Winter retreat and sewing

I attended a Sewing Winter Retreat at the George Washington Hotel in Winchester, VA this past January. What fun to see all of my Northern Virginia sewing friends. It was sponsored by the American Sewing Guild a national organization.
The tops and jacket that I made in the three days I was there were all fitted and cut out prior to the event. I am not a wizard fitting always takes me time as I have many fitting issues.

I like to make jackets. I made one out of upholstery material a while back and it came out really nice. The body of the fabric really suited the patter that was designed to be used in this way. I am talking about McCalls M7288. I made view A this time with the squared off collar.

McCalls M7288

back view

The next project was to make a simple knit T-shirt. I had this Connie Crawford pattern B5215 for a while and I decided to try it. I had to alter the pattern for room in the bust area. I did not have enough fabric for sleeves so I just used a complimentary neutral knit for the sleeves and neckline trim.












 The next knit top used a combination of different fabrics. I bought a "bundle" at a Sewing event from a well know sewer, Rae Cumbie. She often sells off-cuts of projects she has made. I really liked the fabrics so I added the plain purple knit and Viola I had a top. There is a very splashy print fabric that is under the purple section of the top. I didn't get a good picture of it here.

McCalls M7247 back

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Plans for a New Year:Where to go with this Blog?

Have you noticed lately that bloggers are getting much less feedback than lets say two years ago? I have noticed this. I still read all of my favorites and a few more that I am always discovering. Is blogging loosing popularity to twitter? I don't really have the answer for you but I am still blogging. My blog does not raise money for me nor is a career stepping stone, rather it is a public documentation of my hobbies and interests. I like the fact that others can randomly read it and respond to it. That is the purpose in a nutshell. I don't need to be famous or popular or necessarily right about anything just feel the need every once in a while to put my thoughts on my blog. So in the upcoming year I will continue with my hats and sewing as my most frequent posts. I am going to post some updated pictures of what I am wearing as well. I think my style is evolving but to what I am not sure. I just purchased the color theorist's book,"Color Your Style, A Fashion Expert Helps you to pick your colors etc, by David Zyla. He has an interesting way of picking out colors based on the ones found in you skin and eye colors. I think I like this in principle. I have been draped but not always able to find those specific colors. Am continuing to work on my two piece jacket my Chanel inspired boucle wool jacket and a few other unfinished pieces. I am having so much more success with my embroidery machines. Oh and for Christmas I bought a Janome 8900 quilting and sewing machine. I will let you know about it but so far it is amazing. Have a great 2015 my friends!!

Project Runway Allstars inspirations. Could I design a 6 piece wardrobe for myself and sew it??

Project Runway Allstars just finished its season this past Thursday night. Did you watch it??
It got me thinking could I come up with a 6 or 7 or 8 piece wardrobe collection that I could make for myself. If so what would I like to wear. I have so many patterns I cannot sew by the draping method but I can follow and adjust patterns, I am getting better at figuring out alterations for myself.
So I went down to the 'sewing lab' in my basement and pulled out my stash did some measuring and put together an idea board.
 I am not sure how cohesive these pieces will be but I think I am going to give it a shot and try to come up with a spring wardrobe using this method.

I have some interesting African fabric that is a tie dye. I have seen some western style clothing using this fabric pop up lately on some runway shows. I am going to sew this fabric up in some casual flowy wide legged pants and just make an interesting solid knit top to go with them.

The patterns is: Simplicity 1617

The top I am going to sew up is vogue 8792

The short sleeve all one color version.

Another outfit I have planned is to make a sleeveless shirt and walking shorts.
 I want to make the shorts knee length and out of a brown suede type of fabric. The sleeve less shirt will have a basic brown white check body with a complimentary brown print fabric on the shoulder the front placket and collar. I am going to embroider on the back neck placket as well. There was a Threads magazine from 2009 that is the inspirations for this idea.
I will wear this outfit with a brown jacket I made last year and some tie up oxfords.

My biggest challenge will be to make the Cynthia Rowley dress 1607 out of another African print fabric..This dress will have many fitting challenges and I may not be able to actually make it out of the fabric I have in mind but I will at least make a sloper of this pattern. The straps intrigue me.

I need a new "long sleeve white blouse" mine will actually be in an off white as that suits my coloring better. I love the Tuxedo look pleating down the front. I have had this pattern for a while so I am going to make it out of some Egyptian cotton I got at a sewing convention this summer. Simplicity 3789 view C


Another top I want to make out of some very drape caramel linen is Vogue P955 another older pattern. If I can find a picture of this pattern I will post it.
Anyways you get the idea the one thing I wont be doing is making all of these clothes in just 4 days. I don't know how those designers could make all of the clothing like they do in such a short time. I just can't pull that off. Stay tuned my creative juices are flowing,.....

Vogue1036 Jacket Project

Before I cut out my fashion fabric  I am making a muslin of the pattern. I have to say it fits amazingly well. I was prepared to have to make the shoulder adjustments for a square shoulder and a forward shoulder and I didn't have to. There is a whole bunch of room in the shoulders of this jacket. When I read through the directions this jacket has a shoulder header and a shoulder pad. Wow no wonder. I couldn't find any lambs wool for the header at my fabric store so I am going to use a synthetic fake fur that has the consistency of lambs wool. The sleeves have a pieced detail that is very unique. It calls for top-stitching. I wanted to make this special so I have practiced on the muslin trying out top-stitching thread and using a special top-stitching needle. Superior Threads produces such products and I highly recommend them.

Brown denim with metallic gold highlights

This is a photo of my fashion fabric, it is a brown denim with metallic gold highlights so my top-stitching thread is a gold color. I have tried out many of the decorative stitches on my sewing machine,what fun that is. I have a light weight Brother CS 6000i computer machine. I am going to use stitch #02 for my top-stitching. I could have gone crazy with the stitches but I didn't want to end up with a costume effect. Today I will take better pictures of my sloper and I am going to prepare my fabric for cutting out. I have to interface the body of the jacket and it will also have a lining. I might just make the sleeves first because they are the bulk of the work on this jacket. I looked on Pattern Review  and I found one review of the pattern. This person said the band on the bottom of the jacket didn't fit properly so I am going to check mine just to be sure. I have to say that knowing where to cut the notches on the multisize patterns is very difficult. They are stacked onto one another and I was guessing which one was the correct notch for my size. 

 

Crafty me:Vogue 8790 and 1292

I wanted to do a post of things I have made recently so I took a photo of my skirt and top and bracelet.

The skirt pattern was Vogue 1292 the top was Vogue 8790.

The skirt was so much easier to make than the top because the sizing was so easy. It has many pieces which are tedious to sew together but the hardest part was finding an appropriate weight knit at my local fabric stores. They had nothing in a striped except for a powder blue/white stripe. So I had to go with what I could find in colors I would wear.  

The top was another story. There was no way I could increase the bust for cup size as it was printed. So I just made the largest size and kept taking in the side seams. I ended up with very droopy shoulders and a larger arm whole than I wanted. So I banded the arm whole opening and folded up the excess length. I think it came out okay. 

I love to sew because the process is so much fun. I like to fix the problems I have with fit and hope it works out. I am planning my next project now for spring. Yes it takes me that long to finish something. Do you get things done fast or slow?