Working on the blue coat (still)

Why does my life seem so busy and I am not even "gainfully employed outside the home"?

I have been working back on the blue coat since I finished the dresses but I still have not managed to finish it yet.

I finished putting the lining pieces together and then attached the lining to the coat.

Then I machine sewed seam tape to the hem and hand sewed the hem up. I am doing it this way because the lining hem is not going to be attached to the coat hem - it will float separately because of the pleat in the middle of the back. I have to press the heck out of it now and finish the lining hem. Next will be some top stitching and then the buttons and I'll be done.

Belaboring the blue coat, and prom time

Okay, this time, it is taking me so long to blog because the coat was NOT speaking to me. I somehow did not want to be bothered cutting it out. And when I started, it kind of slid around on me and the selvages would not line up and behave and I felt discouraged. So I left it alone for a while and it mocked me from the sewing room every time I went by. So I kept on cutting it out, bit by bit, and now all the blue pieces are done and I even discovered I had enough lining in my stash to completely line it.

I did however, have to make the second shortest view (View B) because the skirt is wide enough that I couldn't overlap the pieces with the fabric that I had. I'm still going to make the pockets on the side seam, not the patch pockets.

In the meantime, I have promised my niece that I will make her prom dress and so today, we went looking for patterns. She had seen some nice dresses on the internet and leaned toward a one-shoulder style (no pun intended). Unfortunately, there were hardly any one-shoulder style patterns out there (in the books that we looked at). In the end, we bought two very different patterns and she is going to talk to her friends and think about which one she would prefer for the prom.

This one is cute and young and because it is short, she may be able to wear it somewhere else, later. We'd make the pink view bodice and band, with the yellow view bubble skirt.

It will take about 2.7 metres of fabric.

This one is much more sophisticated but I still think it wouldn't look too old on her, as long as she didn't make it in black (and she is not wanting black - we looked at some lovely turquoise silk charmeuse).

It will take 3.8 metres of fabric. Both dresses are fully lined so she can choose any fabric and not worry about revealing anything. The Vogue dress is much more structured and the midriff is all top-stitched. Plus it has the effect of two skirts and a small train.

I don't want to influence her one way or the other. This is a once in a lifetime event and she should be happy with her dress without feeling like she "should" choose one sort of style over another. It may even turn out that we will look at more patterns after I make the bodices in a muslin for fitting. This will be the first time I have made a muslin! Patterns generally fit me right out of the envelope so I never bother with a muslin. But sewing for someone else is a different proposition.

Blue Spring Coat

You guys rise to the occasion! The consensus is overwhelmingly in favour of a coat.

I am going to use Butterick B5145 and one of the longer views like C or D (pink or blue), with the regular collar. I will cut out the tabs for the back and sleeves, even if I'm not sure if I will use them yet.

I am not sure how long a skirt I can get out of the fabric I have but I'll try for about knee-length. I am also not sure if I will put more than the three buttons down the front part of the bodice. In a wind, the skirt will fly open if it is not buttoned down. When it's 20 below, that is a big deal. But since this is only a Spring coat, we're not talking 20 velow.

I was hoping to make the cutting easier by folding the fabric in half but when I did that, the selvages didn't match up, even though I carefully folded the fabric along a particular white line. This means I will have to cut each piece out of a single layer of fabric. sigh.

I'm back!

I'm back! It is two weeks now, after the last chemo, and my energy is slowly coming back. And I have the comfort of knowing that I won't be getting zapped again next Friday, as I have been for the last 5 months, every third Friday, so I am feeling even better about that mentally! My DH is out all day Saturday taking a cooking course and after I finished the newspaper and felt at a loose end, I went upstairs and did the ironing. After that, finding myself still in my sewing room, I started looking at patterns and fabric.

I have been day dreaming about my fabrics and patterns, wondering what to do next. I have this blue acrylic fabric that, when I bought it, I thought "jumper".

The photo shows it is not very thick fabric. But I think it is entirely too busy, too "much" for a jumper. So I started thinking about a jacket or even a Spring coat.

But did I want to line it? But did I want an unlined coat? Not really.

Then I was watching "What Not To Wear" and this really short woman was being told that short, fitted jackets would suit her and I remembered the unlined, short, fitted jacket pattern that is really flattering on me. And so why not make a little jacket out of this blue stuff?

So of course, I have 2.5 metres of the stuff and therefore have enough for a skirt too. Would a skirt and jacket be "too much" like the jumper? I could always just wear them separately. Or maybe I should make a lined, Spring coat with one of the patterns I have not used before and make my mistakes (if any) using this stuff from my stash. What do you think?

Red wool coat

How did it get to be the last day of September?

One thing I don't often mention is the prep work for starting a project. I have never used this pattern before so I like to read the instructions first. Then I have to cut apart all the pattern pieces and see which ones I need to use. I double-check them with the list shown above.

The only garment in this pattern is the coat (some have all sorts of things like pants and skirts and things) but there are some variations. I'll be using all the big pattern pieces but maybe not all of the small ones. Once I have the pieces separated, I iron them flat.

I am going to make the long sleeves with 6 buttons on the front (view C) but I want to make the slash/welt pockets (views A and B), not the patch pockets. I also like the detail of the band around the sleeve but it is only on the short sleeve and the 3/4 sleeve.

When you look at the instructions for the sleeve band, you see it is only decorative and not functional. Interestingly, it is made from three pieces of fabric so that the seaming becomes part of the decorative design. I have been debating with myself if I want to use the print lining I got for the backing of the sleeve bands and I haven't finished that debate yet. I lean toward NOT doing it, just because I am not familiar with this pattern and there may be a good reason not to use lining fabric to back the band.

I have got enough fabric that I could make them both ways and see which looked better. You can see that the band gets sewn to the sleeve and the button is just for show. But I like the way it looks on the photo and in the drawings so I think I will make bands and then decide as I go along, whether I will attach them to the sleeve. They get sewn into a seam but I could still pick them out later if I don't like them.

Here I have laid out all the pieces and pinned them, except for the bands. I am going to use Mum's old electric scissors to cut this coat out. I keep forgetting I have electric scissors and while I may not use them for delicate stuff, they should be perfect for this sort of wool.