Saturday Sewing

Although I'm fighting a bit of a stomach bug, I managed to do some sewing today.  I started out with this collection of fabrics, which have been sitting on the worktable tempting me for a long while now.  Once I started looking at them, however, I changed my mind.  

I immediately pulled out two of the fabrics and cut out a couple of tops.  Yes, I did.  Of course, now I don't have enough fabrics to make a quilt, but I do have a couple of really nice blouses.  What exactly that will mean for the quilt, I'm not sure, but I think I can get more of the check and I could at least toss in a beige for this mottled one. There are very few scraps left over, so they won't really help, except maybe as swatches to find other fabrics to replenish the missing pieces.


The tops are something like the Amy Butler tops I made a couple of months ago but this retro Simplicity pattern has sleeves.  Those sleeves had me pretty frustrated this morning because when I adjusted the pattern to fit better, I forgot to add to the sleeves which were too tight.  I did remember to add to the armseye so the patterns didn't match.  I compensated by adding a patch under the arm but the sleeve was still too small.  

In the end, I strong-armed them so that they would ease in, but it was dicey for while.  Thank goodness it worked and the tops are comfortable.  Well, I put one on and it felt okay, so I did the same thing with the second.  Of course I cut them out at the same time, so when I made the bad cut, I did it to both tops.  Yes, that's how I roll!

I plan to wear one this week on a day that I won't be at school.  I have an appointment that will (hopefully) take only the morning, so I can change out of the top at noon if it's too uncomfortable.  In that case, I'll take the tops apart and put the fabrics back into the collection and call it a bust.  It won't be my first time.  I imagine it won't be the last.  Ah, well, c'est la vie.   
Have a great week.
Happy quilting and sewing,
Mary  

Hello, Amy Butler

A few weeks ago I had an opportunity to get to Lola Pink fabric store in Lafayette and picked up some beautiful modern fabrics. 

I noticed the owner's cute top while she cut my fabrics and asked about the pattern.  It's from Amy Butler and they happen to have it in stock.  Lucky me!  Of course, it was added to the growing pile on the counter and about $80 later, I left with a nice little bag of goodies. 

The fabrics are beautiful quilting cottons from name-brand companies, such as Moda.  Lola Pink can be trusted for high quality, bright modern cottons--good reason for my regular visits.

Since hubby was in the field most of the day and there were no grandchildren to get into things, I took early advantage of the quiet and the pretty blue and brown Moda fabric.  Eight o'clock is early for stitching--at least it is for me.  But by that time I'd made a pattern from my favorite skirt and was cutting into this pretty pile.

Deciding what to make with it was easy enough.  I'd used the Amy Butler pattern last weekend to make this pink and black polka dot top.  I got compliments from someone at church, a teacher at school, and a guild member at the meeting on Monday.  I consider it a winner.  Here it is about to be tossed into the washer. 

 Besides, I'd made a few adjustments to the pattern so that it's relatively cool since the air conditioning in my classroom is sporadic.  Instead of lining the top, I made bias strips to finish the arms-eye and, because the fabric is such good quality, I didn't put in interfacing.  It's also loose and flowy so that the fabric doesn't stick to me.  (Having ADD means needing to be comfortable because bothersome clothes are very distracting.)  I promise I ironed it before taking this picture, but lunch called me away.  In the meantime the top slipped off the counter, a puppy made the discovery, wrinkles are the result of a puppy tug-of-war.

 And there you go, not a bad Saturday of sewing.  After finishing this outfit, I replaced the zipper on that favorite skirt, since I broke it while getting dressed one morning this week.

Replacing the zipper took almost as long as making this skirt, but I figured out a tip that I thought you might appreciate and can apply anytime you're making repairs that are difficult.  Use a thread that matches closely but not exactly to the thread already in the garment.  This way you can more easily find the one that needs ripping should you make a mistake.

My zipper looked great at first, but then I saw that the waistband seams were slightly off, and the zipper needed some adjusting.  Because I was using a very light bluish white (just barely a tint of blue) rather than the bright white in the garment, I was able to pick out my seam without disturbing a nearby seam.

I came to the idea of using the off-white while ripping out the original zipper.  It was very difficult to tell which seam I was ripping.  Only one seam held the zipper in place, but a second seam kept the loosely woven fabric from coming apart and I didn't want to weaken it. Once the broken zipper was out, I knew there would be a chance that I'd have to do a bit of ripping and decided that an off-color thread might help.  I was very glad to have that hint of blue.  In fact, I might have been tempted to leave the mistake in.

Back to School

Since I now know that I'll be teaching this year and will have little time in the library, I've been rethinking my wardrobe for the school year.  I've found khakis and tee shirts are perfect in the library because I do a lot of work that requires I be able to move, crawl, reach and so on.  We move armloads of books, clean, work on computers and other machines and climb on steps to reach high shelves.  

In a classroom, however, there's mostly walking around, slight bending, and standing.  Lots of standing!  I wore mostly dresses and skirts when I was in the classroom but never in the library.  I've decided to find a happy medium between those two styles: pants or skirts and tops that are more dressy than tees.

I've been busy the last couple of days sewing a few things for myself.  After paying $30 to $50 each for a couple of shirts, I decided it would be much more affordable to make my own, especially since I have plenty of fabrics that are perfect for clothing.  Remember the boxes of fabrics I purchased from the elderly lady a few weeks ago?  About half of that is beautiful linens that sew up into great fitting pants.  I bought this Simplicity pattern last week and spent a bit of time measuring and fitting the pattern to my size.  



I've made two pair of pants: one in khaki and another in black.  The linen is very comfortable and hangs very well.  I love the hand of this fabric, so I'll probably make several more pairs.  I have probably 10 more pieces of fabric in every color!  So it shouldn't be a problem.



I also made a few tops.  The first one I made is this beige pullover blouse in a light linen that I added embroidery to.  I'm not doing that again for a while....it was too stressful.  The computer is old and easily freezes, which it did.  


I ended up restarting the embroidery program and losing the adjustments I'd made.  So then I had to abandon part of the embroidery motif and just drop in the monogram.  Since I could not line up the border correctly and it is fairly simple, I chose to put it in manually.  And there's the stressful part!  Not bad in the end, but I'm not trying this again soon.


So, since I don't want to embroider on these tops and they are a little plain, I decided to try some other form of embellishment.  Today I made a blue top using the same pattern from the beige linen one.  The fabric is some type of rayon that easily melts, so I couldn't use any kind of iron on.  


Some time ago I'd purchased some wooden game pieces on Etsy.  Rich and I then drilled tiny holes in the pieces to turn them in to buttons.  I stitched several of the wooden buttons on and interspersed them with bright, colorful plastic buttons.   I like the end result.....bright, fun and nonsensical.  


Although I like these tops, one of the problems I've had is that there has to be a button, hook and eye or some other closure in the back neck.  My hair gets tangled in a hook and eye set and the loops that I've made to pair with buttons generally do not stay buttoned.  

I redesigned the back part of the blouse so that I could add a button hole and a small button--no pulled hair and no open back!  The left back extends over the right side of the back and I added a button hole on the extension.  Perfect!

After wrapping up the blue top, I decided that I'd make one more top.  This one opens to the front and is intended to wear over a tank top as a light shirt jacket.  I used a striped blue fabric that was in the boxes but was too small.  


To have enough fabric, I added a Copenhagen blue solid from my stash. I cut the front and sleeves from the stripe, the collar, back and sleeve band from the solid. 


The two fabrics are a perfect match, and the top will look smart with a solid white tank.  I'm considering whether I want to add some type of closure to the shirt.  That might be a little too constraining to work in, so I'll have to wait till it's washed and try it on with the tank to decide.