Sunday, April 29, 2012

And sew it goes-Part 2

Yesterday I traveled with my boss to Richmond to attend a memorial service for a long time friend, mentor and colleague.  That is about 5+ hours trip back and forth.  Following the service, several of us ate dinner at a seafood restaurant.  It was a good time to remember the one who has passed on and to have fellowship with others. RIP Cecil MacFarland!

That said, I did not work on my current dress project yesterday.  This AM I completed prepping lining pieces so I can sew them together.  Depending on my neck and shoulder issues plus other household chores I hope to get all sewn together and to attach the lining to the dress today.

I had two additional tweaks to make to the dress which I did complete.  I needed to take a deeper seam through the upper back princess seams and to take deeper seams through the front princess seams starting right  below waist line down to the hemline.  Even looking at the model's dress on the pattern envelope, it looks rather full through that area.  I thought it was just too full for me.  My upper body to waist line is pretty much a size bigger than my bottom half.  Upper chest and shoulder area is smaller than the bust and waist.  As many of us know and have written about, princess seams are great for fitting those areas due to variance in size.

More post later on progress.

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

v8799 Dress in progress,side seams basted

The front and back dress is complete and attached at the shoulders. I basted the side seams for fitting. A few tweaks needed; overall a good fit. Next is to sew the lining and attach.

V8799 Close up front seaming

This is a closer look of the dress' front seams. I think that making this dress in a solid color with topstitching would be a nice design touch also.

v8799 Dress front

v8799 Dress front by Danvillegirl
v8799 Dress front, a photo by Danvillegirl on Flickr.
This is the front of the dress pinned on Alma Marie.

Sunday, April 22, 2012

And sew it goes

I was happy to begin sewing the dress this AM.  All pieces have been serged finished and the fabric is true to dream to work with.  The front unit is complete (photos later).  I have sewn the upper side and lower side back pieces.  Next step is to insert zipper, will use an invisible zipper.  Sewing back pieces together after that and then beginning sewing the lining pieces.

This is proving to be a nice pattern so far.  All pieces fit together appropriately.  And did I say the fabric is a dream to work with!! Love when all goes well when making a new garment.

Updates later.

Friday, April 20, 2012

A minute here, two minutes there

This week has been consumed with work and physical therapy.  I have been having issues with neck and shoulder, going to PT three times a week and I am getting better.  Sometimes though it feels like torture.

I have taken time a few days to spend a minute or 20 in my sewing room, trying to get going on actually sewing the dress from V8799.  I still have to cut out a few more lining pieces but serger is prepped and ready to go.  The dress fabric is ravels something fierce so I am serge finishing the edges even though the dress will be lined.

Looking forward to sewing time this weekend.  Updates later.

Sunday, April 15, 2012

V8799 Dress

I pin fitted the pattern this AM and found I needed my usual adjustments:

  • FBA-1.5 inches
  • FSA-5/8 inch
  • Swayback-1/2 inch
  • Reduction of waist to hip by 2 inches
  • 1/4 inch horizontal tuck in upper chest, upper back and sleeve
  • Raised neckline-1 inch
I have almost completed the cutting out of the dress fabric.  Have to then cut out the lining fabric.  I am lining in white.  For the jacket with only close by resource being JoAnn Fabrics, I ended up buying the lining in pink that matches the pink color in the dress.  There was no orange or tangerine lining fabric to be found.  I may look online as it will take me a little time to make the dress and by then lining may be shipped from some source.

I was looking online for some tangerine colored shoes and white as well. Neither color exists in my shoe collection at this time.

Update later.  Off to cook some steaks on the grill.


Friday, April 13, 2012

Next up-jacket and dress

I fell in like with Vogue 8799 when new spring patterns were introduced.  As any good Club BMV member would do, I waited for a sale and purchased this pattern.  I have not made a jacket since the faux sherpa jacket this past winter. Thus making this jacket will be a new adventure.  I also plan to make the dress as well; this too will be an interesting journey as well

After arriving home this evening and having some free time, I visited the sewing room to look at knit fabrics and patterns thinking I would make one more top for the Starting at the Top sew along.  I just was not feeling the love for any of my knit fabrics that I have in the sewing room.

I was feeling the love for several woven fabrics and decided that I was going to start to work on making some other items.  This pattern was laying on the top of a stack of patterns and that led me to finding the recent "tangerine" cotton herringbone fabric I recently purchased from Gorgeous Fabrics.  This will be the jacket.



This is fabric I purchased in 2011 from Sawyer Brook and the orange is close match to the jacket fabric.  This is a woven cotton with a raised pattern.  This will be the dress.

The back of the pattern envelope states this is an unlined jacket nor does it reference that the dress, top, pants or skirt are lined.  However the pattern pieces clearly states how many pieces to cut of fabric and lining.  This was unexpected so I will be going through my lining fabric to see if I have the appropriate lining or do I need to purchase tomorrow.

I have cut around the pattern pieces, but have not begun the pattern fitting and measuring yet.  I have worked up an appetite so decided it was time to fix a small dinner for me.  More updates later.

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

V8669

I am participating in "Starting at the Top" sew along.  I completed my third version of this top yesterday.  It was a sewing vacation day.  I was bound and determined to complete it before the noon hour and I did!  It is easy to do that when you sew something you have sewn previously.

This time I changed the 3/4 sleeves to shorten sleeves. I even decided not to hem the sleeves as I see unfinished edges on numerous tops in RTW.  I did hem the top though using my coverstitch machine.

I love the drape of this neckline.  My next version I may change the gathers at the shoulders to pleats and see how that looks.  Fabric is from Fabric.com.  It was not a fiddly knit to sew or work with; that is always a good thing.

Here I am wearing the top tucked in:

















I am wearing it untucked here.  I cut out quite a bit of fullness that I had in the other two tops.  I removed 1inch from waist to hip on the back piece and 1.5 inches on the front from waist to hip.  I like it much better this way.
I am wearing my new Vince Camuto black patent open toe heels I purchased from Nordstroms a few weeks ago.















While posing for these photos I also took photos of the completed Emma top also.  Now that this is complete and I have worked through the neckline gathers, I will make another top soon.


Monday, April 09, 2012

Emma Top complete

The StyleArc Emma top is complete.  It was somewhat challenging for a simple enough top.  There are a lot of gathers at the neckline.  Attaching the collar proved to be more difficult than perhaps it should. The collar piece had notches that were to match up on the bodice pieces.  There were no markings on the bodice pieces for the collar to match up to.

I had to just gather the neckline and arrange it until all would fit to the collar.  I then rearrange after basting the collar twice to get the gathers arranged more attractively when I tried it on.  The instructions have you to attach the collar in two steps.  Next time, it will be attached in one as I did the cuffs.

Attaching the cuff to the sleeve gathers went together without much of a hitch.  With the cuff piece, I stitched the short ends together folded in half, serged the edges together and the attached as one piece to the sleeve.  I then pressed and stitched in the ditch to secure the cuff/sleeve edges to lie flat on the wrong side.

My idea is to wear this blouse with a pencil style skirt.  The fabric is very lightweight and should be cool to wear during warmer months.

One thing I did with the collar which is really a mistake was I shortened the length of it by one inch.  I found I need that one inch for the collar to completely cover the neckline area.  It does not look bad but it is intended to fold over that far.  I will change that for the next one.  I already have the fabric picked out for this one as well.

My next project is Vogue 8669, a draped neck top which I recently made.  I am going to use this material that I purchased from Fabric.com.  I am on vacation today so I get to do some more sewing.
I am participating in the "Starting at the Top" sew along sponsored by blogger Faye Lewis.  When you get a moment go visit the site to see what others are sewing.

Saturday, April 07, 2012

Easy gathers

I wish I could say this method was my original idea.  It is not;  I read it about it on several different blogs and seen it in several sewing related books and magazine articles.  It is I think worth repeating and showing because someone may read this and not have tried/heard of it.

After I serged finished all edges of the fabric and began the sewing process for the Emma top, I pulled out some lightweight, gimp thread I have had forever.  I used this mostly to give buttonholes some body when necessary.  This is perfect thread for use on a lightweight fabric like the one  am using for this top.

First you lay the gimp within the seam allowance under the presser foot.
You then select a zigzag stitch.  On my machine, I select a center zigzag stitch and I increase the stitch width to 3.5 and length is on 4.  This worked well because the seam allowance for this pattern is 3/8 inch.  You then stitch over the gimp the length of the area you are going to gather.  Leave a tail of the gimp at the beginning and the end of the stitching.  This tail is what you pull to gather the fabric.
Pull the tail holding the fabric in your other hand and you then can distribute the gathers as you go.  I then pull the tail from the other end so the gathers are between the two ends.

 You can see how the gathers are starting in this photo:
I have a gathering foot for my sewing machine and an actual stitch used to sew gathers, but I never get the right gathers nor control of how the gathers will look.  This is rather easy peasy to do and I like the results.
I used this method on a heavy wool skirt and I used a piece of knitting yarn to do what the gimp does for lightweight fabric.  After all pieces are attached as the pattern calls for, you can then remove the gimp.  For this top, I cut off the tails and left the gimp as it gave the gathers a little more body.

Friday, April 06, 2012

Emma top update

Crazy week so did not post much.  Yesterday was my Friday, and today is the start of a holiday weekend.

I am making progress on the Emma Top and I am hoping to be pleasantly surprised.  This top has a lot of gathers-front and back neckline and even the sleeves at the neckline.  I took some photos of how I am handling the gathering of the fabric and will post those later.

I am off to get a mani/pedi.  More later.

Sunday, April 01, 2012

More progress

All the seams have been serge finished and the sleeves are attached to the front piece.  I am liking the feel of this fabric.  I think it will be very cool wearing during warmer temperatures.

I culled through more patterns to see what other tops I wanted to complete. I am definitely going to make more of the Butterick top with the draped neckline. I washed some of my knit fabrics that I recently purchased to have them ready for some additional tops.

Updates later.

Emma Top

First I am just not happy with the completed Butterick dress.  It just does not feel comfortable to me. I knew when making it that it was described as close fitting and that's the rub.  I am just not the skinny girl I use to be and there are some parts of the dress that is just to clingy for me to feel comfortable with.  I can say I learned some new things about sewing this dress and I also listened to my inner voice about how to sew the pieces together so that it looks for more professional than the loving hands at home look.

I was not going to post this and decided why not show the good, bad and the ugly.  So here it is. 
I plan on donating it to Goodwill as I know someone will be able to wear it or upfasion it if necessary.

I signed onto "starting at the top" that Faye L has set up for the next few weeks; my time in the sewing room yesterday and thus far today is focusing on the Style Arc Emma Top.
I liked this top the first time I saw it on the site and seeing some examples of the top made by others. I recently watched an Oprah show where she interviews Lady Gaga and her mom.  Oprah was wearing similar top though her's was a long sleeve knit  with pleats more so than gathers that you see with this pattern.

I began the pattern fitting process yesterday and have completed many adjustments.  I will be using this fabric.  It was purchased from Fashionista Fabrics earlier this year.  More later.

August Sewing Simplicity 7295

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