Sunday, January 31, 2016

Fabric Diet

I said I would not buy anymore fabric for several months-then I got the urge to try a GirlCharlee Knit Fix so jumped in for the January Knit Fix, which arrived on Wednesday.  I was so sick that day and stayed home from work.  When package arrived I could not get excited enough to open it and did so Friday.

Here are some photos of the knits that arrived in the GirlCharlee bag:



Aztec Knit

Paisley Knit

Blue-black Buffalo Plaid Sweater Knit

Blue-gray floral french terry knit

Another aztec like knit

Fuschia-lavendar-beige geometric knit
 I think I won't try another knit fix for awhile.  There are a few pieces that I like and will definitely sew.  Some of the others I need to give some real thought to as to whether they will become something!

Friday, January 29, 2016

Under the weather

Since all the snow last weekend and digging out from a lot of snow, I also caught the "crud" which is a vicious cold that leaves one with a horrible cough.  I did complete the Simplicity raglan sleeve top. I think my desire to use the red/black/gray/beige/white lace is somewhat doomed.  The faux suede knit fabric has left me feeling that I want wear it much.  It is rather limp.

I have not felt like putting the top on, setting up the tripod to take photos of me wearing it.  I will soon.  I hope to feel somewhat better this weekend and get some sewing in.

I fell off the fabric diet and caved into the Girl Charlee Knitfix for January.  I received my package yesterday.  There are a couple of fabrics that I like; one is in a colorway that I do not wear much and right now none of them are screaming for my attention.  I have not yet taken photos of the fabrics.

I also realized that I had made what was to be a final year end purchase and have not posted those items either.

Here are photos of the Simplicity top on a hanger:

Front with lace overlay
Back view


Friday, January 22, 2016

Snowing and sewing

We are experiencing snow-a lot of snow.  It has been snowing since 7 AM.  I took a PTO day as I did not want to be out in this snow driving a Honda Civic.  Not a good vehicle for heavy snow.

I continue to work on Simplicity top.  The fabric is bear to work with and the pattern has required a considerable amount of tweaking.  I had to take deeper seams in the front sleeve area and then took a deeper seam in the upper back area in the sleeves.

I basted the side seams for fitting and need to take a full one inch seam from the underarm to the bottom of the sleeve.  The sleeves are huge, very wide.  I may yet take out some of the fullness.

I am ready to stitch the neckband to the top.  I wish I had cut the neckband wider as I don't think the neckline is like what I am seeing on the model. That leaves attaching the hip band and hemming the sleeves.

We are hoping we do not lose power as the winds are supposed to pick up in the early morning hours and just hoping that the snow and winds don't bring down power lines. More updates later.

Monday, January 18, 2016

Holiday sewing

This is what I started working on this weekend-Simplicity 1072.

I am using these fabrics.
The red/white/gray/black circles is stretch lace fabric that I purchased from Vogue Fabrics a second time. The first attempt at using it was back in August when I was working on the Paulina Top by Itch to Stitch.  I still plan to remake that top as I used the wrong sizes and this fabric was not quite right for that project.

Fast forward to November/December I ordered the suede-look knit in a cranberry red color from Vogue Fabrics and the stretch lace was still available.  So I ordered more to use with the knit, not really sure what I would make.

I went back and forth over what top to make using the cranberry red knit, thinking I may make another Renfrew top and decided that the lace would not work.  I then looked at other patterns and while reading through blogs or sewing reviews on Pattern Review I came across another version of Simplicity 1072 and decided that this was what I would make.

I am using the stretch lace as an overlay to the knit center piece.  I hand basted the lace to the knit fabric.  Let me say that the suede look knit fabric is clingy and fiddly to work with, adding the lace was challenging.  The hand basting I treated like quilters do when layering base fabric to quilted top fabric.  This was the only way to get the lace laying right and the knit from moving and puckering.

I have sewn the front pieces together requiring some undoing of stitching because of the fiddly knit. I have attached the sleeves which are HUGE-WAY TO WIDE! I suspected that when cutting around the pattern and went down in size.  I normally use a 14 for upper chest and shoulders, should have gone with a 12 as I am having to take a deeper seem at the front where it is attached to the sleeves.  This will help draw up the front area so that the neckline will be better fitted.

I will end up taking out a lot of width with the sleeves.  When you look at the model on the front of the envelope, her sleeves are crunched up and twisted, plus she is holding them close in to her sides.

That is where things were left for the moment.  I have a doctor's appointment this afternoon and a few errands to run in the extremely cold weather we are experiencing.  It was 17 degrees F with wind chill of -4!!!  Too cold for my liking.

More later!

Friday, January 15, 2016

M7262

I wore my new sweater jacket, McCall's 7262.  I had time to take a few photos before going to doctor and work.







This past the wearability test.  It is little on the heavy side but was perfect warmth for today.  By the time I left work, it was raining and I was still comfortable!  I can see another one in a boucle type knit. 



Tuesday, January 12, 2016

Random Prize Winner

I thought I would share my good news with everyone!  As I posted previously I entered two garments in the New to Me Pattern Contest.  One was a Muse cardigan and the other was By Hand London Jacket.

My jacket was selected as the Random Prize Winner. Here is the post at Pattern Review if you are interested.  My first win at PR for a sewing project.  That challenge boosted my sewing mojo and now just need to find a little extra time here and there to sew some other projects.

More later!

Sunday, January 10, 2016

M7262 Complete

Well my first project for 2016 is finally complete.  Truly it has been completed for several days except I had not purchased nor sewn a heavy duty snap to the shoulder and top edge of the underlying front.

I still find myself not letting go of something until complete; thus not moving onto other projects in my queue.  When I do I sometimes end up with UFO's just taking up space and hanging around in the sewing room.  I wanted this complete as I want to wear while temperatures were not so frigid.  This will be a warm knit coat/sweater to wear but not against long periods of time outside when it is 30 degrees.

I have not taken photos yet of me wearing and will do so soon.  Here is views of the front and back hanging.



I like this pattern and considering making again; perhaps using a sweater knit instead of a textured double knit.  The fabric I used will definitely provide some warmth.

I was happy that I had buttons in stash to use----


The placement of the buttonholes and thus the buttons was challenging.  The underlying front piece is attached via a snap at the shoulder seam.  I had to keep pinning it in place to determine where exactly the buttonholes and buttons should fall.  Because of the mixed sizes I used this did somewhat impact buttonhole placement.  I perhaps should have spaced them further apart, yet they work as they are now allowing for the jacket to fall open more for sitting and driving.

My buttonhole stitches on my sewing machine are finicky and not always do the buttonhole programmed to duplicate themselves as they should after programming them for style and size.  Thus I had to remove one buttonhole which was tedious.  The one thing that I did was to use a water solvent material on top of the knit to help the buttonhole stitches not to sink down into the knit fabric. This worked very well. 

I am ready to move onto the next project once I decide what that will be. 

More later.


Saturday, January 02, 2016

First project for 2016!

I started this on December 31 with pin fitting the pattern, making adjustments to it and then I cut out the fabric.  Yesterday I made considerable progress with this and worked on it some this morning.  I ended up with a small but fixable issue with attaching the front band.  I stopped there for a small break and will finish it hopefully today.

The issue is more of my doing than the pattern.  This pattern has lots of ease, the length is very long for my height and the width would be overwhelming also if I used a straight 14.  I used a 14 for the collar, changed to 12 for the shoulders, back to a 14 under the arm to right above the waist line and then tapered to a 12 then to 10 to hemline.  I cut the length off at the size 8 cutting line.  Thus when I cut the front band piece I cut that at the size 10 length not thinking about the collar at size 14.

Instead of stitching both ends of the band at 5/8 I stitched at 3/8 and will have to turn the collar down a tad more than the current fold line.  I think this will work okay as there is a lot of collar length and being short this will I hope also eliminate too much fullness at the back neckline.  Will see.

I am using fabric I acquired from Gorgeous Fabrics-September 2015.  It is a nice textured fabric that originally I was going to make a dress with it but it is beefy and best used for a coat/jacket.
Here is a glimpse of yesterday's progress



Even though I used a 12 for the shoulder width, I ended up shaving off about 3/8 of inch from the shoulder to right above the front and back notches of the bodice.  That was a good fix for me.  Before cutting out the pattern, I reduced the length by 2 inches even though I had cut it to its shortest length. I adjusted the sleeve length as usual by one inch.  There is a fairly deep hem for the sleeves which will allow for other adjustments if needed.

More updates to follow.


Friday, January 01, 2016

Happy New Year!

Wow-2016 has arrived.  Glad to see another year.

I have a birthday in 18 more days!  I will turn 65-What-What???  Yesterday I received only one piece of mail for the last day of the month/year-my Medicare Part A card.  To be honest I have some very mixed feelings about this new milestone.

1-I don't feel that old. I just took a test about relating with millennials and my score was 91%.  This says to me I am still young in some ways.
2-I am glad that I have made it to this age.
3-I am facing retirement in several more years-I not ready to retire yet as there is still some "hunt left in this dog"!
4-I find myself thinking more and more about eliminating "stuff" to plan for that time in the future when DH and I retire.
5-I have many things on my so called "bucket list" I want to do.
6-I do have more aches and pains-some will require more medical attention this year. Otherwise my primary care physician says I am much better at my age than some of his other patients.
7-I don't do resolutions as I have beat myself up when I did not achieve all of them. Perfection is impossible to achieve; so I am working on doing my best and when I don't I need to learn from it and move on.
8- I am working on having more positive conversations with myself-I read recently that individuals have over 70% of negative conversations with themselves.
9-I am planning on having more girl time with long time friends.  None of us are getting younger and we always have a good time together.
10-I plan on enjoying 2016 doing the things I love-like sewing, blogging, reading, and trying new to me dining experiences-just to name a few.

My sewing plans for 2016-

  • Not buying more patterns-this is hard for me.  I have a lot of patterns, a lot!!  I will never sew them all.  I will be selling some or doing another give away-see item 4 above! 
  •  Using more fabric from my stash-I have a lot of that also.  I will probably be selling some of those or doing a giveaway this year.  See item 4 above.
  • I will sew pants.  I stay away from sewing them as I know that getting the fit right will be a challenge and have magnified this in my brain as something to avoid. See item 8 above!  I made culottes which turned out great and plan to make more as they are a form of a skirt and pant.
  • Return to attending ASG meetings with local chapter.  Never made a meeting in 2015!  Either work or family issues got in the way.  Will put it on my calendar to attend.
  • Continue to read more sewing related blogs which always leads to learning more or  improving on sewing techniques.
To end this post, I want to say thank you to all who stop by.  I appreciate your comments and suggestions. I feel like I know so many more of you from your stopping by and it is nice to be connected to people all over the world!  Wishing you all the best for 2016.


August Sewing Simplicity 7295

 I am not doing well as a blogger. I have been working on this project since July 30. Today, I finally finished it. It has been a stop-and-g...