The thoughts, sewing projects, and fabric oglings of a dedicated sewist.

What's Up: Success in the Knit/Jersey Laboratory, Skirts, Little Bits Workshop

4/17/12
Greetings!  This last week was a good mix of drafting new patterns AND sewing them into something wearable.  I'm excited to share the things I've made and I'll be posting a new tutorial later in the week.

First: my mad scientist work in the knit/jersey laboratory is starting to pay off.  I've been working on adapting a t-shirt pattern I have (Sihouettes #195) into a cowl neck.  It took three drafts but I finally got it right, at least on paper.  I wanted to wear something new and handmade for a night of cocktails and speaks with my good friend Candice.  Candice is crafty (she's the lovely person who did all the hard work on setting up my blog and she has her own blog over at Candoodles) so I knew that she could appreciate the work!  Here's how cowl neck #1 turned out:



While it took hours and hours of drafting work to figure out the pattern, the top only took 45 minutes to cut out and sew.  I used a metallic steel jersey that I bought on clearance at fabric.com for $2.39 - a small price to pay to feel spectacular at the Green Mill with Candice!  The fabric called for an edgier look, so I finished the hem, sleeves, and neck with a serge stitch to leave them looking a bit raw.  The fabric is black on the wrong side and I like how the black peeks out at the neck.  This is a deep cowl, which I like, but I also wanted to have a short/high cowl neck.  Devon had some friends over for a poker game on Saturday night and I spent my time drafting the pattern for and then sewing up this top:




I wanted these edges to look more finished since the fabric is so pretty, so I turned under and top-stitched the arm and neck and added a band to the hem.  I found this fabric (my best guess is that it is a stretch charmeuse) at the Economy Shop and I got 5 yards of it (60" wide) for $3.50!

I'll be posting a tutorial for the high cowl neck top a bit later this week so come back if you want to DIY.

I had a bit of time on Sunday afternoon so I worked on the Dolman Top with Banded Bottom tutorial from Make It Love It.  Here's how it is supposed to look:

Pinned Image

Cute, huh?  My first effort a few weeks back was too small (I forgot to account for the negative ease in the top I copied):



My second effort is closer but a little too baggy for my taste:



I think I'll cut off the band and try again by making the bottom band wider and snuger.  I'll probably re-do the neck band as well as I think it could be neater.  I do have to say that I LOVE sewing jersey now.  I like working on more challenging projects but it's also fun to make a top in an hour!


During the week I worked on skirts for Bryn and Domenica and I should be able to finish them up this week.  I added a blue band to Bryn's skirt and I like this mix of colors:



For Domenica's skirt I got to draft a pocket and a slim waistband (but still curved - no more rectangles!):



And finally, on Saturday I attended a gathering of crafters in River Forest.  Liita, who owns and runs The Little Bits Workshop, is hosting a Trunk Show for local crafters and artists.  Think Renegade but much smaller in scale (for now) and plenty of parking.  Liita has found a great mix of crafters (many of them local Berwyn-ites) with tons of talent.  I look forward to teaching some classes through the workshop this summer and I'm excited to see what we can do with the trunk show.  I'll post more info as we get closer to the date (May 12th - just in time for Mother's Day!), but you can get a preview here:  Little Bits Trunk Show.

Then to crown the week, I went to the zoo with my brother (in from Seattle) and the girls yesterday.  Look who we saw:




They put all of my efforts at creating some pop to shame!

Up next: I want to finish at least one each of Bryn's and Domenica's skirts this week and get their second skirts done next week.  I also hope to find some pockets of time to make small items for the trunk show.  Wish me luck!
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