Tag: projects

On display at Fabric Depot, was a shrug that looked like it was something I could knit.  Sadly, I took no pictures of the shrug itself, but instead the details of how to make it.

Maybe someday.

Things I like:  the sweetheart neckline, the back, the fun sleeves, the length, the material, the fact it’s a wrap dress that wraps in the back.

Things I don’t like:  it’s a good standing dress, but it gapes when I sit, which I’m not thrilled about.  Also, I have miles to go on the fitting thing.  The bodice is too loose.

Overall:  Very happy with it.  It’s so summer!

I’m so very close to finishing.  Here, I am trimming the hem.
 

And here the serger is jamming and causing me to re-thread, even though I only have four inches left to serge. Curse you, serger.
 

That triple band-aid is covering up a nasty burn from the iron.  Still, I soldier on.
 

The final few stitches.
 

Here you can see how I used an improper marking pen on a previous project and stained my tailor’s ham.  Here you can also see that the tailor’s ham comes in handy (or ham-dy?) for pressing this dress.
 

Here you can see the facings flipping out on the arm holes, completely ruining the effect of the cool sleeves.  I’ll show them what’s what, just you wait.

At this point, aside from facing wrangling, I just need to get Julie to mark the hem and then sew the hem and then I’m done.  Ahead of schedule, even.

The bodice has facings along the neckline and the arms.  I am making tiny stitches in the facings and sewing the seam to the facings, to encourage the facing to roll the right way.  Sentinel is helping and watching a movie with me.

Even after I did this, the arm facings would not behave, constantly turning out.  I ended up doing what Gertie did and carefully sewing the facings to the underlining.  That worked well, because of the two layers of fabric, but I’m not sure what I would have done if I had only one layer of fabric.  I’ve made a not on my pattern to underline, should I want to make this dress again.

One of the best things about Collette patterns is that she usually includes pockets in her skirts.  Here are mine.  I’ve always thought pockets laid out like that look rather dirty.  Thank goodness they will be tucked away where no one can see.  It occurs to me that right now we’ve got a sort of external genitalia thing going on, but as soon as I sew this up, we will revert to an internal genitalia thing.  But maybe that’s just me.

Now that all that basting is done (three movies worth, geez-almighty) I can move on to the next step: stay stitching the neckline. we do  this to ensure it doesn’t stretch out with repeated wear.  I’m in.

Here, I have traced my sewing line in disappearing marker so I know where to sew.
 

I’m choosing the organza strips and I get to not only pin, but also to baste the organza.  That Gertie lady is crazy for basting.
 

The finished stay stitched neckline.  You can’t really see it, but it’s done.  And I got to sew together the shoulders!  Very exciting.
 

Here was the original plan for the facings, but I’ve got to make new ones due to arm area expansion.
 

It was easy enough though.
 

It’s important to star one’s cutting layout.
 

Bodice stuff that needed to be cut on the fold. 

 

Prepping my cutting area.
 

Have you seen the movie Unzipped, about Isaac Mizrahi’s fall 1994 collection?  It’s a great documentary.  And one thing I learned is that all the women making the fashion wear black all the time.  So I’m wearing all black in homage. Also because it’s rather cold today.
 

I really despise cutting out.  It might be better if I didn’t have to crawl all over the floor all the time.
 

After cutting out the underlining, I was to put out the main fabric…
 

…and lay my underlining pieces on top.
 

Then Gertie told me to carefully baste around each piece and then finish cutting out.  I suspect this is one of those things Gertie does because she likes to be careful.  I’m doing it, but it’s taking forever.
 

But look how pretty it looks when it’s done.
 

However, I needed to watch a movie to keep me occupied.  And when that movie was over, I was nowhere near done. Grrr.

Today I spent five hours working on this and I’m still not done with this week’s items.  

Muslin #2.  I can see that lengthening the front now has me in trouble with the back. The side seams are even.  I sense a muslin #3 in the future.
 

The back is now a little bit better.
 

The front is reaching my waist.  And notice how taking all that fabric out at the armpit level helped tremendously.
 

But I’ve still got a shoulder thing going on.  I solved this by having Matt cut back until there was a bigger opening.
 

Why is this picture upside down?  There is now more room in the shoulder area.
 

Here is the pattern for #1 topped with the pattern for muslin #2 in front,  with the changes outlined for #3 in green.  I’ve known it since I tried on Sara’s strapless formal dress in tenth grade, but man, do I have shoulders.
 

Muslin #3.  I feel like I could pull in the shoulders a bit, and the waist, but I don’t really know what I’m doing here, so I think I will leave it.
 

The back looks good.
 

Sentinel is a good helper.
 

Now to press all the underlining material.  This dress does not skimp on material.
 

I’m feeling confused about how to make the changes from the muslin to the pattern, so I’ll distract myself with tracing all the pattern pieces.
 

Here’s the official pattern piece.
 

I devised a check system to ensure that I got all the pieces I needed.  I have to be wary of project pitfalls and one of them is not having everything I need.  If I miss a piece and have to backtrack to this stage, there’s a good chance I won’t finish the project.
 

The file cabinet holds what I need.  Here is a skirt piece and a pocket.
 

I only use the finest tools.  A true statement in the case of the rulers, which have been invaulable.  A false statement with the pattern weights which are just whatever object I can find to serve as “heavy.”