Birthday Present for Grandma.

With my Mum living on the other side of the world, it's really hard to do presents for all those special occasions, but I love making things for people I love so since Mum's birthday is coming up I decided it was time to start working on a present for her.

As it's coming into winter in the southern hemisphere I wanted to make something warm, but a bit decadent so I decided on a nice silk jersey shirt, something that you can wear every day, but that's a little bit special.  I found a beautiful piece of silk jersey with an ombre from dark blue to white with splashes of other colours and a leafy print that I thought would work well for Mum so I bought that and prewashed it and then promptly forgot all about it.  A couple of weeks later I realised that time was getting away from me and that I had to make this shirt up soon.

Of course because I was in a rush I couldn't find a pattern I liked.  Kristy from Lower you Presser foot had just done a cowl necked top that I loved but that was a McCalls pattern and I didn't have time to get to a store and buy a pattern - I wanted something I could use now!  of course I couldn't find anything similar in pdf patterns.  Then I started thinking about the patterns that I do have on hand and thought about the Paprika Patterns Jasper sweater.  That had a very similar cowl to what I was looking for.  I looked up all the reviews on pattern review and the thinner materials were looking a bit like what I wanted.  I decided that I would try to modify that pattern to get what I wanted.

I started with a piece of cotton jersey from stash as a muslin before cutting into my good silk.  I cut out the size 7 that I had originally used, left off the bands at the sleeves and bottom (but added 1" extra length to the bottom) and the pocket, and added 2" to the height of the cowl portion.  I then took and extra 1/2" off each of the 4 seams around the body and the sleeve seams to get a better fit.  It ended up exactly like I had hoped.

Now to start with the real material.  Once again however I stuffed up and forgot that the silk jersey had less stretch than my muslin.  I was planning on french seaming everything and got to the point where all the seams were finished their first pass and I tried it on.  Two issues were obvious.  First - it was fitting just nicely, but I still had to take in 4 more seams - and second, my placement of the front piece on the material was unfortunate.  The material I was using has random splotches of colour all over it - unfortunately I'd cut the front piece so there was just one splotch right in the middle and it was brown.  It looked like I'd spilled something down the front of the shirt.  At that point I gave up and went to bed.

The next morning I decided that the splotch was something that I couldn't live with, thankfully I'd bought extra fabric so there was just enough to re cut the front piece so I did that.  I then went back and for each seam I did the first pass at 1/8", turned and did a second pass at 1/4" to give myself just a bit more room.  This worked beautifully.  Unfortunately the sleeves were already finished at the full seam allowance so I couldn't go back and change them, so the sleeves are just a touch too tight around the biceps for me.  The good news is my Mum is smaller than I am so hopefully it'll fit her nicely.

Since this is going to be a present I wanted to finish it really nicely, so the inside of the collar was turned under and stitched in place by hand and the sleeves and bottom band were also finished by hand.

I love the way this turned out and will definitely be making another one for me next winter.  It's warm and snuggly and just all together yummy!

I think the only thing I might change is to add just a touch more length, 1 more inch should do it, it's just looking a touch short here!

And finally here is a picture of Mum actually wearing it. It seems to fit OK from what I can see.  Anyway Happy Birthday Mum!

Blue maxi shirt dress

Just after I finished making my last shirt dress, I looked on the Pattern Review web site and found that there was a shirt dress contest going on at the moment.  It started two days after I made my first shirt dress so that dress was ineligible.  However that just gave me an excuse to make another new dress.

I wasn't 100% happy with my first shirt dress, whilst it's pretty, and comfortable and will therefore be worn tonnes, it is still a touch shapeless which is not my favourite silhouette, so I decided I would start again from scratch to make a more fitted pattern.

I found a piece of plain cotton in my stash and drew horizontal and vertical lines all over it and then used that to start draping a pattern.  I started with the neckline and armholes from previous patterns that I'm happy with and then started shaping.  I made one princess seam right down the front of my dress from the neckline and over the bust point to give good shaping over and under the bust.

A second princess seam was added about 2/3 of the way down the front arm hole to give further shaping through the bust. 

I balanced this with a side seam that was shifted slightly to the back of my body and provides just a touch of shaping.

I decided to forgo any further shaping down the back so as to make the dress more comfortable and just added ties into the back princess seams to fit the back of the dress and allow for some expansion/contraction as required.

Now I could think about materials.  I knew exactly which of my materials I wanted to use.  I found this beautiful blue rayon a couple of months ago and loved it so much I bought 6 yards of it.  It's the weight and feel of a linen but was marked as 100% rayon.  It's  patterned in shades of blue with darker blue bamboo and birds and flowers with pops of yellow in the flower blooms.

When it came to making the dress out of my final material, I extended all my seams full length. I added no flare to the front seams and only a very slight flare to the two side princess seams to create a more sleek silhouette. Each seam was sewn as a french seam so the insides of the dress are as pretty as the outside.

I added a button band down the front of the dress hand stitching the inner layer for a clean finish. I left the two side front seams open about halfway up my thigh.

The free edges I turned under twice and stitched. 

The hem is also tuned under 1/2" twice and top stitched.

I drafted small cap sleeves to fit my arm holes. The edges are finished by turning under twice.

The neckline came about from a picture of a mandarin collar that was higher in the front than in the back. I made a basic mandarin collar that was wider at the front than the back and basted it to my muslin, but with the shape that I had cut my neckline it really didn't work. However if I shaped the collar a bit more I found that it made a really cute keyhole type detail at the front neckline, so I modified my collar piece and neckline to create this feature. Again the collar is finished by hand for a clean finish.

Once I got to the dress to this point I then had a dilemma.  I would usually either just sew the button band closed and sew on a few buttons for effect, or use snaps since I hate buttons and I find button holes always look scrappy to me.   But that would make my dress ineligible for the Pattern Review contest.  I thought about just skipping the contest, but in the end I decided to use it as a learning experience and teach myself how to do bound button holes.

I did a number of trials first before cutting into my final dress, the finished button holes may not be perfect, but I'm more than happy with them.

Button hole from outside

Button hole from inside

I had no idea what buttons I wanted to use and when I was going through my very meager button stash I found a couple of glittery bugs and butterflies. I laid them against my dress as a joke, but really liked the way they looked, and every button I tried after that made the dress seem quite stodgy so in the end I went with the pink and purple bugs and butterflies. They are definitely a personal touch!

so I love the way this dress turned out and know that it will get quite a bit of wear during the summer.

Blue Purple Plaid Shirt Dress

Quite some time ago I found a fantastic turquoise and purple plaid gauze material and used it to make this summer top.  This is by far my favourite summer piece of clothing and is worn constantly when the weather is fine.  However I don't actually like the top - huh! how does that work?.  I love the fabric and I love the comfort factor, but I don't really love the pattern that I made it into it, its just a bit too shapeless.

I always wanted to go back and try again on this top but the fabric was no longer in stock.  Fast forward a year or two and guess what I found in my favourite discount fabric store - my favourite fabric. Of course I had to buy more.  I bought 4 yards of it this time, thinking that would be enough, but now I'm thinking about going back and buying the rest of the bolt.

The fabric sat in my stash over winter waiting for some fine weather.  A couple of weeks ago I decided that it was finally time.

I decided that this time I wanted to make a dress with the same basic style as my original shirt - in other words a shirt dress with mandarin collar.

 I reached for the pattern that I've been using over winter to make flannel shirts as I'm finally pretty happy with the fit of this pattern using the french dart so I figured I just needed to extend the length into a dress.  It came together pretty easily, the only issue I had was with the collar.  I went back and redrafted the collar for the V neckline, but I forgot to add on the width of the button bands so the collar ended up too short.  I decided that I quite liked that and finished the top of the button bands at and angle and stopped the collar at the end of the button band so it creates a notch.

I added a small pocket on the front, cut on the bias, but I had to cut my button bands with the grain as I was running out of fabric.  There was no pattern matching done as I just didn't have the fabric to do it!

I finished the bottom of the dress with the sides curving up at the seams and the back slightly longer than the front.

I added a bias cut yoke at the back  with a seam up the middle as I loved that detail of my original shirt.

And I cut the sleeves off into little cap sleeves based on the pattern that I used for my original shirt.

I then made a self fabric belt out of the last of my material.

The problem was I couldn't figure out where to wear the belt.  It I wear it up at my natural waist it's pretty much right under my boobs. down lower and it creates all sorts of muffin rolls. and either way it s quite uncomfortable and really doesn't look that great.

Unfortunately with the french darts only it was just a touch too shapeless to wear without the belt.  So after it's first outing I went back and added fish eye darts under the bust for more shaping.  So I can now wear it without the belt and it's much more comfortable.

 I still don't like the way the darts ruin the line of the plaid - which is why I went for the french dart in the first place, but I like the shape better so I stick with it!.

It's still not the most flattering of dresses, but its comfortable and I still love the material so its getting plenty of wear!