Category Archives: sewing

3 kids, 3 t-shirt quilts

Posted on by

My first foray into t-shirt quilt making was for my son, as he was getting ready to go to college. I researched the process by reading lots of blog posts, looked at photos of lots of different styles of t-shirt quilts, and decided to make a quilt with a variety of different-sized rectangles and squares rather than the standard square grid quilt.

I had gathered up my son’s old t-shirts, designed the quilt, but hadn’t even finished cutting up the shirts when my son went off to college. I continued working on it while he was away but didn’t manage to finish it before he finished his freshman year at home due to COVID. I got distracted by all the turmoil of COVID and spent my sewing time sewing masks so I didn’t make any more progress on the quilt until after my son went back to school for his sophomore year. I managed to successfully finish the quilt by the time he came home for Thanksgiving but the quilt remains on his bed at home and never made it to school with him.

Shortly after I finished my son’s quilt, I started working on a t-shirt quilt for my middle child, who was then a high school senior. I managed to finish her quilt on time, and she brought it to college with her. It seems to be holding up well to daily use and a trip through the washing machine, and has even traveled with her to summer internships.

I intended to start my third child’s quilt a year in advance, and I did get her to select the shirts she wanted me to use almost on schedule. But between the second and third quilt I sewed a lot of garments and kept putting off the tedious step of fusing all the t-shirts to fusible interfacing. Plus child #3 requested that I sew her prom dress, and over the summer a sun dress, a cropped shirt, and a couple of pairs of pants. I finished most of the garments before she left for college, but just barely started the quilt. I decided to finish the quilt before sewing any more clothes, and also decided it was time to get my sewing machine tuned up after 15 years of not having it serviced. So after dropping my daughter off at school and spending a week in Switzerland, I came home and got to work. Five weeks later I finished the t-shirt quilt, just in time to personally deliver it to my daughter in Boston while I was in town for a business trip. We’ll start with photos of the finished quilt and happy recipient, and then for those interested in the process, I’ll detail how it was made.

The first step in my process is to select my t-shirts. For the past 10 years or so I’ve been trying to save any t-shirt that someone in my house is discarding if there is any sentimental value or there is any reason I think it might make its way into a t-shirt quilt. So for each of my kids I sorted through my bags of old t-shirts to retrieve those they wanted to include in their quilt. Then I sent them back to their rooms to find any additional shirts they wanted to donate to the cause. We talked about colors and themes and activities they wanted to make sure were included and sometimes we went back to the t-shirt pile to retrieve a few more shirts. My kids all played Dynamo soccer and we have Dynamo shirts in just about every color so I used a lot of Dynamo shirts as filler and to find pieces of a particular color. For my third t-shirt quilt, my daughter had some tie-dyed shirts and wanted a rainbow theme with the shirts arranged in a spectrum. We were short on some colors so I dug through the pile to fill in. I also added some fabric scraps from garments I recently sewed.

Once I finish selecting shirts I measure them all and make a spreadsheet including a description of the shirt, color, and smallest and largest size block that could be made from the shirt and look good on a quilt. Then I use PowerPoint to make a scale drawing of my quilt (I made all of them 60″ x 84″ to fit a twin bed) and start creating and moving around blocks of the appropriate size and color. I tend to pick a size for the block in the middle of the range to start with and then adjust as the design comes together. My third quilt has more shirts than the other two so I used smaller block sizes for most of the blocks and cropped them closer to the printed images. In the end, I had 67 blocks. Sometimes I decide to leave out a few shirts that weren’t that important to the quilt recipient and that don’t fit well in the design and sometimes I add more shirts. I add the size of each block to the PowerPoint design and then I print it out and keep it handy as a guide for cutting and sewing. Sometimes I make additional changes as I go to correct mistakes.

The next step is to wash all the t-shirts I’m going to use and rough cut them. I use a big scissors to cut them to a size bigger than I anticipate using without precisely measuring them. I save all the t-shirt scraps in case I need a piece to fill in a spot later (generally because I made a mistake). Now my big t-shirt pile is a little smaller and I have a big bag of t-shirt scraps.

Next comes the tedious step of fusing all the t-shirt pieces I plan to use onto lightweight interfacing to stabilize them. One of the blogs I read recommended Pellon 906F fusible sheerweight non-woven polyester interfacing. I buy this product by the bolt. I do my fusing on a big rectangular ironing pad. Following a suggestion from a blogger, I put a Teflon sheet on the ironing pad to keep the fusible interfacing and the t-shirt ink from sticking to my ironing pad. I put one t-shirt piece, ink-side down, on the Teflon sheet. Then I put a piece of interfacing larger than the shirt on top, fusible side down. Sometimes I do several smaller shirt pieces together and fuse them to a larger interfacing piece. I keep a bowl of water next to my ironing pad and I dip a piece of quilting cotton fabric into the bowl, wring it out, and cover the interfacing piece. Then I set my iron on the wool setting on the wet fabric and press. I hold the iron in place for about 10 seconds and then move it over and press the next section. A big t-shirt piece will take a few minutes to press using this process. I try to have something to watch or listen to while fusing as this process is fairly boring.

Once the t-shirts are fused, I lay them out on the floor according to my diagram. They are still only rough cut at this point. Then I collect them one section at a time and start working on trimming and sewing.

I refer back to my diagram and trim each piece exactly to the specified size plus half an inch for the quarter-inch seam allowance on all sides. Occasionally I realize at this point that I rough cut a piece too small or not adequately centered and this requires splicing in another piece.

For my first two quilts, I sewed the trimmed pieces together on my regular sewing machine (a Bernina Aurora 440 QE, which has been quite a workhorse for me). However, my Bernina was getting its first ever tune-up when I was ready to start sewing so I pieced this entire quilt with my Brother ST4031HD serger. The serger knife had stopped cutting and I had not yet figured out why, so I kept the knife lowered and serged without trimming. I used grey thread and adjusted the stitch width to be just under a quarter inch as I realized that the thickness of the fabric added to the seam allowance. This technique worked really well and seemed quicker than piecing with a sewing machine. I think this will result in stronger seams, which is nice for a heavy quilt that will likely get a lot of use. I pressed all of the seams in the direction that they seem to naturally want to fall (the top fabric stays straight and folds towards the bottom fabric).

I continued trimming and serging blocks together into units and then serging units together. I made a few mistakes along the way, including discovering too late that I had trimmed a block to the size on my diagram, but that size was typed incorrectly. I corrected it by adding extra strips of fabric. I try to create units that will all be able to be sewn together without having to sew partial seams or sew around corners. I made a mistake that required one partial seam to correct. In the end all the blocks fit together fairly well except in one spot, which required unsewing one seam, trimming off about a quarter inch, and resewing. The trimming and sewing part is probably my favorite part of the t-shirt quilt process. I like watching the quilt come together and all the blocks come out nice and crisp with the interfacing as backing. Here you can see the front and the back side of all the blocks sewn together.

The next step is to prepare the three Bs: backing, batting, and binding. My daughter selected a green cat gnome quilting cotton print for the backing and binding. It wasn’t wide enough for the quilt back so I sewed two pieces together. I also fused a custom-printed quilt label on the bottom right corner and later hand stitched it in place to keep all the corners down. I made 1.5-inch continuous bias binding from a square of the extra backing fabric. I think this is a particularly cool technique for making bias binding although it does require some careful measuring and a lot of cutting. I bought a queen-sized Hobbs HF90 heirloom fusible cotton blend batt so I had to cut that down to the size I need. This batt is a fairly lightweight 80% cotton and 20% polyester, which works well for t-shirt quilts without adding substantially to the weight of an already heavy quilt.

Because the batting is fusible you can put the backing on the floor (I put a large top sheet on top of the carpet first and build my quilt sandwich on top of the sheet), layer on the batting, and layer on the quilt top and then press with an iron to fuse everything in place. I bring my iron down to the floor, lie on the quilt, and do all the fusing. I start in the center and work my way out, using an organza pressing cloth to keep the t-shirt ink from melting onto my iron. After fusing the font I turn the whole thing over and check the back for wrinkles. I did a pretty good job this time and only had to peel back a little bit of the backing to remove a wrinkle. I fused that spot again after straightening it out.

Now the quilt sandwich is ready to sew! Fortunately, my Bernina was back in tip top shape so I used that for quilting with my Bernina stitch regulator (BSR) foot. I selected a spool of Isacord rainbow multicolor polyester embroidery thread that I had bought years ago and never used. I thought it went well with the rainbow theme and it kind of blends into the backing. I could have used just about any color given the range of colors in this quilt. A solid red or medium green would also have worked, and a green might have been better for the backing. I did find the Isacord kind of slippery to work with and I had some problems with skipping, especially over some of the denser ink areas. I used 50 wt cotton thread for my other t-shirt quilts and I liked working with that thread better on a heavy quilt with large-scale quilting rather than small details.

Quilting a bed quilt with a home sewing machine is challenging because you have to roll up the quilt and stuff it under the sewing machine arm, and also drag around a big heavy quilt. As t-shirt quilts are extra heavy, this was quite a challenge. Someday maybe I’ll get a long-arm quilting machine, but for now I do the best I can with the Bernina. I worked up a sweat and some shoulder pain from sliding the quilt around. I quilted this quilt entirely freehand with big meandering stipples. It’s basically doodling with a sewing machine. My stipples came out mostly smooth and round, but there are definitely a number of sharp angles and glitches too: don’t look too closely and you won’t see them!

The last step is to trim the edges of the quilt and attach the binding. I fused the french-fold binding technique, which is how I bind most of my quilts. I sewed the binding along the edge of the quilt with a quarter-inch seam allowance using my Bernina walking foot. There’s a little extra jig required at each corner for nice mitered corners, and then there’s a bit of work needed to join the beginning and end of the binding into a giant rubber band. Attaching the first side of the binding to the front of the quilt was fairly painless (especially compared to quilting the quilt). The classic french-fold binding technique requires hand stitching the binding to the back of the quilt with a slip stitch. This is a very pretty finish, but it would probably take me at least 6 hours for a quilt of this size so I have finished the binding of all my t-shirt quilts by machine. I folded over the binding, used clips to hold it in place, and used the edge foot on my sewing machine to stitch in the ditch. It took me about an hour to go all the way around the quilt.

And then I was done! I took some photos and celebrated! I also sewed up a cute pillowcase with extra backing fabric. I will use it as a bag when I deliver the quilt, and then it can be used with a standard bed pillow.

I still have a lot of t-shirts left, including a lot of shirts that used to be mine. Some day I’ll have to make a t-shirt quilt for me!

Fall Liknit

Posted on by

A while ago I bought a couple of yards of PyLos LiKnit in almost every color. I’ve previously used the black, seafoam, lavender, and linen colors. There are also several lovely warm Fall colors that I have been contemplating using in coordinating garments for months.

I started with a pair of orange pants (LiKnit “metal rust” color), very similar to my previous Pattern Emporium Urban Boldly mashup pants with the low rise size AU 10 Urban pants mashed with the Walk Boldly wide leg and a high contour waistband lined in athletic knit. This time I tweaked the contour waistband a bit from my last mashup and sewed half-inch elastic into the waistband.

I wanted a LiKnit top to go with the pants. I previously had made a black Sinclair Bondi LiKnit top, but I find the LiKnit doesn’t quite stretch enough around the bust and has drag lines, even though I sized up. I decided either darts or a boxier cut was probably needed for a LiKnit top so I went with the Sinclair Loop drop shoulder knit top pattern, which I had previously used to make a sweater. I made this one in Marsala LiKnit with the scoop neck, cropped length, simple hemmed bottom. I think this pattern works well with the LiKnit fabric. The LiKnit stretches surprisingly well for the neck band. I would like to try this pattern with a narrower neck band too. I think the split hem might also work well with this fabric.

I actually finished the top and pants back in August and took them on my Switzerland trip. I didn’t post these photos earlier because I have plans to complete my me-made Fall ensemble with a jacket made from light mustard LiKnit. But I’ve been super busy with other things, my sewing machine is in the shop, and I need to finish a quilt and some pants for my daughter before I sew any more clothes for myself. So the mustard jacket may not materialize for a while. In the mean time, I’ve been wearing the outfit with a store-bought purple sweater. I also have a surprising number of other tops and jackets in my wardrobe that go with orange pants… who knew?

Before I took my youngest daughter to college in August, she insisted that I make her some more black “flowy pants.” She has a pair of black LiKnit pants I made using the Sinclair Cleo pattern extended into palazzo pants that she wears pretty much non-stop. They have held up really well through lots of wear and wash and dry cycles. They are not stretched out and have no pilling. Unfortunately, they did come in contact with a spot of bleach, so there is a light spot that my daughter periodically colors in with a black sharpie. Anyway, she asked for another pair of black LiKnit flowy pants, as well as black ponte pants for cooler weather. She is about the same size as me but taller and a little slimmer so I used the same Pattern Emporium Urban Boldly mashup approach with the same base size as I used for my orange pants, but added 1.5 inch to the waist height (basically the high-rise version plus an extra half inch) and didn’t shorten the leg before hemming. The pants fit her very well and she loves them, but I didn’t manage to get a photo before she packed them up to take to college. She asked me to make another pair just like them in black ponte and send them to her.

October update: Ponte pants finished and delivered. She was wearing the LiKnit pants when I saw her so I got photos of the LiKnit pants (outside) and the ponte pants (inside).

Lovie Dovie

Posted on by

Last winter when Petite Stitchery introduced the adult Dovie longlline crop and dress pattern, I knew my teen daughter would love it. Sure enough, I showed her the pattern and for months she kept asking me when I would make it for her. She picked out a 180 gsm light sage green polyester/spandex yummy rib fabric from Surge Fabric and I finally got around to sewing her dress. I sewed the size XS knee length option with the regular front neckline (there is also a lower cut option). The bodice is lined and I used the same fabric for the lining.

The dress was pretty quick to sew — I would have finished the whole thing in one afternoon/evening, except that I added pockets (not in the pattern) and that took extra time so I had to finish hemming it and sew the shoulder ties the next day. The pattern instructions were ok, but could have been clearer. I’m spoiled by Sinclair and Pattern Emporium, which provide very detailed instructions and tips in their patterns. This pattern offered on a little advice on what type of stitches to use (I ended up using a shallow zigzag on my sewing machine for most of it and surging around the waistband, pocket bags, and sides of the skirt) or detailed fabric recommendations for dress and lining (I lined it with the same fabric as the dress but saw suggestions in the Facebook group for lining with power mesh or athletic knit for more support). The pattern also inexplicably is calibrated off by a factor of 10. All of the measurements in the pattern have to be multiplied by 10 (my projector calibration setting is 12.8% for all the other pattern companies but is 128% for PS) — easy to do but why? This pattern uses the burrito method to make the lined bodice straps, and I would probably have been stumped by the instructions if I hadn’t just made a Sinclair Bloom top that used the same technique. I briefly thought I was supposed to attach the waistband to the bodice and the lining waistband separately to the lining, but after pinning it that way figured out that all four layers get sewn together at once.

The pattern suggested that this dress would require 2 7/8 yards of fabric, but from looking at the pieces for size XS, I figured I could make it in less than 2 yards. Indeed, I had almost half a yard left from my 2-yard piece of fabric. I think the crop top version could be made out of leftovers from other projects.

The pattern suggests adding clear elastic in several places, some of which didn’t seem necessary to me. I ended up adding clear elastic to the horizontal part of the front and back neckline as well as right under the bust.

My daughter and I agree that pockets are required on all dresses, so I borrowed the pocket pattern from the Sinclair Yasmin dress and added deep pockets that easily hold a cell phone. The waistband provides sufficient anchoring for pockets and there is enough room at the hips that the pockets do not show through the skirt (although if you put enough in them they will obviously show). My daughter went out with friends and put her phone and wallet in the pockets and came back and told me the big pockets were great and her friends were jealous.

My daughter is about 5’5″ and the knee length comes exactly to her knee. I’m a few inches shorter so would probably cut the skirt about three inches shorter for me.

This is a super cute pattern. The optional (and removable) shoulder ties take it up a level of cuteness too. The cup size options make it easy to get a good fit at the bust. In the Facebook group people report that if you use supportive enough fabric for the lining the dress can be worn without a bra.

After I finished making my daughter’s dress, I decided it was so cute that I needed a crop top for myself. Except I don’t actually wear crop tops so I took the size small Dovie crop top pattern and added an extra 2.5 inches to the waistband height (extending a total of 5 inches, but it gets folded in half). I used about 2/3 yard of lavender DBP.

I cut and sewed the entire bodice in about 2 hours, having already figured everything out for the dress. The waistband assembly is a bit different for the top, and that’s where I got a bit stumped and there was some trial and error until I landed on the following approach that worked very well for me. I sewed up the sides of the waistband to form a tube and folded it in half so that it has an outer and lining piece. I aligned and pinned the raw edges of the outer and lining and then used a large zig zag stitch along the edge to hold them together. Then I aligned the waistband with the bodice main and lining, pinned, and stitched all 4 layers together with a large zig zag. Finally I surged over the zigzags and added clear elastic to the seam as I went, giving it a gentle stretch. I didn’t bother with the shoulder ties since I expect to wear this with with sweaters or jackets.

It’s a cute little top, but I don’t think it is quite as cute as the dress. Nonetheless, it will go with a number of pants and skirts in my wardrobe, and I expect I will get a lot of wear out of it. I’m modeling it here with DBP Sinclair Cleo palazzo pants I made last year. The look is definitely enhanced with the the right bra (on me that means wide straps, padded cups). I think the straps are set slightly too wide for me, and possibly a tad too long, and if I make this again I’ll try to adjust that.

I had some lavender PyLos Liknit in my stash so decided to make a Pattern Emporium Songbird Kimono jacket to match. I used the crop length with the narrow binding and extended the binding to the bottom (as I have done previously with this pattern). I used 1-inch fusible knit stay tape again to interface the binding. I used the tapered sleeve option and shortened it by 2.5 inches. This is a fantastic pattern with very clear instructions and lots of useful sewing tips. This time I got it right the first time.

Just Peachy!

Posted on by

I bought the Pattern Emporium Just Peachy Stretch Shorts pattern last winter and finally got around to making myself a pair of shorts out of leftover grey cotton-lycra fabric from my stash (that I previously used to make Urban tapered pants). They come with elastic or yoga waistbands with are fairly similar to the PE Walk Boldly and Urban pants respectively with the same back darts and hip shape. The main differences are that they are (obviously) shorter than pants and the shorts have a taller yoga waistband and a straight inseam while the pants have a curved inseam.

I made my usual size AU10 with a size AU8 waistband. I made the mid rise with a yoga waistband, stitched front pockets, and length 3, which has about a 6-inch inseam. I have learned from my past experience with PE pants that because I’m short, the mid rise ends up being a high-rise fit on me, especially with a yoga waistband added. I followed the pattern pretty much as-is except for lengthening the pocket bags and adding half-inch elastic to the fold in the yoga waistband. I used a zigzag on my sewing machine for the pocket stitching and to sew down the 5/8-inch hem (fused in place with seam tape first).

I struggled a bit stretch the size 8 waistband to fit the size 10 shorts smoothly and in the end it puckers a little bit more than I would like. I probably should have made wider darts in the back or graded the waistband or switched to a contour waistband like I’ve used on some of the pants.

I love the way the pockets are finished with a binding. It’s a really nice finishing touch and the instructions were easy to follow (the instruction said to make the binding longer than needed and cut off the ends after it was sewn, and that worked really well).

The shorts are super comfy and I will probably wear them for casual wear and sleeping. Even with added elastic, the waistband is not as firm as I would like due to the fabric I used not having great recovery. I probably should have added a power mesh or athletic knit layer for a firmer feel. It is not actually too lose, it is just a feeling thing, especially when I load the pockets.

I don’t actually wear shorts very much outside my house (except for bike shorts and soccer shorts) so I don’t really need a large collection of shorts, but when I need more, I will use this pattern again. It would work well for both casual as well as dressy shorts (perhaps made out of ponte, scuba, scuba suede, stretch velour, etc.).

Bloom woven top (but actually with a knit)

Posted on by

I have made several pairs of pants and a cardigan from PyLos LiKnit fabric and I adore all of them. I made a Sinclair Bondi elbow sleeve top from black LiKnit which is ok, but the LiKnit doesn’t really have enough stretch for this pattern without some adjustments (more ease or maybe adding darts?). Since the LiKnit behaves almost like a woven, I decided to try making a woven top with seafoam LiKnit and I selected the recently-released Sinclair Bloom. I made the sleeveless version at the shortest length with the rounded back neck. I treated the LiKnit fabric exactly as if it were woven, using regular straight stitches for the seams and top stitching.

There is some complexity to this pattern, but as usual, the Sinclair pattern is fairly detailed and pretty easy to follow. The front and back yoke are lined (I used the same LiKnit fabric), and the front yoke is interfaced with fusible woven interfacing. I used a medium weight, which was probably a little heavier than needed–next time I’ll try a lighter weight interfacing. The front and back have some gathers, which I’m afraid I didn’t distribute evenly enough, but they’re mostly ok. The sleeveless version uses the “burrito” method to encase the neck and shoulders, which is a fun technique.

Despite being a knit, the LiKnit fabric worked pretty well with this pattern. I may try one in another color of LiKnit with sleeves. I would also like to try this pattern with cotton double gauze.

I’m overall pretty happy with how this top came out, and it looks great with my seafoam LiKinit Urban Boldly mashup pants! In fact I wore this outfit to a conference last week and got complements from complete strangers. Also it was very light weight and packable, and doesn’t need to be ironed.

Heartlight skirt

Posted on by

The Pattern Emporium Heartlight Skirt pattern is a versatile pattern for very flattering flared A-line knit skirts of all lengths. It’s also super fast and easy, unless you’re me and you make it harder for yourself. I did two things that made constructing my skirt harder the first time (adding pockets and using a waistband fabric a lot firmer than the skirt fabric), but now that I know what I’m doing I can continue to add pockets and add firmer waistbands and it shouldn’t be too bad the second time around. And if you want to try either of these things, keep reading for some tips.

I was planning to use this bright floral DBP fabric for a dress, but liked how it went with my purple double-gauze pants, so made a Sinclair Bondi v-neck t-shirt instead. I also realized that the colors in the fabric coordinate with a number of other things I own (including my sneakers), so having separates in this fabric would be useful. I decided to make a skirt, and coincidentally Heartlight was the Friday discount pattern a couple of weeks ago, so I bought it and figured I would give it a try. I loved the shape of the skirts this pattern makes and the soft yoga waistband, but I was disappointed it didn’t come with pockets. I read on the PE Facebook page that people had added pockets, some using another PE pattern that I don’t own, and others improvised based on the pockets in PE pants patterns.

I cut the pattern out using my projector. I cut a size AU10 about 2 inches above the knee length (thinking that since this wasn’t a petite pattern, this is what I would need, but it actually ends up being more above the-knee than I was expecting). The skirt front and back plus the pocket pieces I cut used less than a yard of fabric. If you are taller or want a longer skirt it will obviously use more fabric, but the pattern has some tips about how to cut the skirt in pieces to use the fabric more efficiently and to allow this pattern to be used with narrower fabrics. Because DBP is very soft and stretchy, it does not have enough hold for a yoga waistband unless you add elastic or line it with another fabric. Especially since I was planning to add pockets, I knew I needed a different fabric for the waistband. I also realized that my floral fabric was very busy and might benefit from being broken up by a black waistband. I decided to use black 256 GSM athletic brushed poly for a nice firm yoga waistband.

I referred back to the PE Walk Boldly pants pattern jeans pocket instructions. As the shape of the hip on the pants does not match the skirt I could not use the pants pattern piece, but I improvised following the same concept. I made pocket rectangles about 6 inches wide and 8.5 inches deep, and then doubled them for the front and back of the pocket bag. I angled the rectangle to align with the skirt side seam and adjusted the top edge to align with the waist of the skirt. I opted for a straight slash pocket opening.

Once I figured out how to make the pockets work they were pretty easy to cut and sew. I stitched the top of the pocket to the skirt front, understitched and topstitched, then folded it in half, surged the bottom, and then basted the rest of the pocket top and side to the skirt front piece (ok I realize that really requires an entire tutorial and not just a diagram and single sentence unless you are already familiar with making these sorts of pockets). The pockets are big enough for my phone and are well anchored in the waistband.

My biggest problem came attaching the waistband, largely due to the difference in stretch and firmness of the two fabrics. I followed the pattern instructions and used the quarter method to distribute fabric and pinned in place with 8 pins. I knew that stretching the athletic knit waistband to fit the DBP skirt would be difficult, so I decided to machine baste it before sewing it together. It was a complete disaster, with parts bunched up too much and some parts not joined together at all because the waistband had curled under. I unpicked a few spots and tried to fix them, and grew increasingly frustrated as I went. I eventually declared it a mess and went out to dinner. After I came back I unpicked the entire waistband (easy because it was basting stitches) and started over. This time I started by basting the two edges of the yoga waistband together with a wide zigzag stitch over the edge. This ensured the two edges would stay together and prevented them from curling. Then I applied the quarter method again, but this time used a lot more pins. I machine basted the whole things and it looked much better. Finally, I surged the layers in place, stretching the waistband as I went. After that all that was left was to hem the bottom, which I did using hem tape and a zigzag stitch.

The end result is comfortable and looks good, and I even like it untucked too… actually I’m more likely to wear it that way. I like the fact that the skirt is a little big swishy, without having all the fabric of a full-circle skirt (I love those too, but not for every occasion) and that it doesn’t require any gathering to make it. I’m pretty happy with how the pockets came out, although with DBP you always have to be careful how you load pockets to keep them from stretching out awkwardly. The PE “foxy” pocket style would also probably work with this pattern. Although the firm athletic knit was a bit of a pain to deal with, it makes for a great waistband that feels like it will stay put as I wear it, even with loaded pockets. I might make a black skirt entirely out of this fabric. I would also like to try this pattern in a rayon ponte and also try a longer length.

So much fabric!

Posted on by

Given my current interests, I couldn’t visit NYC without a trip to the garment district. After all, my wardrobe (and my daughter’s wardrobe too) for the trip was mostly me-made clothes.

After passing the giant button, we headed to the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) museum where the exhibit right now is on statement sleeves. While this might not have been the most fascinating topic for my husband, he has learned to recognize statement sleeves and has been pointing them out to me ever since.

Silk cocktail dress with “bound sleeves” by Tom Ford, 2013

We walked past lots of fabric stores and stopped in at Mood Fabrics to check it out. It was an amazing three floors of fabric sensory overload: floor to ceiling fabrics of every variety! In the end I took a bunch of photos and only bought two yards of fabric because I was just too overwhelmed with choices. It would be very cool to visit with some specific projects in mind.

Purple fluffy pants!

Posted on by

I haven’t sewn many garments with woven fabric lately because I don’t like to iron my clothes after I wash them and I would also rather not deal with zippers. I also find knit clothes just tend to be more comfortable to wear. However, “fluffy” cotton double gauze is trendy right now, you don’t have to (and you really should not) iron it if you wear it crinkled, and when you use it for loose fitting summer clothes it is cool and comfortable and does not need a zipper. I bought three yards of purple fluffy from Mily Mae Fabrics and decided to make some woven palazzo pants.

I love the Pattern Emporium Walk Boldly and Urban knit pants patterns so selected their Vacation Vibes pattern for woven palazzo pants. The pattern has both a low-rise and high-rise option, as well as several pocket choices and options for subtle or dramatic flare legs. I love wearing high-rise pants so I went with the high rise waist, subtle flare leg, and foxy pockets. I cut a size AU10 short and made no pattern modifications whatsoever.

I washed and dried my fluffy fabric before use and did not iron it at all to keep it nice and fluffy. I projected the pattern onto the fluffy and cut it with a rotary cutter. It is a little tricky to sew because you want to avoid having it stretch out. I used a walking foot on my sewing machine with a slightly longer stitch length and surged all the seams after I sewed them to tidy up the edges. every time the pattern suggested pressing with an iron I ignored it, and just did some light finger pressing. I made a bias binding for the large foxy pockets (big enough for my phone without any modifications), but it requires several passes through the sewing machine to attach. By the time I got it attached it had stretched out a bit so I moistened the pocket openings with a damp cloth, reblocked them to their proper shape with my hands, and let them dry before I finished attaching the pockets. The pants were very easy to sew, and went together quickly. The waistband was super easy to assemble as there was nothing to stretch: I made a casing and threaded a piece of 2″ elastic through it. I’m 5’2″ and ended up hemming the short length 2.25 inches to wear with flats. The only time I touched my iron was to very lightly press the hems.

Here I am modeling the pants with my new Chorus top. I tucked it in so you could see the waist band but I will probably wear this shirt untucked. I like the subtle leg option, which is plenty wide on me. The dramatic leg could be fun with the right fabric, but may be more pants than I really need.

I thought the pants looked pretty good and were comfy to wear. But the rise was really sky high on me and the crotch was sitting pretty low. I am a big fan of high-rise pants, but as a short person, I sometimes find high-rise too high when there is no petite version. I also find I frequently have to size down and/or grade in the waist on PE patterns, despite choosing sizes that match my measurement. I decided to wear my pants to work all day and see how they did. They were comfortable and looked alright, and the double gauze was just right in both the 75-degree F outdoor weather and indoor air conditioning. but by the end of the day I was convinced that the waist was definitely too high for me. I also noticed that the pants slipped down a bit as I wore them and I kept stepping on the hem. The pockets were kind of droopy and I was concerned my phone could fall out when I sat down.

I cut off the waistband, removed about 2 inches from the top of the pants and graded in the sides from the hip up to the waist. I took about 3 inches out of the waistband circumference and sewed it back on. I think they fit much better now. They sit right at my natural waist rather than above it and there isn’t so much extra fabric around the waist. Next time I make these I think I would cut a size smaller (especially if I use double gauze since it stretches out a bit when you wear it), low rise, and still probably grade in the waist. I would also reshape the pocket opening to attach higher on the leg and hem them a bit higher. I might try a yoga waist band in a coordinating athletic knit (the pattern has instructions for that too!).

New photos show the reconfigured waistband. As an added bonus, since the pants are pulled up more the hems have risen and I no longer trip over them. I made a Sinclair Bondi v-neck tshirt (my first Bondi v-neck) out of a floral DBP in my stash to match the pants. I was going to make a dress from this fabric, but I liked how it paired with the pants so decided to make separates instead. I also like the shirt untucked. Skirt coming soon. I wore this outfit to work, and by the time I walked home it was 92 degrees F. The whole outfit was still comfortable, even in the heat and humidity!

Ruffles and Flutters

Posted on by

The Ellie & Mac Felicia Custom-Fit Cup Size Dress Pattern is super cute, but takes some time to make, especially if you include the flutter and ruffle options. It offers a nice custom fit by providing cup-size options and bodice darts. This isn’t all that critical for those with my proportions, especially when I sew with light, stretchy fabrics. However, I do think the bodice pattern will be nice for sewing heavier knits. I sewed my dress with a lightweight and drapey rayon spandex deadstock fabric form Califabrics.com. The lightweight fabric drapes quite nicely for ruffles and flutters, so I took advantage of that.

I made the high v-neck option with the long flutter sleeve. I made a couple of deviations from the pattern for both the neck and the sleeve. When I started basting together the v-neck, following the pattern instructions, I found that the acute angle that is marked for the v-neck back is too sharp an angle to smoothly match the high v-neck in the bodice. After trying unsuccessfully to make it work a couple of times, I cut a new neck band and cut the angle at 90 degrees. This lined up with the bodice perfectly and lies very smooth. (From looking at photos others have posted, it looks like others may have had this problem too and would benefit from a 90 degree cut.) The other change I made was to fold the arm facings in half so that I when I top stitched them down they have a finished edge and do not need to be trimmed. This might not work with heavier fabric but worked really well with my light-weight fabric.

I added work for myself by adding a ruffle to the bottom of the skirt. I cut the skirt mini-skirt length and cut a 4.25″ x 140″ ruffle, as suggested in the add-on ruffle tutorial. (I’m 5’2″ so miniskirt plus ruffle comes to just above my knee.)I hemmed the ruffle and gathered the ruffle in four sections before attaching it to the bottom of the skirt. The ruffle looks really nice, but it was time consuming to do all that gathering and get it even, especially using such stretchy fabric.

Because I refuse to sew dresses without pockets, I added inseam pockets to the sides of the skirt and secured them at the waist. I view this step as critical, but it did add to the time needed to complete this project. In addition, once I had the whole thing sewn together I realized that the fabric was so stretchy that the bodice had “grown” a bit from the weight of the skirt — and that was before I put anything into the pockets. The clear elastic didn’t help, and was a bit itchy around my waist. I ended up cutting off the skirt removing about an inch of fabric from both the bottom of the bodice and the top of the skirt, and then reattaching them with a 1.5-inch waistband in between, cut with a smaller diameter than the bodice so that it would stretch around my waist. I lined the waistband with athletic knit to add some stability to the waistband. This looks and feels a lot better, and I can actually put things in my pockets now too.

Overall, I’m pleased with the results, even if annoyed by the process. The ruffle at the bottom looks great with the flutter sleeves. The rayon spandex is soft and breathable and very comfortable to wear, but given my feelings about pockets, I will think twice before using it for anything other than a top in the future. I was very happy to figure out how to get the v-neck to lie flat and to recover from the growing fabric problem by adding a lined waistband.

A bunch of Bondis

Posted on by

I love the Sinclair Bondi tshirt pattern, and have previously used it to make long-sleeve scoop neck and screwp neck versions, as well as bishop-sleeve versions, and even a wool sweater. I think I’ve made at least nine Bondi’s previously. It’s summer, so I’m mixing it up now with some short sleeve variations.

I ordered a few colors of cotton Lycra to have on hand, and my daughter spotted the sage fabric and requested a cropped short-sleeve tee. I made this one in a size 4R but graded the waist to a size 0 and cut the bottom at the horizontal waist line shown on the pattern. In hindsight I probably should have cut it a half-inch longer, so I ended up sewing about a 3/8-inch hem rather than my usual 5/8-inch t-shirt hem. Actually, she probably wouldn’t have cared if I hemmed it shorter, as it does seem to be what everyone her age is wearing. I used the crew neck and cut the sleeves about an inch shorter than the short-sleeve length marked on the pattern. It seems to be exactly what she wanted.

I didn’t have enough black Pylos Liknit fabric for another pair of palazzo pants (my daughter is wearing the last pair of black LiKnit pants I made in the photo above and would desperately like me to make her another pair when it restocks), but I had enough for a Bondi. I made this one with a screwp neck and elbow sleeves in a size 6P. The Liknit has only horizontal stretch so you can see some lines at the side of the bust, but it still fits pretty well and is very lightweight and comfortable to wear. It looks great with my black LiKnit pants and also these LiKnit pants in the linen colorway.

Finally, I used some light-weight, wide-rib poly-spandex in a groovy print that I bought on $3/yard clearance from Mily Mae Fabrics last year to make a short-sleeve screwp-neck Bondi in size 6p that pairs perfectly with my seafoam LiKnit pants.

So now I’m up to 12 Bondis and I’m sure there will be more! I still need to try the V-neck version… perhaps I will try that next.

Join the Chorus

Posted on by

In the end, my Love Notions Chorus drape-neck blouse looks pretty nice, but I found it to be a rather frustrating pattern to sew, in part because the pattern doesn’t include very detailed instructions, and in part because it seems to be especially problematic for small sizes. The pattern has a variety of options, including shallow and deep drapes in the front and back or a plain back, plus it can be a top or a dress and have a variety of sleeves or not. I decided to make a plain back, deep drape front sleeveless blouse in size small out of a yard of slate blue ITY from my stash. I initially cut out the pattern as drafted, except I shortened the front by 2.5 inches and removed the side vents.

I had read the Love Notions Facebook group and had seen some complaints about the deep drape being too deep in small sizes and for short people (I’m 5’2″), so I cut the deep drape and basted it together just enough to be able to test it. Sure enough, the drape was too deep on me. If I positioned it just right it looked great, but if I moved the drape shifted and revealed my bra. I took a photo of the problem and posted it to the Facebook group, and within minutes I received suggestions for fixing the problem. Some suggested workarounds such as taping the drape to my bra or adding boning to keep the drape centered. However, there were also some marked up diagrams of how to adjust the pattern.

Inspired by those diagrams, I looked at the pattern again and realized that I could align the shallow and deep drape and see where they differed. I then drew a new cut line between the shallow and deep drape lines. While I was at it, I fixed another problem I had observed: the seam where the back facing and front drape line up at the shoulder didn’t quite match because the back facing edge was slightly longer. I thought it might be easier to get the shoulder and back facing to lie flat if everything lined up. So I adjusted my new cut line to be the right length to match the shoulder seam. You can see here the outline of the deep-drape front in blue, the shallow-drape front in green, and my new cut line in red.

I unpicked the shoulder seams, recut the top of the drape based on the new red line I drew on the pattern, and sewed it back together. This time the drape was just right. Although the pattern doesn’t call for it, I put a few stitches in the outer shoulder edges to hold the facing in place.

Next I started working on the arm hole binding. This is a point in the instructions were more details and a photo or two would be helpful. I wasn’t sure whether to sew the binding on with a stretch stitch, straight stitch, or surger. After consulting with the Facebook group, I used a stretch stitch to sew one of the bindings, but was not happy with it so I unpicked it and tried again. After much futzing I ended up flipping the binding to the inside instead of using the wrap around binding the pattern calls for. I did not execute it all that well on the first side, but it came out better on the second, but still more puckered than I would like. I suspect my binding might be a bit too short for the size of the arm holes.

Once the arm holes were bound I tried the blouse on and found that the back facing kept rolling up and sticking out the back of the neck, despite being understitched. I tried top stitching close to the edge, which helped some, but not enough. I added another row of top stitching 5/8-inch from the edge and pressed, the seam, which ended up being a lot better.

Finally, I hemmed the top and here it is! Overall I like it and if I make another one it should be a pretty quick project. I might try one with sleeves instead of arm bindings, or if I try another one with bindings I will probably try adding about half an inch to the length of the bindings so the bindings do not have to stretch as much. I might also try adding some shaping to the waist. I think a shorter facing, and possibly even a binding for the back neck would work better too. You can see in the back photo that the outline of the ITY facing.

Photos above with Pattern Emporium Urban Boldly mashup pants in seafoam LiKnit.

Ruffled Harper cardigan hack

Posted on by

When I saw the Sinclair Harper cardigan hack on the SewYouThinkYouCanSew blog about a year ago I knew I wanted to give it a try. This hack is based on an Anthropologie Cardigan. I loved the look so much that I bought the same fabric, Impressionist Double Sweater Knit in eucalyptus from Serge Fabrics. Then I got busy with other projects, including a Sinclair Laura cardigan in the tea leaf color of the Impressionist Double Sweater Knit. When I bought Pylos LiKinit in seafoam and discovered it was exactly the same color as eucalyptus, I knew it was time to make a seafoam/eucalyptus outfit (see my post on my Pattern Emporium Urban Boldly mashup pants).

I followed the instructions for the Harper cardigan hack on the blog with a few modifications. I started with a size 6p. Since I prefer not to have neckbands that creep up my neck, I lowered the back neck band and narrowed the whole band, just as I had done for a previous Harper sweater I made. I used patch pockets (but without the top band) but still split the front pieces as was done in the hack. I also added a slight flare to the outside seam of the lower front pieces. I omitted the sleeve cuffs and lengthened the sleeves slightly to compensate. I was able to cut all the pieces from 1.5 yards of fabric in my size. I’m very happy with how the ruffled harper came out! It is a jacket I can wear to work and look professional, with a fun ruffle in back. This one is a light-weight sweater knit good for spring and fall or keeping warm in overly air-conditioned buildings. I might make a warmer one for winter in French terry or a cozy sweater knit.

Since I had fabric leftover I made a Sinclair Cache top to go with the cardigan. I followed the cache pattern but added a scoop neck and cut the back hem to match the front. I actually don’t love how the Cache came out in this fabric with the scoop neck as it doesn’t lie flat under the cardigan, but I’ll wear it anyway.

Urban Boldly mashup pants

Posted on by

Pattern Emporium offers two different wide leg knit pants patterns that are fairly similar but have some important differences. Walk Boldly has the widest legs, the highest rise, lots of pocket options, and an elastic waist. The wide leg option in the Urban Pants Collection is not quite as wide, doesn’t have as many pocket choices, and has a yoga waist band. Both pants are pretty much the same from the crotch up to the bottom of the waistband, with the same back pleats that I love so much. I have seen a number of questions in the PE Facebook group about whether these two patterns can be mashed, and of course the answer is yes!

I like both patterns a lot, but I like the comfort and fit of a yoga waistband, especially one that has been modified to fit me perfectly. But sometimes I want the look and swooshy feel of extra wide-leg pants. So I started with my wide-leg urban pants modifications (laid out in Affinity designer) and digitally traced the Walk Boldly legs onto the front and back urban wide-leg pants leg pieces. Since the crotch lines up perfectly, this is easy to do. I shortened the leg pattern pieces by 2 inches and was able to cut all the pieces in size AU 10 from 2 yards of 58″-wide fabric.

I used seafoam Pylos LiKnit fabric for these pants — not the first time I’ve made summer pants out of LiKnit, but the first time with this pattern. LiKnit is a rayon/nylon lightweight knit that looks and feels somewhat like linen. It has horizontal, but not vertical stretch. I realized the lack of vertical stretch might be a problem when making these pants, but I decided to give it a try. it turned out not to be a problem at all for me except for the waistband, which I lined with athletic knit. I basted it on and realized immediately that I would need it to be bigger to comfortably get this low-stretch fabric over my hips. So I removed the initial waistband and cut out a new one. I added about a half inch vertically and an inch horizontally from the yoga contour waistband I had customized for my grey ponte wide-leg urban pants. This one worked perfectly. These pants looks and feel great to wear!

Pants modeled with Sinclair Harper cardigan with ruffle hack and Sinclair Cache top in eucalyptus Impressionist Double Sweater Knit

Totally Tartan! (Part 3)

Posted on by

(See also Part 1 and Part 2.)

I still had some cotton lycra diagonal tartan Spoonflower fabric leftover from my tartan dress project, so I decided it was about time for my husband to get in on the tartan fun. I paired the tartan fabric with royal blue cotton lycra from knitfabric.com and made him a short-sleeved Sinclair Tao semi-fitted classic raglan tshirt. I also made myself a cap sleeve, scoop neck Sinclair Demi classic raglan knit top. Both came together very quickly and easily even though it was my first time using both patterns.

The Demi is semi-fitted, similar to the Sinclair Cachet relaxed top (which does not have separate sleeve pieces). It is not as fitted as the Sinclair Bondi. I really like the scoop neck option, which is not as low as the Bondi scoop neck — more like my invented Bondi screwp neck. The fit of the Tao is almost identical to the fit of the Sinclair Kai semi-fitted crew neck for men.

How to sew a $1000 prom dress for $120

Posted on by

Last winter my daughter was browsing online looking for prom dress inspiration when she found the dresses of her dreams: Teuta Matoshi’s Flourishing Meadow Corset Dress, Flourishinig Meadow Midi Dress, and Flourishing Meadow Gown. She loved the sage green embroidered tulle, full skirt, and enormous tulle puff sleeves. She preferred the long sleeves on the corset dress and the V neck on the gown (but maybe not cut quite that low). What she didn’t like was the $850-$1050 price tag. Just in case, she showed me the dresses. When I suggested that we could try sewing something similar she objected that reproducing the embroidery on the tulle would be difficult and time consuming. I assured her that we could buy the tulle already embroidered.

I asked my daughter to look at online pattern shops for a suitable dress pattern (ideally with projector PDF files), and to check online fabric stores and Etsy for embroidered tulle. Over winter break she got to work and emailed me a list of URLs for dress patterns and tulle. The dress patterns were designed with zippers for woven fabrics, and all would require some modification to get the look she was going for. It occurred to me that one of my favorite indie pattern companies Sinclair Patterns had a knit dress in a similar style. I wondered whether the Sinclair Yasmin dress might be adapted to have deep front and back Vs (but not so deep as to preclude wearing a normal bra), a full skirt, and a tulle overlay. I remembered seeing a post from a sewist on Sinclair’s Facebook group in which she had used the Yasmin pattern to reproduce the Internet famous Lirika Matoshi strawberry dress, which also has a tulle overlay. I decided the Yasmin pattern could work.

My daughter debated which tulle to use at length, and eventually selected tulle that appears to be exactly the same as the tulle used in the original flourishing meadow dresses. The embroidery might be a little bit looser than in the original, but otherwise it seems to be the same. We ordered the tulle from an online lace store in Hong Kong that sells on Etsy.

Once we settled on the pattern and the tulle, we needed to find light green fabric that matched the tulle. It is really difficult to shop for fabric by color online as the color looks different on different monitors and different lighting conditions impact the fabric photos. I also wasn’t entirely sure what kind of fabric I wanted. I knew I wanted a knit, something with some sheen to it, and ideally a bit of structure but also fairly drapey. I ordered about 20 different green fabric samples from four different online fabric stores. I tried scuba, ITY, tricot, and various other fabrics with combinations of spandex, polyester, nylong, and rayon in their fiber content. I ordered variations on sage green, light green, mint green and “greeninsh” (yes that’s what one fabric store call it) colors. You can see most of the samples in the photo below. Note how much variation there is in the fabrics, including those that have the same color name.

The winner was Sage Sparkle Nylon/Spandex from Califabrics, which was the perfect color and weight for this project (and a little lighter than the green in the original dress). This is a fabric that might be used to make leotards or bathing suits, but also has a nice drape for a dress. When I went back to the website to order five yards of it, I discovered they had only one yard left. As it was a designer deadstock, I feared it might not be possible to get more, but I emailed the store to find out. About a week later, Ron from Califabrics emailed me to say he had found another 15 yards of this fabric (Thank you Ron!). I was so excited I ordered it immediately!

Before cutting into the beautiful prom dress fabric, I decided I would do some prototyping first. I sewed myself a Yasmin dress out of floral ITY fabric without alterations and then sewed my daughter a Yasmin top modified to have front and back deep Vs. Finally, I sewed myself a lovely baby blue knee-length dress with the V alterations, a full-circle skirt, and a tulle overlay with embroidered daisies. I learned a lot in the prototyping process and got a really lovely dress for myself that I probably would not have otherwise attempted (and I wore it a couple of weeks ago to perform with my flute choir).

After my extensive prototyping, I opened the Yasmin pattern in Affinity Designer and modified it for this final prom project. I started with the 2R size and drew in a square shoulder adjustment (that I had discovered my daughter needed when I made her the modified top) and the modified front and back Vs from my prototyping. I moved all the dots for marking the pleats closer to the seam allowance so that I could mark them on the fabric without fear of them showing up on the finished garment. Having learned from making my blue dress that the tulle overlay substantially reduces the bodice ease, I added about an inch to the side seams of both the front and back bodice pieces, starting at the bottom and tapering up to a quarter of an inch at the armscye. I also added about an inch to each side of the front and back waistband pieces, effectively adding almost 4 inches of ease. (That seemed like a lot to add, but I needed it for the blue dress and I figured if it turned out to be unnecessary I could always trim it off and resew the side seam.) I further modified the bishop sleeves I used in the blue dress to make them even wider and puffier, including stretching out the top of the sleeve so that it needed to be gathered before being attached. Finally, I drafted a full-length (40 inch) full-circle skirt pattern based on the Sinclair flared skirt add-on pack for the Valley Skater Dress. I then opened a new Affinity Designer file and made a a page the size of my 5-yard fabric piece. I copied the pattern pieces onto this page and laid them out so everything would fit. The big puffy sleeves just barely fit (I had considered making them even bigger to more closely match the original, but this was all I could do with the fabric I had). I decided I could cut the skirt as two giant semi-circles and avoid the center seam.

I realized that the projector wasn’t going to be much help for cutting the full-length full-circle skirt. So instead of projecting I moved all my cutting mats to the floor and spread the green lining fabric out on them. Then I enlisted my husband to assist me in making a giant compass out of a pencil and a piece of string to draw the semi-circles on the fabric (you never know when things you learned in geometry class may come in handy!). I then cut the semi-circles with a rotary cutter. I used the lining semi-circles as a template to cut the tulle semi-circles. I then moved my cutting mats back to my sewing room and projected the bodice and pocket pieces as usual. I cut the bodice pieces on the bias to maximize the stretch I could get out of the tulle in both directions. The waistband needed the most horizontal stretch, so I cut that entirely in the horizontal stretch direction. You can see this in the finished dress if you look at how the flowers are angled in the bodice. The flowers on the skirt are vertical in the center and horizontal on the sides due to the semi-circle construction.

Once everything was cut out, I zigzagged all the tulle pieces for the bodice to their corresponding lining pieces so that I could sew the two layers as one (flatlining). Then I started working on the pleats, first pinning and taping on both sides them before zigzagging them in place. Then I sewed together the bodice and checked the fit on my daughter. It fit well without any further modification, so I went ahead and attached the sleeves and made a casing at the wrists for 1/4-inch elastic. I checked the fit again on my daughter and she approved.

Next, I moved on to sewing the skirt. I sewed the to tulle pieces together with a shallow zigzag and a quarter-inch seam allowance. I left a 5.5-inch opening in the side seams to align with the pocket opening in the lining. I attached the pockets to the lining with my sewing machine and understitched them. Then I used my serger to sew the lining side seams in place. To help keep things from slipping out of the pockets I sewed the pockets partially closed from the top down 1.5 inches, left a 5.5-inch opening, and then sewed to the bottom of the pockets.

The next step was to join the two skirt layers and attach them to the bodice. I sewed the tulle to the lining at the waist with a shallow zigzag stitch and a 1/8-inch seam allowance. I then machine-basted the bottom of the waistband layers together with a 1/8-inch seam allowance. And then I basted the bottom of the waistband to the skirt layers. I had to remove some of the basting when I realized some of the layers had slipped out, but eventually I had everything securely basted together. Finally, I sewed the waistband (with bodice already attached) to the skirt layers with a shallow zigzag and 1/4-inch seam allowance.

At this point the dress was ready to try on and probably finished except for minor adjustments and possibly hemming. However, I had to wait two days for my daughter to return from a college visit before she could try it. You can see it here on a hanger both with and without a long crinoline underneath.

I think it looks nice both ways… more princessy with the crinoline and more sophisticated elegance without. After my daughter tried it on we decided to leave it unhemmed as the length looks about right with the heels she is going to wear to prom. I cut a pretty clean edge on the circle skirt and it is not going to unravel. This probably saved me an hour or two of hemming, even with my folded hem foot. In the end my daughter cut a layer off the crinoline to make it a little less poofy and not as hot to wear.

And here she is all dressed up and ready for prom. We did a photoshoot outside of Phipps. I got some good twirl photos and a nice back view, but forgot to take pictures of the pockets… you can’t see them but they are there, and she was quite pleased to go to prom with her wallet and phone in her pockets and no need to carry a purse.

So in case you are wondering… how much did it cost me to make a $1000 prom dress? The cost of the fabric, pattern, and thread for the dress was about $120. I probably spent another $50 or so on fabric for the two prototype dresses (the prototype top was made from scraps from a previous project) and about $50 on fabric samples (and some of the larger samples will get used in other projects). I didn’t add up the amount of time I spent on this, but it was a labor of love and a lot of fun!

Update: She went to her second prom a week later since the friend she went to prom with goes to a different school. I came home from work early to do her hair and makeup and her “tax” was she had to pose for more photos in our yard. This time I got some pocket photos too.

Totally Tartan! (Part 2)

Posted on by

If you haven’t read Part 1, read that first, and when you’re done with this read Part 3.

Ready for a bigger challenge, I decided to make a pair of pocket leggings out of the tartan Spoonflower sport Lycra. I selected the Sinclair Flex No Front Seam Leggings pattern in size 4p. No front seams meant no worries about matching plaids in the front: all I needed to do was center the main front leg pattern piece on a vertical line in the plaid. Of course, then I had to align the waistband piece to the main front pattern piece and figure out how to cut the two back leg pieces symmetrically and somewhat aligned with the front leg piece. I decided to use the color blocking option and make the side pocket pieces in a solid black 300 gsm QUAD performance jersey knit from Surge Fabric Shop to avoid any plaid matching issues. The QUAD fabric is a similar weight and composition to the sport Lycra, but has more stretch and a brushed side that feels really nice. I wish it came in more prints because I really like this fabric. I ended up using up almost all my remaining QUAD fabric, which was too bad because I accidentally folded down and trimmed the wrong pocket pieces. Since I didn’t have enough black fabric to recut those pieces, I carefully unpicked them and then sewed a small patch on the corners I had trimmed off. It’s not very noticeable unless you know where to look (in the black section just below the waistband in the back).

The leggings were more challenging than most of my other recent projects, in part because of the slippery plaid fabric, but also because the waist construction involves joining many layers. As I rarely pass up a pocket opportunity, I included the back waistband pocket (highly recommended by the pattern designer). Adding the waistband pocket was fairly quick and easy, but it meant an extra two layers to join when I attached the waistband to the rest of the leggings. I did most of the sewing on my serger, but had so much trouble aligning the waistband that I basted it on my sewing machine. Even then, it still didn’t align and I had to unpick and ended up hand basting and then finally serging. The pattern also calls for optional top stitching. I top stitched some of the seams with a zigzag on my sewing machine, but wasn’t super happy with how it looked on the plaid so I didn’t top stitch all of it.

In the end, the leggings came together, the plaid is mostly (though not perfectly) aligned where it needs to be, and the leggings actually fit me. I chose the high-waist option and they stay in place pretty well, even though I did not include the optional drawstring (because I like my leggings to fit tight without a drawstring). I think on my next pair of Flex leggings I might add elastic in the waistband fold for a little extra hold. Overall, I think the leggings look good. However, one disappointment is that when the sport Lycra stretches, a lot of white shows through between the printing (“whiteout”). Since the legging pattern is designed to stretch the fabric, it means the fabric is not so bright, especially in the hip area. You can see it looks l a lot brighter near the ankles, where it is not as stretched. I think if I had a rotated the pattern 90 degrees on the fabric the whiteout might have been reduced.

I was going to make a tartan sports bra to go with the leggings, but then the new Sinclair Wave Athletic Knit Tank Top With Waistline Shaping and Pockets pattern came out and I decided to make that instead. I paired the tartan fabric with a black polyester/spandex stretch mesh from Knitfabric.com for the front and back side panels. (I still have enough tartan fabric left over for a sports bra and maybe also some color blocking on bike shorts.)

I debated whether to go for a 4p or 6p and in the end decided to sew the Wave in a 6p because I prefer my athletic tops to be loose. I think the 4p could have worked but would have been tight across the bust. Next time I might grade the sides in towards the bottom. I used the scoop neck option with bands, the cutout back, and hemmed bottom. The cutout back is a super cute feature that is easy to make. I ended up not doing any top stitching except on the hem and cutout.

Putting the wave pieces together is a little bit like assembling a puzzle, but it all worked out ok. My main frustration was with the Spoonflower sport Lycra fabric, which is slippery and doesn’t press easily. It made the bands and curved hem more painful to sew than they should have been. I did reasonably well with the plaid matching on this one, and even aligned the plaid on the top with the plaid on the leggings, although the top is darker because it doesn’t get stretched as much.

This is a top I will workout in, but it also looks great with jeans. I like the fact that there is enough shoulder coverage that this can be worn with a regular bra or a racerback, and it offers more sun protection on the back than a lot of sleeveless sports tops.

Because I don’t know when to stop and you can never have too much tartan, I made a headband to match and now I have a totally tartan athletic kit! I love the pockets in the leggings and the fact that the black panels on the top align with the black pocket panels on the leggings. I wore the leggings a few weeks ago in the Carnegie Mellon “Random Distance Run” and will certainly wear the entire outfit for future CMU races.

Songbird Kimono Jacket

Posted on by

I love my lightweight Pylos LiKnit palazzo pants and wanted a jacket to go with them. I was looking for something unstructured and drapey that I could throw on over a tshirt or a dressier shirt in warm weather. The Pattern Emporium Songbird kimono jacket/duster/cardi seemed about right. I decided to give it a try in the cropped length with the narrow binding option. I made it in AU size 10 with the semiflared sleeves, shorted 1 inch. I made it in a 2-way stretch fabric, but it is also suitable for wovens.

It was pretty quick to cut and sew from the black LiKnit. (I took a couple of days off this week to sew after having spent last weekend on campus at graduation.) I used 1″ fusible knit stay tape for the interfacing on the binding, which is not exactly what the pattern called for, but it seemed to work pretty well. I cut the bottom of the binding at an angle, but messed up and cut one side at the wrong angle. I fixed it and then forgot to adjust the length of the other side to match and didn’t notice until the whole jacket was put together and I discovered that the binding was lower on one side than the other. I pondered how to fix it, and then decided I didn’t really like the binding ending a few inches below the hem anyway. I considered attempting to unpick the whole binding, which didn’t seem like much fun. I also considered just cutting off the binding and redoing the whole thing, which probably would have worked ok but I was too lazy to do it. In the end I decided to splice additional binding pieces to the bottom of both sides and bring the binding down to the hem line. This is not really the right solution, but since the whole thing is black, unless you look at the jacket in bright light, the two diagonal splices are not very visible. Other than the splices, I really like this look and when I make another Songbird jacket I will almost certainly plan to extend the binding on purpose this time. Here’s a closeup in the bright sun so you can see what I did.

Even though I shortened the sleeves by 1 inch, I still felt they were too long for me (a problem I often have for garments that don’t come in petite sizes). The sleeve hem is 1.5 inches so I folded it over a second time and effectively shortened the sleeves by 2.5 inches, which was perfect for me. The pattern comes in a choice of semiflared, flared, or tapered sleeves and multiple sleeve lengths. I was looking for something to cover my arms so I chose long sleeves. I wanted something loose but I didn’t want flared sleeves that would get get in the way, so semiflared was the right balance.

I’m modeling the jacket here with a Sinclair Yasmin dress, but trust me it also looks great with the palazzo pants. Also note my little tricolor beech tree in the background, which struggled last year but is hopefully making a comeback.

Low waist, high waist band: More Urban Wide Leg Pants

Posted on by

My first pair of Pattern Emporium Urban Wide Leg pants came out great in purple ponte. However, I thought I could make the waist band fit me a bit better and improve the pockets. I made another pair in black ponte but this time I changed the waistband to a contour and flattened the top of the front pockets. These were even better, but I felt the waist could be more fitted while still leaving more ease through the seat and legs. So for my third pair I used the low-rise pattern instead of the high-rise pattern, but added an extra inch to the height of the contour waistband piece. I also graded in the tops of the pants legs at the side seam on both the front and back pieces. I cut the updated pattern out of a yard and a half of charcoal grey super soft “charming heather” legacy ponte from Zelouf fabric (69.1% Viscose, 27.1% Nylon & 3.8% Elastane). I cut back pockets too but in the end didn’t use them as I wasn’t sure whether they would look good with the low rise. Now that I see how the pants look in the back I think the back pockets would work but maybe a little shorter than the ones I borrowed from the Walk Boldly pants pattern — and I still may add them.

I love the fit of this latest hacked version of Urban Wide Leg pants. The high waist is both comfortable and flattering. I can wear with shirts either tucked or untucked. The waist looks good and the pants stay snuggly in place without pinching. This is also the softest ponte I’ve used so far. (Pants modeled with Sinclair Bondi top in CMU tartan.)

I really like this version and will probably make more with these modifications or try this waist style with the wider Walk Boldly legs. So to summarize what I did, I made the Urban Wide Leg pants, low waist style with jeans pockets in size 10 with the following modifications:

  • I changed the waistband into a 3.5-inch tall contoured waistband. I cut separate front and back pieces as well as inner and outer pieces. I used an athletic knit for the two inner pieces. I sewed 3/8-inch elastic to the top seam joining the inner and outer layers and then understitched it to the inner layer.
  • I moved the side seams in about 1 inch at the top of the pants and graded them out to the original size 10 side seam line about 5.5 inches below the top.
  • I changed the top of the front pockets to be straight diagonal slashes and I lengthened the pocket bags by about .75 inch.
  • I shortened the legs by 1.5 inches and then sewed a 2-inch hem to fit my 5’2″ height.

Totally Tartan! (Part 1)

Posted on by

When I joined the Carnegie Mellon University faculty in 2003, the school mascot was tartan. Yes, a plaid scarf. Kind of strange, but maybe not in a town where the terrible towel is also a thing. But in 2007 CMU decided to adopt the Scotty Dog as the official mascot, which is much better if you want someone to put on a costume and run around at sporting events. Nonetheless, the official CMU tartan remains a major part of the university identity. The CMU Kiltie band (affectionately referred to as the band without pants) wears tartan kilts and the CMU doctoral robes and hoods are adorned with wool tartan trim. You can even buy wool tartan fabric at the book store along with matching tartan flannel pajamas. I have purchased both and have even used the wool tartan in an original quilt design and as part of an original fabric design.

I’ve wanted to buy the tartan design in a fabric other than wool or flannel, and thought I might just digitally print some tartan knit fabric. However, the digital tartan file on the university website since 2010 does not actually properly tile for a fabric repeat. I have spent many hours futzing with it and trying to figure out if there was a way to crop it so that it would tile. I succeeded in a vertical tile, but not a proper horizontal tile. I came close, and maybe nobody else would notice that it is a little off, but I couldn’t bring myself to use it. You might say I was “mad about plaid” and you would be right. So last Fall I reached out to friends in CMU marketing and communications and asked if anyone knew where I could find a version of the digital tartan that would properly tile. After a few weeks of searching my friends reported the answer was “no.” Apparently the lack of repeatability was a known problem and I wasn’t the first to ask, but nobody had ever fixed it. But as CMU was winding down for winter break, one of the designers offered, in the holiday spirit, to fix the digital tartan for me for. I was thrilled! A few days later I received my first repeatable digital tartan files and uploaded them to Spoonflower for printing. I printed a sample of a cotton spandex jersey knit, a couple of yards of polyester modern jersey with 4-inch squares, and a couple of yards of sport Lycra with 5.5-inch squares.

When my fabric arrived I checked out the printing and the sizes of the plaid. After looking at lots of pictures of plaid dresses, I decided I wanted the 5.5-inch version printed on point for a dress, so sent a request to the designer for a diagonal version. In the mean time I decided to make a shirt out of the modern jersey, using the Sinclair Bondi pattern, a pattern I have used many times before. I tried to cut the plaid so it would match horizontally, but otherwise didn’t worry about plaid matching. I’m pretty happy with the results.

After printing up the diagonal tartan in Spoonflower cotton spandex jersey knit, I started working on my tartan dress. I was looking for a pattern that would allow me to keep all the tartan running in the same direction, and thus chose a gathered skirt rather than a circle or semi-circle skirt (which would have had the plaid appear to curve). When I saw a Styla Dublin dress with enormous puff sleeves sewn up in cotton-lycra plaid by another sewist, I decided to try the Dublin pattern. I first used the pattern to make a cotton-lycra Dublin top. Since this pattern didn’t come in a petite size, I was tempted to shorten the skirt of the dress, but decided to go ahead with the size 6 pattern as written, only shortening the shoulder elastic. This seems to have worked just fine. My tartan dress came out great and looks much like the plaid dress that inspired it. And, of course, I made it with usable pockets (lengthened slightly to better hold my phone). The pattern suggests optionally adding clear elastic at the neckline. I didn’t do that but I did understitch the font and back neckline and also understitched the pocket openings.

This is a bit of a different style than I usually wear, and I usually prefer circle or semi-circle skirts for less bulk around the waist. The Spoonflower cotton spandex is somewhat stiff from the saturated inks that sit on top of the fabric rather than absorbing into it so the gathers do poof out a bit. I don’t think this is the most flattering waist style for me, but I still think the dress looks pretty cute. I do love how the stiffer fabric poofs out the sleeves and the ruffle at the bottom of the skirt. The dress is fun to wear and looks great with my Scotty dog necklace (an inexpensive online purchase to keep the outfit on theme). Also, thanks to my neighbors for letting me pose in front of their dogwood, which was in full bloom on the day we took these photos.

I’ve started working on making some athletic wear out of the sport Lycra fabric and have ideas for using up the rest of the cotton spandex fabric. Stay tuned for more totally tartan posts in Part 2 and Part 3!

Perfectly purple pants! (Urban Wide Leg, also in black)

Posted on by

I love the two pairs of Pattern Emporium Walk Boldly pants I made earlier this year. I especially like the high rise, back darts, and bold wide legs, which seem to look great on me with minimal adjustments to the pattern. But I also love the feel of a yoga waistband (which doesn’t dig in at the waist as much as an elastic waistband and is tight enough to stay up with fully loaded pockets). I had some success with the Pattern Emporium Urban tapered pants (poor fabric choices aside), so decided to try the Urban wide leg pants.

I selected the gorgeous plumberry viscos nylon ponte from Surge Fabrics (65%viscose/30%nylon/5%spandex, 320gsm, 50% horizontal/40% vertical stretch). It is a really lovely and intense shade of purple with a nice drape and good stretch. I inadvertently cut the pants legs 90 degrees rotated the wrong way on the fabric and it really made no difference.

I made a few adjustments to the AU size 10 pattern. I added .75 inch to the length of the front pockets. I added back patch pockets from the Walk Boldly pattern (positioning them based on the suggested mid-rise positioning). And I split the yoga-style waistband into four pieces: front/back/inner/outer and graded them down a size towards the top. I cut the two inner pieces out of the waistband with heavy 300 gsm poly-spandex athletic knit, which is my go-to fabric for lining waistbands because it is soft and comfortable but also has a strong hold. I sewed the two fronts to their corresponding backs and then sewed the inner pair to the outer pair at the top. Then I sewed 1/2-inch elastic to the seam allowance and then understitched the elastic and seam allowance to the inner band.

I tried glueing the layers of the bottom of the band with a fabric glue stick as suggested in the pattern, but I found the glue didn’t hold well on this fabric. I ended up machine basting the two layers of the waistband and then machine basting the band to the pants, checking for puckers and gaps, and then making a few adjustments before surging the band to the pants. I cut off 1.5 inches from the bottom of the pants before sewing a 1-inch hem (for some of the flats I will wear these pants with, I probably should have raised the hem a bit more, for reference I am 5’2″).

The pants fit wonderfully and are super comfortable secret-pajama pants (modeled here with Sinclair Bondi tshirt). The Walk Boldly pockets look great on the back too. I finished them a few weeks ago and immediately put them on and headed to the airport for a trip.

The finished waistband looks good, but it took a lot of pins and basting to stretch it as I sewed it to the pants. Overall, I am very happy with how these came out looking and fitting so well with minimal pattern tweaks!

I wanted a pair in black and decided to make a few more tweaks. I used a black 67% Rayon/28% Nylon/5% Spandex 310 GSM ponte from Mily Mae Fabrics. I made a 58-inch wide panel in Affinity Designer and laid out all the pieces so I could use my fabric more efficiently. I was able to cut all the pieces from less than 1.5 yards of fabric.

This time I made a contour waistband, allowing me to make the top of the waistband a little smaller and the bottom a little bigger (and easier to attach to the rest of the pants. While I was at it I made the waistband about a quarter inch taller. I lined it with athletic knit and added elastic as I did for the purple pants. I also changed the front pocket opening to a shallow diagonal as I think the shape of the pocket opening in the pattern ends up being a little bit too low. I cut the pants leg 1.5 inches shorter to begin with, and gave it a 2-inch hem.

I love how the contour waistband came out. It looks smoother than the non-contoured band and feels really nice to wear. I also really like the high waist and the back darts, and of course, all the pockets. I’ve been seeing ads for expensive yoga dress pants, marketed as pants you can wear to work. These pants seem quite similar to me. I plan to make more! (Modeled here with Sinclair Bondi top with bishop sleeve add-on.)

How do the Urban wide leg pants compare to the Walk Boldly pants? They are actually very similar patterns. The main differences are that the Walk Boldly has an elastic waistband while the Urban pants have a yoga waistband and the Walk Boldly pants have a leg that flares out more and is extra wide (but the crotch and hips are the same). Also, Walk Boldly comes with more pocket options. Because the yoga waistband is higher than the elastic waistband, the rest of the pants have a shorter rise, but when you add the waistbands, the total rise is not much different.

If you wanted to mix and match and make your Walk Boldly’s with a narrower leg or your Urban pants with an extra wide leg, I expect tracing the leg shape from one pattern onto the other would work just fine since the crotch and darts are in exactly the same place in both patterns. In fact, I plan to make a pair of Urban wide leg pants with extra wide Walk Boldly legs (with waistband and pocket modifications used in the black pants above).