A Shiny New Completed Garment! - Gather Kits Mortmain

Finally a completed garment that's not a Granville shirt! This month has been busy busy busy and i'm not quite sure where it went to be honest the last few days weeks I think I must have been in some kind of time warp!

 

We were invited to the wedding of our friends down in Dumfries on Saturday and of course that needed a new dress! I wanted a pattern that I had made before so that I wasn't going into this task completely blind and also wanted a dress that could be worn after the wedding for general wearing so knew that I didn't want something too fancy or too dull.

Thankfully my rearranging of the house has unearthed most of my patterns and the mortmain dress was fairly near the top - perfect! Then quite out of the blue, Amanda at the sewcial studio contacted me to see if there was some fabric that I would like from her range at her studios new premises.

The fabric which I chose was a beautiful red printed Josephine Kimberling cotton which is rather heavier than expected however as the weather sudenly turned cold today that is no bad thing! The fabric almost feels like a flannel, but not quite. The fabric is still available on her site here.

The sewcial studio is based in Tamworth in Staffordshire, England. I don't profess to be an expert in English geography however (there seem to be a number of geocaches around and) it is really near the M6 and a number of rail stations so really easy to get to their workshops if you so wish. They are currently running a number of lampshade and finding your way about your sewing machine and overlocker workshops. I* also have it on good authority that mid november they are holding advent calendar workshops :-)

So to the dress. I performed my now standard FBA and found that the fit was almost spot on. Two small problems were that the darts are TOO DAMN LONG. I should have realised when I was sewing them up that they would be having a pointy party right up there on my chest but oh well. The other issue I had was the fact that I forgot to account for that sway back adjustment that I always make. Theres not a huge amount of extra length but enough to make it noticeable. The skirt again was winged - 24 pleats were made each about 3.5 cm in width. some were slightly more some were slightly less and by slightly I mean like a mm! I used the full width of the fabric for the skirt and cut to around 60 cm this length is a touch too long but ill not make the mistake of omitting seam and he allowances again. the finished skirt length ended just where I wanted it to.

So all in all a really nice dress IMO and Thanks so much Amanda for letting me try your fabric :-). Also the grand operning of the new store was yesterday adn it seemed like a great time was had by all!

Take Care all

Jen xx

Completed: Another Camberie

This was a dress that was never meant to be a dress!

The other week I was digging through the large bag which has become my leftover fabric dumping ground to see if there was any way in which I could reduce its size and get some use out of something! Well what I found turned out to be the first ever muslin of my emery bodice and some lovely floral poplin from my first ever cambie. Two pieces which I reckoned had potential to be saved from the bag of doom! There was a good amount of fabric left from the cambie but in a strange L shape so my options were very limited - there certainly wasn't enough for a full gathered or pleated skirt and definitely not enough for a full dress!

I knew that one option that would work with the piece of fabric I had would be a pencil type skirt and I reckoned that with some coaxing I could fix up the bodice muslin and make a pretty summer dress. The initial muslin had been made up using black thread and a purple zip crudely affixed at the back. an hour and a half later the bodice had been resewn, re darted and the zip had been removed. The back neckline darts aren't perfect but I cant see them so it works for me :-) I also decided that I would try another exposed zipper. A feature that I really like right now.

For the skirt I revisited a favorite pattern - the sewaholic cambie. (I'm pondering a few changes for my next bodice, I love that top but the area under the bust could do with some curved darts methinks) I have never tried the variation A skirt and it looked like it would fit perfectly on the remaining fabric. I cut a size 10 based on the waist measurement, however it quickly became apparent that I could have made up the 8.

There are a few things wrong with the dress - most apparently those awful bust darts - more time and care next time I think. There is also a bit of extra fabric making an appearance at the back too. not in the usual place but more of an all over effect...That can easily be fixed with a cardi right!!

Todays outtake!!

I'm not sure exactly if and when I will get round to wearing this dress the fit isn't wonderful and I seem to be carrying a bit of extra weight again. I blame the stresses of moving house and finishing a thesis!

Hopefully everyone is doing well - I hope to catch up on my reading list soon and be back to sewing by the weekend! It feels dead weird to have my machine in a box and doing nothing!

Take Care
Jenn xx

Complete: New Look 6020(2)

Hey guys! Iteration 2 of my New Look 6020 project is now completed :-D read - has been complete for quite some time... haha

I tried a few alterations from the first version that i made and I showed a few quick pictures of this during MMMay week 2 (and week 3) and even then I wasn't convinced that I had made the right changes - now after a ton of wear, I seem to have confirmed that while the changes helped they were not the right ones.

After many an hour trawling through the internets I'm pretty sure I need to size down to a 12 and perform an FBA. This should reduce the excess I'm still feeling in my shoulders and neckline. Also what is with the extra space before the pic below...(what can I say my laptop is pish!)

A lot of the gaping and excess is around the shoulders and the neckline as I cut a 14 based upon the 38.5 inch finished bust measurement. My high bust is a little over 36 inches and that puts me into the size 12 range. Next time I think I'll try the FBA as I have tried a few times recently to OK effect... :-)

This isn't to say that I don't have a wearable dress! It fits so much better than my last attempt and I love the fabric - it was another Mandors purchase and was around £6 per m.

Close up of the fabric

One thing I have decided upon with this version is that I'm happy with the length - previously I had toyed with the idea of making the dress full length but I now know I'm happy with this length.

you can see the excess on the right neckline - it has a weird curve

All in all I think two more iterations and I might have a dress that I'm 100 % happy with...It turned out that with the lack of time I ended up with, I didn't use this pattern for the wedding but I cant wait to make this up again. I love love love the neckline and it's great to have a TNT princess seam bodice! As for that crepe...I have a plan, but need to wait for the cooler weather so sleeves will be functional!

Hope everyone has a great week - 'm off to another festival on friday - the gentleman of the road tour with mumford and sons and primal scream. I'm not necessarily the biggest fan of either bands however looking forward to the break. It's about a two and a half hour drive for us but the scenery is breathtaking! I think this dress may also make an appearance!

Jen xx

Completed: Sewaholic Cambie with a Pleated Skirt

Hello! It seems summer has now come and gone! Well almost. The sun seems to have returned to the clouds... At least I had a dress ready for the summer and conveniently as it turns out - it was the same day as my cousin's wedding!

Sewaholic Cambie Dress

The bodice pattern I used for this dress - as the title suggests is the Cambie by Sewaholic. This is a personal favourite bodice of mine however looking at the fit i think I need to make a few changes. I have already shortened the waistline by a cm or two and for this verison I made a sway back alteration too. Next time I think I will side down the bodice to an 8, perform an FBA, raise the neckline by a few cm and then grade back out to a 10 for the waist, I found that the neckline still gapes a little and I am determined to rectify this!

I think this photo proves we have lived together toooo long!!

In terms of pattern placement I only really agonised over the placement of the CF bodice. I wanted to have the flowers of the print on full display! Because of this I ran slightly over the 2 m of fabric I had and used some scraps from a previous project to use as the back lining and pocket pieces. The fabric was really light so definetely required lining - if only for modesty!

For the skirt I used my now favorite sewing technique - pleats! I substituted the gathered skirt for one width of fabric rectangle for the front and two half width for the sides - maintaining the pocket pieces of course. This brought a whole new meaning to advanced higher maths!!

each pleat was measured out to 4.8 cm

I did experience some overlap of the pleats because the fabric was 160 cm wide.... and I experienced a lot of heartache in ironing them pleats when I took the dress out of the case! This added like an hour to my getting ready time!

So thats about it for this dress. Sadly I ran out of time to make the red crepe dress which I had wanted to but I'm really happy with what resulted! And to finish on a high - who can resist an awesome photo in a beautiful car!

Hope everyone else enjoyed their summer (!)

Jenn xx

Completed: Gather Kits Mortmain

I will be honest - I did a happy dance when this pattern arrived through my letterbox as part of the pattern swap hosted by the monthly stitch - and not least because someone let the postman into the close!! I had been hankering after this pattern for the longest time and finally I could get to work. I had the perfect fabric sourced - a beautiful Amy Butler floral and a zip had been sent as a supplementary gift so I was all set to go on return from my holiday.

Then disaster struck and my plans were blown out of the water. As my grandmother has always been really enthusiastic about my sewing hobby I knew that I wanted to make a dress for the funeral and what better a plan than to make up the dress which has been the source of so much excitement for a woman who meant so much to me?

The fabric I purchased for this new vision of the dress was a dark blue with gold outlined flowers. I saw it and instantly knew that this would be the perfect fabric. It is a kind of hybrid between a lawn and a poplin. I cant decide which! It came in at around £6/m too so - bargain! I couldn't find a zip that I really wanted but I think my second choice works just fine. I had to stitch over the ends of the zipper as it was open ended.

For the bodice and as per my measurements (38:31.5) I made up the size 14. This size worked mostly well for me however for next time I have noted a few small changes.

• take around 1 inch of length out of the back - around 1/2 for a sway back and 1/2 for short back
• make a large bust adjustment of around 1 inch
• make the dress in a heavier fabric - I really want the pleats to stand out
• remember to add my standard pocket piece! (from the cambie)

For the skirt however I went a little off piste... As I was really limited for time I decided to make the pleats up and place them myself based on the width of fabric rather than the slightly narrower pattern pieces. I didn't want to copy off the skirt pieces and carefully copy over all the notches. So i aligned up the side seams and the centre back and front and then divided up the remaining fabric to give me the required number of pleats. I thought it worked well adn is an alteration that I think I will proceed with. I also cut the fabric to a custom length based on the length between my natural waist and knee. Unlike my kim however I remembered seam and hem allowances...

I really hope you like the dress I certainly do and it's one that I enjoy wearing for the sentimental reasons that I have noted. I have really enjoyed indie pattern month over at the monthly stitch and seeing everyones wonderful takes upon all the challenges however really disappointed that I havent been able to complete everything that I had planned. Also I realise that these pics are a bit awful however thats what a fortnight of stress and not sleeping does to you! after seing these I went and relaxed with a facemask and some tea for an hour!

Enjoy your weekend folks make sure to make the most of it!

Jenn xx

Completed: New Look 6020

Hola!
After declaring that I had not much time for sewing, my production seemed to take an upturn! This dress came together relatively quickly once I had a spare few hours to actually sew it! I even managed to get my overlocker overlocking properly again - somehow the left needle thread had worked its way out of the tension disks :-s. oh well sorted it now is :-)

So with both of my machines fully working, making up this dress from scratch was actually a fairly painless experience :-D. Fairly. I want to make a dress for my cousins wedding at the end of June and have decided to use this pattern and make the necessary changes over a number of wearable muslins before making up the final version in some lovely red crepe I bought in Edinburgh fabrics. I'll share each iteration as I learn to get a perfect fit on this one.

The fabric was a 45" wide cotton from Mandors. I realised at the last minute that I didn't actually have any fabric that was appropriate for a first run of the dress so spent ages lurking all the new bolts which have recently appeared. I felt the flowers on this print stood out more than a regular floral.

This pattern called for facings and as I really dislike facings I decided that I would try and fully line this dress - skirt and all.

Partial fail on the white lining here...

For this I just made up two identical dresses. I had to think a bit about the construction order a little but it went together OK. I attached both dresses at the zip and then pressed the other armhole and neckline under by 5/8" and top stitched. Not the neatest finishing ever but the print hides it a bit. Next time round I am going to finish the armholes with a bias binding facing - much less lazy and a far better finish. I might actually just finish this version with a binding. Maybe. I altered the other half's jeans the other night and it wasn't actually all that bad...

I ended up with a fair amount of gape all around the neckline - I think this is something to do with both my requirement for a narrow shoulder adjustment and the fact it may have stretched while under construction as well as I get the inkling that I cut the size too big. (oh well that's why I didn't cut straight into my crepe....) So in the back I added two darts - which turned out a little too narrow and   took out 3/4" length out of the shoulders; on the front I am debating some front darts. I have already taken a wedge out the back paper pattern piece for my next run. Finally I removed quarter of an inch from the back length with another quarter inch marked onto the pattern pieces for next time.

I had no idea how to expression an extreme close up...

One thing that I liked about the dress is it is more like a tea dress than other styles I have tried. This dress sits under my knee and it took a while but I think i'm used to it! I'm kind of feeling the length right now however will no doubt loose some of it for version 2. Or lengthen it the jury is out on full length, I do love a maxi however the wedding is in the South of England....

I  also wore this as my birthday dress the other week (imperfections and all and as a result I'm almost set on trying the size down) - so that is item #2 off my 2015 plan scored off! yay!

Hope your all sewing up a storm :-)

Jen xx

Kompleted: Kim Sewalong Dress

Sorry for the title I couldn't resist.

 

I was sewing along with the Kim sewalong over at the BHL blog and today I would like to share my finished Kim. I actually have two copies of this pattern. I wasn't expecting the Kim dress as part of my kickstarter bundle, so when I saw it on pre-sale I snapped it up. I think something about their decision to stop printing the Georgia dress meant that they substituted Kim. No matter. Whatever happens the spare one will not go to waste!

I Totally added pockets to this dress! - A variation on the emery pockets, sewn into the waistline

The fabric for this dress was bought in the sale at John Lewis and is a Hemingway design which is 100 % cotton and cost around £5 /m I can't remember the exact price (I saw it subsequently in another fabric store for about £12/m so bargain!!). I bought 2 m of this fabric and used only about 1.5 m. I then cut the rest into lots of varying sized squares which I plan on using within a quilt. The other remnants have been set aside for another (still secret) project ;-). I love it when this happens as then it seems like the next project is free!

I made up a muslin of this dress using the wrap skirt around Christmas however was never too happy with the resultant fit. I transferred a few changes onto the pattern pieces however I think I still require more :-(. The muslin was mostly OK - from a few days wear I assessed that the back neckline needed a little more taking in and the straps were a little too long.

Take 2 has resulted in a dress which fitted pretty good until it came to my bust - I removed a wedge the first time which left a still gaping back so then returned and removed a little more. The dress was now an inch too narrow! I unpicked the zip and it now sits on the very edge of the fabric so I'll need to remember this if I make it up again. The tops of the straps were sewn with a 3/4" seam allowance which meant the outcome was a little snug around the back of my shoulder so maybe next time I'll drop the armseye a little? They are however the correct length now. So there's that. I think the sweetheart needs a little bit of a raise too - this isn't an unusual bra for me so the fact you can see the top of the bra suggests that this needs raising a touch. nothing major though.

The straps of this dress are still sitting too wide on my shoulders so thats another reason why you get a great view of my bra. What I'm thinking if I make version 3 is to take some width out of the CF side seams and then add it back in to the side seam of the SF piece. Another method I'm toying with is to try a narrow shoulder adjustment - however I'm not 100 % convinced that this will fix the issue as the base of the arms is still very wide. Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

One other change that I'm toying with making is to make a small sway back adjustment. This adjustment makes sense as taking the length out of the straps has lifted the waistline so that it now sits on my natural waist however seems to dip by the time the seam hits the middle of my back and bags out a little. another slight disclaimer: I made a slight error in cutting my skirt fabric - I measured the length from my waist to my knee and cut this length. Completely omitting seam allowances and hem allowances. Ooops!! So its a Kim Mini really....

So I'm mostly happy :-D however it seems that by the time the fit is 'just so' this will no longer be the Kim dress :-p. This is still very much a wearable dress although I am a bit annoyed at the zip  - it seems to line up ok at the seams however as I always find when I buy poorer quality John Lewis zips I can never get the zip invisible. *Jennifer learn from this*!!!

Did anyone else been taking part in the Kim Sew Along?

Have a good weekend all :-) (I'm currently waiting for my parents to get up so we can go on some advnture in Glasgow somewhere!)

JCS xx

Completed: By Hand London Anna Dress

Back in April last year I backed By Hand London's kickstarter campaign and the other weekend while I felt really ill with my kidney infection I got the best delivery ever: a box full of patterns pins and fabric! This lifted my mood no end as I have been itching to try some of their patterns since last year when I backed them!

Before I got the delivery I had in my mind that I wanted to try the Elizalex dress first, however on a complete whim I picked the Anna pattern out of the box and traced it all out.

Lets talk about the fabric. I picked up this 3 m length of lightweight cotton from a recent trip to Ikea for the pricely sum of £10. The pink parts of the pattern were white before the prewash however a red top somehow made it into the same wash cycle...

Strange sporran esque print!

Due to my measurements I sit just above the finished sizes for a UK 14/ US 10 -so because this is the size I cut for my Kim muslin (and intended on using 1/2 inch seams however managed to use the full 5/8 seam) this is the size that I cut here too. I notionally glanced through the sewalong for the dress and spied that there was a lined version of the dress. I'm not hugely keen on facings so opted for the V-necked lined version of the dress.

The pin showing where the zip lies.

In a bold move, I inserted the zip without really checking if i would require to take the neckline in, however as it is an alteration I make on every garment I brass necked it and took the back neck in by 1.5 inches on either side and the results were perfect!

If you can get past the print the fit is really great

 I really must admit. I get the hype. Before I was a little skeptical over the BHL Anna and weather I actually liked it but this dress is so flattering and the fit is so good straight off the pattern sheets. This dress was initially only going to be a muslin however it initially fit so well I couldn't see it go to waste and there marks the start of the Dylon drama!

I  had a right headache with this fabric and where to place the print, I'm not 100 % sold on the print either. One of the main problems was that lining up wrong on the CF skirt would have left me with a sporran.... I tried a few different placements with the different pattern pieces as I didn't have enough of it to properly match the print. In fact in the end I loved the print so much I went and bought Dylon.

 Print hell this was! The placement and just the overall pattern of the fabric looked plain bad.

No gapey nackline :-D

I realised that because it was a big print with multiple colours that the dye may not take well so tried bleaching it. After two rounds of bleaching the colour of the dress was no different apart from a few faded patches and I had read that bleaching destroys the fibres of the fabric :-(.

However 2 dyes later I have a wearable dress! I finished a little early today so I tried to get some photos in what was left of the light...

I only realised that this has been ongoing for so long when I saw the photos and had had an interim haircut...

An outtake - I think someone came in the close at this point!

I must admit there are a few thngs I would tweak on this dress however nothing ~major. If I make this dress up again I definately will have to take some length out of the skirt - I cut out about an inch after I tried it on and even then took a huge hem. In addition I think i will also take an inch out of the waist - i prefer a slightly more snug fit. The final alteration I will make is to omit the sporran print fabric. I much prefer the black...

Has anyone else made up the Anna with the lining? I really prefer linings over facings I think the finish is so much neater.

Have a good week folks :-)

Jen xx

Completed New Look 6144

You may remember that I made this pattern up about a year ago and the whole construction was riddled with errors as well as a considerable amount of head fuck. All in all this dress took me around 3 weeks to complete.

New Look 6144

So I thought that with another years worth of sewing experience under my belt I would try again!

I had to rake through my previous posts to determine what size I made the last time however they didn't really allude to much. Matching the old pieces against the pattern tissue, I had cut a 12. This time I cut a 14 and removed 1.5 cm of length from the waist and 1 inch from the hem and here's the results.

The fabric I used was a really nice Herringbone 59 inch poly cotton which I picked up from Mandors for £5.99 / m. the pattern suggested 1.6 m but I read the yard requirements like a dufus and now have an extra 60 cm of fabric which I have no idea what to do with! Any ideas? In any case it handles really well and didn't shrink much in the wash/dry.

Close up to see the slight stripe in the fabric

To add a fun twist to the pattern I decided to use some scraps of this snowman fabric for both the front and back facing.I would have a picture, but you know - if the garment I made am having a full blown war with ever surfaces on the blog, I'll link back!

The two half of the Raglan sleeves when laid out adjacent show how deep the dart of the dahlias sleeves should have been.

One thing which became really apparent while preparing the pattern pieces was the extent of the problem in the raglan sleeve of the dahlia. The curve at the top of the sleeve is significant and would make a deep dart in the 1 piece dahlia sleeve. The sleeve problem of Dahlia is one of the reasons I decided to revisit this pattern. I remember these sleeves coming together really easily and couldn't remember how they were constructed. It seems that the sleeves do work well in two piece, I may redraft the sleeves for dahlia based on these and try that one again.

The length of this dress is better too - I don't think I removed too much from the hem length this time

One of the changes I made to the dress was to remove the kickpleat from the back skirt. I ended up removing it the last time and this time after a fewdays wear i'm still not sure that i'm missing it? I think the next time I also need to remove a further inch fron the waist but the current adjustment means the dress sits almost right this was also revealed through a day's wear.

I don't know what happened when sewing the back - it seems to be pulling down?

So all in I think this dress worked OK. I'm not so happy with the pulling at the back or beneath the pleat at the front neckline I think this might need a slight FBA? The back neckline needs brought in a little as per my usual adjustment, but I can live with the back not being perfect. In contrast this dress took me about 8-9 hours including tracing, pinning and cutting as well as using tailors tacks to mark the darts compared with the previous 3 week marathon!

I'm still recovering from a kidney infection that absolutely flored me all of last weekend and the beginning of this week so for me the weekend can't come soon enough - on that note enjoy the rest of the week and heres to a great weekend!

Jen xx