Danvillegirl Sewing Diary

Finally another project completed.  Inserting the sleeves proved to be a real hassle.  The sleeve ease was just to much for this dress.  I ended up trimming abut 1/4 to 3/8 off the sleeve from notch to notch to get it attached appropriately.

I plan to take some photos of the dress today.

My next project is skirts.  I have some white fabric recently purchased from Gorgeous Fabrics and a navy blue that I acquired in October while in Asheville, NC.   I have a few new skirt patterns but I have some patterns that I have made over time that I really like the look and the pattern is perfected at this point.

More later.

I made great progress on this dress this AM.  I love stay/sewcations!  I hope to finish it this afternoon.  I had to take a break to rest my neck and shoulder.I attached the bottom band to the dress.  I then blind hemmed the bottom edge of the band to the dress.  I then attached the lining to the dress at the neckline using this facing attachment technique..  This made for a nice RTW look of lining sewn to zipper.I then stitched the sleeve band to the sleeve and it is now ready for attaching to the dress.Here are photos of the dress in progress.  It definitely needs some pressing after all work is done.  The dress on the hanger looks more like a sack than when on me.  I just noticed this after posting these photos.   Interesting!!  More updates later.

Progress on B5602 slowed down a little yesterday.  There were tweaks to be made both with lining and dress with the waist and side darts.  The waist darts are too long or perhaps I should say they came up to high at the bust area.  The side darts needed tweaking also and they needed to be lengthened and deeper.  All of that is taken care of now. 

The next step is to attach the hem band to the dress at the bottom and to attach sleeve hem band to the sleeve.  Then I will attach the lining to the dress at the neckline, sew lining to zipper; then leaves the sleeves to be inserted.  All in all I am liking how this is shaping up.

Yesterday I wore a dress that I made a year ago and never wore. The fabric was from Vogue Fabrics. I even purchased red shoes to wear with it at that time.  I was not overly pleased with the dress.  The neckline and collar seemed off for me.  Yesterday AM I decided I would wear the dress.

Upon arriving at work, I began getting compliments right away.  I, of course, thanked everyone as they also asked if I had made it.

I think part of the issue for my not wearing it is that it reminds me of a red/white gingham dress worn by little girls, or at least little girls from my memory bank.  It also makes me think of a tablecloth.

One thing that I had not finished with the dress was sewing a red button at the collar.  I have now misplaced that red button.  I decided to use a pin (brooch) from my collection that belonged either to my mother or grandmother.  I even got compliments on that.

I took a few photos with my iPhone before leaving work yesterday morning.  Thus the following are not gre…

I have not kept up with posting my MMM garments worn recently.  Last week I again wore this top, Kwik Sew 3740. But I wore it with a solid black knit skirt that is RTW from Cato's.
I also wore another version of the KS top, this one, with blue pants and blue pumps. I always receive a lot of compliments for both of these tops.
Over the past weekend, I wore this knit top from Butterick.  All of these fabrics were from Fabric.com
I have plans to wear a dress I made in 2011 that I have not worn before and do not have any photos of it to show.  Will post some later.

I made some progress on the dress today.  With my neck and shoulder issue, sewing is slower than molasses.  I have to take some frequent breaks.

I started sewing the back pieces first as I have some concerns with the new dart developed from the FBA I made and decided that I would tackle that later.  I am also not following the instructions for attaching the neckband and lining.  I find that the instructions for this particular pattern for lining is just way too many steps and way to much hand stitching.

I attached the back neckband to the back pieces;I then inserted an invisible zipper.  I had to restitch one side of the zipper as the neckbands did not line up correctly the first time.

The neckband was a lighter weight cotton than the cotton herringbone dress fabric.  I used two layers of the interfacing material to give it more body and bring it closer to the weight of the tangerine fabric.




I also completed the lining fabric and attached the facing neckband to the lining fabric.
The…

The Butterick dress pattern has been fitted and I'm ready to cut out the fabric today. I was so happy to get time to go into the sewing room last night. This allowed me the time to make the final tweaks. Updates later.

I lost my mother a little over 10 years ago.  I miss her very much and so appreciative of all that she gave me over the years, especially her love.  Alzheimer's took her too soon. 

I never experienced Motherhood.  Some times I think it was a loss.  Most of the time though, I think that God had other plans for me and through my work, many of the individuals that we provide vocational training and the like to became my children over the years.

Wishing all who celebrate the day, Happy Mother's Day.

Peek view of recent pattern purchases.  I came pretty close to my plan of not buying patterns for three months, but a sale is a sale.


I also purchased two other Vogue patterns but camera battery was low; will post later.

I have decided to go a different direction with the tangerine fabric.  With the weather pretty much warmer these days, attempting a jacket seems like a waste of time.  I just don’t wear jackets that much during the late spring and into summer.So the fabric is going to become a dress.  This is fabric acquired earlier this year from Gorgeous Fabrics.This is the pattern I will be using:I am going to take the design of using contrasting neck band and welt pockets shown on the black and white dress, and use this on the pink style.  I am not a fan of v-necks on me so not using that look.  Here is the contrasting fabric:I fell in love with this color combo because of a pair of shoes I found on the web; and because that color is found in the dress I just completed.I spent most of the afternoon in the sewing room making fitting adjustments to the Butterick pattern.  Here you can see the FBA that I completed.  I still need to make swayback adjustment and FSA.  With my ongoing neck/shoulder pain…

I wore several items that I made last week for work.  One combo item was made in 2010.  This is one of my go to favorites to wear, a Kwik Sew knit top and Loes Hinses skirt.  It is wash and wear, making it  so easy to maintain.
This is a close up of the cowl neckline.  I also made the sleeves short instead of sleeveless or long as the pattern called for.









Here is shown together with the LH skirt.  Many people when I wear it think it is a one piece dress.  Because of the many colors in the fabric pattern I wear the top with several solid colored skirts and pants.

Another item I wore this week with this McCall's tunic top with black pants and pink kitten heel shoes.
I wish I had taken a photo of the combo I wore but this photo gives you an idea of what the top looks like.  I had several positive comments about the tunic top.

v8799 fully lined and sleeves inserted, a photo by Danvillegirl on Flickr. Vogue 8799 almost complete. I need to hem the dress. I lined and hemmed the sleeves at the same time.

v8799 neckline closeup, a photo by Danvillegirl on Flickr. Close up of the neckline.

v8799 area to tweak, a photo by Danvillegirl on Flickr. This is the area that needs to be tweaked.

This is where I am now with the dress.  I need to take a deeper seam in the front princess seams from below "tummy" down.  Then I can hem and have a new dress completed.  
The lining is sewnReady to attach to dressSleeves to be insertedHem the dressDecide on jacket to make-either the one with this pattern or another one.I am still debating on the jacket.  Either use the one with this pattern or find another suitable one. I am put off somewhat by the elastic in the back of the jacket and perhaps I can work around this.  I like the collar and the sleeves on this jacket.
Some photos later.

On Thursday of last week I wore another garment that I made about a year ago.  This is the dress made from fabric purchased from EOS.  The photo is not a recent one, however.

I signed on to participate in the Me-Made-May 2012 challenge.  I committed to wear at minimum two garments a week that I have made.  On Tuesday, I wore the Style Arc's Emma top as shown here from an earlier post.



Today I will be wearing another garment made last year.  Will post that one later.

The lining is sewnReady to attach to dressSleeves to be insertedHem the dressDecide on jacket to make-either the one with this pattern or another one. I have been sewing in little bites of time.  I wish I had a few hours to sew and hopefully this weekend will provide me that opportunity.