So I decided to cut out another twist top dress. I wore this one yesterday, and Wowza! everyone (well, like 5 people) exclaimed on how great the dress is. Happy Dance!

I have a lovely navy knit with white roses on it. Lori gave it to me at a BABES.

I’m happily cutting away. I’ve got the back pieces and centerfront cut. I lay out the last of the navy knit and place the sidefronts on it. I decide to check to see how the front top piece will fit, and it won’t!

So what do I do? I stop. I put down the pattern pieces and my rotary cutter, and I leave the room.

I come back after I’ve calmed down. What to do? Hey, how about I follow the recommendations in the pattern instructions and cut the front top pieces out in a single layer? I’d like you to know that I had read the pattern instructions. Just because I rarely follow them anymore doesn’t mean that I don’t look at them.

So the side fronts and one top front piece are cut. I still have to cut the other front top, the sleeves, and the godets. I will probably have to piece fabric for the sleeves or the godets or both. We shall see.

I think my favorite patterns come from the Burda Plus magazine. They usually send 4 pattern sheets with each magazine. That’s 2 large pieces of paper printed front and back. The sewing lines are printed in different colors for different patterns.

This sheet is from E952, the spring 2007 issue. I was getting ready to trace pattern 406 Dress.

As you can see, if I cut out a pattern, it would destroy the sheet for all other patterns on it. Plus, I use seam allowances, so I would need to add them somehow. So that’s one reason that I started tracing.

The other reason is that when I tissue fit with tissue, I shred the tissue. I just can’t be gentle enough with it. I like to use PatternEase to trace, and that doesn’t rip so easy.

The pants are cut and the front fly is complete. I’m short on interfacing for the yokes, so I’ve got to go shopping before I can go any further on them.

I’m pretty sure the fabric came from a BABES, and that reminds me that I need to check to see what BABES is up to these days.

Jacket with collar

The front – sorry for the crummy pic.
The sleeve is just basted in to check how
well it fits in the armhole.

I had to stay home with Pulguito. He had a fever of 102F and threw up this morning. I feel terrible now. I think I might have it. Pulguito seems to be fine.

I feel terrible. I want to sleep. My head hurts, and I have no energy. I felt fine this morning.

When I finally got enough energy to do a bit of sewing, I didn’t have any fun! It was time to ease the sleeves into the jacket. I hate that. Well, I used to hate it. I never could get the sleeve in smoothly. Practice makes perfect, I suppose. But I still dread it.

Before I run the ease line on the sleeve cap, I pin the sleeve into the armhole just to check things. The back of the sleeve seems long.

Well, I’m an optimist, so I go over to the sewing machine and run my ease line. I gather up the sleeve cap and pin it into the armhole again. The front goes in great, but not the back.

The back

Previous Post on Jacket

Things are moving along. As you can see the fronts and backs are finished. I forgot to increase the hem depth from 5/8 inches, so my hems are going to be kinda skimpy. I briefly thought about facing the hem, but let’s be serious here.

I sewed, serged, and top-stitched the sleeves only to discover that I had done the wrong seam. ARGH!!! Who ever heard of a 3 piece sleeve anyway! I had to rip that all out and sew the underarm (lower?) seam on the sleeve. That seam needs to be sewn so that one can attach the sleeve facings (psuedo-cuffs). The thing is that they have you put the cuffs on and then (I think) you are supposed to sew (no problem), serge (no problem and that’s my addition to the instructions), and topstitch that upper seam allowance. I can’t figure out how to do that, so I’m not going to do it, and I’m going to cease worrying about it right now. The cuffs are on the sleeves. One upper sleeve seam is sewn; one is not. So one cuff is ready to be topstiched.

Oh, did I mention that the collar is done. I have to attach it.

Previous post on this jacket

So did I use the stretch blue cord to make Burda Plus 401, a princess seam jacket, from Spring 2007? No. Of course not. Why would I follow thru on a plan?

Ready to fit

I did follow my usual M.O. by tracing the pattern onto patternease. I sewed the patternease together for fitting purposes. I found that I needed a 4 inch (10 cm) full bust alteration (fba) in front. The armhole and back felt tight, but I didn’t do anything to alter them. My experience says that the armhole ALWAYS feels tight when I’m fitting with patternease, and I decided to trust my method of using my high bust measurement to choose my size.

Slash lines

I decided to attack the FBA like I would for adding a dart in a dartless top instead of trying to fiddle with the princess seams. In the end, it’s like fiddling with princess seams, but because I have to add so much (4 inches to each side!), the fiddling is too difficult.

So I took my assembled front and slashed as indicated in the image to the left. I opened up the front, adding the 4 inches that I needed in the vertical slash that was under the bust point. This adds fabric where I need it (aka boob area) w/o changing the size of the armhole and without changing the size or shape of the shoulder and neckline.

It didn’t work the way I had envisioned. I ended up with a very large center front panel and skinny looking side panels that arcked sharply back. I don’t have a picture, and I’m not going to try to draw it. Please, just take my word for it that it didn’t work.

I decided that taping the pieces back together would be easier than retracing.

Slash lines

Then I had to decided how I wanted to attack this alteration. 4 inches is a serious change in the pattern, and if that change isn’t placed correctly, I get a boob shape in the wrong place and not enough fabric over the boobs. I don’t really need added width. My boobs may be enormous, but they don’t hang under my arms. What I need is more depth in front (apex to armpit). So I decided to add 2 inches to each of the side princess seam panels. This worked really well.

Forgot to lengthen the facing

However, while I was fitting, I neglected to look at the front facing piece. Well, if you add length to the front, you have to add length to the front facing. And the above picture gives you an idea of how much I need to add. Oh, and I did it this way because I don’t really care what the inside of a garment looks like AND because I didn’t have enough of the correct weight interfacing to cut 2 more facings..

So I finished my pink cords, no pix of the finished product. I decided to go with the buttons on the left even tho they are different sizes. I don’t think anyone will notice.

I’ve traced and cut out Decades of Style #3101 1931 Parisienne Coat. The size 46 printout has some issues, so be sure to talk to DoS if you are making that size. I, fortunately, am using the 44.

I’m using the same fabric that I used for my salon trousers. So far, I’ve sewn the dart on the fronts and interfaced the facings.

from the front

I was so sure that these would fit (the previous pair was too big), that I left nothing to let out. However, if I don’t pull them up so high, if I wear the right underwear, and since I’ve scooped out the back crotch a little, they are wearable and very comfortable.

It’s getting there. I had this top cut out and sitting on my work table for months. I’m not sure why I got stalled with it. It’s a great style for me, and the charcoal is a wonderful color for me.