Mirroring Suzy Bee Sews - Life So Strange It Should Be Fiction

So I kind of skipped ahead on the sewalong and finished my jacket! The jacket is meant to be worn with a belt but I liked the look on me better without it so I pressed the collar flat and added a press stud as well to keep the collar in place. Alteration were all listed in the last post . Fabrics used were a poly crepe for the main and a poly satin for the lining. I'm really happy with the fit, the drapey fabric caused me a bit of grief though. I had a lot of drag lines on the upper sleeves which I think were caused mostly from the drapey fabric. I interfaced the upper part of the sleeves, inserted sleeve heads and shoulder pads and while they aren't perfect its a lot better than before. On that note, I interfaced the collar, sleeves, front and hems, but with this fabric I should have interfaced the back and the whole peplum too. I think it would have made the peplum sit a lot nicer. I have a feeling I put the collar on the wrong side, but too late now to change it! So some th...

I'm always looking for an interesting t-shirt variation, so I had mentally bookmarked Burda 08-2013-131 .  Then when Dibulous made it , I got really interested. I have a lot of fabric purchasing to confess.  A lot.  But let's start with these pieces from Fabric Mart back in December.  They had merino wool jersey on sale, how was I supposed to leave it on the table? The merino is quite thin and not suitable for a fitted tee.  So I needed to come up with top patterns that are a bit loose and will work with this thinner fabric.  As a plus, it is quite drapey! I love orange, but I was a bit disappointed in the unsophisticated color "Orange Pop" or whatever it was called turned out to be.  It was just not rich enough for my taste and I fretted that I'd made a mistake in buying it.  I figured I had nothing to lose so I tested a small swatch in a fairly dilute dye bath.  OMG, a million times better!  So I popped the whole piece into the washer ...

One of the things I've been meaning to get into my wardrobe is a pullover top with a cut on sleeve.  It's a dolman top, so how hard can it be?  But I've been too lazy to draft my own, so when Joann had Simplicity at 5 for $5, I picked up  Simplicity 1805 .  Had it been $2 I wouldn't have gotten it. Zooey Deschanel in Derek Lam It turned out to be fortuitous because I got a haircut the next day, which is a whole other conversation, and while I was waiting I picked up the Lucky magazine they had out and was instantly enchanted with this dolman top on Zooey Deschanel.  It's Derek Lam, and I just love how the simplicity lets the fabric be the star, and the perfect proportions.  And I already had the pattern!  The "Eh, it's only a dollar, it's ok if I end up giving it away" pattern was muslined and earmarked for a fabulous silk within 24 hours! This has been a popular style with designers for several years.  There are plenty more examples out there, li...

I had a fairly small piece of this Fabric Mart yellow wool crepe (purchased in October 2010 for $9.99/yd) leftover from a dress that I made last winter (and haven't blogged about because I want to change the skirt from dirndl gathers to darts but haven't).  I couldn't make my usual A line skirt  so I looked for an interesting pencil skirt pattern.  The curved darts on Burda 07-2010-120  and I decided to give it a shot. The dirty little secret nobody talks about with wool is that it wrinkles as much as linen, maybe more.  Or maybe this doesn't happen to anyone else? To try to keep the wrinkling under control (I sound like I'm talking about my face, ha!), I decided to underline the skirt in silk organza.  For the back, I treated the organza and wool as one at the darts, sewing them together.  However, for the front darts I wanted to take maximum advantage of wool's moldability with steam.  Getting those darts flat was going to be crucial to making ...

I've joined into the Lekala sewalong hosted by Lara at Thornberry . The pattern is 4329 and since Lekala has personalised sizes the theory is that we shouldn't have to adjust the pattern........except for me, lol. I printed out and taped together the pattern this week. I used my measurements plus adding extra to the back, high waist and making the upper arm 17". Once the pattern was printed (and I checked the 4" printing square) I doubled checked the arm measurement and it was only 16".....based on that I decided to make a muslin. Now while I really do like Lekala patterns my biggest issue with them is that they work off full bust and don't add an option for a FBA (though they do now allow for a narrow shoulder option and I really should have added that), so the shoulders were too wide on me. Adjustments I made after the first muslin; Added 2" to the bicep width Added .5" to the back width. Took in the waist 1" at the centre back. Petited the...