about housewifery that I've encountered, nothing.

O Hai!

Somehow I spun off the bloggerly merry go round there for awhile. It gave me a chance to re-think a thing or two or three or four. One thing I re-thunk was separating the Home Entertainment blog from the Anna Rich Illustration site. We shall see how it goes. Not knitting much, waiting to start a knit-along with my sister, working on another pair of incredibly tedious green socks for DH. What is it with green socks? Here is where I'll expand to some good purpose on the sewing and knitting and fiber foolishness I that constitutes my___well, home entertainment.