Sewaholic Alma

Way back in June, I agreed to take part in Indie Pattern month organised by my fellow Wellington blogging pals Mel and Kat. The plan was to make an Alma blouse. I actually finished the blouse about mid July, but I've only just taken the photos. Yep, it has actually taken me nearly three months to photograph it!

I love the shape of this blouse, like the Pendrell it is designed to be worn outside or tucked in. I'm very much a non-tucked in girl and I'll be the first to find a blouse pattern which fits with that.

This was my very first Sewaholic make and I was really unsure of the fitting and sizing, and I ended up actually cutting the 16, based on my bust measurement. Me, being me, why waste time making a muslin. Time to test things? Let alone the spare fabric? Yeah, nah! So yes, I used my beautiful embroidered cotton for the first try! Check out this!

I stitched it up, darts and all, used my new invisible zipper foot and stitched in a perfect invisible zip, tried it on and...

Yep, enormous! I didn't need a zipper at all, it just went on over my head! I decided the darts were actually perfect, so unpicked the side seams and my zip and sewed it back up at the smaller size.

And I managed to sew the zip in again - beautifully.

Hurrah it now fits!

Have you noticed the sleeves...? No I thought not, have another look.

Like my puff sleeves?

None of the Alma sleeve shapes really took my fancy. I certainly didn't want cap sleeves, and the slightly longer ones didn't really float my boat, not with this fabric, so I drafted my own!

I've never done this before, but what is the Interweb for? I took the longer sleeve and completely redrafted it. For those interested, I'll put this in a new post. Anyway, I now have lovely puff sleeves which fit me perfectly.

I'm really pleased with how this has turned out. The blouse has certainly had a lot of wear already. Methinks I'd best make another ASAP!

So the details...

Fabric:  White embroidered cotton from Global Fabrics, September 2012, I can't remember the cost, but I bought three lots of fabric coming to $100 all together.

 Notions:   Thread, interfacing for the neck facing and an invisible zipper.

Pattern:  Sewaholic Alma
First worn:  Now I can't rightly remember, back in late June/early July at some point.
Worn with (in this pic):  An RTW skirt from Next (UK), and a very battered and sad pair of black pumps which I've worn and worn from M&S (UK)
Changes made:  Yep, completely redrafted the sleeves to give a cuffed puff sleeve.
Another one?  I reckon I probably will. This one gets lots of wear. It's comfortable and the fit is great for me.

Autumnal Beignet

This skirt has been a while in the making. I cut it out in January (I think) with an idea for it to be ready for me to sew in March. It was to be part of Cindy's and EmSewCrazy's impending seasonal change theme for the Stashbusting Challenge.

And so the fabric sat there in it's bag in my sewing room all cut out with no one to sew it. It was a while before I felt like sewing, let alone being capable of walking down the stairs in our house to the sewing room!

When I eventually started sewing, it was still difficult to get up and down the stairs and so pressing seams did not happen as frequently as it should. I managed to finger press some bits, which is possible with linen.

The fabric I bought last February time from Global Fabrics here in Wellington. It was one of my first fabric purchases here in New Zealand, so I will for a silly reason always have a soft spot for it. The lining also came from the same store, but at a later stage, with the prime purpose of lining this skirt.

Not the best photo of the lining and fabric, the red is a real raspberry red and the lining is similar. All the seams (both shell and lining) are French seams, bar the side seams where I couldn't work out the pockets with French seams! However, due to my lack of pressing, some of the seams in the lining did not completely encase the first seam (as above). A wee bit of seam trimming had to take place!

If you haven't worked out already, the pattern is Colette Patterns Beignet, a high-waisted button-through skirt.

I didn't really have any major issues with the pattern, it's pretty simple to put together. I think the frustrating part (not difficult, just frustrating) was attaching the skirt lining to the facings, which are made in the shell fabric. My curves were not perfect on the inside, but no one can seem them, so I'm not worried.

The pattern suggests making the belt loops by stitching them and turning them inside out using a bodkin or threading a needle through, but this was impossible with my fabric, I ruined one.

Consequently, I chucked them all and started again folding them and sewing on the outside. I don't honestly think it shows on the finished skirt.

I added 2 inches (I think) to the length of the skirt. The skirt would have been a tad to short for me otherwise. I like the finished length.

I also used a bit of poetic, ahem, sewer's licence and didn't sew as many buttonholes as on the pattern.  I've got nine. This may seem a strange number, but I had ten buttons and thought I'd keep one spare, so I re-measured and sewed nine buttonholes. These weren't all without a hitch. For some reason my machine decided to stay still as I stitched one and ended up with an enormous thick stitch. I had to unpick it (something I am not a fan of, since my seam ripper and I generally part after an argument!)

What do you think of these buttons though?

I got them at the Christmas market here in Wellington. They're wooden and I think they look great, but then I might be slightly biased! :-)

If I did anything differently next time, I would consider making the pockets from the shell fabric, depending on what fabrics I was using. The pattern uses the lining fabric, but with this mix of fabrics, I don't think they lay flat enough.

So, the details
Fabric:  Raspberry red linen for the shell bought February 2012 from Global Fabrics, red polyester lining fabric from Global Fabrics, October time
Trim:   Nine flowered wooden buttons from the underground market, Frank Kitts car park, Wellington
Pattern:  Colette Beignet
First worn:  Thursday for work and lunch with a fellow Wellington sewing blogger, Melissa, where we found time to suss out MrsC's new off-shoot from her craft shop, Made Marion on Lambton. Well I needed some thread, a zip and also an invisible zipper foot!
Worn with:  My sparkly Sorbetto (made in September 2011), black belt from Glassons, black cardigan from Glassons, Everybody black pumps from a shoe shop in Edinburgh (UK). Oh and of course the added sexy moonboot and crutches :-)

 I'd been to work sitting down and the nature of linen means it's a tad creased, but who cares, don't those buttons look cute?

 I would say this is closest to the real colour.

Burda 7767 - Pirates ahoy!

Finally I can post about this shirt.

This is my February contribution to the Stashbusting Sewalong, the creation of the lovely Cindy and Emily. February's challenge was aptly named the "Love challenge" and so I decided to make a shirt for Mr N. Which he challenged me to make last year some time.

Encouraged by the two rogues galleries from the amazing Carolyn, I used Burda 7767

In my stash, I had some dark grey cotton with a thin white stripe. The fabric has a slight stretch, which I hoped might help with the fit. I also love to sew these fabrics.

Having taken Mr N's particular measurments, checked those against the pattern as well as against a favourite RTW shirt in the wardrobe, I finally decided which size to make. I definitely measured twice, if not three or four times before cutting.

This shirt was definitely a labour of love. One of my own aims for the year was to produce clothing which was more wearable and with a better quality of finish. Consequently I decided to make this with lapped seams. No pinking or French seams, let's make it like any other men's shirt and finish it with lapped seams. I've never used these before, so it was quite a learning experience, particularly when there's a curve in the seam.

This is the underarm seam, check out those lapped seams all joining together.

I also followed MrsC's instructions and made sure the pocket lined up exactly.

 

I wish I'd used slightly stiffer interfacing. I had a lot of interfacing in my stash, but some of it was so old and after a panic email to local friends, I decided to cut my losses and chuck out the old stuff that wasn't sticking. This delayed the construction somewhat, as some of the main pattern pieces needed recutting.

Mr N knew I was making the shirt (it's not easy making things without him finding out!) and so we went button shopping together. As you can see we chose some plain white buttons for the front. These were going to be used for the cuffs... Until Mr N saw these...

Yep, some jolly roger pirate flags! :-) I guess I could have tried to make these with a double cuff so he could wear cufflinks, but these buttons negate the need. Aren't they fun? You like? Well even if you don't, we do and more importantly Mr N does, so...

The shirt was a double love challenge in one way, since the end of February was Mr N's birthday and I made the shirt so he could take it with us for his birthday long weekend in Queenstown. This was why the picture in the last post showed the shirt on a hanger. So for your delight and delectation, here is the man himself modelling the shirt I made...

 

Like me, Mr N is not of the modelling persuasion and we took these the evening he wore it for the first time, but he's happy with the shirt.

The only problem are the sleeves... They are too long. If I make the sure again I will probably shorten them, but I think what I could do for now is to move the pirate buttons across to ensure the cuffs do up more tightly. This will at least keep the sleeves off his hands. I'm not touching the buttonholes, trying to make buttonholes sized to fit those flags was not easy!

The nitty-gritty
Fabric: Grey cotton with a slight stretch, bought from Global Fabrics last November/December time (not sure if this counts as stash or not, but it certainly went in the stash pile before I considered cutting it...)
Trims: White buttons for the front and jolly roger flag buttons for the cuffs, all from Spotlight.
Pattern: Burda 7767
First worn: An evening out in Queenstown, South Island for Mr N's birthday
Worn with: Black trousers from Rodd and Gunn, Wellington.

Welly bloggers finally meet-up!

Warning - picture heavy post!

One fine day in the middle of spring, seven intrepid sewing bloggers (and a baby!) from Wellington (OK, one from Palmy really) finally met to drink tea, eat cake, talk about sewing, look at patterns, ooh and ah over furry fabric and swap ideas, stashes, etc!

Yesterday we met up in Martha's Pantry, a tea room in Wellington. This tea room on Cuba Street is the quintessential English tea room, with fine bone china and high teas. We opted for sparkly cakes and milkshakes instead!

Sparkly cake!

Lots of hundreds and thousands!!

Joy making sure she gets the most out of her shake!

After trying on the hats in the tea room...

we moved on down Cuba Street with the intention of going to Minerva Books. However, we walked past Unearthed on the way, after laughing at the tartan Thermos flasks (remember those from childhood picnics?) Juliet suddenly unearthed (geddit?) a box full of vintage patterns! That was it!

Forgotten was the book shop while we ooh and ahhed and had a good look through the patterns. I believe most of us came away with goodies!

So finally we dragged ourselves away and went on to Minerva books. We had the chance to check out the Drape, drape books and the Pattern Magic books which were in store, but at a price. We left there empty handed!

Next on to Global Fabrics... The linen sale didn't tempt us, nothing really convinced us to buy anything, not even the bright pinks...

Nor the fur...

We left there empty handed too! Perhaps it was the thought of the fabric swap ahead. So final stop for these intrepid sewers was the famous MrsC's shop, Made on Marion where to took over the big table space at the back of the store to swap fabrics, patterns, etc.

MrsC was sewing the ribbons for Tuesday's grand opening of the newly refurbished National Library of New Zealand. This happens to be where I work, so I was definitely interested in that!

I can't wait to see them Tuesday morning at 6am!

And so on to the swap! There was a LOT of patterns there. Juliet had a whole load she'd got from the local op shop, so we were ages cogitating and ruminating over patterns. Whether to actually take that 80's pattern with the massive collar or the party frock straight out of Working Girl!

Joy deciding whether the pink really is her or not!

Anyway, there are loads left so look out for something very special coming next week...

So the intrepid band, minus one, who had left by now, but is in the earlier pics.

Joy - a charm of magpies

MrsC - Sent from my iRon and also of Made on Marion

Jo - Making it well

Erm, Me, Nikki

Juliet - The crazy gypsy chronicles

Kat (with baby Drake) - Modern vintage cupcakes

Missing from this pic is Mel - the Curious Kiwi

So no doubt you'll be wanting to know what I came away with...

From Unearthed, I got the following...

 Two lovely vintage patterns which will need grading up, but...

 This great fabric! It's shouting circle skirt at me, but I'll need red or navy with it as there's not enough there.

From the swap I got...

The dresses, not the jackets!

Pale blue lining and a dark blue with grey leaf pattern fine crepe which I'm hoping might make a Taffy blouse.

Phew! What a day or afternoon to be precise! I was shattered time I'd wended my weary way home back on the bus, but I can't wait for the next meet-up!

Oh and as for the outfits... We tried to go sixties for the Sew Weekly theme... You'll have to check out the other blogs for their outfits, and mine will follow soon!

Stash busting my way :-)

At the beginning of the month I had about two weeks off work with laryngitis. I think my Mr N really enjoyed it, since within a month, his new wife had lost her voice! It's not been my idea of fun in some ways since my other escapism (apart from sewing) is singing and I still need to abstain and it's so hard not to sing!

Anyway, I have days off work and what happens? My mind goes to sewing and what I can make. I intended to stash bust and cut out three things, the dress of which is finished. I've still got a skirt and blouse to finish. I bought some more patterns in the hopes I could use them to use up the stash. Look at these... two new Colette patterns (new for me)

The Beignet is sorted, but I've no fabric for the Anise! :-)

 

My first Sewaholic patterns. I was so impressed with the speed. They were here from Canada within the week! Not bad I reckon.

I also managed to download some patterns from t'Interweb, a couple of Burda Style patterns, the Eva dress from Your Style Rocks - this dress is so elegant and looks amazing, I can't wait to get my hands on this pattern!

 

And also Victory Patterns Nicola Dress

I did get carried away! I can't wait to get started on these...

Trouble is, I then met up with Juliet. The Crazy Gypsy came down to Wellington and we went fabric shopping... We went to Global Fabrics and all my good intentions of using up my stash disappeared. Well wouldn't they with such lovely goodies and masses of lovely fabrics in front of you?

I reckon I did pretty well though. I got four lots of fabric for about $100. OK, not a complete bargain, but still... First some lining for my Beignet (you'll have to wait for that!)

This lovely cotton (not quite eyelet!) I think this will become an Alma blouse.

This blue and pale cream cotton, which I think will possibly become the Cambie dress. It's quite a heavy fabric which hangs beautifully. Global Fabrics had this in a couple of different colour ways, I decided the dark blue was better for me.

 

Finally this lovely white jersey. It'll need a top under it due to the sheerness of the fabric, but I just couldn't resist it, plus it was on special!! I'm still not good at sewing knit fabrics, so I'm hoping and praying I can make this up successfully! Isn't it lovely?

So I've admitted! I'm off work sick and spend my hard earned cash on patterns and fabric - oops! My stash busting project kinda didn't happen! Do you do the same? I think it must be that I have more time to think about the sewing when I'm off like that and end up buying all sorts! Methinks I ought to learn to control myself! Oh well!