Year in Review - 2009

Well, it is that time of year to see what I've actually accomplished this year. I tallied up the numbers and it was once again surprising. I ended up making or working on 107 items. That number does not include alterations. Don't forget, I'm not just sewing for me. I sew for every member of the household, cats excluded. Much of what my daughter and I wear, I've made. Some of these items were *really* easy, too!

Here's the breakdown for that number:

21 tops/shirts
11 skirts
12 dresses
2 art ensembles
3 refashions
6 trousers/shorts
8 jackets/vests
23 other items - including hats, totes, under wear, etc.
6 knitted items
15 costumes - Peter Rabbit and Ben Hur

Amongst all of those we have winners and losers. It was harder to pick the winners - I liked a lot of what I made. The losers were much easier, so we'll start with those.

A green knit top from Burda. It didn't work for me at all, neither style or fabric. Maybe a different color would have been better? No matter, it has been cheerfully donated, am I'm sure it will find a good home eventually.

This Burda boucle jacket. I'm not sure why I don't like it more - it is warm, and I like the colors. I just don't wear it very much. It's ready to be donated away, too.

This Knipmode sweater. Originally I made this sweater in aqua blue and liked it, but the red version didn't work out as nicely. The last sweater I made from this fabric I disliked, too, so I just trashed the rest of the fabric that I had. No point in completely striking out with a third try.

With that out of the way, we can look at the winners, I could put a lot of garments in this category, but I'll try to keep the number low!

First, the Barcelona suit. I love this suit and I get many compliments on it whenever I wear it. The matching vest is also a winner, but not pictured.


Second, the large self-drafted tote bags. This one is my favorite, but I like the red winter version and the one I made for my daughter's music books, too.

Third, my son's Patrones jeans. He *loves* these jeans and wears them every week to school!

Fourth, my red scarf. I love red, I love cables and I love being warm. Enough said.

Fifth, another knitted item, the Manos silk/wool sweater. This sweater is so soft and perfect for summer air conditioning.

Last, but not least, the red four piece pajama set. I am so glad I made the whole set including the pajama pants. The flannel back satin is comfortable, warm and machine washable, too!

Now, I haven't shown you the plaid Vogue 1132 suit yet nor my husband's newest shirt, but I could add those to the winning list, too. I'll do a catch up post on Saturday with those two garments. Tomorrow we'll take a look at last year's goals and how well I did accomplishing those and reveal some new ones, too.

Parting Shots: Another Winner. Wellie seems to be another winner of the year. He certainly has added some excitement about the house! Here he is Christmas morning, peeking out of the tree, after he'd crawled back amongst the presents:

Later that morning, he found some eggnog in the bottom of a glass that was rather tasty:

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas and Happy Holiday to all you, dear readers. Please take a moment to reflect upon the wonderful season, the birth of the Saviour and all the other reasons to celebrate.

I will be taking a holiday break to spend time with my family and will back to blogging on Thursday, Dec. 31, with a look back at this year's textile activities (maybe I'll get that jacket done sometime, too!)!

Parting Shot: Christmas Roses. FedEx brought me a box of lovely roses early yesterday morning from my husband. Isn't he great?

Vogue 1132 - Vintage Plaid Jacket

The Body Is Done!

After taking longer than I had originally planned, the body of the jacket is finally done. In my own defense, I wasn't home Monday or Tuesday due to all day play practices and a lot of errands. I also took a little longer because I chose to do all the traditional hand stitching rather than using fusible interfacing for the lapels and collar.

Here's the detail of the matched plaids at the side front seam:


The collar is not yet attached, but waiting, still pinned to the ham after being shaped a little more with some steam:


My plan is to make the lining tomorrow and then to get the jacket finished on Saturday. We'll see - not everything goes according to plan! I should be able to show you the finished suit next week.

Parting Shot: Party Ready. Tonight is the last concert our family is involved in for the season and we're going to an appetizer party at a friend's house after the party. I've volunteered to bring blue cheese deviled eggs. For some reason, people love these things. Strange enough, I don't! I don't like eggs at all, yet I make them for other people. Go figure.

Holiday Outfits!

I made the children's holiday outfits on the 30 Minutes per Day sewing plan, and I never did show you the children actually wearing the outfits. They wore the outfits on Sunday for another program, so I was able to take a few pictures.

Here is my daughter, wearing the Jalie crossover top and modified vintage circle skirt. This outfit really works for her for many reasons: it is easy to wear, it looks more grown up, but doesn't look too mature for an 11 year old.

Next is my son, wearing his vest and new red tie. The vest could be an inch or two longer, but it will last the season and since I didn't pay for anything except the buttons, I'm not going to agonize over it. I can always make him another one.

Here they both are:

Tomorrow, I will have an update on the Vogue 1132 plaid jacket. I think I'll have the fashion fabric body done by then!

Parting Shot: Claimed. Wellie has claimed this box for himself. We were trying to find a box for an unusual present and started going through the extra shoe boxes. Wellie decided this one was good enough for him for a nap.

A Complete Set!

And Some Instant Gratification, Too.

Yesterday, I bought more flannel back satin to make the matching pajama bottoms to the pajama set that I made a while ago. The pattern is Burda 11/09, #131 and is part of the collection from which I made the first three pieces.

These are your basic elastic waist pajama bottoms. Not exciting, and I even made them easier by eliminating the drawstring/elastic combination and just made an elastic waist. Did I mention that they were quick? I turned on the serger and regular machine at 8:00p and by 9:00p the bottoms were done. They were nice and warm last night, too.

It is nice every once in a while, especially during this busy season, to be able to make a project from start to finish in an evening, wear it and enjoy it!

Parting Shot: Gifts. My daughter is making these leather key chain/backpack tags for her friends and one for herself. She saw all these leather samples being sold at Martin's House of Cloth for really cheap, so we bought some to make Christmas gifts. She decided on monograms and little flowers in glue-on rhinestones. Quick and easy!

Vogue 1132 - Vintage Plaid Jacket

We Have a Back!

Amazingly enough, I got everything done that I wanted to today and did not have to attend or perform in a concert! I decided the back was the easiest thing to work on at the moment, since I haven't started any of the hand stitching needed for the fronts.

It took a little while to line up the plaids, and I'm pleased with how it all came out. For the most part they match, except for the very top bars at the shoulders, which wouldn't due to the curve of the pieces and the peplum extensions between side and side backs, due to the slant of the seams. That's the way it is with plaids: you can only match so much and not worry about the rest. You have to pick what is most important, which is usually what is most visible, and match that. Those areas are generally centers and side seams. Anything curved, like princess seams will only match so far and then things go awry due to the curve.

I really had to make sure that these plaids matched well at center back. I have a fellow choir member who sits behind me admit that she looks at my plaids to see how well they are matched! She sews, too, so I totally understand why she'd be looking at them!

Parting Shot: Bare. I'll give you only one guess as to why our tree branches are bare at the bottom. That icicle on the left is in danger.

Vogue 1132 - Vintage Plaid Jacket

Still Creeping Along . . .

But that's ok. Today was concert #3 of the week, with just one more for this week on Friday morning. After today, I think work on this project will pick up quite a bit. I've been cutting and fusing interfacing, which isn't exciting, but is important to the look and feel of the finished jacket.


I've also decided to pad stitch the lapels and collar, since this project is taking me a while anyway, an extra day or two won't hurt! To that end, I've marked and basted the hair canvas to the fronts.


You might have seen the hair canvas in the buttonhole post, but if not, I did apply it before making the buttonhole (which, yes, is now finished!) and then cut out a rectangle to reduce bulk where the buttonhole would be made. You can see that below.


So, I am making progress. Even though this progress isn't putting thread into fabric and never will be seen in the final product, it is very important! It is hard to remember, but all the extra time and care put into the interior work of a garment pays off when the final product hangs and wears as it should.

Tomorrow I plan to actually sew some seams. I'm not sure which ones, but I will be sewing some seams!

Parting Shot: Recital. Today's event was a Christmas recital featuring a mix of light hearted secular tunes and traditional carols. This was my daughter's first public flute performance, and she did really well. She played in a group, and it was nice because there wasn't the pressure of playing solo for the first performance. I'm very pleased as she's only been playing since September. Having 5 years of piano lessons didn't hurt, as she knows notes, tempos, etc. already. My son played a couple of piano duets with a friend his age, but I didn't get any decent pictures of him.

Vogue 1132 - Vintage Plaid Jacket

Front Details

This week is and is going to be one of those weeks. We have four different concerts/recitals this week, in which at least one and sometimes two family members are involved. Tonight and tomorrow will be events #2 and #3 for the week. Over the next couple of days, I really won't have two or three free hours to really work on jacket body construction. Meanwhile, I will have to work on the small things, like the bound buttonhole, the covered button, and cutting/fusing all the interfacing.

Today I decided to work on the bound buttonhole and a covered button. I've decided to make these on the bias, which adds a nice touch to the jacket and relates it to the skirt, which is cut on the bias. The covered button was the easier of the two tasks, with a very, very little bit of glue to keep the fabric exactly where I want it :

Only having to make one bound buttonhole wasn't too bad, either, but I had to stop and get all the interfacing and thread tracing in place first.

I trimmed out a rectangle from the hair canvas where the buttonhole will be located to reduce bulk:

Because I chose to make the lips on the bias, I decided to interface the square of fabric for the lips before making the buttonhole. I chose a very lightweight interfacing from my bag of scraps so as not to make the piece too thick, but still give it some support so that the lips wouldn't stretch out of shape with use.

The buttonhole as it now, not quite finished on the left. I don't have time this evening. I need to eat and leave for a concert!

Q/A: I have a few that I will answer over the next few days, so here's the first regarding the technique used for the sleeves as shown in yesterday's post: Designdreamer asked, " . . . but how do you determing [sic] the correct length before you sew the "hem" of the sleeves?"
Well, I've already made a muslin for this jacket and I've made this jacket once already in red. I was able to measure the sleeve length of the red jacket and make sure that these sleeves were the same length. Alternatively, lacking those two things, a sleeve could be basted into the body of the jacket, checked for length and then removed for finishing and then replaced permanently.

Parting Shot: Poor Turkeys. These two turkeys showed up in the yard today looking for something to eat. I didn't see the rest of the flock, but it must have been hard hunting to find something to eat under the snow.

Vogue 1132 - Plaid Jacket

Sleeves!

Yesterday I started to work on the plaid jacket to match the skirt. Since I knew I would not have a big block of time to work on the jacket, I decided to start with the sleeves rather than the body. I also wanted to try out a technique that Bunny used on the sleeves cute little red coat she made for her granddaughter; the technique originally came from Nancy Zieman. I always like to give something new a try, and I am pleased with the results. I made mine a little differently, by changing the order of the seams, but the result is the same.

I prepared both the fashion fabric and lining sleeves in the usual manner by stitching the darts, the sleeve seams. I then interfaced the hem on the fashion fabric sleeve. This produces a nicer hem, and make the sleeve a little stronger in the hem area which will likely see the most wear and tear of any part of the sleeve. I also pinked the top edge so that there would not be a hard line visible on the outside where the interfacing ends.

The fashion fabric sleeve and lining sleeve were sewn right sides together at the bottom.

When opened out, before pressing up the hem, the two sleeves look like this, joined at the bototm:


Then the hem was pressed into place and catch stitched to the interfacing only.

The lining sleeve was turned into place and the sleeves caps matched. The lining hem formed a pleat at the bottom for wearing ease and was pressed into place.

Once the sleeves are stitched into the jacket body, the lining sleeves will have to be hand sewn in place. That really isn't too hard and doesn't take too much time.

Now I can start working on the body of the jacket!

Parting Shot: Everywhere. This cat is everywhere. Whenever I open up something new, there he is, right into it. That includes the dryer. He makes the girls look boring by comparison.

Vogue 1132 - Vintage Plaid - Skirt

Almost Done



The skirt is all done except the hand finishing on the inside of the waistband and the hook and eye. I'll finish that tonight while listening/watching TV.

The pattern did not have a lining, but I like lined skirts so I added one, as you can see from the photo above.

Each skirt is hemmed separately. The pattern indicated a narrow hem, so that's what I did. For curved hems it is easier to do narrow hems than wide ones anyway.

The skirt by itself honestly isn't that exciting, it is just a bias, long, a-line skirt. The real star of this wardrobe pattern is the jacket. That is one of next week's projects!

Parting Shot: Turkeys. The turkeys are still around as my husband found out this morning. He went out to snowshoe for a little bit and took this picture of the turkeys taking flight.

Vogue 1132 - Plaid Skirt

Thanks for the comments regarding shortening this skirt! The pattern instructions are to length or shorten at the hemline, rather than folding out like I did. Either method accomplishes the same thing, but one will change the width and the other one will not. I suppose then, the real question would be: do I want a shorter skirt with the same hem width or a shorter skirt with a narrower hem width? It ends of being a matter of personal preference. I like fuller skirts - I just made a black circle skirt - so it makes sense that I'd rather have more width.

I made the change mostly because I'm petite, but I if I were truly going to make the whole skirt in petite proportions, I would not only remove length, but skirt width, too. I *could* do that, but I like the extra volume, and at this point, the skirt has been cut out and assembled, so I'm not going to fix it.

Today I was able to get the side seams done and the zipper inserted. The zipper took a little longer, because of course, the plaids had to match. It took basting the lower section three times to get it right, but it looks good now!


After a quick try on, I determined that all I needed was a couple of darts to make it fit better in the back only. I sort of knew this would be the case, as I've got a narrow waist and a sway back going on. No surprise, and the darts were easy to add. They will be hidden under that large peplum anyway when I wearing the suit.

Now I can cut and assemble the lining (not originally included in the pattern), add the waistband and hem it. My goal is to have the skirt done on Saturday. I think that can happen.

Q/A: From JustGail: I also was wondering about the shortening (or in my case, lengthening. It seems to me that the fold-and-true method would be OK for a small amount of change, but for a large amount, while you are keeping the original hem size, isn't the shape of the skirt becoming more flared than the original pattern?? Yes, the skirt will end up being more flared, that's an excellent observation! I actually like it with more flare, so it doesn't bother me.

Unless there's a hem detail, such as a flare/godet/pleat, why is it now considered "wrong" now to just extend the lines on a garment with straight seams? I'm talking about leg and arm length only, not when doing proportional lenthening/shortening for the body areas. Hmm . . . I didn't know it was "wrong" to do that if the piece is straight, like you've pointed out. As long as the piece does not have shaping for different sections such as upper and lower arms where you would need to know exactly where the extra length is needed, I'm not sure there is problem with adding a little extra length at the hems. Can any one else comment on this?

Parting Shot: Making Progress. We've got the police station assembled and some of the vehicles. That used a lot of pieces, now for the rest of the set and then the other sets we own. Thanks mamafitz for the link! I know we can buy replacement pieces from Lego, so we're keeping track; we're only 3 short on the police station right now.

Snow Day!

Today was a snow day for the children, so while I was able to get a little sewing done, I didn't really strive to get any major sewing projects done. Instead, the children and I embarked upon the great Lego project.

The great Lego project involves finding all the Legos and then putting together all the sets to see if we have all the pieces. If some lucky little boy gets another large set for Christmas (about 1000 more Legos), it would be nice to know if the current sets can still be put together.


No snow day would be complete without going out to play in the snow! Here are the children and the town snowplow.


Last, but not least, today's snowfall total:

Tomorrow I'll get back to the Vogue 1132 plaid skirt. It is almost ready for side seams and zipper; it just needs a few passes through the serger.

Parting Shot: Always in the Act. We can't do anything without Wellington getting in the middle of it. Literally.