Last years Bettine Dress

Pattern: Bettine Dress by Tilly and the Buttons. It is already my second version - my first version I made for our Honeymoon.

Fabric: This time I used a very drapy viscose. I think I got it from Walthamstow Market last autumn. As always when I see a fabric with butterflies on it - I just can't leave without it. I tried, but came back at the end of the shopping trip. I knew immediately that it would be perfect for Bettine!

Alterations: I have some minor fitting issues with my first Bettine. A) it is too short, B) it rips under the arms when I try to bend and stretch forward, and C) the shoulder seams slip backwards. The length was easy to fix, I just added 4 cm to the pattern. For the shoulder seams, I added 1.5 cm to the back shoulder seam tapering to nothing towards the sleeve and removed the same amount from the front shoulder seam. Tapering again to nothing towards the sleeve. As you will see in the photos, the shoulder seam is still slipping backwards.

Lastly, I did a broad upper back adjustment and added 1 cm to the front and back bodice in the shoulder area. I'm not sure if this adjustment is actually the right one for me because I have a narrow back. The problem of ripping underarm seams is not completely solved yet, as they still tend to rip if I'm not careful (although there is some more give). I guess the actual problem are my broad shoulders, so I have to look into fitting these.

For this version I also added the optional sleeve taps and small white buttons that came from my Kiev shed find. I didn't make the pocket version as I felt the fabric is not stable enough.

Have I worn it yet? I did loads in autumn and I really love the fabric. It is super soft! However being so soft can also be disadvantageous. I noticed already that something weird was going on with the fabric when I tried to straighten it before cutting it out. I was using the thread pull method to identify the grain. I did not pull hard but the thread kept breaking. Not snapping but just disintegrating.

So, when I was wearing the dress the first time after a couple of hours I noticed pulled threads on the front of the skirt! The culprit was my kitchen table. The wood of the table apparently pulled the threads out. Leaving white spaces behind where the thread had been before. That has never happened to me before. With none of my garments.

I'm still wearing it because the marks are not that visible but they are there (you can actually see them on most photographs). Has anything like that happened to you before? I have not sewn with soft viscose much, so maybe it is a usual feature of this fabric? Or maybe it is just bad quality...

Pink ZigZags!

Country Girl ;)

I actually planned to have more sewing time after all the wedding preparations were done. But no, we went straight into our next big adventure: house hunting! So that's how we spend most of our Saturdays - looking at other peoples houses. So far nothing has come along that both of us really like. That means more searching and less sewing.

But I've found some pictures that we took in August in which I wear the first dress I made after finishing my wedding dress. I wanted a quick no-fitting sewing project and thus made my third version of Simplicity 1803 (see versions one and two).

The fabric is a liberty copy print on cotton lawn. I bought it on Goldhawk Road and it is one of the first fabrics I ever bought. So it felt really good to finally use it. I tried to match the Zigzags as best as I could and am really happy with the result.

Sewing the dress was quick, but there was some fitting involved. I hadn't made the yoke version before and didn't anticipate any problems. But having pinned the yoke to the dress, the yoke was strangling me. So I had to take it apart (Does anybody enjoy to take out understitching on trimmed seams? No me neither) and then deepened the neckline curve by 1cm. I couldn't go deeper because then I wouldn't have been able to turn the yoke right side out. The fit is better now, but still not 100% comfortable.

Due to my square shoulders the yoke is not sitting smoothly. You can see the fabric bulging next to the armpit. I tried to handstitch the bulge down but couldn't get it to lay flat on the right side, buh.

Gathers at the front.

Other than that the dress came quickly together. I used my overlocker for the first time to gather a seam. Just amazing: so fast and even gathering. The good thing is that you don't need a special foot for it. So if you have an overlocker and haven't tried that feature yet, I can only recommend it!

Now the big question: Have I worn it? Yes I have, but not very often. The problem is that if I'm not standing straight and don't push my shoulders back, the yoke is bulging massively. See the evidence below. I've worn the dress with a pink boat-neck wool jumper. It is a really nice outfit but I don't like to wear wool on my skin. And also I'm in autumn mood which means I want to wear brown, orange or red colors.

I wonder how it would look like without the strap of the bag?! Probably worse.

Here come the Racoons!

So here it is, another Megan Dress :) I love it! 

Fabric: Cotton with adorable racoons. I bought the fabric at backstitch.co.uk last year as a treat after driving the first time without the driving instructor. It was £14/meter - more expensive than the fabrics I usually buy. But how could I resist?

Pattern: Megan Dress by Tilly and the Buttons featured in Tillys book Love at First Stitch.

Fitting: Having made the Megan Dress once, solving the residual fitting issues should have been easy. However, taking into account that I hadn't done any pattern alterations for several month, it took longer than thought. I had to retrace the bodice because I messed up completely. See that's the reason I'm tracing all my patterns!

I made the following changes:

1. added 2 1/2" to the length of back and front skirt
2. broad back adjustment of 1/2" because in my first version I can hardly move the arms forward
3. deepened the back skirt darts which have now a diamond shape
4. shaved off the curves for the hips on both back and front skirt
5. lengthened the front and back bodice by 1/2"
6. moved the bust dart down by 1/2"

The neckline still gapes a little, so I have to take it in a bit at the shoulder seams for my next version :)

Construction: It took my about one weekend including cutting. I didn't want to hurry, but enjoy the actual sewing process.

I tried to pattern match the seams, but failed. Luckily the front looks fine with a row of racoons going down the center and also the matching at the waist line is not bad. But the back or side seams are not matched. I blame that on the fact that I cut the fabric double layered. Obviously the bottom layer was not straight :(

Have I worn it? Yes I have worn it to work and I can attest that it feels super comfy. No more strain on the back bodice when stretching out my arms. I can sit down without exposing too much leg. I even got compliments at work from my colleagues which made me happy :)

Will I make it again? Yes! I'm hoping that Megan will become a TNT pattern for me. So far none of the dresses I've made qualify as a TNT. So fingers crossed.

The fabric is bunching over my bust. But that will be gone after I take it in
(on my next version) at the neck shoulder seams.

A Parfait in Corduroy, please

You might remember that I sewed the Parfait twice already, once in linen and once in cotton voile. I have worn both versions loads in the summer and decided to make a autumn/winter version as well. To add warmth and to prevent sticking of the dress to tights, I lined the dress.

Fabric: I used a soft baby rib corduroy for the shell. The color is fuchsia red (thus very difficult to photograph) and I brought it from Ukraine when visiting Leschas family over Easter. The dress is lined with a super slippery acetate lining. It was a nightmare to sew. A fraying nightmare. But it looks pretty with these massive red flowers and I could well imagine it as a bathrobe :) The facing fabric is some cotton lawn leftover I had in my stash - liberty copy cotton lawn. I used it for lining the pockets as well.

Embellishments: The buttons are made from coconut shells and I bought them a year ago in Canterbury. That brings me to the question: Can I put coconut buttons in the washing machine?

Construction: 

SHELL: I didn't follow the instructions and decided to press all seams open to reduce bulk as much as possible. To do so, I first finished all the raw edges with my overlocker before stitching the seams. I also trimmed the seams in the interfaced straps and pockets super small to avoid any problems with stitching the buttonholes. There weren't any :)

LINING:  I cut the whole dress pattern (minus the straps) in lining fabric as well. I used french seams to enclose the raw edges fully because these were fraying a lot. I couldn't overlock or zig-zag because the sewing machine ate my fabric. To say the acetate didn't press well would be understated. It didn't press at all, so putting in nice french seams was a challenge.

I finally understood how very very important it is to use the right needle size when sewing. I tried to sew lining with a big needle - it got stuck in the machine. Then lazy me tried to sew corduroy with a small needle which lead to skipped stitches.

I finished the hem of the lining with my rolled hem food. Which turned out ok but not great. Any tips about how to stitch a nicely rolled hem over side seams? 

coconut buttons!

Facing: I didn't plan to use a facing. I thought it would be alright to just use a lining. The lining would have been enough to give the neckline a nice finish, but it wouldn't have been stable enough to stabilise it. I realised this when trying on the dress. The neckline was out of shape and the whole bodice looked saggy. So I cut a facing, interfaced it and sewed it to the shell. I was planning to hide it below the lining, but sewed lining and facing in the wrong order, ups.

I've sewn the side seams with an 1/2" seam allowance only so that I can wear a jumper or blouse underneath the dress. Styled with black tights and boots, I think the dress is a great autumn/winter outfit.

Now have a look at this nice zipper: The only zipper I had on hand was a white one.

But I managed to make it completely invisible, phew.

invisible zip

Now I'm leaving you with another pic that's look like I was in an enchanted forest :) You will see this fabric soon again, because I had enough to cut out an EXTRA Kelly Skirt. Ah, I just love it when you can squeeze an extra garment out. And I had only 1.50 meter. And as it was end of roll, there were also some stains on it - stains that you can hide on the insides of waistbands :) 

Hepburn Dress in Chiffon

Finally, I'm back online and my life slowly settles into a routine - I hope. I'm not sewing much at the moment, because coming home from my new job just leaves me exhausted and yearning for bed. But nonetheless I have a few makes to share with you that I made before moving :)

So let me show you my version of the Hepburn Dress, which is a pattern by Audrey & Me. Audrey & Me patterns are designed by my friend Charlie from thisblogisnotforyou. Maybe you have heard about them, if not you are definitively missing out ;) I was lucky enough to test the Hepburn Dress pattern before it's release---actually I was getting on poor Charlie's nerves asking "Is it ready yet? Can I test it? I want to make it before I move, please". Haha...

I was especially thrilled to sew this pattern because I wanted to sew with Chiffon. Sewing with Chiffon was on my 2014 sewing list. I was super terrified of sewing with Chiffon and thought it would be a good idea to learn to sew with it. Charlie's pattern came to the rescue...

Pattern: Hepburn Dress by Audrey & Me pattern. PDF pattern. I made version 1, which has pleats at the neckline and boxpleats at the skirt. The pattern comes with lining instructions for the bodice.

Fabric: Butterfly Chiffon for the outer shell and a pink polyester rayon for the lining. The butterfly chiffon I got from Goldhawk Road and the rayon I bought from Minerva Crafts, when they were having a sale a while ago. I was really curios about what rayon is, as I can't get it at Goldhawk Road. And I love it.

Alterations:  Surprisingly enough, I hardly had to do any alterations! I only did my standard forward shoulder adjustment and moved the bust dart in the lining down by 1". I cut a size 10 for the bust and graded to size 12 for the waist. I think the dress sits a bit snug around my bust, so next time I will cut the bust at size 12 as well.

Construction: To make sewing with Chiffon easier, I followed the instructions of how to sew with Chiffon by Andrea posted on cation designs. Thus I soaked my massive amount of fabric (I think it was 2.5 meters) in a bowl with corn starch and water. Which should stabilise the chiffon. I then ironed the fabric dry. Which was a total mess with the starched water dropping everywhere and soaking my ironing board despite me constantly changing the towels beneath the fabric. It took me one hour to get it dry and the fabric seemed to become stiff. (The stiffness didn't go away after washing so I guess I melted the polyester???)

The actual sewing wasn't a problem at all. I finished all seams with french seams to achieve a nice and tidy finish. I even managed to put a french seam below the zipper thanks to the description from Mercury-Handmade fashion. However, there was one point that I didn't think through when choosing my lining fabric: You can see the darts and seams through the shell because I chose a contrast lining, buh. I also managed to put the lining wrong way in. With the darts looking towards the shell. I don't mind too much and next time I will know better.

To line the skirt, I just assembled two skirts - one made from shell and one from lining fabric. So you can say I sewed the dress twice :) I hand stitched lining and shell together at the waist seam, which took me 2 hours. I attempted first to stitch in the ditch by machine, but due to the slippery fabrics, the stitches were not at all in the ditch!

The hems are finished with the rolled hem function of my overlocker. So quick :)

Have I worn it yet? I did several times. It goes perfectly with my Hetty Cardigan and white tights and these cute pink shoes I bought recently (which you can see only in the first pic).

Will I make it again? Yes I will for sure. Maybe not this year, because I'm feeling already to cold to wear sleeveless dresses, but definitively next year :)

It's still summer: Time for a second Simplicity 1803!

I made this Simplicity 1803 dress as part of Heather B's Summer Sundress Sew-a-long. Which is a great encouragement to make more summer dresses, especially because we have lovely warm summer weather in the UK. It means I can actually wear my summer dresses, yeah. I also wanted to have a second version of this dress with a patterned fabric, because with my white version I'm constantly worried about stains and dirt.

You might notice that I added cap sleeves this time. I intended to make a muslin with sleeves first, but couldn't wait and decided: when they fit -> sleeves, when they don't fit -> sleeveless. However, when assembling the dress I realised that I liked the sleeved version more. For this particular fabric, the sleeve version looks cuter :) 

But there was a small problem, the sleeves didn't fit. Because of my sloping shoulders, the pleat was sitting towards the back and it looked awful. I then moved the pleat forward towards my shoulder point, which looked much better. It took me two hours (and loads of ripping) to get the fit right, but it was so worth it.

This time I didn't line the bodice and skirt, because I wanted to sew a thin summer dress. As the fabric is not see through, this is fine. But the problem I have now is that the skirt is clinging to my panties! In most of the photos I took for this dress, it was actually clinging to my front and back. Awful. And I wasn't wearing a cotton pantie. So this means a) I go nude (not going to happen, haha), b) buy an anti static pantie (does it even exist?) or c) wear a slip (which will be hoooot in summer).

I have worn the dress with a slip already and it was fine. No clinging. However, the slip was a really cheap one from ebay and thus I'm thinking of making my own from silk. Maybe in black with a little lace trim.

 I didn't insert a lapped zipper this time, but went for the invisible one. I think I did a good job as you can hardly see the zipper and it was the first time that I put one in without using any instructions, yeah. *Me so proud* I'm always stabilising the zipper seam with fusible interfacing, which works like magic - no puckering!

You might notice that I didn't match the pattern. I tried at first and would have loved to place the four roses on each front panel. But because of the directionality of the print it didn't work. And then I got frustrated and couldn't be bothered to match anything. But I don't think you really notice, because the pattern is so busy.

I had some fabric leftovers and cut two stripes from it to make a long belt. I can wrap the belt twice around my waist and depending on my mood either tie it to a bow in the front or in the back.

Now I bet you really want to know what fabric I used? It was a liberty copy print that I got for half the price (because end of roll = 4£/m) from Goldhawk Road. I fell in love with it when I saw it and had to have it. That was 1.5 years ago. I couldn't decide what to make from it, but think it is a lovely pattern for a summer dress. I'm not sure you can see it on the photographs, but the leaves and flowers are outlined in gold. Love it!

I finished the hem with the rolled hem function of my Bernina (did I say that I love this function?!) and used black thread because it matches the fabric. So overall I'm super happy with this dress and think it will be great for autumn as well, as I can wear it with black tights. 

So how about you? Are you still sewing summer clothes? Or are you already preparing for the colder seasons?