Author Archives: lorrie

About lorrie

Password researcher & fashion idol. Bad-ass cyberfeminist. Usable privacy & security prof. Quilter. Runs after 3 kids + soccer balls.

Nori (and Alva) for Lorrie

Posted on by

Sinclair Nori Woven Peg Trousers, size P6, 2 yards batik quilting cotton, 2-inch elastic waist

Sinclair Alva Woven Dolman Style Top, size P2, A/B cup, 1 yard double gauze, shorter deep hem, cuffed arm holes

I’ve never sewn pants out of woven fabric, but I liked the peg-leg (almost barrel leg) style and pocket style on the new Sinclair Nori Woven Peg Trousers so I decided to give the pattern a try. I don’t have a lot of woven garment fabric in my stash, but the instructions said it worked with quilting cotton, and I do have a lot of that. I selected a fun batik fabric that I had several yards of, but I ended up needing only about 2 yards of it.

I cut out a size 6P and machine-basted it together to check the fit. I was very happy with the fit, but prefer a higher back rise. I reduced the seam allowance where the center back meets the waistband to increase the rise by almost half an inch (and I marked this on my pattern so that I will cut a higher back rise next time). Then I removed the basting and sewed the pants together according to the pattern instructions. Most seams were sewn on my sewing machine with a 5/8-inch seam allowance, then surged, and then top stitched. This process is much more involved than sewing knits, but it produces a nice finish.

I went with the 2-inch elastic option for the waistband. As there is no stretch in this pattern, the waistband casing is the same size as the top of the pants, and thus become quite gathered after you insert the elastic. To keep everything smooth, the instructions recommended adding three rows of stitching through the waistband. That was a little tricky to do while stretching the elastic and the stitching isn’t as consistent as I would have liked, but I got it done and it looks pretty good. It is also comfortable to wear. Here’s a photo with my shirt tucked in so you can see the waistband.

The pattern offers cuffed or hemmed options. I went with the simple hem.

The pants are very comfortable but don’t look sloppy. And the pockets are plenty big and I love them! I expect I will enjoy wearing these pants and will probably make more in other fabrics. I would like to try these in chambray and perhaps a lightweight stretch woven. It would also be fun to try a colorblocked version of these pants.

My Bernina 440 QE sewing machine has been giving me trouble for a while, and in the middle of this project I got so frustrated with it that I packed it up and got my old Viking 500 out from under the table, wound a bobbin, and used it to finish the project. There’s a reason I’ve kept it all these years. Now I just need to find someone in Pittsburgh who will fix my Bernina.

Next, I decided to make a purple Alva top to go with the pants (and lots of other things in my wardrobe). Recall that I bought 18 yards of cotton double gauze when it was on $3/yard clearance last summer. This top used up less than a yard of it! Before I started cutting I ironed a 3-yard piece of it, so now I need to find something else to make with the rest of the ironed piece.

After reading comments from other sewists on the small end of the size range that the Alva top runs large, I sized down to a P2 (normally I would make a P4 or P6 in Sinclair tops). I cut the A/B cup version with a small dart, but I’m not sure the dart is actually needed for those with small busts and it doesn’t hit me in quite the right place. I will try modifying the pattern to leave it out next time.

I sewed this top entirely on my regular sewing machine without using my serger (which was sad because I had to use my Viking, which is actually a fine machine, but doesn’t have some of the conveniences I have grown accustomed to). This pattern includes instructions for French seams. I’ve never sewn French seams before, but this seemed like an easy pattern to try them on. They are more work than serging the edges, but they do give a nice finish and weren’t that hard to do. I managed to do the collar binding more neatly than I did on my double gauze dress last month, largely because I followed the advice to hand baste the binding in place (that made it much easier).

I decided to use the deep hem option but wasn’t sure whether to go higher or lower. I cut the lower option. When I tried it on before hemming I decided I liked the lower option better so cut off the bottom two inches before hemming. I also debated plain sleeve openings or adding cuffs, and in the end added the cuffs for a more finished look.

Overall I’m happy with the Alva top, and it does go nicely with my Nori pants and the wide leg pants I made out of the same fabric. With this fabric, the Alva doesn’t drape all that well, and it tends to hang away from my body, especially in the back. This might be less of an issue with the longer hem length or a more drapy fabric.

Just Shorts

Posted on by

Pattern Emporium Just Peachy stretch shorts, size AU10 with waistband adjusted to AU8, black Pylos LiKnit, length 3, mid rise, elastic waistband, back darts, stitched pockets (with pocket opening adjusted higher)

Sinclair Bondi 22 fitted t-shirt, aqua wide lush poly spandex, short sleeve, hip length, “screwp neck“

Summer is here and I reached for a pair of shorts to wear out of the house and couldn’t find any I liked. They were all either shorts I wear for playing soccer, shorts I wear for sleeping, shorts that don’t sit where I want them to at my waist, shorts that I find uncomfortable to sit in, or shorts with inadequate pockets. Clearly I need to sew myself some new shorts.

I used the Pattern Emporium Just Peachy stretch shorts pattern to sew up some black PyLos LiKnit shorts. I used this pattern once before to make grey cotton Lycra shorts that I mostly wear for PJs (the yoga waistband is super comfy but doesn’t stay put as well as I would like when I put my phone in my pocket. This time I used the mid rise with the elastic waistband option. I went with length 3, stitched pockets, and back darts. I adjusted the pocket opening to be higher (basically used the bottom of the high-waist pocket opening) — this makes it less likely for things to fall out of my pockets without the need to increase the length of the pocket bags. I stitched the pockets with a zigzag stitch. Next time I will try to cover stitch. I do love the way the look of the binding over the pocket opening edge.

I used the AU10 pattern with the AU8 waistband. I should probably have graded the waist of the leg pieces to match the waistband too — next time.

The rayon/nylon knit LiKnit fabric is very light and these are super lightweight shorts to wear and pack for travel. They look almost like linen shorts but are much softer and easy to care for. They also dry quickly when you get caught in a rainstorm (ask me how I know).

The shorts are modeled here with a short-sleeve 4p screwp neck Sinclair Bondi t-shirt in aqua wide lush poly spandex from Mily Mae Fabrics (which I made last year and may not have blogged). Normally I will wear the shirt untucked but leaving it tucked in here so you can see the shorts waistband and pocket details better.

Overall, I’m happy with these shorts and I have already worn them several times in the hot weather, including on a trip (they travel well!). They fit well but I personally would like them to sit a little higher at my waist, especially in front. Next time I make this pattern I would add a bit of rise, perhaps somewhere between the low-rise and high-rise line, and narrow the pocket bags so my phone will stay vertical.

Meet you there

Posted on by

Pattern Emporium Meet You There dress, orange cotton double gauze fabric (washed and ironed before cutting), size AU10, knee length (2 long tiers, each shortened by 1 inch), mid neck, 1/2 sleeve, back ties, pockets (sewed down bottom of pocket openings)

I may have gone a little overboard when I bought several colors of “fluffy” cotton double gauze, 18 yards total, when it was on clearance at Mily Mae Fabrics for $3/yard last July. But it was really cheap and it is nice summer fabric and it will never go out of style, right?

I saw someone wearing an orange fluffy tiered dress during my travels last summer and it looked very cute and comfortable. I knew I had the orange fabric to make it and thought the PE Meet You There tiered dress pattern would be perfect. But I didn’t get around to actually making it until now.

I previously used some of the purple to make a pair of PE Vacation Vibes pants. PE patterns tend to run on the larger side, but these ended up being extra large on me and after I made them I had to cut off the waistband and resew it to remove some of the bulk. Part of the problem was that I didn’t press the fabric before I sewed it. There is a wide range of advice online about how to prepare double gauze for sewing. Everyone seems to agree that you should wash and shrink it, but some argue for pressing and others against. The anti-pressers argue that if you aren’t going to press the garment each time you wear it (and I definitely will not) then you shouldn’t press it before you cut and sew it. As I am definitely an avoid-ironing-at-all-costs sort of person, I decided to go with the no-press approach. But having tried this with the pants, I now see the folly in my ways. This fabric does, in fact, stretch and grow as you wear it, so pressing it before cutting gives you a more accurate size. I decided to go with a light pressing approach, both because I am too lazy to press three yards of fabric until it is perfectly smooth, and because, from what I read, that isn’t actually necessary and could also weaken the fabric. You can see in the photo below my unpressed fabric on the left and my lightly pressed fabric on the right.

The Meet You There dress has lots of options. I decided to cut a size AU 10 regular with the mid neckline, half sleeves, knee length, with pockets and waist ties. The knee-length dress can be achieved with two long tiers, and I shortened each by 1 inch to account for my short stature. That worked out fine, but I think next time I would achieve the same length by shortening the bodice by 1 inch and then shortening only one of the tiers, or perhaps even shortening the bodice by 2 inches and leaving the tiers as is. Because the gauze tends to unravel, I folded the hem under twice for a clean finish (which also shortened it a little bit). I thought the mid-neckline worked well for me. The low would have been too low on me. I think the high would have been fine, but I like the scoop neck styling provided by the mid neckline.

The instructions are great, with lots of nice tips. The instructions for the neck binding were very good, but double gauze is not a great fabric to work with when sewing narrow strips. I should have either been a lot more careful with it or used a tighter woven fabric for the binding (which is on the inside and you never see it so it doesn’t have to match). But I did the best I could, and with the help of my fabric glue stick I mostly got it folded under, but there are some edges sticking out on the inside.

The sneaky sleeve hem tip was fun, and did seem easier than the traditional method of threading elastic into sleeves. But the best tip was using clear elastic to gather the skirt tiers. I followed the instructions and used 1/4-inch light-weight clear elastic and ended up folding and marking it in eighths. I sewed it on using my regular sewing machine foot and a zigzag stitch. I followed the advice to sew everything on a sewing machine with a 3/8-inch seam allowance and then serge the edges to neaten.

I mostly followed the pocket instructions, but found that the pocket opening was too big and I thought my phone might fall out. So I sewed up the bottom two inches of the pocket opening.

I finished it last night and thought it looked pretty good, but wanted to see it in full fluffy crinkle. So I dunked it in the sink and tossed it in the dryer until it was only damp. Then I hung it up and went to bed. In the morning it dry and beautifully crinkled, so I wore it to work. It held up well to the heat and humidity and was fairly comfortable. I like the way the crinkles give the skirt and sleeves dome extra body.

Now I just have to figure out what to do with my other 14 yards of double-gauze fabric.

Birthday shirt

Posted on by

Sinclair Kai men’s t-shirt , size 38 with waist graded to 42, 1.5 inch shorter than regular length, 1.5 yards cotton Lycra

My husband loves to wear striped t-shirts shirts but finding good striped t-shirt fabric in anything other than alternating white/color stripes is difficult. I bought this yellow striped cotton Lycra fabric when I saw it about a year ago and finally got around to sewing it up last week. I used the Sinclair Kai men’s t-shirt pattern, which I used to make him a sage green short-sleeve striped shirt last summer and two long-sleeve shirts (plus the striped shirt I made him for our family photo shoot last December). He wore the sage shirt a few days ago and one of his friends was surprised to learn I made it and said it looked just like a shirt from the Gap. I used the size 38 short, graded from the waist up to a 42 width to give him a little more ease, and used the regular length hem shortened by 1.5 inches because he never tucks his shirt in.

I gave him his new yellow shirt as part of his birthday present. He seems to like it. It was also the right color for wearing to the Riveters game yesterday.

Swooning over ballooning

Posted on by

Pattern Emporium Be Mine Balloon Sleeve top, size AU8, 1.5 yards woven rayon, mid neck, regular length, wide facing, no front seam or button loop

Ok, ignore the silly title, but do check out the lovely balloon sleeves I just made. I do adore them! As with many statement sleeves, they don’t play well with most sweaters (better break out the shawl for chilly days and over air-conditioned rooms), but who wants to hide fun sleeves anyway?

I’ve been wanting to make a Pattern Emporium Be Mine Balloon Sleeve top since it first came out a year-and-a-half ago, but didn’t get around to it until now. I even bought the fabric for it a year ago – a light-weight woven rayon floral from knitfabric.com (yes they sell wovens too). I don’t love that you’re not supposed to put it in the dryer (I did wash and dry it before cutting it so that if it does end up in the dryer sometime it has already been shrunk) and that it requires some ironing, but it was nice to work with and it made a lovely top. (Photographed here with my PE Urban Boldly mashup pants in orange LiKnit.)

I made the regular length with the wide facing option and the mid neckline (after much debate and staring at photos from other sewists). I omitted the front seam. I kept the back seam but omitted the button loop (thus the back seam is really not needed but it adds a little detail). I also did all the optional top stitching (there were too many colors in my fabric to pick one that would blend so I used white thread, which provides a little bit of contrast). After reading posts from a number of other women on the smaller end of the size range that they were sizing down because this over-sized top was a bit too big for them, I sized down from an AU10 to an AU8. I also added a 1/2-inch sloped shoulder adjustment, as that seems to usually make tops hang better for me. Otherwise, I sewed the pattern as written.

The top fits me very well in the size 8 (I’m glad I sized down). I’m short so I could potentially shorten the top a bit, but I think it works pretty well at this length. I often have to shorten sleeves, and these certainly come out longer on me than on many other people, but I actually like how the cuffs sit a bit lower on my arms. I’m also really happy with the mid neckline, which comes out as a scoop for me — the low neckline would have been very low on me.

As with all the PE patterns I’ve tried, the instructions for the Be Mine top are quite thorough and easy to follow. I’m not going to lie — the facings and sleeve binding are a lot of work. I used my serger and my sewing machine with three different feet! But if you take the time to do them right they come out beautifully. I didn’t do everything exactly right the first time: I started sewing a sleeve band on the wrong way and started sewing a hem facing upside down. But I recovered from these minor goofs and got back on track and I still got the whole top done in one Saturday afternoon/evening.

Now I need to figure out what fabric to try next (something with easier laundry requirements, maybe a polyester woven or a cotton double gauze). I would also love to try this as a jacket hack so I can wear these gorgeous sleeves in cooler weather.

Hot peppers for PEPR

Posted on by

Sinclair Valley Knit Skater Dress with modified half-circle skirt from Flared skirts ADD-ON, size P6, pockets, upcycled from mystery polyester knit nightgown with low stretch

Back in 2018 Lea Kissner and I talked about the need for a new privacy conference over dinner. Lea noted that there wasn’t a conference where privacy engineering practitioners could meet and talk about the solutions they implement in practice. Most existing privacy conferences were targeted more at privacy researchers or privacy lawyers. Lea had worked as a privacy engineer in industry for many years and I had co-founded a privacy engineering masters program and also had experience starting and running conferences. So Lea convinced me that we should work together to start a new conference. In August 2019 we met in Santa Clara, CA for the first USENIX Conference on Privacy Engineering Practice and Respect.

PEPR 2019 went well and we had planned to continue PEPR as an annual event in the Bay Area, as that seemed to be where most of the privacy engineers are. COVID derailed this plan and PEPR 2020 was held entirely online. The USENIX Association (and every other organization that runs events) struggled through the pandemic and decided they could not afford to run PEPR 2021 online as well. So, the Future of Privacy Forum and Carnegie Mellon University CyLab stepped in to co-host an online PEPR 2021 event and I presented my talk “Illustrating Priavcy Engineering Concepts with Potty Talk” from my third-floor bathroom. USENIX ran PEPR 2022 as a hybrid event (I remotely presented a talk on the design of cookie consent interfaces from my kitchen) and then returned to fully in person in 2023 and has been running PEPR in person ever since, but unfortunately I was not able to attend in 2023 or 2024.

I decided that I needed a pepper dress to wear the next time I attended PEPR in person. Most of the pepper fabric I could find was quilting cotton. I could not find any knit pepper fabric that I liked. I thought about custom printing some pepper fabric, but never found a design I really liked. A week before PEPR 2025 I decided I really needed a pepper dress and scoured the internet for suitable fabric that I could get delivered to my home quickly. Again, I mostly found quilting cotton.

I noticed that pepper PJs in knit fabrics were readily available. So I decided to order a size XXL pepper nightgown and try to cut it up and turn it into a dress. Two days later, the nightgown arrived and I got to work figuring out what to do with it. The website claimed it was 95% polyester 5% spandex knit, but the garment tag said it was 100% cotton. It feels more like polyester to me and a drop of water beads on the top. It only has about 30% stretch so I’m not sure about its spandex content. The fabric features bright red peppers on a dark grey background with black outlines.

I decided to use the Sinclair (free) Valley Skater Dress pattern with a half-circle skirt from the add-on pack. I have made this pattern previously and it was pretty easy and I thought I could adapt it for this project. Because the mystery fabric did not have a lot of stretch and I know the bodice is very fitted, I decided to size up to a 6p rather than using the 4p size I had used previously. I extended the bodice by about an inch and a half as suggested when making the dress without a waistband. I cut the nightgown open at the side seams and projected the two bodice pieces onto it and cut them out, leaving the neckband and shoulder seams from the nightgown in tact.

Then I projected the sleeves onto the fabric from the nightgown sleeves and cut them out with the hem in tact so that I would not need to hem the sleeves. Finally, I had to figure out what to do about the skirt. The nightgown was not quite wide enough to cut out the pieces for the half-circle skirt. I decided to improvise and pivoted the sides of the skirt pieces in until the fit the fabric I had. I left the bottom hem in tact (and thus, not quite as rounded as the pattern called for) and I reduced the rounding on the waist and made sure it would fit the bottom of the bodice. I ended up with something closer to a one-third circle skirt than a half circle skirt.

I really wanted to add pockets to the dress but didn’t have enough nightgown fabric left for deep pockets. I decided to use scraps of cupro jersey from another recent dress project to make the pockets. This is a super lightweight and not very stretchy knit and it worked really well (although it would have been slightly better if it were dark grey to match to dress fabric) — now I want to use it for all my knit pockets. I followed the pattern for inseam pockets but extended the pocket bag a bit to make them slightly deeper. The pocket construction took as long as making the rest of the dress — reminding me of how much I hate assembling inseam pockets. The part I really struggle with is stitching the top and bottom of the pocket openings without catching any of the pocket bag on the outside of the pocket. After trying and failing on the first pocket I unpicked it and used my trusty glue stick to line up the pockets and then sewed them with my edge foot. It still took way too long!

After I assembled the pockets it was easy to attach the skirt to the waistband. Since everything was already hemmed, I added a label and I was done… until I looked at the back and noticed a lot of bunching at the waist.

I decided to add a simple swayback adjustment, and then I was really done.

And then it was time to accessorize! I ordered a bag of plastic pepper charms and added jump rings to turn them into pendants.

This morning we presented our UsersFirst framework at the PEPR conference. As you can see I was fully on theme with pepper dress, necklace and socks. And the pockets came in handy for the microphone pack.

Little black dress

Posted on by

I decided I needed a little black dress — something versatile that could be dressed up or down. I wanted it to be a washable knit with pockets, fit well, and go with everything. I bought some beautiful lightweight, drapey but only a little bit stretchy black cupro jersey last year and had just enough for a short-sleeve Sinclair Alana dress. Cupro is 65% model and 35% poly. It is described as having 50% horizontal stretch and 25% vertical stretch, but in practice I think it has less stretch than that.

Alana is one of my favorite dress patterns because of its flattering princess seams and pockets that are both easy-to-construct and look great as part of the dress. As I have done with my other Alana dresses (this is my fifth one, but first with short sleeves), I graded the seams in at the waist to make it more fitted and extended the front and back facings to below my bra line. I made the short-sleeve, knee length version with with a regular neck in my usual size 4p, although given how little stretch the cupro has I could have sized up. I fused the hems with 5/8″ HeatnBond softstretch light hem tape and then cover stitched them.

The dress is very light weight and I expect it will travel well. I plan to throw it in my bag for all my trips this summer. I think it will look good with a sweater or blazer, dress shoes or sneakers.

Scrunchie Burrito

Posted on by

I had a bit of leftover rainbow fabric from the skort and decided to make some matching scrunchies. I have never sewn scrunchies before, so I searched for instructions online. There are lots of instructions available and I found two that looked reasonable and gave them a try. The first one involved sewing the long end, threading in the elastic, and then layering the shorts together and sewing the loop closed with a sewing machine. This resulted in an ugly and not quite aligned seam, especially with the slippery stretch fabric I was using. The second technique called for hand sewing the end, which worked, but took more time.

I decided to look further and found a video and instructions for the burrito method, which allows you to make scrunchies with perfectly aligned seams and no hand stitching. This involves a bit of a geometry trick, as you need to make a donut and then turn it inside out. In the burrito method you cut your rectangle (I used a piece 4″ by 23″) and sew the short ends together to form a loop. You fold your loop in half, right sides together, folding in parallel to the seam. Then you fold the top layer in on itself and bring the bottom layer sides up around the folded in part and carefully stitch the long edge without catching the top layer. As you go you pull the top layer through until you have stitched almost all the way around the (inside-out) donut. You leave a small gap and then turn the whole thing rightside out. Then you thread the elastic in (I used 8 inches of .5″ elastic), sew it into a loop, and then close the hole in the seam. I did all the stitching on my serger except the final hole closing. I didn’t press or pin anything and it was super fast to make!

rainbow scrunchie

AA in Lorrievision

Posted on by

During my 2013 sabbatical I quilted a pixelated self portrait, based  on the Salvador Dali painting Lincoln in Dalivision (1977), which was inspired by Leon Harmon’s grey photomosaic of Abraham Lincoln (1973) that was published in Scientific American. Twelve years later, I decided to take a similar approach to creating a portrait of a dear colleague and renowned privacy scholar who is moving to another university.

I began with a photo of my colleague, brightened the colors, ran it through a pixelator, and cropped it a bit.

I printed out the pixelated image, tacked it to my design wall, and began digging through my quilting fabric stash for matching colors. I cut 2.5-inch squares of fabrics and tacked them up next to the printout. I easily matched all of the blue and off-white pixels, but struggled to find enough of some of the other colors and had to resort to some duplicates. I asked a friend to contribute a few fabrics from her stash, which helped to add some more gold, brown, and black pixels. I also used some fabric scraps from garments, including corduroy, liknit, brocade, and some shiny gold fabric (which I also reversed and used its matte back). I designed a label for the back and uploaded it to spooflower.com for digital printing. While I was at it I printed the original image, the pixelated image, and the CMU Scotty dog mascot in 2.5-inch squares as well. Then I drew a 2.5-inch grid on a piece of light-weight fusible interfacing and transferred the squared from my design wall to the interfacing.

Once everything was transferred (and after a 4-day power outage that delayed this project), I used my steam iron to fuse the squares to the interfacing. Then I folded along each vertical line and sewed each column with a 1/4-inch seam allowance. I clipped the seams at each horizontal line and pressed the rows in alternating directions.

Then I folded along the horizontal lines and sewed each row.The result was a reasonably neat grid of squares without having to piece each one individually. The squares came out less square than I had hoped. The columns were almost perfectly sized but the rows came out a bit shorter than I had planned — note to self that the seam allowances in the second direction may “eat” more fabric than intended.

Next I layered the quilt top on a piece of  fusible polyester cotton batting, and layered that on top of a fun newsprint fabric leftover from a dress I made my youngest daughter. I fused it all together and selected embroidery threads to match the colors in the quilt top.

Finally, I was ready to quilt! I used my free-motion quilting foot to quilt the top with squiggles, basically doodling with thread. I signed my name in thread in the lower right.

Then I cut 1.25″ bias binding strips from a square of fabric and used my bias binding tool to make double-fold binding using my favorite technique. I sewed the binding to the front of the quilt, glue basted it to the back using Elmer’s glue, and then hand stitched in place.

Despite the power outage delay, I finished the quilt just in time to present at a scheduled farewell event.

AA in Lorrievision, 2025, 18″x30″, quilting cotton and assorted scrap fabric, machine quilted

Rayon shorts that look like a linen skirt

Posted on by

After seeing how easy it was to make the Pattern Emporium Sashay Stretch Flared Shorts for my rainbow Pride outfit, I decided to make another pair, this time in dusty sage Pylos Liknit, in the longer length, and with pockets. I followed the pattern instructions to add jeans-style pockets, but I decided not to add the extra quarter-inch for seam allowance (as I felt it was plenty roomy) and I adjusted the pocket opening so it would not dip so low. I used the AU10 pattern with the full skirt option and a 1.5″ elastic covered waistband. This one also went together quickly, but the addition of the pockets and hemming probably doubled the construction time. I used 1 1/4 yards of 58″ fabric.

I love the way the LiKnit fabric works for this skort: it is lightweight and swishy. This is a pattern for knits and the LiKnit is a two-way stretch knit, but it looks a lot like a woven. It also has enough stability that the pockets work well. This should be cool to wear on hot summer days, but this week I wore it to work with the sweater pictured above (Pattern Emporium Sweet Cheeks sweater in versailles brushed hacci sweater knit), tights, and rain boots.

Pride skort

Posted on by

Last summer when I visited Mood Fabrics in New York City I bought a yard of slinky rainbow polyester fabric with the intention of making a skirt to wear at the Pittsburgh Pride parade this year. A couple of weeks before Pride I realized I had not gotten around to making the skirt. I flipped through my pattern collection and decided that the Pattern Emporium Sashay Stretch Flared Shorts would be even better than a skirt. They come in subtle, medium, and full variations, with multiple lengths and waistband options. The subtle version is a slightly flared pair of shorts, but the full version is a skort that looks a lot like a skirt — but offers a little more modesty. I decided to use the full version with a 1.5-inch covered elastic waistband. I was going to add pockets, but after reading the pocket warning in the pattern instructions, I was concerned that if I put anything in them they would stretch out too much with the fabric I was using. So I decided to forgo pockets and plan to wear pocket bike shorts or leggings with pockets underneath.

I cut out the size AU 10 full version at the short length. The shorts are cut with just two pieces (one for each leg) and a waistband. I was just barely able to get these pieces out of a single yard of fabric (and it was clear that the long length would require more fabric). Because I was using striped fabric and I wanted the rainbow to line up where the legs meet at the crotch, I cut out one leg and then flipped it over and laid it down on the fabric, perfectly aligned. I traced around the first leg and cut out the second leg. I used my fabric glue stick to glue the crotch pieces in place before surging them together so that the stripe alignment would not slip.

The pattern instructions said that swim fabric did not need to be hemmed and this slinky fabric is similar to swim and also won’t unravel so I did not bother to hem it. I basted the waistband on three times before I was able to distribute the shorts fabric evenly, but eventually I got it and surged the waistband on. And that was it… easy peasy! Without pockets or hemming, this is a very quick sew!

Her uniform

Posted on by

I asked my college student what she wanted for her nineteenth birthday and she asked me to make her another pair of her favorite black LiKnit “flowy” pants (PE Urban Boldly pants similar to mine, but adjusted for her taller height).

While I was at it I made her another cropped Bondi (size 4R but graded the waist to a size 0 and then graded the back waist even more, bottom cut at the horizontal waist line shown on the pattern) out of leftover cotton lycra fabric from a shirt I made my husband.

I made her a pair of pants just like this when she went to college, and another pair with the same pattern but in black ponte. I don’t think I have a photo of the ponte pair. She has apparently been wearing these two pairs of pants and the Cleo palazzo pants I made her on repeat all year. In fact I had to rehem two pairs of pants with frayed hems from dragging on the ground and reinforce some threadbare spots.

Short-sleeved Bondis

Posted on by

Bondi is my most-made pattern, and now that I have it adjusted to perfection, I’m making even more. I made two short-sleeve, screwp-neck, 4p Bondi shirts in one evening. I made one from a yard of seafoam and off-white pencil stripe stretch modal jersey that I bought last Fall from Cali Fabrics because it matched my seafoam pants perfectly. I made the other one from a yard of green frost ITY from stylishfabric.com (the color looks like avocado to me) that I ordered last year while collecting greenish fabric options for my daughter’s prom dress. I was in the middle of a lot of light green sewing so I decided to knock these two out before I took the seafoam thread out of my serger.

I cut the striped shirt out carefully and used my fabric glue stick to match the stripes. I was also careful with my placement of the blue stripe in the neck band. I think it came out better than my previous attempts at striped shirts.

I fused all the hems with HeatnBond Soft Stretch and finished with a cover stitch (which did require changing the thread after all, but I did this last after I was done with all my seafoam sewing). I’m still not great at cover stitching, but each time I do it I try to read some tips or watch a video and I’m slowly getting better at it. I can setup my Triumph for cover stitching pretty quickly now, and I have now mastered the technique of pulling the top threads to the bottom at the end so they can be easily tied off. I also realized I was using the wrong table attachment (the hazard of having too many accessories?) and that was making it harder to sew over seams.

Colorful Coda Coat

Posted on by

It’s been over 20 years since I last sewed a quilted jacket (see my first quilted jacket, made in 1999 and my second, made in 2003). Quilted jackets seem to be somewhat fashionable this year, and when I saw the Love Notions Coda Quilted Coat pattern I had to give it a try. I saw lots of people using pre-quilted fabric or turning thrifted quilts into Coda coats (some nice examples and tips here), but since I am a quilter, I decided to piece and quilt my own Coda (some nice examples and tips here). I spent hours asking the Internet to show me quilted coats, and finally settled on using a rainbow of bright batik fabric from my stash in a random-looking pattern of squares and rectangles that I designed. I was inspired by several of the quilted coats I saw, including Thread + Sprout‘s rainbow scrappy patchy jacket. Here’s my finished coat – yes it is very colorful and bright, but sometimes I need that! Now let me tell you all about how I made it.

I started with the size small Coda pattern and projected and cut out lining pieces from batik fabric in my stash. I then basted them together to check the fit of the coat. I decided to make a sloped shoulder adjustment, scoop out the back of the neck a bit, and shorten the sleeves by 2.5 inches. I considered shortening the whole coat since I am 5’2″ and it is drafted for someone 5’5″, but I decided I preferred it to be a little longer (and saw that many other sewists were lengthening their Codas). I could have left the sleeves as-is and cuffed them, but figured the quilt would be bulky so decided to shorten so I would not have to cuff.

Next I needed to decide what type of batting to use. I usually use cotton or fusible polyester cotton batting, but was hoping to make a lighter-weight jacket so looked to see what batting people recommended. I noticed that people who wanted a lighter batting often chose silk or bamboo. I ordered both from Battingsupersale.com (first time ordering from them and was quite pleased) and chose their Simply Bamboo batting because it seemed softer and drapier than the silk.

Next I designed my quilt. I drew out my pattern in Affinity Designer and overlayed it on the Coda pattern pieces. Then I started cutting up my fabric and made a stack of the squares and rectangles needed for each section of the jacket. One piece at a time I laid out each section (guided by a print-out of the design), and pieced it with my quarter-inch guide foot. I pressed the seam allowances in opposite directions so they would butt up to each other nicely, and occasionally applied a dab from my fabric glue pen to achieve perfect alignment.

Once I pieced all the sections, it was time to make the quilt sandwiches. I spread out my bamboo batting on the floor and attached the lining pieces with basting spray, which is basically a light-weight repositionable glue (like on a post-it note). This is the first time I used basting spray, and it was a lot easier than I anticipated. It mostly stayed where I sprayed it and did not have a lot of lingering fumes. I then used the lining pieces as templates to cut out the batting. Then I layered the batting/lining pieces on top of my pieced sections, carefully aligned them, and cut them out. I had designed the pattern so that the front and back pieces all aligned so it was important to get everything lined up properly. I did not use spray baste here because I discovered that the bamboo batting was very clingy and stayed in place just fine on its own without any pins or glue.

Now it was time to quilt. After weighing many quilting options, I decided to go for a simple two-inch grid, quilted with a variegated rainbow polyester thread (with the same thread in the bobbin). I used a hera marker and a ruler to mark the quilt lines, and I quilted it using my walking foot. It mostly went well, but I’ve been having some issues with the bobbin tension on my sewing machine and the stitches are not as even as I would have liked.

After all the pieces were quilted I lined up and carefully attached the pockets. I decided not to bind the tops of the pockets and just folded them under and topstitched. Without binding, they are almost invisible since I matched the pattern and the quilting pretty well. Then I surged around all the edges with pink thread that sort of matched most of the lining.

I had previously considered my construction options. Should I quilt the lining with the top and batting or use a separate lining piece? I decided to quilt the lining because I thought it would further minimize bulk. I think its fine, but you do end up with interior seams that you have to treat. I decided to serge the edges, sew with a half-inch seam allowance, and press open. A nicer option would be to bind them, but I didn’t want to bother. Next time (yes there will be more quilted coats) I may just add a separate lining and keep all those pesky seams hidden from view, as some sewists suggest (this tutorial has lots of great tips).

I ended up sewing the shoulder seams and attaching the sleeves, but leaving the side seams unsewn until after I attached the binding so as to avoid having to bind the sharp corner where the front and the back meet.

The pattern suggests making your own double-fold bias binding tape, something I had never done (I usually bind with French-fold binding, as is common for quilts). But I read that making double-fold bias binding tape was pretty easy to do, especially with the help of a cheap bias tape tool. Some sewists even find making binding tape quite enjoyable. Having now tried it, they are not wrong. I used this nifty technique where you start with a large square, cut it into two triangles, mark them lines parallel to the hypotenuse, and sew them together in a staggered way so that you can use your scissors to cut one long continuous bias trip. Then you run it through your bias tape tool and iron and you have binding. I followed this process with 2-inch strips to make half-inch bias binding. It worked great except that I miscalculated and started with a 15-inch square, and ended up with slightly less binding than I actually needed, so I had to stop attaching the binding and go make some more. Next time I’ll probably go with an 18-inch or 20-inch square to make sure I have more than enough.

Once I made the binding, I followed the pattern instructions to attach it to the jacket by first unfolding it and sewing it to the inside, then wrapping it around to the front and sewing it in place. Instead of pinning it to the front I held it in place with a thin bead of Elmer’s washable school glue, and then set it with my iron (you can still easily peel it off, even after ironing). Yes, I have really embraced the use of adhesives in sewing – for this project I used basting spray, fabric glue pen, and Elmer’s glue. Once the binding was in place, I stitched it near the edge, sewed up the side seams, added a label, and I was done.

I tried it on and was fairly pleased with the results, but despite my use of bamboo batting, it was still pretty stiff. I decided it needed to go through a round of washing and drying to loosen it up a bit, shrink it slightly, and turn it into its natural puckered shape. If you never wash a quilt you can keep it nice and crisp, but I plan to wear this one enough that it will need to be washed, so I figured I might as well get that over with now and soften it up in the process. I always have a little bit of fear about washing a quilt though. I tossed it in my washer on delicate cycle with Woolite, and then after a quick spin in the dryer it was ready to wear (and much more comfortable now).

This project took a bit longer than most of the clothes I make because first I had to make a quilt and then turn it into a jacket. It would be much faster with pre-quilted fabric or cutting up an old quilt. But I really enjoyed both the process and the very colorful results!

Fire spinning skirt

Posted on by

My daughter joined a fire spinning club and has to wear 95% cotton or wool clothing while playing with fire. Personally, I would go with tight jeans in this situation, but she doesn’t like to wear jeans. I previously made her a pair of black cotton french terry pants (which apparently I never photographed), but a few weeks ago she emailed me that she wanted a black skirt, and sent a sketch of what she had in mind. She wanted a midi-length skirt with a slit on the right side, but in several inches from the side seam so that she could dance in it, ideally pockets, and a waistband that wouldn’t move around. She wanted the skirt to have a little bit of swish, but not so much fabric that it would be a big fire hazard.

I decided to use the Pattern Emporium Heartlight skirt pattern, which I previously used to make a short skirt for myself, modified to have pockets. I used the size AU 10 pattern with AU 8 waistband, just as I had made for myself. I used about 2 yards of 95% cotton/25% spandex black jersey fabric.

To achieve the slit I split the front panel of the skirt into three pieces. I drafted pocket bags that I could anchor between the side seam and the interior front seams, with top diagonal pocket openings. I’m showing the front pattern piece in the figure below, divided into three, with the pocket pieces laid over it. The pockets fold up at the green dashed line. (I know she only asked for one pocket, but once I figured out that I could anchor them in, I decided to give her two.)

I sewed up the left seam but only sewed the top 10 inches of the right seam and then serged the raw edge of both sides of the slit and top-stitched them down. After she tried it on and found the waist not as secure as she wanted, I threaded elastic into the waistband.

She says it is exactly what she wanted for her fire spinning performances and she likes it so much that she will wear it even when she is not performing.

Adjustment!

Posted on by

I’ve spent the past few months pondering back and shoulder adjustments and trying them out. While making my first Wanderulst dress I realized I needed a swayback adjustment to remove the extra folds of fabric at the back of my waist. But I also noticed that my shoulders slope down quite a bit so I tried a sloped shoulder adjustment as well in my second and third Wanduderlust dresses.

I also noticed that my Sinclair Bondi t-shrts and sweaters didn’t look as good in the back as they did in the front. Here’s one that I made recently in size 6p from rayon/poly/spandex plum sibley brushed sweater knit from Surge Fabrics. The fabric is super soft and stretchy and it fits reasonably well but you can see some minor issues in the back.

Then I made a Bondi sweater with the sloped shoulder adjustment from a washable wool with only about 25% stretch. I noticed that I have more significant drag lines under my arm pits in the back, probably due to the fact that this fabric is not very stretchy. I posted photos in one of the online sewist Facebook groups and someone pointed out to me that my shoulders are both sloped and broad. I set up my cell phone behind me transmitting its camera image to my laptop so I could study my back, and tried on a bunch of different tops and jackets so I could see what was going on.

I made a Bondi t-shirt in size 6p with both sloped and broad shoulder adjustments (and bishop sleeves) from an aqua wide lush poly-spandex fabric from Mily Mae. This was better, but the drag lines were not completely gone.

After studying the black ponte Onyx blazer I made a few months ago, I eventually noticed that the top of the shoulder seam was not actually at the top of my shoulder and had a tendency to slip down my back. I realized that when I pulled my shirt or jacket forward to get the shoulder seam where it belonged, it tended to bunch up around my neck. And this is why I find it uncomfortable to wear most jackets with collars! I thought perhaps what I needed was a forward shoulder adjustment, which involves basically taking the top of the shoulder from the front pattern piece and moving it to the back. I went into Affiinty Designer and moved an inch of the Bondi tshirt pattern (already adjusted for sloped and broad shoulders) from the front to the back and cut out another tshirt. I didn’t take a photo, but the results were not great.

I decided to stick with the sloped and broad shoulder adjustment for my next Bondi in size 4p, made from purple (looks like magenta) monaco rib poly/rayon/spandex from Mily Mae. I think it came out pretty well, despite some minor back issues. I think I’m done adjusting the Bondi for now.

Magnificent Magenta

Posted on by

I bought three yards of a beautiful magenta ponte fabric from Mily Mae last year because I love the color (it matches the highlights in my hair) and I love working with this kind of ponte (67% Rayon/28% Nylon/5% Spandex). I thought about making a dress out of it, but eventually decided on a magenta suit. I already have a (store-bought, me altered) purple suit, but I don’t have a pink suit. Magenta is on the more purply side of pink, which means it can be interpreted either as pink or purple.

Unfortunately, magenta doesn’t seem to quite match either pink or purple threads, so I had to order several threads online until I found a close match that I could use for top stitching that would blend into the fabric. None of the Gutermann or Coats & Clark threads I ordered were quite right, but Amann Saba all purpose poly wrapped poly core thread tex 30 color 1059 did the trick.

I used the Boo & Lu Onyx blazer pattern for my magenta suit jacket, with the same modifications I used for my hip length grey ponte version with pockets. I had hoped to get the facings interfaced and catching in the top stitching properly this time, but still ran into problems that required extra gluing and fusing to resolve. I still feel there must be a better way to make the facings, and if I make another Onyx maybe I will figure out what it is.

I used the Pattern Emporium Urban Wide Leg pants pattern to make magenta pants to go with the jacket. I haver previously made three tapered and three wide-leg pants with this pattern (plus a few mashups with this pattern and the PE Walk Boldly pants). I made these size AU10 low-rise (which ends up being high-rise on me), with the waist graded in and the waistband modified to be a contour waistband lined in athletic knit and with elastic added. I added front jeans pockets with straight pocket openings.

Last winter I also bought some super soft purple 86% Poly/12% Rayon/2% Spandex Monaco Rib fabric from Mily Mae, and it turns out to be almost the exact same color as the magenta ponte. Why they don’t call them both by the same name is a mystery to me, but regardless, I clearly needed to make a rib-knit sweater to go with my suit. I used my favorite Sinclair Bondi classic fitted t-shirt patten in size 4p hip length with a screwp neck, adjusted slightly for a broad and sloped shoulder. I cover stitched the hems, using the magenta thread spool and a bobbin wound with the same thread for the needle threads.

The whole outfit looks great together, and I will wear it as a suit with my matching magenta booties! I expect I will also wear the pieces as separates. Although this is a color I wear year round (I also have a cashmere sweater and a winter parka in this color), to me it is really a spring color.

April update: I couldn’t resist some magenta jacket photos with the magnificent magnolia trees in front of my house!

Pocket Onyx, more shoulder adjustments, and why the type of interfacing matters

Posted on by

I made another Onyx blazer, this one hip length in charcoal grey ponte (charming heather legacy ponte from Zelouf) with pockets. I tweaked the pattern some more before I cut it out, this time to add a simple sloped shoulder adjustment (in addition to the round-back adjustment and small-bust adjustment I made on my purple cropped Onyx). I noticed that when I raised my shoulders (as in a shrug) the drag lines I saw on the back of my purple Onyx mostly disappeared. So I lowered the outside point of the shoulder by .75 inch and adjusted the shoulder line on the center and side front and back pieces accordingly. Then, I lowered the armscyes to meet the lowered shoulder point, ensuring that the size of the arm openings did not change. This reduced the excess fabric from the shoulder area that had been pooling around the armscye and helped reduce drag lines on the back. The fit of the back is now about as good as I’m going to get so I will stop tweaking and use this going forward. I made a size 4 hip length, shortened by two inches. I reduced the height of the pockets by only about .5 inches and made them a tad narrower to fit the shortened side-front pieces.

For the purple Onyx, I cut the facing pieces using the front-center pattern piece so that I could sew them down when I top stitched the front seams. I used a lightweight fusible interfacing with no stretch. I noticed that the interfaced facing shrunk a little bit, making it more difficult to attach smoothly, but I made it work. However, on the grey ponte, the lightweight interfacing was a complete disaster. When I clipped the facing to the front center pieces, I found the facing was about an inch shorter. I tried to make it work but it was clearly not happening. Then I remembered that I had tricot interfacing (Superpunch Fusi-Knit White HTC1300), which has some stretch to it. So I cut new facing pieces and fused the tricot interfacing on, with the stretch running vertically. This time the facing did not shrink and everything went together the way it was supposed to! This was a great lesson in selecting the right interfacing for the job.

I did most of the sewing on my serger but I used my sewing machine with my quarter-inch edge foot to do the stay stitching, basting, and top stitch the front and back seams. I used my regular edge foot to top-stitch the tops of the pockets. I sewed the arms to the bodice with my sewing machine before serging, and I made sure to start and stop the serged seam in the armpit. As with the purple Onyx, I sewed the center back seam with my sewing machine, pressed it open, and then topstitched a quarter inch on either side of the back seam. This makes for a nice flat seam that looks very nice.

I used fusible hem tape on the bottom hem and sleeve hems before sewing. I also used it to hold the facing edge in place before top-stitching. I used a glue stick in a few places to keep pieces aligned before sewing.

Ponte is a comfortable fabric to wear, washes well, and resists wrinkles, snags, and pills. The charcoal grey should go well with a lot of things and I expect I will wear this one a lot. The pockets are a nice convenience too, although I probably won’t routinely put my phone or anything heavy in them as it will stretch the ponte. The hip length is just long enough to cover an untucked shirt, which makes it a pretty versatile length to wear with a lot of things. Here I am modeling it with black ponte PE Urban Wide leg pants and a Sinclair Bondi top in plum brushed sweater knit. The jacket also looks great with the PE Urban Wide leg pants I made previously in the same charming heather ponte fabric.

Summary of modifications to size 4 hip-length pattern with pockets:

  • Small-bust adjustment (performed by redrawing the inner curve on the side-front pieces to have less of a contour and then shortening the center front pieces to match the length of the new curve)
  • Sloped-shoulder adjustment (3/4 inch)
  • Round-back adjustments (2 5/8-inch adjustments near top and bottom of arscye)
  • Deepen back neckline by about 3/4 inch and adjust back facing
  • Shorten bottom hem by 2 inches
  • Shorten sleeves by 2 inches
  • Shorten pockets by 1/2 inch and adjust width to match width at hem line
  • Cut facing and interfacing from front-center pieces instead of facing pieces

Cropped Onyx Blazer

Posted on by

After making my tulip Onyx Blazer, I went down a rabbit hole of fitting adjustments. My first Boo & Lu Onyx fit reasonably well, but seemed too loose in the back. After much experimentation and sewing up an entire muslin of the hip-length version with pockets out of an old couch cover, I came to the conclusion that 1) a size 4 would fit me better than the size 6 that I sewed and 2) I need a round back adjustment. Although I have recently also discovered that I need sloped shoulders, broad shoulders, and sway back adjustments on some patterns, it wasn’t clear that these were needed here so I decided to proceed with my cropped purple scuba suede Onyx without these adjustments, although now I am reconsidering.

I finished the blazer yesterday and it was warm enough this morning to snap a few photos outside before I walked to work.

I started with the size 4 pattern, opened it in Affinity Designer, and added two 5/8-in round back adjustments near the top and bottom of the armscye. I had added a small-bust adjustment to the size 6 version that was a bit difficult to execute and did not result in the contour I really wanted. I read in the Boo & Lu Facebook group about an alternative SBA that involved simply redrawing the inner curve on the side-front pieces to have less of a contour, and then shortening the center front pieces to match the length of the new curve. This was easy to implement. I also slightly lowered the back neck line (I find this more comfortable, in part due to the round back issue) and adjusted the neck facing accordingly. I used the crop length and extended it by two inches so that it wouldn’t be quite so short. I shortened the sleeves by two inches because I am short and have short arms. Finally, instead of using the front facing pieces, I cut extra center front pieces to use as facing. This allowed me to solve the problem of the front facings not lying flat by stitching them down when I top stitched all the seam joining the side and center front pieces.

I cut out my cropped onyx from leftover purple scuba suede I had used to make a Sinclair Alana dress two years ago. This fabric is thick and stretchy, so wasn’t the easiest to work with. I fused ultra-light interfacing to the facing pieces, which stabilized them. However, even though I had stay-stitched as recommended, it was still difficult to join the facing pieces to the front pieces that did not have interfacings as the front pieces had a tendency to stretch more than the facing pieces I was trying to match them with. I had to unpick and resew one side twice until I got it right. I also wasn’t able to achieve a really sharp edge. After it was all sewn together I topstitched along the front and back seams, using my quarter-inch edge foot as a guide. My first attempt at this was a mess — the lines weren’t straight and the facing didn’t fully catch in the stitching. I unpicked the top stitching and used Steam-a-Seam 2 fusible tape to glue the edge of the facing to the inside seam it was supposed to align with. Then I carefully redid the stitching and it came out much better.

I’m pretty happy with the end result. It fits better than my first Onyx and the fabric is fun. The length works really well with dresses, but as you can see here it also works with pants. I don’t think this length looks as good with shirts not tucked in though, so I’ll probably make a longer one. It does go perfectly with the dress I made from the same fabric. The rounded back adjustment and lower back neck were a good improvement that makes the blazer more comfortable to wear and keep the back closer to my body. I feel like there is still something more I should be doing on the side back pieces to reduce the drag lines pointing to my armpits (which were not as prominent on my muslin, but maybe because it was made from a woven fabric with less drape). Maybe I do need a sloped shoulder adjustment? Also note that the front is fairly open in the photos and so you can see some fabric bunching under the right arm. When I pull the front pieces closer together that goes away.

Even though I didn’t do any of the fancy seam finishes, I do like how the seams look on the inside, sewn with my serger and neatly top-stitched in place. I did sew the center back seam on my sewing machine and serged the edges so that I could press it open.

Now that I have a collarless blazer pattern that fits pretty well, I want to make more! (But maybe keep trying to address the back drag lines with a sloped shoulder adjustment?) Next up, the hip-length version with pockets.

My new best (sweater) friend

Posted on by

Winters in Pittsburgh are generally relatively mild, but we’ve had more cold days than usual this winter, and the forecast for this coming week predicts more snow and below-freezing temps. I like the instant gratification of sewing in-season items that I can wear right away, so I tend to only sew warm sweaters in the winter and lightweight dresses in the summer. I bought a whole bunch of heavy sweater knits on sale at the end of last winter and only sewed some of them before it got too warm to contemplate wearing them. I was in the middle of futzing with suit jacket pattern adjustments, but decided this week’s forecast called for a new heavy sweater: Something warm and snuggly that can be thrown on over multiple layers and worn on repeat both around the house and outside.

I’ve previously made three Pattern Emporium Sweet Cheeks “roomy” sweaters. But I sized down three sizes to an AU4 and made them all at the cropped length so that they wouldn’t be so roomy. I made a brown mid-scoop neck and a green v-neck out of brushed hacci knit and a purple v-knit out of stretch sweatshirt fleece. This time I decided to go full-on roomy, slouchy and made my normal AU10 size hip length and with a v-neck. I made the pattern without any adjustments other than shortening the sleeves by 1 inch and slightly reducing the diameter of the wrist bands. I used Morraine double cashmere sweater knit from Surge Fabrics in the kelp color. This is a soft 320 gsm 44.5%Rayon/35.9%Poly/19.6%Nylon fabric with 4-way stretch. I used matching Banff ultra thinck 1×1 rib sweater knit for the v-neck, cuffs, and bottom band. (I like the kelp color, even though it isn’t purple. My daughter has a thrifted wool sweater in this color that she wears constantly and I had to darn it when she was home over winter break.)

I cut the sweater out yesterday morning and sewed it all together after dinner. I’m getting better at making all the bands, but they still take some effort. My normal size is, indeed, very roomy, but not too roomy. I think going one size down would still be roomy enough, and if I was using a lighter-weight fabric I think I would want to size down. The hip length gives a very different look than the cropped length, and I like them both. I’m modeling these with PE urban tapered pants in black ponte, but they also look great with leggings or jeans, including my wide-leg cargo jeans for a totally relaxed and slouchy look. (Also, I made the necklace at a ceramics party a few years ago.)