Herringbone Coutil

I've been lurking around BurdaStyle a lot recently, because I'm totally enamored of free patterns. I also like cheap patterns, and BurdaStyle has both. I especially like this military style jacket, Hikaru. I first saw this one at the end of the summer and made a mental note to get some herringbone fabric, which I promptly forgot about. I've been doing so much maternity sewing for a while now that jackets and warm weather clothes like this one have been on the back burner, but I returned to the pattern last night and have fallen in love all over again. Even though it is now too cold here in CA to enjoy this one, I'm still going to make it. It will be perfect for Phoenix "winter" weather, when I go home in a few weeks for Xmas.

Check out this version of the jacket by ParaNoire--lovely, right? The level of detail is fabulous--the little button on the inside of collar, for instance, is perfect. And I really like that she got rid of all the buttons running up the front seams and turned this into military chic, rather than Salvation Army. Finally, check out what she listed as the fabric: Herringbone Coutil.

I never heard of it before. Turns out coutil is generally used in corsets--it has a super tight weave that has hardly any stretch. I'm totally in awe to see a fabric that typically has a very singular purpose be used in a radically different way. And to have the result to be so lovely, just seems to be a bonus.

Unfortunately, from what I can tell, herringbone coutil is about $30 a yard, so I probably won't be making my own coutil jacket anytime soon. Maybe as a graduation present to myself. But still, this kind of thing makes me want to buy a fabric dictionary and start studying.

Green Polka Dots!

I went on my annual fabric spree this summer at Osgood's Fabrics in Springfield, MA. What a wonderful place. Here's a shot of just one of the aisles:


And there are lots and lots of aisles, just like this one, with bolts of fabric that are all probably from the 70s. Polyester Paradise. And this is after they cleaned up the place when they moved locations a few years ago.

Anyway, while poking around I found a bolt of a polyester dress material--white with grass green polka dots! Heaven! And the best part was that the polka dots aren't regular, but slightly askew. I got three yards, but honestly I should have gotten five because I love polka dots and I love green. We had to go to a wedding reception in the middle of our trip, so the polka dots got used for Simplicity 2640.

It's a cute dress pattern and it goes together really easily. The back is also quite nice--a little low cut, but you can still wear a bra with it. I like the pleat detailing, but I will say, that the dress fits a bit oddly.To begin with, I had to take it in considerably in the back because otherwise it made me look quite pregnant when viewed from the side. It may partially have been my fabric choice, but I think the main problem is that the pleats in the back hit quite high. Say, about 2 or 3 inches below the bra. That seems really weird to me, because of course you don't want the pleats flaring out that high on your back. I wish I had noticed this before I cut the fabric, because I'd definitely have fixed it so that the back bodice would extend down further and thus position the pleats closer to my lower back. This would make the pleats open the fabric up over the hips, where most of us need the extra width, as opposed to over my natural waist, where I need less width. I like the dress style enough that it would be worth redrafting a new back. The pleats are quite lovely and they fancy up what is otherwise a very simple pattern.

I was trying to figure out why Simplicity would have drafted the pleats at a point where they aren't particularly necessary, and I think it may be because Versions B and C of the dress have open-backs. I wasn't crazy about that, so I just used the back from Version A, but the bodice from Version C. I'm realizing now that this may be why the pleats hit so far up the back--if they were lower, this would be a pretty revealing open-backed dress. Particularly for the 16 year old prom girl on the envelope cover. She obviously made the open-backed version against her mother's wishes and now is having to stand with her back against a wall all night just so it doesn't show in any of the pictures.

Green shoulder straps!
Sadly, the center front seam is pretty visible when wearing polka dots.
Bummer.

And a cute green sweater!

Sorry, the back pleats aren't very visible in this picture.
Instead it just looks kind of rumpled. Oops.

Anyway, it is a pretty dress and comfortable to wear. Plus, green polka dots. Really, I need to go more places in green polka dots, I think.

Fashion Square Dress--Fabrics?

I finished up the fourth muslin for this dress and I think it's at the point now where I'd like to make a wearable version. So . . . fabrics? I'd love to find a geometric print, but those seem hard to come by, so that's probably out. I've been searching around and finally narrowed it down to five top choices.

Optic Blossom (Linen), by Amy Butler

Pop Garden, Daisey (Rose), by Heather Bailey

Pop Garden, Peonies (Ivory), by Heather Bailey

Greens, by Timeless Treasures

Embroidered Crinkle Cotton

I'm really leaning towards Amy Butler's Optic Blossom, even if it is quilting weight cotton. I think the Daisey print by Heather Bailey is probably too regular, especially given the number of seams on the dress. But I really love the embroidered crinkle cotton and I bet it would make such a lovely summer dress for this wedding.

Spring=Yellow

It's already heating up here, mixed in with some frigid (for me) days in the 60s, so I'm making spring and summer tops right now. And really, who doesn't enjoy making yellow tops when it is still slightly grey outside? This is New Look 6179, made with a poly chiffon from Jo-Ann's. I bought this fabric last summer; for weeks, every time I went to Jo-Ann's I'd come across this fabric and think it was pretty. It finally went on the clearance rack (crazy!) and so I bought three or four yards. So glad I did--the shirt turned out really well and I still have enough leftover to make a nice summer dress that I might actually wear.

Sweet and simple.

Detail of the fabric--it has brown, dark grey, light grey, red, green, and blue in it. Hard to believe all those would look good together, but it works out nicely.

They've gone plaid!

Spring is arriving and J! is due for a new pair of shorts. His first pair, in brown plaid, are long gone--disintegrated at the seams, I think. That was back when I first started sewing and I'm pretty sure I made him a size Large. He wears a Small. Ha. The second pair--blue plaid with silver stripes--are his favorites. He really loves the silver stripes. He actually points them out to people. Those won't last much longer, I'm afraid.

So, here's the third pair. Green plaid with narrow yellow and blue stripes. I like how they turned out, although I'm not crazy about the piping. I'm also not so crazy about this pattern (Simplicity 3891) anymore. It's easy to make, but I don't like the patch pockets. I think I'll look around for a different pattern--maybe this Kwik Sew 3267. As far as I can tell, the Big 4 don't really make many patterns for men. What a shame, because J!'s a good sport and wears pretty much anything I make for him. I'm hoarding a few yards of some really hideous dinosaur fabric; it will make a great pair of shorts--perfect for his 29th birthday.

One other thing. All the big pattern companies make "Men and Boy" patterns, so that you can dress your son and partner up in the same clothes. This strikes me as very odd, although it makes sense from a marketing standpoint, I guess. I mean, I hardly ever see "Women and Girl" patterns--if you want to have matchy-matchy outfits with your daughter (or niece, or whatever) you have to buy two separate patterns. But for your partner and son, just one pattern will work. I didn't read carefully enough the first time I used this Simplicity pattern, though, and I cut the front short pieces from the "Men" sizes and the back pieces from the "Boy" sizes. That would have been a hilarious pair of shorts.

J! models his new shorts.

And the back.


I really need a "Man and Dog" pattern, so that J! and Tessa can wear the same outfits. Maybe if she's very good, she'll get a matching green plaid collar for her adoption day present.

Out of hand

Last summer I had finally amassed enough fabric that I couldn't keep stuffing it under my sewing table and hoping J! wouldn't notice. So I decided to get organized and I spent the entire weekend neatly folding all my fabric. Then I came up with a genius idea--I would place each piece of fabric and its scraps in a nice ziploc bag! That way I could keep everything together; when I wanted to use a particular kind of fabric I wouldn't have to go digging around to find the larger scraps.

It really was a brilliant idea, but unfortunately I wasn't just dumping the ziploc bags into bins. Had this been the case, my trip to Costco to purchase 117 ziploc bags would have been vindicated. Instead of bins, I decided to store my fabric in some hanging shelves in the closet--we had the shelves, the closet space and no bins, so it really wasn't much of a choice. Anyway, end result: ziploc bags sliding all over the place (usually onto the floor). Disaster.

Having spent a good amount of time organizing all the bags, though, I wasn't crazy about doing it all over again the next weekend, so I decided to live with it. Really, this just meant a lot of shoving and increasing frustration on my part, while the ziploc bags slowly got their revenge through passive resistance and slipperiness. Last weekend, though, I couldn't hide from my horrible organization anymore. Plus, I was tired of getting attacked by an avalanche of plastic everytime I opened the closet doors.

Ugh.

Two hours later, all the bags are gone, all my fabric is neatly folded and organized by shelf, and all the scraps are now in a wicker hamper we weren't using anyway. Should have done this months ago. Plus, as a bonus, I found three pieces of nice fabric I'd forgotten about. Sweet!

Ahhh. So much better.

Spoonflowering!

Spoonflower opened their virtual doors to everyone a while back, but I didn't find out until around October. I got suckered in by The Small Object's "letter to my niece quilt." Awww. I couldn't resist. So, I made my brother and his new wife a quilt. Instead of a letter, though, I used the text of "their song" from their wedding and added in some fun border circles, sent it off to Spoonflower and had it printed.

The quilt turned out alright. I'm not crazy about it. I liked the design, but it was hard to quilt since I don't have a quilting machine and I didn't have time to do it by hand. I think if I ever find the time, I'll steal the quilt back from them and do it properly. I just ended up quilting the circles and underneath the words. Arrr! adorably said they would hang it up in their new house, but I hope they use it.

The fabric itself was quite nice. The color saturation in some of the larger circles wasn't quite right, but I imagine they are still working out the kinks with their printer. And if I ordered any more yardage, I'd definitely first print up a color pattern, so that I know what colors to use. At the time, I only knew for sure how pink and brown would print, so I just used those two. Fortunately, I like pink and brown together. Also, I don't think I would print a 2 yard pattern again. I think it would be a lot of fun to make another "special occassion" fabric, but I would do a smaller pattern and make a wall hanging out of it, rather than a quilt.

Leaf Bowls

I really like these Oak Leaf bowls from Martha Stewart. They are the kind of gift that would be perfect for one of my grandmothers, who entertains a lot but who has more than enough bowls. That said, I can't help but feel that this is not the kind of project I'll probably do. For one thing, it involves what looks like a lot of tedious cutting. I hate cutting. For another thing, I don't have a local fabric store that carries wool tweed. And I probably wouldn't order five different kinds of wool tweed online, since to make the shipping charges worth it I'd have to order way more wool tweed than I really need. Or end up making leaf bowls for everyone I know.

I wonder, though, if you could do this project with the felt, a really heavy interfacing, and quilting fabric? I doubt the cotton fabric would have enough heft to hold up, but maybe. If I had an actual studio, I'd probably try this out. This is why I need a sewing studio. So that I could simply open up my wool tweed stash, pick out a few yellows and oranges that didn't make it into my fall wardrobe the year before, and turn out some leaf bowls.

Or I could just spend hours and hours creating new fabric designs to send to Spoonflower.

Wedding Dress #3

I fussed around with a number of different ideas for WD #3. The wedding was in Malibu, at a very nice ranch, so I wanted something pretty dressy. On the flip side, though, this wasn't a formal wedding, so I didn't want a gown.

This is another pattern I got from my grandmother. I love that this dress pattern is so simple and yet can be either formal or casual, depending on the fabrics used. A brocade would make this into a rich, luxuriant dress, but it would also work in a simple cotton print. As it happened, my grandmother had also given me several yards of a black and white print. A polyester mix, I think, judging by the very odd texture--one side is rather slinky and the other is almost ridged. When she initially gave it to me, I had no idea what to do with it, frankly. After all, black and white stripes on top of an arabesque flower pattern doesn't go with everything. It worked out well, though, when I paired it with a simple black for the bodice. Too bad the jacket pattern was missing. But I love that this dress, which fits perfectly, reminds me so much of my grandmother--her pattern and her fabric.

I'm not even sure how to describe that pattern--stripes and paisley?

Do the Polka . . . Dot!

So, back when I first got interested in sewing (sometime last summer), I went on a fabulous shopping spree at my favorite fabric store, Osgood's. Unfortunately, Osgood's is in Chicopee, MA and I live in Davis, CA, so the 2,950 mile commute is a bit rough. On the flip side, my boyfriend's parents are lucky enough to live right down the street from Osgood's, so I make it out there at least once a year.

During my first trip to Osgood's I picked up some great blue and white polka dot fabric. Some kind of slinky polyester, I know, but look how perfect it is! Diagonally arranged polka dots, with some neat extra trim of small white lines with tiny blue dots. It's the trim that did it for me--I wouldn't have bought this fabric if it had just been blue and white dots.

I saved this fabric for quite a while--I wanted to make a really cute dress that I would actually wear. I finally picked out a Very Easy Vogue (V8025) dress that I liked. The final result looks pretty good, although I can never get the ribbon to stay tied.

Vogue 8025

A few thoughts about this dress and pattern:

1. I've made two dresses using this pattern now. I like the dress style a lot--it follows the waist naturally and it drapes nicely when you use the right fabric. It can cling, though, so the dress should either be lined or worn with a slip.

2. Lining this dress would be difficult, I think, because of the casing for the ribbon.

3. I think I need to shorten the skirt just a bit. It hits right at the knee, but I have oddly short calves, so shortening the skirt would make my legs look more proportional. (I have a feeling that four inch heels would produce similar results, but that sounds more painful than ripping out the hem. Also, I think this dress would be cute with ballet flats, my personal shoe solution for everything.)

4. A few months later I made a tank top using the same fabric, but with a different neckline. I wear it all the time. Looking back on this now, I think I'd get rid of the ribbon casing and redo the neckline using the tanktop pattern. I bet it is still possible, but I don't know if I have the energy for it now. Bummer.

More Lotta

I know, I've already copied one of her bags, so I should leave the others alone. But I can only find the Smyca bag in purple, which I'm not crazy about. So why not make my own? I've seen this style bag around, and I even have a similar bag from H&M, so I don't think it would be too difficult. I like the minimalist fabric LJ used, but I almost think the bag is simple enough that a busier pattern would also work. Even a light cotton print, if reinforced, would probably make a really fun spring or fall bag. Maybe this "apricot" print, with green edging?

Kitchen Floral Apricot, by Robert Kaufman

And for the interior of the bag--this green polka dot pattern? The outside is so busy, that I think something calmer would work for the inside. Plus, I'm also a sucker for green and yellow together--I think it comes from reading Strawberry Shortcake books when I was growing up. Didn't Lemon Meringue always wear yellow and green?

Pop Parade, by Metro for P & B

Wanted: Single, Floral Fabric looking for Full-Skirt Sundress; 40s or 50s only!

This fabric is just dying to be made up into a sundress, possibly for your next Red Hat Society dance party? You can't tell from the above photo, but there are even little candles on the chandelier! Perhaps the little number in stripes would do, with a cream belt and cream edging to break up the fabric pattern a bit.

From the Vintage Pattern Wiki