#OAL2017 - Self Drafted Avian Dress

Andi Satterlund of Untangling Knots  and Lauren Taylor of Llaydybird are currently hosting what they call an Outfit Along (#OAL2017) where you knit a garment along with Andi and sew a garment along with Lauren to create an entire outfit.  

 This idea sounded like it was right up my alley so I decided that this year I was going to try and join in.

Now I've been spending money what seems like hand over fist at the moment so I decided that if I was going to do this I had to do it from stash so I took myself off to my Laundry where all my fabric and wool are stored and started looking for things that I could use.

I found a couple of different options but in the end I decided to go with this:

The material is a 100% medium weight duck cotton  that goes by the name "Avian" it's technically an upholstery fabric but since when has that ever stopped me.  I found this a while ago and didn't even think about it - I just knew I had to have it - I'm just glad now that I decided to buy 2 yards of it not just the 1 I was originally thinking of.

The Yarn is Classic Elite Yarns "Villa" in Emerald.  A  70% baby alpaca, 30% bamboo Viscose yarn that is so super soft and snuggly I couldn't resist it when I found it in the 40% off bin at In The Loop.  

Next issue - patterns.  The OAL has official patterns that go with it, but it is not required that you use those exact patterns to join in.  For the sewing portion of the OAL the official pattern is Kim Dress from By Hand London.  I was temped to buy this pattern right up until the point where is traced the outlines of the dress onto a picture of my body.  The style just didn't suit me at all.  I still wanted to keep the same basic idea of a dress though, and I knew that with such a heavy fabric it was going to need to be pretty structured, so I started sketching and ended up with this idea.

I pulled out my basic sloper and started tinkering.

I'm pretty happy with how it all turned out.  The fit of the front of the bodice is great - just one minor issue with the dart points, but they seem to be diminishing with wear which is nice.  

I lined the entire back bodice and the top half of the front bodice with some purple cotton that I had and inserted an invizible zipper down the back of the dress.

I'm not entirely convinced about the back of the dress.  The racer back seems to make my shoulders look huge - and its a bit of a pain to get a bra to fit underneath - you can just see it peaking out of the top here.

I think i'd also like just a touch more width across the back so that the rolls of fat are not quite so obvious.

The skirt is just two large rectangles with 8 equally spaced inverted box pleats.

I even remembered to put pockets in.  I put the pockets into the side seams, which in turn are hidden inside the side pleat.

Whilst this is not a garment I would usually wear day to day I'm really enjoying wearing it.  It'll be interesting to see just how much wear I get out of it though.

Now I've just got to see if I can manage to finish my cardigan in time - it seems to be taking ages to get anywhere.

Knock Off Jelly Roll Socks

So after knitting my Crazy Stripes Tee.  I wanted a simple project to work on.  The lovely ladies at  knitting group that I go to on Friday all seemed to be excited by, and working on the Jelly Roll socks.  They looked very cute, but I couldn't bring myself to buy such a simple pattern - it was pretty easy to figure out how they went together - so I just jumped in and started knitting.

The yarn that I used was Crazy Zauberball Colour #1564.   a beautiful 25% nylon, 75% wool from Germany in a "Fresh Fish" colour way, that I picked up one day when I finally checked out one of my local yarn shops Dee's Nimble Needles.

I worked the first pair of socks top down working magic loop.  I worked in stockinette stitch for about 1.5" to create the lower roll then worked a short row heel.

 I added 2x2 ribbing around the entire arch of the foot and then finished at the toe with Kitchener stitch.  I then went back and picked up a row of stitches about 3/4" below the top of the sock and worked in stockinette again for about 1.25" to create the upper roll around the top.

I wasn't totally happy with this sock,  It's a bit too short around the ankle, and the ribbing on the top of the foot puckers a little bit, so rather than make a second I modified my pattern on my second sock.

This time I knitted for 3" before starting the short row heel

and then did 1x1 ribbing on the underside of the foot arch.

I liked these much better so I made a third sock the same as the second.

The final decision was whether to take the first sock out and redo it, or to make a second one to match it.  I decided in the end that I might like a pair of low rise socks so just made a second one.

so I now have two really funky coloured pairs of ankle socks ready to wear once the weather cools down again.

Knitted Crazy Stripes Tee

OK I actually finished this piece a while ago but I never got around to photographing it, but there is no way I was going to leave this piece off my blog - I am so so so so so happy with the way this piece turned out.

Last time I was back in Australia My mother-in-law went though her stash of half used balls of wool from Bendigo Woolen Mills and told me to take anything I like.  Well of course, being me, I wanted all of it.  I tried to restrain myself a little bit and only took about 6 balls, among them were three balls of 4 ply wool in purple, lavender and white.  There were then a couple of 8 ply balls in aqua, red and blue.

I knew exactly what I wanted to make with the 4 ply wool - the Crazy Stripes Tee by Atelier Alfa.

I wasn't entirely sure what size to use - my measurements put me anywhere between a size M and an XL - and that only thing that I didn't like about this pattern is they don't provide any finished measurements for the shoulders - that is usually my go to measurement for figuring out what size to start with.  In the end I decided to go with a size Medium. The shirt is just a bit to big across the shoulders but fits perfectly everywhere else.

This shirt is knitted using many short rows.  I utilised many different methods for turning short rows throughout the shirt, but I never did manage to find a method that worked without a visible glitch.  I don't know how noticeable it really is, but I'm not going to worry about it - it is what it is.

Apart from short rows there wasn't really anything difficult about this pattern - it went together beautifully.  The colours used for each stripe were fairly randomly picked.  I used the darker purple as the dominant colour and then just added in the lavender and white as I felt like it.  Every now and then I added a row of the 8 ply aqua colour just to provide a real pop.  I tried to keep these rows pretty infrequent though as I didn't want the larger 8 ply to affect the gauge too much.

I did change the pattern slightly when it came to the sleeves,  The pattern calls for 3/4 length sleeves, but I have no use for those - if its cold enough to want to put on a wool shirt then I need full length sleeves.  After browsing through the many other photos of this top made by other people I really liked the way the top looked when you extend the stripe pattern into the sleeve, so that's what I did.

The only other minor change I made was to the neck band, cuffs and bottom band.  The pattern called for only 4 rows ribbing and 2 rows stockingette, but as my neckline was quite wide I chose to make a wider neck band and did 6 rows ribbing and 3 rows stockinette.  I used this same band on the cuffs and bottom as well.

Overally I love this top.  The wool is a little on the scratchy side so I do have to wear a long sleeve shirt under it, but I love everything else about it.

Jeans

After all my work on my pants pattern lately I figured it was about time I made myself a new pair of Jeans.

When I was last at the fabric store they had a couple of pieces of denim on their discount tables, both stretch denims in two different shades of dark, dark blue.  Perfect.  Just what I had been looking for.  I couldn't figure out which colour I liked better so, at $1.99/yard I figured it wouldn't hurt to buy both pieces, and that's what I did.

With every pair of pants I've made to date I've noticed one big issue.  I hot wash and dry all of my material before I start working with it, but every time I've made pants, after a couple of washes  the legs end up too short. Obviously my material is still shrinking in the wash.  So this time I washed and dried my fabric three times before I  cut it out.  Hopefully that will be enough.  I decided to start with the darker coloured denim first and ran that through the wash numerous times.

As far as patterns go I started with the pattern I used for my teal cords and black wool pants and then started playing around with it to make it into a jeans pattern.

The first thing I did was to remove the seam down the front of the pants.  I kept the back seam for shaping, but decided the front seam was unnecessary.  I then played around with the rises, both front and back.  I lowered the rise at the front by about 1.25", tapering out to nothing at the side seams, then raised the rise at the back by about the same amount, again tapering out to the side seams.

Once I was happy with that I went ahead and cut 2.5" off the top to create the waistband.  The piece that I cut off I kept and used to make the waistband pattern piece, just adding seam allowance at top and bottom.  In the back I taped the two waistband pattern pieces together to create a curved back waistband piece.

Then I headed to the drawing board to decide on the detailing for the jeans.  I looked at a number of different yoke styles and ended up deciding on an upward curving yoke , which allowed room for my back pockets to stay in the area that I like them.

I sketched the yoke onto my back pattern pieces and then cut them off.  I then taped the two pieces together to create a single yoke pattern  piece that just needs seam allowance added at top and bottom.

I cut out a pattern piece the size of the back patch pocket I wanted, and then drew some  curves onto it mimicking the curves in the yoke, and cut the pattern piece along these curves, so the pocket is made up of three separate pieces, each top stitched for decoration.

In the front I played around with a couple of different options for the front pockets and in the end decided on adding yoke pieces under the pockets,  that can again be top stitched for decoration.  After sketching the curves I wanted for the pocket and yoke onto my pattern pieces I again cut the pattern along these lines and used the cut out for my yoke pattern pieces just needing seam allowances on top and bottom.

Finally I just retraced the top of my front pattern pieces and cut them down to create front pocket pattern pieces and I was ready to cut into my fabric.  I had 2 yards of fabric and I think I used just about all of it.

Since the other pants that I've made out of this pattern have been made from non stretch woven material I knew that there would be a few alterations needed to get it to fit nicely in my stretch denim so I just basted my basic pattern pieces together to start with.  The original pattern was made with 1/2" seam allowances.  To account for the stretch I started by sewing all seams at 5/8".  The pants were still a little baggy so I then took them in another 1/4" at the top of the side seams and down through the hips,tapering to about 1.5" at the knee.  and then I brought in the front seam by 1/4'".  On the inseam I took an extra 3/8" off at the inseam tapering to about 1" at the knee.  From the knee down I tapered both the outside seam and the inner seam back out to about 5/8" in from the original seam line.

Once i had the fit to how I wanted it, I trimmed all the seam allowances back to 5/8" then started sewing it up properly.

I originally planned to top stitch these in red, but decided that i wasn't feeling it.  I found a beautiful teal thread in my stash and decided to use that instead.  I then pulled out my metallic silver thread and decided I wanted to add that in as well.

I started sewing on the back of the pants, sewing the seam down the back of each leg.  I flat felled each seam and top stitched them with two rows of the teal thread.  I then stitched the two back pieces together down the back rise, again flat felling and top stitching.

The yoke was sewed on - again flat felled and top stitched, however this time with two rows of teal with a row of the silver metallic thread in between.

The three sections of the back pockets were sewn together, each seam top stitched with one row of teal and one row of metallic silver stitching.  The top of the denim was tuned over to create a facing for the inside of the pocket and they were then finished  off with a piece of contrasting cotton fabric to enclose all the seams.  The pockets were then stitched into place on the back of the pants using two rows of teal stitching.

I then moved on to the front of the pants.  The front yokes were stitched in place and then top stitched  with one row of metallic silver and one row of teal stitching.

The pocket bags were made out of a contrasting cotton fabric with a small section of the denim material stitched into place over the corner where the pocket is visible from the front.  The pocket bags extend into the front fly.

For the front fly I used a metallic zipper that I salvaged from an old pair of jeans and installed it using my basic front fly method.  Making sure the all edges were finished including the pocket bags.  The fly facing is made using the contrasting cotton fabric interlined with a piece of the denim to add stiffness.  All stitching for the front fly was done using the teal thread only.

The front and back sections were then sewn together along the inseam and the seam flat felled and top stitched with two rows of teal stitching and finally the side seams were sewn up and serged to finish them.  They were top stitched from the waistband down to the end of the pocket bag using the teal thread.

The waistband is two layers of denim one of which is interfaced using a medium weight iron on interfacing.   The waist band is top stitched top and bottom with one row of teal and one row of silver thread and the waistband closes using 4 plastic snaps.  I didn't add any belt loops as I never wear belts and I used the snaps rather than a button as I hate buttons.

I wanted to keep as much length as possible so I serged the lower edge of the pants, turned them up 1/4" and stitched them with a single row of teal stitching.

I love these jeans so much, they are very comfortable thanks to the stretch in the fabric, I love all the style lines and top stitching.  However one minor problem is the waist band tends to stretch out quite a bit and they have a tendency to fall down.  If I can be bothered at some stage I'll open up the waistband and add some elastic into the back to keep them in place - either that or I'll have to add a few belt loops after all.