Tag: projects

Man, oh man, do napkins take a lot of seam pressing.  Still, they look great, no?  I got 12 from my leftover fabric.  10 two-color, and 2 of just the green.

One of the things about sewing that drives me crazy is all the leftover material.  In the past I have saved every bit and piece, but not ever done a thing with them.  So now I try to squeeze as much out of the leftover material, but the question often is “what to make?”  I was lucky with the Crepe dress, to have goodly bits of material big enough for square napkins, so here I am cutting away, while watching a video on fitting.

On display at Fabric Depot, was a shrug that looked like it was something I could knit.  Sadly, I took no pictures of the shrug itself, but instead the details of how to make it.

Maybe someday.

Things I like:  the sweetheart neckline, the back, the fun sleeves, the length, the material, the fact it’s a wrap dress that wraps in the back.

Things I don’t like:  it’s a good standing dress, but it gapes when I sit, which I’m not thrilled about.  Also, I have miles to go on the fitting thing.  The bodice is too loose.

Overall:  Very happy with it.  It’s so summer!

I’m so very close to finishing.  Here, I am trimming the hem.
 

And here the serger is jamming and causing me to re-thread, even though I only have four inches left to serge. Curse you, serger.
 

That triple band-aid is covering up a nasty burn from the iron.  Still, I soldier on.
 

The final few stitches.
 

Here you can see how I used an improper marking pen on a previous project and stained my tailor’s ham.  Here you can also see that the tailor’s ham comes in handy (or ham-dy?) for pressing this dress.
 

Here you can see the facings flipping out on the arm holes, completely ruining the effect of the cool sleeves.  I’ll show them what’s what, just you wait.

At this point, aside from facing wrangling, I just need to get Julie to mark the hem and then sew the hem and then I’m done.  Ahead of schedule, even.

The bodice has facings along the neckline and the arms.  I am making tiny stitches in the facings and sewing the seam to the facings, to encourage the facing to roll the right way.  Sentinel is helping and watching a movie with me.

Even after I did this, the arm facings would not behave, constantly turning out.  I ended up doing what Gertie did and carefully sewing the facings to the underlining.  That worked well, because of the two layers of fabric, but I’m not sure what I would have done if I had only one layer of fabric.  I’ve made a not on my pattern to underline, should I want to make this dress again.

One of the best things about Collette patterns is that she usually includes pockets in her skirts.  Here are mine.  I’ve always thought pockets laid out like that look rather dirty.  Thank goodness they will be tucked away where no one can see.  It occurs to me that right now we’ve got a sort of external genitalia thing going on, but as soon as I sew this up, we will revert to an internal genitalia thing.  But maybe that’s just me.

Now that all that basting is done (three movies worth, geez-almighty) I can move on to the next step: stay stitching the neckline. we do  this to ensure it doesn’t stretch out with repeated wear.  I’m in.

Here, I have traced my sewing line in disappearing marker so I know where to sew.
 

I’m choosing the organza strips and I get to not only pin, but also to baste the organza.  That Gertie lady is crazy for basting.
 

The finished stay stitched neckline.  You can’t really see it, but it’s done.  And I got to sew together the shoulders!  Very exciting.