Simplicity 99 cents sale!

Just could not resist the Simplicity $.99 sale.  Here are my Simplicity $.99 patterns.

I also took advantage of the OOP Sale at BMV two weeks ago.

It’s a Dress

I will say that the dress is complete except for hemming and stitching down the facings, and adding hook and eye.

I made many fitting adjustments to this dress; I am glad that the dress had so many darts as this aided in the ability to make adjustments in numerous areas.  There are front and back neck darts, side bust dart, front and back bodice waist darts, and front and back skirt waist darts.

I think the pattern runs a little large and then I used some larger sizing than probably I needed to.  Nonetheless, I now have a good fit.  I did not take photos of me wearing the dress, not a day for me to do that.

Here is shot of the front and back of the dress on a hanger:

I also attached the snaps to the KS Jacket using Snap Source Snap Tool Setter.

And parting shots of the patterns I purchased yesterday at the Cynthia Guffey sewing event sponsored by our local ASG.

Checking in

The front darts have been sewn into the jacket front and jacket lining.  The dart was created due to the FBA made and I decided to incorporate the dart into the design.  I had real issue with getting the darts marked on the fabric and then getting them sewn going in the same direction.  A rookie mistake that I should not be making.  Both front darts now match.  And that is where I left the jacket on Sunday evening and have not touched it since.

Monday, I went to our local JoAnn's to check out what is left at the store.  The store will be relocating to another location and claims to be moving into a larger store.  The store they were in was large, IMHO, and was always understocked looking.  Hope the relocation will be truly be an improvement.  I wanted to get some sewing notions and marking paper.  I ordered some marking paper from Create For Less but thought it would not hurt to check locally as well; JoAnn's being the only local source at this time.

There is hardly anything left in the old store and as far as I can tell, they are not replenishing until they open the new store in APRIL!  The old store is bound to close before the new is ready as there is hardly anything left in the store including patterns.

Speaking of patterns they are running a huge sale with McCall's and Butterick selling for 4 for $2, and Vogue/Burda/Simplicity selling for $1.99.  Being a patternaholic I took advantage of the price and purchased a few patterns.  There were a few that were on my list of patterns to buy.  Some were patterns that were discontinued some time back, at least I don't see them on the BMV websites.

I am feeling the urge to start sewing for spring and have a few tops I want to make that will work for transitioning from winter to spring.  More later.

Recent pattern purchases

I took advantage of a recent Club BMV sale and purchased a couple of patterns, like I don't have a million already.  I purchased two Butterick dress patterns.  Also I purchased a Vogue Sandra Betzina pattern.

At a local retail store I saw similar tops to the SB pattern.  There seems to be a trend toward tops with sleeve shirring and pleating.

I have lost my sewing mojo for some reason.  This work week has been trying to say the least.  Plus I have had car issues making my after work life a challenge so when I get home I am not motivated to do much in the way of sewing.

Later.

Is it me? Am I not marching to the same beat?

I am NOT getting excited about the new fall patterns I have seen at McCall's and Vogue.  Maybe I am just not in the mood to give up summer.  But I think what I have seen so far looks like everything I have been seeing for quite some time now.

Having said that I did buy one of the McCall's fall patterns-this dress.  I did see a review for a knit top on another blog and on pattern review that interest me but not one of the fall line up patterns.  I also bought a couple of Simplicity patterns several weeks ago-this one.  I also purchased  this pattern but again I don't really see it as a fall pattern.

I am sure there will be more to come; I definitely hope so.  I notice that Butterick has not promoted their fall  line up so maybe something to look forward to.

McCall's Top 5977

Well I actually took a few moments to start on this top this evening. DH had to work late and I traveled to outlying facilities today so I spent a lot of time on the road today. So when I got home I heated the oven and put two Cornish hens on to bake.

I then decided to take a few moments and pinned in the darts. I then sewed them and had to stop to go work on the rest of the dinner. Mind you it was probably 10 minutes of time, but that is all I have been able to work into my life this week. I see the weekend coming up!!!!

Also I just realized Blogger has a new feature and you can add pages (up to 10) to your blog. I added a page called Patterns for Sale. (See right side upper link) I am continuing to spring clean my pattern stash. I have had these posted on Pattern Review. I have sold a few, so if interested drop me a note. I will be adding more.

More patterns for sale

I posted a classified on Pattern Reviews for some additional patterns for sale. I am continuing to clean out my pattern collection. The Vogue and Simplicity patterns are $3.50 each and this includes shipping within US; shipping to Canada I need to add $1.25 due to extra cost. There are three independent patterns for sale as well, those are $6.50 each and this too includes shipping except for Canada, I will add another $1.25. You can go here to see what I have for sale in case you might be interested.

I found my sewing room!

I made it into the sewing room after dinner last night. Progress to date:

Serger is set up for the Simplicity blouse. Sewing machine is threaded and bobbin wound.

McCall's shirt pattern has been adjusted with the fitting changes needed:
Swayback adjustment
Narrow upper back adjustment
Forward shoulder adjustment
Full bust adjustment

Will need to shorten sleeves as usual. So my fabric will be cut today. I will get these finished so I can wear the ensemble before fall!!!

Off to my sewing room.

Sewing on my mind

I am almost finished with the skirt. I attached the facings last night. All that is left to do is hem the skirt. I am racking my brain trying to determine what kind of blouse/top to make to go with this skirt. I have the fabric; I just can't make the final decision.

I have another skirt cut out and that will or should be a piece of cake to sew up.

My Vogue patterns came today!!!

Response to recent comments

Gwen asked what I meant by "EOS fabric". That is my short hand for Emma One Sock. An online fabric store out of Pennsylvania, owned and operated by Linda Podietz. (I apologize to Linda as I may have spelled her last name incorrectly.) She offers a very nice range of fabrics and customer services is superb.

Miss Linda enquired about what patterns I ordered from Vogue this AM. Here you go

All photos above courtesy of Vogue Patterns website.

On Wednesday I took advantage of another Club BMV offering and ordered these McCall's patterns:

All photos courtesy of McCall's Patterns website.

Rambling thoughts!

Tomorrow will be my Friday! Yeah. This has been a heck of a week. We have been moving our offices as our building project is 2/3 complete. I moved into another office this week and it has been just a tad crazy. My office set up is complete and today seemed more like a real work day.

I have not had any time to complete my dress. Really not much more to do and when that is the case, I can't seem to get or to make the time to complete the task.

I have had some great inspiration reviewing blogs during lunch time browsing. I saw this great looking dress the other day in the window of a local shop and of course my first thought was I can make that!

Below is one of the two KS patterns I purchased while in Richmond. The teal top is similar to a knit top I saw in Talbot's. I think I will make a couple of these to wear with skirts and pants. I even have some knit similar to the teal color of this top.

Richmond Trip

I love Richmond. The more I travel here for business, the more places I find to go after meetings.

Last night I went to Hancock fabrics on Midlothian Turnpike. I found some black crepe fabric to become a dress using the recent Simplicity pattern. They sell KS patterns, so purchased two of them. They also sell DVD's and I purchased two of the Palmer/Pletsch DVD's. I then had dinner at a new Chinese restaurant in the same strip center. It was the best Chinese I have eaten in a long time. They were having a grand opening and I truly hope they do well as I plan to eat there again when next I am in town.

Tonight I went to a mall called Short Pump Town Center which is a suburb of Richmond or it is to me. They have Nordstrom's, Dillards, J Crew, J Jill, Chico's etc. All of the stores we do not have in Roanoke. I was able to acquire two Kasper three piece suits on sale for $89.00 each. In RTW and in petite sizes, Kasper is the best fitting garments on me. They were regularly priced at $280. I am doing my part obviously for stimulating the economy. I will get tired of the suits before I will ever wear them out.

The great part about this shopping adventure was the window shopping. I saw so many sleeveless blouses with ruffles just like this and this. Plus numerous other garments similar to numerous other patterns in BWOF.

Time to shut down now, early meeting tomorrow. Then on the road back to Roanoke. Weekend is in sight.

New Fabric, New Patterns and Few more sewing minutes

I ordered a 'gowchass" knit fabric from Gorgeous Fabrics. Of course I don't have availability to a camera at the moments so you will have to be patient and wait. But it is truly lovely, exceeded my expectation.

I also got two new patterns this week. They are from an independent pattern maker called Colette. Her patterns come in a little booklet and I am looking forward to trying both patterns. I ordered "Macaroon" and "Parfait". Both are cute dresses. I want to try the Macaroon pattern first.

I sewed a little more on my knit cardigan this AM. I had a doctor's appointment so had a little extra time this morning to attach the collar to the back neckline and to topstitch in place. I then pinned the side seams to try on. I think it fit well. I unpinned the side seam and then pinned the sleeves in place to sew them next. Slow but steady.

No Sewing Going On Here

This work week has been crazy! Time at work is non-stop; meetings, reports, spreadsheets, more meetings. Today I had to have a mammogram and then the afternoon was my first physical therapy session regarding my left knee. In between was work.

DH fixed us dinner tonight and I was just too tired to go to the sewing room to begin pinning up the hem in my dress. I am sitting in my chair with laptop writing this.

I did receive a new pattern in the mail today from an independent pattern designer. I think this tee has great potential and I saw a tutorial the designer developed with a neat modification to this tee pattern, adding a ruffle insert in the center.

I am putting myself on a pattern diet as I have purchased quite a few in the past few months. I am also planning a pattern sale soon. I need to scan or shoot photos of the patterns I have set aside. More about this later.

Trip to Richmond

I traveled to Richmond, VA on Thursday to attend a business meeting and stayed over as the meeting would continue to the following day. We all went to dinner at a place called Crab Louie's. Great food and great service.

When traveling to Richmond, I had to get to the Midlothian Turnpike. As I am heading down the road, I spot a Hancock's Fabric store. Fortunately I was able to stop at the store when I was heading out of town. I did find some nice fabric but left it all at the store. It was nice but was not jumping of the shelf into my hands. I was able to pick up a Simplicity pattern and three Kwik Sew patterns. More on those later. Since the closing of the Hancock's here, I had not been in one in almost two years.

This was a pretty good size store. I wish I had had more time to shop. I had another commitment that evening so needed to get on the road.

Deliveries

Well I did not do any sewing today! The weather was gorgeous today-low 70's. DH and I decided to go motorcycle riding and it was a perfect day for that. We then went to Outback for dinner.




Upon returning home, I checked the mailbox and found two more patterns I ordered from BMV. These are Butterick patterns and they had a sale earlier this week. So did Vogue and yes I ordered three patterns from them.



Here are the two Butterick patterns I ordered.

This is a dress for knit fabric-either Double Knit or Ponte Knit. Yesterday I received my fabric order from Fabric.com and part of the order included two yards of Ponte Knit in Navy. Not sure if that is enough to make either dress, but will check that out tomorrow.

This skirt pattern I ordered after seeing Erica B's gorgeous skirt she made using this pattern. A great looking skirt and I decided I needed to make this one also.

I have one more snap to sew on the dress that is taking way too long to complete. Once that is done I plan to decide which of numerous projects I have going on in my head to start on tomorrow. Good thing for me is that Monday is a holiday so sewing is the plan for the day.

Another part of the journey

As many of you know the Vogue 1026 dress was to be my next project. However the pattern sizes were all wrong. I now have the correct pattern size and that dress will become part of this current sewing journey. The jacket from Simplicity will be worn with this dress also.

I had debated whether I would go ahead and pin fit this pattern making necessary adjustments before starting to sew the other two items. I want to get a start on the sewing so will put this on my pattern cutting/fitting to do during the week list. Given my current work status this will probably be more thinking than doing. We shall see.

Off to sew now, more later.

Simplicity dress fitting

Last night after dinner, I spent more time in my sewing room instead of at the computer. I pin fitted the Simplicity dress pattern. My usual fitting adjustments will be needed, those being

1. FSA-forward shoulder adjustment
2. Swayback
3. FBA-full bust adjustment
4. Front and back tuck in upper chest
5. Shortening the dress length for a better look for my shorter height

I made adjustments 1 and 2 above last night. I am trying to determine how I want to do the FBA. This is a princess seam type dress and many times I use Sandra Betzina's princess seam FBA technique.

Of note about this pattern. The finished measurements noted on the pattern side front piece has an error. They note the waist measurements correctly as they did with the hip measurements, but the descriptive-Waist and Hip are reversed. Thus on the pattern piece,at the waist line, they give you various waist finished measurements but have labeled it Hip. For the hip they labeled it waist. It is apparent when you read the measurements.

Tonight I have to work late and attend our agency's board meeting thus no sewing related work this evening.

Did you hear this sound-AAAGGGGHHHH!

Yes, this was the sound I made after my last post as I headed back to the sewing room to start on Vogue 1026, Badgley Mischka dress. That horrible sound referenced above was because I took the pattern out of the pattern envelope, started unfolding the pattern and when looking at the front piece with the finished bust measurements printed on it, saw that the bust size was way to small. I then discovered I had purchased the wrong size pattern!!!!

Now I am all for pattern adjusting to get the right fit but this would require a total remake. So hopefully I can return the pattern to JoAnn's and exchange for the correct size. Thank goodness I had not taken scissors to paper! I acquired this pattern for $3.99 during their recent Vogue sale. I cannot believe I did not catch this before purchasing the pattern!!! AAGGGHHHH!

Purchase from JoAnn's

So, I did not get enough patterns on sale through BMV! I went to JoAnn's on Friday to get some thread and a few other notions. Vogue patterns-$3.99 better than the BMV offering. So here are two other patterns I purchased.

Of course, I knew I was also going to look for this pattern. I fell in love with Erica B's yellow top that she was wearing with her new Nubuck jacket that she made. You can see her top and review here.

While at JoAnn's I actually found and fell in love with some fabulous fabric. For me to find fabulous fabric at our local JoAnn's is a great phenomenon. Maybe since they combined two into one, we may see better fabric. Not all JoAnn's are created equal. I have found great fabrics at some and not much in others. I plan to make a run tomorrow to acquire at least three of the six fabrics I liked. One will be the Badgley Mischka above and the others may become the Simplicity top and jacket.