New project - wool suit

I am being a good girl and only using up my stash. I bought all those pieces of fabric on speculation, so it is only fair that I finally sew something with them. The difficulty is deciding what fabric will go with what pattern.

First of all, I finished that striped shirt and it looks pretty good. I sewed down the facings with a single line of topstitching. I put it on the dress form for a photo before I realized that I should press the topstitching and buttonholes. You can see a little of the "puckering" caused by the topstitching in this photo but it disappeared after I ironed it.

I got out a bunch of my "outfit" patterns, to ponder over and speculate what I would make with them. I'm going to a wedding at the end of May, and it would be fun to have a new dress and matching jacket. I have made the two Vogue patterns with the short jackets with the swing backs and I could definitely do them again. I haven't made the plaid outfit (V1132). I got that jacket pattern for the back on it too, having in mind my "Edwardian" (or maybe it is Victorian?) jacket that I was planning a couple of years ago.

I have these long lengths of fabric in the pale pink with the same stuff in navy, and then there's the bright pink. I laid them out on my ironing board to think about them.

Then I remembered this pale blue (ice blue) pure wool with a thin white stripe, that I had bought at Darrell's a few years ago. It was actually two remnants. I got some matching lining at the time and planned to make a suit out of it. It is nicer in real life, compared to this photo.

I had thought I would use this jacket pattern that I have made a few jackets out of in the square bottomed, notched collar views, but only once in the rounded bottom view. The one I made in the rounded bottom view was this one:

It is also pure wool with embroidery on it. Every time I wear it, I feel great and I get compliments. Of course, it is mostly the fabric and the colour, but I like the fit also. For some reason, even though it is virtually the same pattern as the square bottomed jacket, it works much better than the square jacket, in terms of the hem lying flat and the pockets working. It is very odd how that happens. I wonder if it was a fluke, that the red one works so nicely, but I am willing to gamble on the ice blue wool, and see how it turns out.

Wanting to start something new

Still working on that shirt. I get so impatient when I want a project to be finished already. I prefer the phase where I wonder what fabric to use with which pattern, to the nitty gritty of finishing.

In the meantime, tragedy befell my favourite track pants!

I don't know how long I have had these Pearl Izumi pants but it has to be close to 15 years. I love them. They make my butt look small. They fit comfortably over my yoga pants and I wear them to the gym three days a week. Last week, I was zipping down the ankle zipper when it suddenly parted company with itself! The zippy mechanism jumped off the teeth. I can rip everything apart and install a new zipper. But I was wondering if any of you clever sewers out there had a magic fix? You have to get the zipper teeth back into the zipper pull and I'm not sure if I can do that.

I finished the cute little blouse with clear buttons. They have a little band of "cut glass" around the edge which sparkles nicely. I haven't worn it yet but plan to, the first warm day. Today was warm and it got up to 10C (50F) but that isn't really warm enough for a short sleeved blouse. And I have a cold so I didn't even get to go out and enjoy the weather much. But soon!

I decided to flat fell the armhole edge, to contain the ravelly polyester fabric edges. I've been doing French seams for all the rest.

It turned out well.

I put the cuffs on by sewing the right side of the cuff to the wrong side of the sleeve first.

Then after I sewed up the ends, I turned the cuff to the right side and used the zipper foot to sew the folded edge to just over the sewing line.

Here's the finished cuff. I still think I'm going to sew a line of top stitching around the other three sides.

After I turned the facings to the inside down the front, I saw that there was going to be bagging. This might fix itself after I put on the buttons and buttonholes, but in the meantime, I hand sewed a line of basting down the fronts to hold the facings down flat.

So I have just got buttons and buttonholes to go, and maybe some top stitching.

Yet another blouse

In using up my stash, I seem to be gravitating towards shirts. Someone made a comment here not long ago, and their Blogger link led to a blog project called Never too many white shirts. While I've got my own issues, I happen to agree with the idea of "no such thing as too many white shirts". But this one is striped.

First of all, I was rummaging around my sewing room when my husband came by and snapped this picture of me. Silly. The tin man red hat on the far right is the funnel I use to refill my steam iron, perched on the water bottle. On the chair on the left is that gold silk still waiting to be cut. In woodworking, they say "measure twice cut once" and in sewing with expensive fabric, I say "think 20 times, cut once".

I got out ALL my blouse patterns and stared at them. I really liked that Calvin Klein pattern but it is dated with the gathered sleeves. On the other hand, it is a nice pattern and maybe it's not so bad with gathered sleeves. It comes with French cuffs too. I always liked the high neck band and the possibility of flipping the collar like in the photo, with a tiny cummerbund around the neck. That's dated too, I suppose. In the end, I chose the also old but not as dated Vogue 7332 on the right.

My fabric from the stash is quite a few years old now, a polyester (cringe) but with a bit of a texture to it. Bright white with navy and red pin stripes. I recall it being on sale (of course).

I'm making the B view with the stand-up collar. I've made it before so I know it works. I think it'll be a nice addition to my red or navy jackets and skirts.

I took the "risk" of cutting it out on folded double fabric. When I have stripes like this, I will often cut the pieces out one single layer at a time, to make sure nothing gets crooked or doesn't match. However, you can see through the fabric enough that you can see the stripes on the second (bottom) layer, so I straightened everything up properly and used lots and lots of pins to hold everything exactly in place and just cut.

So far so good. I've got the collar on. I think I will end up putting a single row of top stitching along the fronts, as the bands are just facings turned inside and the stitching will make them flatter. I might even sew a second row of stitching down the fronts, to hold the facings in place for the buttons and buttonholes. We shall see.

New blouse and no thread issues

I sanded down the throat plate, held my breath and started sewing. It worked! I made a complete blouse without the thread breaking once. I feel a little embarrassed, having ranted so long about it being the needle hitting the bobbin case. I even heard back from Singer, who wrote that they thought it might be a timing issue. But that was after I finished the blouse, so I'm off to the races, I suppose.

I've had this pattern for a little while but never made it. It's cute. I rummaged through my stash and hauled out this white stuff that I had bought at Darrell's years ago. It is a weave but it feels a little like a knit (it is textured), and it has a fine silver thread that you can glimpse occasionally. It also ravels quite a bit and is one of those fabrics for which you keep your lint brush always at the ready on the ironing board.

I think it might have been a remnant because it was only through clever cutting that I managed to get short sleeves out of the piece I had.

I decided on French seams for the shoulders and side seams, to keep the ravelly ends in. Around the armholes, I trimmed one side (the shirt side) and folded the sleeve-side-seam allowance over to contain the ravelly bits and then sewed that down with a zigzag stitch. Yes, it would be easier if I had a serger! But I don't.

The front bands are sewn across the bottom, right sides together, to make a nice square finish. But instead of hand sewing the band to the wrong or inside, I sewed it first by machine, wrong side to right side, then I sewed the square bottom, right sides together, THEN I folded it over to the RIGHT side of the blouse (the outside) and sewed it by machine with a topstitch.

It's a bit faster that way -- no hand sewing -- and it gives it a professional or maybe commercial look. Anyway, I like it and since I learned to do this with all the jean jacket bands I have sewed, I now do it with all the other bands I sew.

I also used the same technique on the bands that hem the slightly puffy sleeves.

Here is the puffy part of the short sleeve being sewn to the band and you can see how much the fabric ravels. The green thread is there to gather up the puffy part.

I have yet to go get buttons. This is a single button I have in my button box. It has no mates -- too bad because it is just like what I think would go best with this blouse. The silver thread makes the blouse sparkle a tiny bit but silver buttons would be way over the top. This one is a clear plastic button with a flower motif embossed on it and so it "sparkles" just a little bit. Plus, it is a bit bigger around than most of the shirt buttons I normally use and I think that would suit this fabric, since it is textured and not sleek.

Here is the blouse, awaiting my trip to the button store. Cute!

Tunic shirt done!

Whoosh. Well, it wasn't difficult.

I usually flat fell my seams to finish them but I didn't want to do that on the light weight silk, so I thought I would use a French seam finish. I did that on the shoulders but zigzagged around the armholes. Then, I was going to French seam the underarm/side seams when I realized that wouldn't work with having vents on the sides. Instead, I sewed a "normal" right-sides-together seam and then ironed the seam allowance under, thus also making the vent edge finished.

It was at this point that I decided to re-examine my sewing machine for why it was breaking threads. I have a follower who also works where I shop for groceries and we had a nice long talk this week, about threads breaking and people who fix sewing machines. She said something like, "of course, you have checked the throat plate for snags" and I said "of course". But when I was sitting there, this afternoon, staring at my machine, I realized that I had not looked at the throat plate (the plate with the lines on it for 5/8 seam allowances, where the needle goes through the hole into the bobbin area). So I took it out and looked at it and sure enough! There were tiny metal snags where needles have broken over the years. Well. I thought that the sewing machine guy might have said something to me, especially as when I took the machine in, I said "it is breaking the top thread". So I got a tiny piece of very fine emery paper for sanding metal and spent 10 minutes buffing the snags. Then I proceeded to sew rapidly, using straight and zigzag stitches and the thread didn't break once! I did not allow myself to feel elated yet. Then I made six buttonholes and the thread broke twice! Grr. I am going to sand the heck out of the throat plate again and make sure there is nothing snaggy on it and then start a new project and see what happens. I suppose I could also buy a new one.

Anyway, here it is, a tunic length shirt with 3/4 sleeves. It fits and I am happy with the way it turned out. I'll want to wear it once to be sure but I think I have found the pattern for my gold silk. Now, for the sand paper...

A shirt muslin

Yes, I am still hanging in here. :) Last time I was here, I had made a shirt. I have now worn it and it fits and wears very well, so that's gratifying. But Christmas was approaching and I wanted to make a few little things for the family, as we were all getting together for two whole days over the holidays. I rooted through my stash and came up with fabric for nine different shoe bags. In Canada, in the winter, you are always carrying your shoes when visiting other people's places (unless you just take off your boots and go around in socks, which is also acceptable). So that was fun and I hope well received.

I had thought I wanted to try out a new suit pattern, a nice Badgley Mischka Chanel looking thing, so I hauled out some navy fabric and stared at that for a few days. The jacket pattern is only lined in the sleeves, which is interesting. I had thought I might use this pattern for that raw silk I found years ago and which is still hanging about my sewing room. But it is kind of scratchy (with a metallic thread) and I am not convinced any part of it should be unlined.

So I stewed some more. Then I put the navy stuff away and folded up the suit pattern pieces and thought some more about the gold silk. If you go back to the August 3, 2010 entry (which isn't that far down because I have hardly been blogging), you will see that silk.

I got some helpful comments about making a tunic length shirt and so I took out my Vogue pattern 2634 and thought about it. I had made some sleeveless shirts with it and discovered that it was too small because it was a size 10 and not my usual 12. However, over the last little while, my husband has been losing weight by eating vegan and I have benefitted by losing a few pounds too and now the size 10 almost fits across the chest. I added one centimetre to the centre back fold (adding 2 centimetres to the total width) and am hopeful this will work.

It is crazy busy fabric but it has an interesting provenance. I went to Darrell Thomas to see what he had in his annual "cat rescue" fund raising sale and found this piece of polyester for only $3. It is the same weight and feel as the gold silk, so I determined I would use it as a muslin for the tunic length shirt in the Vogue 2634. I may not wear it but if it fits and works, I will have made my decision about what to make with the gold silk.

In the meantime, my Singer has been breaking the top thread again. It did this some years ago and I took it to the sewing machine hospital and he fixed it. I took it back in October and he gave it a tune up but it was still breaking threads - most aggravating. I hate it when things don't work according to their nature. Then I changed the threads and bobbins and am sewing very slowly and the last few metres of sewing have been okay. But I wrote Singer anyway and will see what they say, if anything. I promise to report, if anything happens.

That shirt

Well let's see, it's only been two months since I last blogged here. Good grief. But in the meantime, I ran an election (and lost) and learned a whole lot (and blogged over there). And I started novelizing the emails I wrote in 1995-6 when I was in London for a year (for NaNoWriMo). And yes, I finally finished that shirt:

I can't believe the rookie mistakes I made on it, which came from not being able to tell the right side from the wrong side of the fabric. Only I can tell where the errors are but I do know what I did. I used to sew the collar and cuff facings down by hand but for some years, I've been attaching the whole thing by machine. I describe the process here where I attach a collar to one of my husband's shirts. What I did with this shirt was attach the band to the right side (instead of the wrong side) and now I have to deal with the machine stitching being more visible (to me at least) that I would have liked. C'est la vie.

So, now I'm free to start a new project, and I don't know what yet. I was making this template shirt in anticipation of wearing the finished gold silk one to my charity gala, but as the date got closer, I knew I wasn't going to get it done, so I looked at some of my "old" fancy dress things to see what I might wear instead. I had made a "Chinese" dress quite a while ago (I don't think I blogged about it so it must have been before 2005) and used a new pattern to do it. When I tried the finished dress on, I was shocked that it didn't go over my butt and so I never wore it. I kept it because it looked so cute, in red faux Chinese embroidered satin, and because I had hopes that I would lose ten pounds or so. When the Oriental theme of the gala was announced, I hauled it out of the cupboard, dusted it off (literally) and tried it on, thinking I'll finally give it away to the Sally Ann. Imagine my surprise when it fit! My husband has been cooking vegan for the last few months and I have benefited by losing enough weight that the dress now fits. So that's what I wore!

I told people that I have lost ten pounds because of my husband's cooking but that never does come out right. He has lost over 25 pounds. It's cutting back calories of course, but also no saturated animal fat that makes a big difference. These two photos are a good contrast too, showing me tense in one and relaxed in the other. The camera does not love me, I know, but it is interesting how some pix are so much better than others. Plus you get to meet my hubby, although you can do that more at his blog which he kept nicely over the summer when he was biking to work and taking photos. Now that he is on the bus for the winter, he is not taking so many pix.

So there, I am mostly caught up to date. Oh yes, I had to take my sewing machine in again to be repaired, as it was breaking threads yet again. Most aggravating and disappointing, as I bought a Singer to have a better quality machine.

The perfect shirt, template

I pulled out sleeve pattern pieces, and front and back pieces from different patterns, and layered them to see how different they were from each other, and maybe try to figure out why some shirts wouldn't allow me to stretch my arms out in front of me.

I didn't find anything! The sleeves were practically identical in the shirts that didn't work, compared to the shirts that did work. Same with the fronts and backs. I went to the closet and tried on the shirts that don't work (why do I still have them hanging there, you ask? I ask that too.) The only thing I can think of is that all the shirts that work have a little Lycra in the fabric. And I think it is the width of the back that makes the difference, not the type of sleeve. In other words, my problem is that the back isn't wide enough, which means I am too big for the pattern. I can stand to lose 10 to 15 pounds and there it is - a whole pattern size. sigh.

I also looked at the sleeveless shirts I had made (and never worn) from the Vogue pattern 2634 and then I looked at the pattern and slapped myself up-side the head. It was a size 10, even smaller than the 12 with which I was having issues.

I decided to go with the McCall's 5630 "perfect fit" pattern and start to modify it. I pulled out the pattern pieces and discovered that I had already made this pattern!

Again, I used cotton with a little Lycra in it. I wasn't all that happy with how big the collar was but the shirt was a pretty good fit otherwise.

So what I did was cut the collar back at the points, so it would be a bit smaller. I've done this before with good results.

I had it in mind that I would use some plain cream coloured fabric I had, but in the process of looking for it (I have boxes and boxes of fabric), I found some nice striped cotton (no Lycra!). It is a little thicker than the silk but I think it will be okay for a template. My plan is to make the body straight, so it is more like a tunic than a shaped shirt. It won't be as long or as baggy as a tunic, but I want the stripes to be straight, all the way up and down.

When I cut out the front and back pieces, I cut as straight down the stripes in the fabric as I could, eliminating the curve in at the waist. I will still put in the bust darts but I won't put in the vertical front and back shaping darts. It will be interesting to see how boxy and bulky the shirt looks with no vertical shaping.

The Perfect Shirt

I appreciate the comments on the gold silk. I really want to make some sort of shirt with it but not an entire "shirt dress". The comment about a tunic length got me to thinking about all the shirt patterns I have used of the years and those that I have bought but never used.

When I started making shirts (as opposed to blouses) for myself, I used one pattern exclusively. It wasn't a true shirt like a tailored man's shirt but it was good enough to make many (dare I say dozens) of shirts over the years. It's the McCall's 8053 on the right. It has a proper two piece collar and nice long shirt tails, for when we used to tuck our shirts into our skirt or pants. It doesn't have a separate band on the front, for both buttons and buttonholes. Instead, it does what many of the women's shirt patterns do and that is, fold over the front into a facing, which flares out at the top and has to be ironed down with each washing. It is also very wide and boxy and goes straight down, with no darts.

On the other side of the photo above is Simplicity 9210. This is what I've been using lately (and for some years) to make what I call the "camp shirt" (or I suppose you could call it a bowling shirt). It has a one piece, spread collar. I like the two piece collar because it looks more formal or dressy and can take a tie (I sometimes, used to - rarely - wear ties). The camp shirt also has the facings. It is square but it does have bust darts to give it a little shape. And the bottom is hemmed straight across with vents at the bottom for ease of movement.

The next pattern on the right is Simplicity 9877. I started making this very fitted shirt when I started leaving my shirt tails untucked. Despite the cowgirl motif in the main photo, I have used this pattern successfully for quite a few cotton/Lycra shirts and I wear them a LOT. It has a one piece collar that has the shape of a two piece. That means when undone, it sort of looks like a two piece but it doesn't do up (at the very top) square enough to wear a tie. It has separate bands on the front that are interfaced and topstitched and look more like a tailored man's shirt. It also, despite it being so fitted, allows my arms to move. (That sounds strange but I went through a couple of patterns which were sized correctly but for some reason, I couldn't stretch my arms out in front of me.) I have made a few of these shirts with vertical stripes and they work, even with the deep darts in front. But for the gold silk, I didn't want the stripes to be interrupted like that.

On the left is McCall's 5630 which I have never used. I bought it because it is billed as "perfect fit" and it has a two piece collar, front bands and a slight shirttail hem. But it has body darts and I am not convinced I want to use those for the gold silk (because of the stripes in the fabric but also, I think the finished look should be a little loose).

Next is Vogue 2634 which I had to have because those women just look so lanky and elegant. I can be elegant (given the right circumstances) but I'll never be lanky. It has a very long, tunic length option, a two piece collar but no front bands.

Finally, we have a pattern that is very 80s but which I love in spite of its shoulder pads, gathered sleeves and tucks. Of course, it is very Vogue and so the photos look so elegant. I only had one shirt made from it and it didn't have the shoulder pads and I never made the cool neck cummerbund and I really got it for the neck detail. Because I like to wear ties. Plus, it has a French cuff option and one of these days, I'm going to wear cufflinks too. [I just like the look of a tie and cufflinks and I can get away with it because I'm pretty small and fairly feminine (how's that for non-commitment and lack of superlatives?)].

What's next for me is to compare pattern pieces to determine why some patterns restrict my arms (I didn't include those patterns above because, in my opinion, they don't work). Then I want to combine the best parts of the patterns that do work, to make a shirt that will be "the perfect shirt". It will have a two piece collar, front bands, hopefully no darts (I'll allow bust darts if I have to) and be loose-ish but not boxy. For the gold silk, I would like a long body but a straight hem, so I can wear it out like a tunic but tuck it in if I want. I will make the first prototype of this perfect shirt using some piece of some fabric I have squirreled away over the years and if it works, the gold silk will be next. I've been mulling over this puzzle for ages. It's very much like the mulling I do when I try to come up with what will be for me, the perfect bicycle. But that's another story.

New project with silk?

I came down from sewing to blog about sewing and was sitting here (at the computer at 7pm) when suddenly, I thought I was going blind, it got so dark. We have some dense red cells moving through the area and there have been funnel clouds west of here. I thought I'd better post this before I lose power.

I finally finished the red rayon camp shirt. It is such a pretty colour, I am glad I have a new one of these shirts to wear.

I made the buttonholes vertically for a change. It fits loosely so there won't be any straining at the buttonholes or fear of gaping.

Now I have ironed the other piece of silk I got in California a year ago. It is a sort of Dupioni, in that it is stiff-ish with slubs in it but it is fairly thin too. I had thought I would make a dress out of it but I think it is too thin. Then I thought I would make a camp shirt, as the pattern works so well and I could tuck it into a skirt to make it look less caasual. But then I measured it and found out it is 136 cm wide and 190 cm long - almost 2 yards! I can get the shirt out of it but then I will have quite a bit left over and don't know what to do with that. Any ideas? Shirt and something, or something other than a shirt? Or maybe a long sleeved shirt!