The Evolution of a Panda Pattern

For the last year or so I've been teaching sewing at my local recreation center, a few kids classes and a few adult classes.  Over that time I've created a number of little patterns for use during class.  A pot holder, a zipper pouch, tote bags, shoulder bags, owl pillows, circle skirts.  Most of these are based off of free tutorials on the web.  During one of my latest classes one of the kids said she wanted to make a stuffed panda.  I had a look on the web and couldn't find exactly what I wanted so I decided to create my own pattern.

To start with I searched the internet for a picture of a stuffed panda similar to what I was thinking of and from that sketched out all the different pieces I would need:  White Head, black shoulders and arms, white body, black legs and black ears and eyes.  Next step was to test this pattern, so I needed some fabric.  I went through my stash but the best I could find was some faux fur type fabric in black and white so I decided to use that...bad decision.  This stuff shed like crazy when it was cut and was a real pain to sew - definitely not something that beginner kids could tackle.  I also found that the pattern was just way too small.  I ended up hand sewing the entire thing as it just didn't work trying to get those tiny pieces under the machine.  I didn't bother finishing this guy off - he's basically tacked together and filled with offcut scraps, but still my daughters named him Fluffy and he's been sitting on her bed since I showed him to her.

OK #1 is a failure, lets move on to iteration #2.

I went back and sized up all the pattern pieces.  I also made the ears proportionally larger and legs and arms longer.

For my second test I went back to stash to try and find some better fabrics.  I found a double faced black knit that would work nicely, but nothing in white so in the end I used some zebra stripe fleece.

This guy was quickly named Zeb-Zeb.  This time I actually went and added the whites to his eyes and a nose to try and make him look more finished.

But I still wasn't happy with the proportions.  His body is way too long and not wide enough so I went back to the drawing board again.

By this time I'd gotten to the fabric store and bought both black and white fleece and iteration #3 turned out much better.  Meet Chubby!

He's still not perfect.  I would like to go back and try one more time, but for now he's close enough.....and three Panda friends in the house is more than enough.

At this point I was pretty happy with the pattern but it was just a couple of pieces of scrap paper.

For quite some time now I've been playing with the idea of  learning how to draft patterns on the computer and I thought that this pattern might be a good place to start.

The first question was what program to use.  I wasn't ready to shell out big bucks for a program if I wasn't going to get anywhere so I started with programs where I could get free trials or were free,

The first program I tried was SmartDraw and I did quite well with the software and got the pattern drafted without too many issues, but when I went to print it I couldn't do it without all sorts of watermarks etc - I would need to buy the program to get it to work fully.

I next tried Valentina - but I found that it was a bit too pattern drafting focused and I wanted a bit more control.

I finally ended up at Inkscape.  This one took a bit more learning to figure out how to work it but after a couple of days I finally got it.  This time I drafted the pattern fully and even managed to get the final copy saved in PDF format.

For this project I made three separate drawings each the size of a single Letter sized page.  For my second trial I did try and make one big drawing and then split it up into pages later. I figured out how to do it but its a long convoluted process,  hopefully I can find an easier way to do it if I continue with this experiment.

But the good news is I have a finished pattern and yes my students were able to make their own Pandas out of it and were very pleased with their results so that's a definite win in anyones book.

Simple Green sweater

When I saw this fabric I knew I had to have it.  I find it really hard in winter to find fabrics that are bright and colourful but also warm and snuggly.  This is both.  Its a knit fabric with a fleece backing - so plenty or warmth and snuggliness, plus look at that colour - so bright and cheerful!

I only bought 1 yard of this fabric as I knew it was going to be a shirt of some sort. I decided to go back to an old pattern.  Simplicity 5133 that I stole from Mums pattern stash quite some time ago.  I made a shirt from it back in 2015 and its starting to get  a bit old and worn out so I thought this would be just the fabric to replace it.

Again I made view 2 with long sleeves and a V neck.  Its a straight size 14 with no modifications.

I finished off the bottom and sleeves with a cuff simply because it's the easiest finish for knit fabrics.  Each of the cuffs is sewn to the front and then turned under and stitched in the ditch for a nice neat finish inside.

A few minor fit issues around the bust but nothing big enough to worry about.

I really like this shirt and have worn it quite a lot....and It goes perfectly with my peacock jeans allowing those pockets to be shown off.

Red Roses Active wear

Back on the activewear making.

This make was all about the fabric again.  I found this fabric at Sewfisticated Fabrics and couldn't resist it.  It's a medium weight scuba knit fabric in white with a printed design of huge red and pink roses all over.  I knew I wanted to make leggings out of it, but knew that I'd have no tops to wear with it so bought this pink with red dots poly lycra fabric to make a shirt to go with it.

I started with the pants pattern I was working on last time and put the three pattern pieces back together so I now had a pattern with just a single seam up the inseam and the gusset.  I added a little extra width at each seam line so that the pattern isn't quite so tight,  I then extended the length down to the ankles.

This was a quick sew using the serger and sewing with a scant 1/4" seam allowance for extra width. They fit beautifully from the knee up, but there is a bit of extra fabric around the knee that I can't quite get rid of without an outside seam.  For the time being I will live with them as is.  The top of the pants are finished with 1.5"wide elastic turned under once.

Then I wanted to make a top to go with these leggings.  Again I wanted it to incorporate my crop top bra and I wanted it to showcase the roses fabric to tie it into the pants.

I decided I wanted to try and combine my crop top pattern with the raglan sleeve shirt pattern, but then make it a tank top.  The first thing to do was to modify the back of the crop top pattern to include a rounded strap like the front.

I would then hang the rest of the shirt from these seam lines at front and back.  I basted the  crop top together and cut out the polka dot fabric and pinned it in place matching the two fabrics around the arm holes and cutting it off at the top at the curve from the strap.  I thought I had it all beautifully matched but when I put it all together I ended up with some pulling around the sides at the top.  It's fine if you pull it down firmly as it's shown here, but it has a tendency to ride back up as you're working out.

I finished off the armholes with a binding of the polka dot fabric and the bottom of the crop top with a piece of 1.5" wide elastic.

Whilst I had the legging pattern out I decided I wanted to make a few pairs of leggings to wear under dresses this winter.  I started with a medium weight sweater knit in a blue and black geometric pattern.

I wanted to try and remove that extra fabric around the outside of the knee so I took my pattern and added a outer side seam,  I then took a dart at each outer knee pattern piece based on the excess fabric I pinned out of my roses leggings.  I then tried to remove the inner seam and replace it with one going diagonally from knee to outer seam and whilst this worked OK on paper when I cut it out and basted it together it really didn't fit well fro the knee down.  Luckily I had just enough material to re-cut it with the standard inner and outer seams, though I did have to piece the new front sections at the knee but I like the way they fit better now.

I finished off these with 1.5" wide white elastic and this time did not turn it under for a really high rise legging.

Finally I wanted to make a really snuggly pair of leggings so I grabbed some beautifully fabric that I found.  Its a knit fabric backed by a fleece and feels so snuggly inside.  I bought this in both a bright green and a grey.  I used the grey for the leggings.  I cut this with both the inner and outer seams and like the way this fits.

I have an observation that I want to put here so I can remember for next time.   Using this pattern in a fabric with 4 way stretch remove 1" from the top of the front pattern piece tapering to nothing at the side seams.  If using a fabric with only 2 way stretch make sure you have that extra 1"at the front and also add 1"to the top of the back pattern piece across to the side pattern piece and tapering to the existing point in the front.  Also add 1" to the length of the legs - as seen in te photos this second pair ended up quite short - I may go back and add a cuff to them later.

Gold Keilo

This dress was actually made quite a while ago but I realised that I never blogged it.

This was a pretty simple make - its the fabric that makes it special.  When I saw this fabric in the store I knew I had to have it and bought a couple of yards.  I then decided to use that yardage to make a Christmas present for my sister last year so went back and bought another couple of yards for myself.  It's a poly lycra with a metallic gold painted over the top.

For a pattern I went back to my self drafted Keilo dress pattern.  I  went and bought the actual Keilo pattern from Named patterns so that I could make it as a present for my sister but I was too lazy to print it out and compare it to my version I just went with what I knew already works.  For this version I did do the split up the back however I didn't add a seam all the way up the back, just cut a slit and added a facing around the slit.

There is just one slight issue with this dress - because the fabric has more stretch than I had used on my original I have to tie it very tightly to get it to look Ok.

But seriously look at this fabric.

Sirrocco Jumpsuit into dress modification

I have a beautiful piece of fabric sitting in my stash at the moment that I really want to make into a beautiful dress, my problem is figuring out what pattern to use. I have a vision in my head of this fabric made up into a long sleeve maxi dress with long sleeves but I'm just not sure how it's going to work so I thought I'd start with a muslin.

First up was figuring out the top pattern.  I quite like the wrap top of the Sirrocco Jumpsuit.  I made some modifications to the pattern last time I made it, but when I pulled out my pattern pieces this time they were not the ones I remembered - I think I may have thrown out the latest version of the pattern and kept one of the old ones.  So I decided to start again with the pattern.  I cut out the pattern at a size 40 based on my upper bust measurement, then had to do a very large full bust adjustment.  3.5" on each side (for a total of 7" added for my full bust measurement).

In doing this adjustment I ended up with one really huge bust dart and another big dart in the side seam that I just could not get to sit nicely when I tried to sew them up, so instead I decided to move the side dart up into the armhole and make it into a princess seam, instead.

The next step was to make the sleeve into a long sleeve - this was as simple as taking the short sleeve and extending the length down and tapering it in to get the wrist diameter I wanted.

Finally, I had taken about 2" out of the length of the top as I changed the darts into a princess seam, so I widened the waist band to 5" to make up for the length I took off the top pieces.

I used a piece of fleecy purple fabric in my stash to work on this muslin and realised that I could then use this to replace the purple top on my long sleeve sirocco jumpsuit.  I've never been happy with the top on that jumpsuit so this was a great way to modify it.  I decided to cut the final waistband down and keep the existing purple waistband as well as I quite liked the way it broke it up.

So I now had a top pattern I liked - onto muslin 2.  I still didn't know how the skirt portion would work to make it into a maxi skirt so I decided to do a second muslin.  This time I used a beautiful red sweater knit fabric that I bought recently. 

The top worked nicely with my pattern modifications

Then I had to figure out the skirt.  I tried a number of different options.  First a gathered skirt - Not a good look.  Then I tried some box pleats - these were better but I still didn't like the final look, so for the next option I decided to try a half circle skirt.  Unfortunately due to the width of the fabric I could only make it knee length, but I definitely liked that look a lot more and ended up finishing the dress with this skirt.  Not quite the maxi dress I originally envisioned but I do like it  - and so does my daughter - she keeps stealing it off me.  I'd be more than happy to hand it over to her - but the top half does not fit her yet (thankfully)

As you may be able to see in the pictures I never actually finished the bottom of this dress.  I left it to hang so that I could straighten out the hem once it dropped, but I've never gotten around to finishing it.  Oh well - I just keep wearing it anyway.  Maybe one day I'll go back and straighten out the hem....maybe....


And that still leaves me with the question of what to do with my good fabric. Do I make another short dress? I do love the way this dress looks but I'm often stopped from wearing it cause of having to wear leggings with it in the cold....I hate leggings! 

So do I try for a paneled long skirt with the wrap top, or something totally different like the kielo wrap dress?