Author Archives: Tracy
Olympia 2017
Mum and I went to Olympia again this year, we went by coach, because of an accident on A13 it took 5hrs to get there, luckily for us we took a packed lunch, the ladies sitting next to us weren’t as fortunate. The coach driver allowed us to stay until closing so we only missed out on about 30 minutes shopping.
This is just a quick post to show off my new stash.
From Bombay fabrics I bought this fabric
They are both clear cut from Fabric Freedom, I have an idea for a dress in the purple and probably a halter neck from the pink/orange.
from Fabric Galore
A Liberty tana lawn ‘baby rainbow pinks’
From Girl Charlee
This is a beautiful Cotton Rayon Spandex blend, I had read about Girl Charlee in various blogs and I must admit I had thought of them as being a bit expensive, some of their fabric is expensive but this was £5 a meter (at show) they were friendly and very helpful.
M Rosenberg and Son
it feels like a cotton Lawn, it has that silky feel to it, I already have this in red but I’m too scared to cut in to it, this is going to be my test version.
These three are all jersey fabric and to be honest if I hadn’t already fallen in love with the last two, I wouldn’t have bought anything from their stall. They seemed more interested in serving their regular customers, and even when I went back later on, with no other customers it was a struggle to get served.
I also bought two more patterns from Sewoverit
Unlike other years I have definite ideas about what I want to make with the fabric I bought.
sewoverit vintage shirt dress
Hello, here is number three in my list for February, the Sew over it Vintage Shirt Dress, the pattern is lovely and very easy to put together, however I was sort of led astray by the gumph in the little booklet and should have gone with my initial thoughts to do a size smaller.
The pattern does give you the finished sizes for bust waist and hips, it also says that the dress had less ease than the big four patterns, looking at them I should have gone with the smaller size, however I am very conscious of ‘design’ ease.
As you can see I changed my mind about the fabric, and you can also see it is a little bit shapeless and that is with taking a extra inch out of the waist.
luckily though before I did my usual 1inch out of the bodice I checked the internet, and discovered that the top piece was quite short anyway, after measuring it I came to the conclusion that it didn’t need to be any shorter.
The instruction booklet was very straight forward and the set in sleeves were some the the easiest I’ve installed. One of the changes I should have made though is a full bicep adjustment, although I can get the dress on I can’t move my arm. The two choices I have is to either make it no/short sleeves or see how much I can get back from the seam.
If I make it again I will make the smaller size do a SBA and widen the sleeves. I’m not sure if the fabric is just a little stiff for this pattern as it makes me think of a coat dress rather than a shirt dress.
At the moment I am toying with taking it apart and making the smaller size. I don’t think that I’ll wear it as is.
next up challenge for March
February round up
I have been stitching up a storm this month, I have managed to get all my goals finished and a couple of bonuses, after finally finishing off the the white plantain, I got the urge to make another two, still with short sleeves and no elbow patches.
I did make a couple of errors on these because all the t-shirt related items I make this month were all on the overlocker and with a 3/8 seam allowance, I didn’t bother checking the instructions, if I had I would have realised it had a 5/8 seam so they are slightly too big.
They have wider neck bands than the previous one as I used the instructions from the raglan t-shirt but I’m quite pleased with them.
so february I managed
Two Monetas
Two Plantains and a Plantain finish
I finished a skirt
the 70s halter neck and shorts
Hey June Lane Raglan
and last of all the vintage shirt dress
Hey June – Lane Raglan
To tell you the truth there isn’t much to say about this, it has a couple of options
Elbow length, 3/4 length, long, or long banded sleeves
Curved or banded hem
A hood
Thumbhole wristbands
Chest pocket
A separate front pattern piece with a built-in full bust adjustment (sizing guidelines are outlined in the pattern)
Needless to say I didn’t need the Full Bust Adjustment 🙂 I used the curved hem and 3/4 length sleeves, this was put together on the overlocker except for the twin needle stitching on the cuffs and hem.
The white fabric was bought from ebay the blue was a t-shirt from Primark.
Raglan sleeves are a doddle to put in, to be fair most t-shirt patterns appear to put their sleeves in flat any way but because the raglan sleeve actually incorporate the shoulders as well they are even easier to put in. Then you do the neck treatment, side seams and hemming took me about 2 hours start to finish.
The one thing I did worry about was the curved hem, but I overlocked it first which brought it in slightly and I ironed it in first. I’m very pleased with it and can see a couple more in my future.
Moneta Dress Mk2
I managed to get in a second Moneta dress this month, this fabric has been in my stash a little while, I think is an eBay buy, it is a slightly heavier t-shirt fabric.
I made this moneta a size smaller on the top, removed 3/4 inch from the length of the top and graded out to the same waist measurement, with the skirt staying the same size.
I feel that this is a better fit.
I lengthened the sleeve again by 2 1/5 inches but used a binding for the neck, I assume because it is a heavier fabric than the last one it was easier to tell the back from the front, while putting it together I had stitched a small square of fabric to both back pieces.
bye for now.
February Projects
We have another bonus project coming up, I changed the fabric I decided on for the sewoverit shirt dress, after cutting it out I had enough left over to cut view 3 shorts and a halter neck top.
I did make a test version on the shorts which fitted perfectly. The shorts though straightforward has no waistband, it has grosgrain ribbon instead, this was as fiddly as putting the elastic in the moneta dress.
Those little folds at the seams were very hard to keep in place as you stitched them down then you fold them over and stitch in place, you then tack them to the seam allowance I’m assuming it is to give a better fit as it will expand over the hips.
I used bias binding on the hems as instructed by the pattern which does give a nice clean finish as you can in the photo above I used my overlocker on the seams.
I removed 1/2 inch from the side seams and shifted the strap over slightly, once the top had been put together I had to remove a further 1/2 inch if I make this again I will have to reduce across the top pattern.
Here is a picture of the outfit with buttons
More soon
Moneta Dress
I’m in two minds about Moneta it is very comfortable and it looks great but it is a pig to put the clear elastic on the skirt and until I put the collar on I wasted a lot of time trying to work out the front from the back.
I bought the fabric from Olympia last year, for some reason I keep thinking it is heavier than it actually is, it is almost t-shirt weight.
I cut a straight size 10, It is what my measurements fell in to but if I make it again, I think I’ll go down a size, it is a bit loose across the chest. The two changes I did make was to lengthen the 3/4 sleeves by another 2 1/2 inches, I measured a dress that I already had to decide on the length and to shorten the bodice by 3/4 inch
Most of the dress was put together on my overlocker, the other problem I had was keeping the seams aligned as they went through the overlocker, so I had a couple of holes that I need to go back and redo.
To be honest one of the problems with the elastic might have been caused by the fact instead of 6mm elastic it was 9mm elastic, I now have the proper elastic so hopefully next time will be easier.
Originally I was just going to have a simple neckline, but with the issue i discovered not being able to tell front from back I decided on a collar, I downloaded the extra collar pack from Colette and picked the tie version, I had now trouble attaching the collar, I wasn’t sure about actually timing it so I made a loop to put both end through.
here are some photos of me wearing it
I can’t decide whether I should wear a belt with it or not.
Sew over it Shirt dress is coming up next, I have changed my mind on the fabric
Bonus finish – Plantain Top Deer and Doe
The Plantain T-Shirt is a free pattern offered by Deer and Doe – this is what they have to say about it:
T-shirt fitted at the shoulders and flaring at the hips, with elbow patches. Short, long and 3/4 sleeves included in the pattern.
I wasn’t sure about elbow patches so I left them off, I started this sometime last year, I had it cut out stitched together with the neckband completed, but for one reason or another I didn’t finish it.
Because I needed to get a twin needle set up in my sewing machine I thought that I would finish this t-shirt, I have a confession I have actually worn this a couple of times even though the hem and cuffs hadn’t been finished.
I’ve stitched the neck binding wrong sides together then folded it over to the front and stitched round again, I find it gives a cleaner finish, obviously it wouldn’t work with a smaller neckline because of the stretching to get over the head.
it does need a good iron, and part of me wishes I’d just left it in the unfinished state, the ridge round the bottom isn’t as bad in person as it seems in this photo.
The fabric is a very light jersey that likes to cling 😦 bought from eBay, if I had seen it in person I might not have bought it but a good fabric for playing with.
Moneta coming up
Project 3 January part 2
Hi, just a quick post to show you the finished version of project no. 3
The model on the packet has buttons down the front of her dress but I’m not sure if this needs it, the other thing it could have is the lowered belt, still not 100% convinced about that either, I don’t think that the fabric needs any other decoration.
Four items finished on time, hopefully this is how the rest of the year will carry on.
Project 4 – January
This is probably the item that is going to cause me the most problems, but to be fair it is going to be my own fault.
For Project 4 I’m going to take this dress
And turn it into this dress
The original dress fitted fine as long as I didn’t want to move my arms or anything practical like that.
I had two attempts at making the top half of the dress, which gave me enough to do the main bit of the front bodice, I needed to do some pattern matching for the straps, I am very please with the result.
I needed to do a bit of patching on the front skirt pieces, luckily it was where it folded under to make the button tab that was short otherwise i would have had to found another plan for the fabric.
I probably should have sized down the top as I needed to take and extra 1/2 inch off the side seems and bring the front seam in an extra 1/4 inch, I’m thinking I might make the shorter version with the shorts and the halter neck so watch this space.
The dress came together very easily and if I had started with a length of fabric, it would only have taken a couple of hour to put together.
I wasn’t sure about its double buttons but I think they look alright you do need the hook and eye at the seam otherwise it gapes.
more later
Musings of a Craft Enthusiast 