Catching up with blogging again - Party Top

Continuing with my catching up of unblogged items, here is a sleeveless cowl top.

Photo lightened so you can see the drape

I made this last November in about a day and a half which is unheard of for me!  A friend of mine invited us to her 50th birthday party. I had bought a stretchy multicolour sequin skirt specially for the party, but had been unable to find a top to go with it, so I whipped one up!

I knew exactly what I wanted  - just plain black with a cowl neck. I used the MyImage cowl neck pattern that I have made before here and here, and just left the sleeves off.

After having my sewing machine for 16 years I discovered a really good stretch stitch, which is probably a lightening stitch.

lightening stitch?

I had tried to twin needle the hem but that did not look good, so I tried this new stitch and it was fab.  I used Wondertape to help with all the hemming which helped tremendously. I left the edge of the cowl drape raw as it tucks inside the top and doesn't get seen.  I think I did this on the other two that I made as well.


Unfortunately I haven't any pictures of me wearing it at the party - which reminds me I must try and get some from my friend!

Catching up with blogging - Bjorn Again

Me-Made-May has highlighted the fact that I have several items that I made a while ago that I haven't blogged.  I started a post about several tops that I have made, which was just going to be a short post, with a brief overview of each top.... The brief post became epic, so I have split it into individual posts after all. Here is the first post starting with the oldest and silliest top in the group!

Enter Pink Chiffon.....

Something silly for Bjorn Again

An Abba tribute band, came to my local town last summer .  Apparently people often dress up to see them so I thought I would join in, although I was the only one in my group to do so,  I have had these somewhat garish trousers for 20 years - they glow slightly in ultraviolet light - they are hideous but at the same time great! I never know what to wear with them, so thought I would knock something up.  I just happened to have some bright pink polyester chiffon in my stash (as you do), which I thought might be appropriate!

The top is pretty much a circle with a hole cut for the neck. I bound the hole with some satin bias tape and sewed two lines halfway up the semi circle to create a space for my body and sleeve areas. It was just the thing for a silly night out and my friends couldn't believe that I had made it!

Me-Made-May15 review #4

Day 18 Friday 22nd

The Friday theme for today was Animals. We do not have any pets and the squirrels and birds in the garden were a shifty bunch, so no animal photos from me. I realised too late I could have worn one of my Magpie tops...but I wore this instead an unblogged Bronte top

Day 19 Saturday 23rd,
No photo, but wore sludgy green Burda top 2/2013 #127

Day 20 Sunday 24th
Repeat of yesterday .... but with a very poor late night photo:

Day 21 Monday 25th
Inpromptu day out to Lords for the last day of the test match for Husband's birthday treat, with dinner at Pizza Express whilst waiting for our train
I wore my abstract top:

He wore one of the shirts I have made for him:

Day 22 Tuesday 26th
I went to the gym wearing my new unblogged True Bias Hudson Pants:

Day 23 Wednesday 27th
Burda Magpie top

Day 24 Thursday 28th
Self drafted skirt and unblogged Burdastyle top 2/2013 #127 combo, changed out of my skirt into my Hudson pants in the evening

Observations this week are that I have managed to get a couple of bottom half items in the mix and have worn me mades every day. My other observation is that I really need to get my hair cut - fortunately I have a cut and colour coming up next week, so I should be looking a bit more vibrant soon.
I have just about been keeping up with Flickr, but gave up on the pinterest site. My blog reader has had several more blogs added over the course of this month. It is so interesting seeing other people, in their lives, wearing things they have made!

Me-Made-May review #3

Me-Made May review number 3 starts here:

Day 12 Friday 15th

Theme Friday I think I wore my abstract jersey top and completely forgot about Theme Friday

Day 13 Saturday 16th

brand new unblogged top Kirsten Kimono Hack

Day 14 Sunday 17th

Magpie Kirsten Kimono Tee

Day 15 Monday

Geometric cowl top no picture today

Day 16 Wednesday 20th

Chevron skirt.
The outfit laid out in the linked post is exactly how I wore it on this day!

Day 17 Thursday 21st

Cowl Renfrew and Husband in one of his shirts made by me

Six out of seven this week, but I have not been so good at documenting my Me Mades this week for some reason.  I have still been going through some of the stuff I have accumulated 'because I might use the fabric for something'. I have been a bit more ruthless than I usually am in throwing stuff out, but I have also repurposed some of the things that I have had for a while.  The new Kirsten Kimono Tee hack at the top of this post used an old t-shirt of Youngest's that she grew out of before she had worn it much. I am also working on a couple of other things where the fabric is coming from PJ's and Tee's of Husband's. Being a XX or XXXL kind of bloke, there is a lot of fabric in one of his tee's!

Me-May-May review #2

Me-Made May review #2:

Day 7 (friday 8th)

 Plantain Tee under my hoodie. This was the first Theme Friday and was 'Your sewing Space' so I thought I would show the mechines I have at my disposal - so I have here a treadle Singer that was converted to electirc from my M-i-L's mother, my elna overlocker, my 16yr old Elna (behind my head), my new Janome (on box), my daughters John Lewis mini machine and an old Elna portable/travel machine.

Day 8 Saturday 9th

Unblogged top burdastyle 02/2013 #127

Day 9 Sunday 10th
Plantain Tee - no picture

Day 10 Monday 11th
Burda Magpie top - no picture

Day 11 Wednesday 13th

Blue MyImage cowl top & Simplicity skirt

Tuesday was not MMM as I go to the gym on Tuedays and Thursday was a no go as I was just grumpy and had a lot of stuff in the wash!

My MMM observation so far is that I have a lot of tops!  and have more to come... Some people would rather make a dress if they have enough fabric, but I don't seem to wear the dresses I have that much, so will get much more use out of a top. More effort required on making bottoms I think!

being indecisive....

I am so indecisive!  I have some abstract print jersey left over from a previous make and had decided that I was going to make one of 2 patterns: the Lady Skater dress which I have made before and thought I might give another go, or this pattern from Burdastyle.

  Versus

I had pretty much decided that I was going for the Burdastyle dress - I have liked it since I got the magazine, have had the pieces traced out for a year and Middlest pretty much told me not to make because it was too trendy(??!!). I have only seen a couple of these around the Internet and I'm not really sure why.

Then today I was scrolling through my blog roll on Feedly and saw this post from Sew DIY. In it she has made a dress using Simplicity 2443.

I have had this pattern for some time and always thought I would get round to making both the dress and the jacket at some point.

Arrgghh! Inspiration is all well and good, but sometimes it is paralysing! Help!

FO: Self drafted Jumbo corduroy skirt

I have been doing a pattern cutting course for some time. We have made bodice, skirt, dress, trouser and jacket blocks to fit ourselves and have drafted variations on each. Up until recently I have not actually made any of the patterns we had drafted, other than the toiles required to perfect the blocks.

A little while ago I thought it was high time I remedied this and made a pair of trousers (post to come). Spurred on by this I had a vision of a skirt that had an inverted pleat and pockets at the front.

And I had the perfect fabric - a lovely jumbo corduroy that I bought at my local market some time ago:

To make my skirt I used the pattern we had drawn up for an inverted pleat front skirt:

front to be cut as one piece

and the pocket front skirt:

I knew I didn't want it as long as the block we drafted or as flared. The pleat in the front was all wrong to start with - as drafted the pleat is wider at the bottom to help the fabric hang better when it is made up. This didn't work with the corduroy as it cut across the wale of the cord and looked terrible! I then folded the pleat so that it was equal all the way down and followed the lines of the cord which worked much better.

My teacher said to cut away the back of the pleat to minimise bulk at the waistband

I used some chambrey-like fabric for the pocket lining as the cord was too thick, and I also used it for a facing instead of a waistband. I have lost some weight since making my block, so I had to take in the sides quite a bit at the waist and hip.

I have worn this skirt loads since I made and really like it. I thought the pockets would be enormous, but they are perfect. It is pretty much exactly as I imagined it to be - that doesn't happen very often, so I am super chuffed!

worn with unblogged Bronte Top

the skirt sits at my waist

Also, a month or so after I finished it a Boden catalogue popped through the door with this skirt which I think looks pretty similar:

Me-Made-May review so far

Here is my first round up for Me-Made-May. This year I am planning to wear me-made items for 5 days out of 7 and to weed out stuff from my wardrobe that I no longer wear. I have worn me-made everyday so far apart from Tuesday as that is the day I go to the gym and I have not made any sports wear!

Day 1
Self drafted dress

Day 2
no photo, but I wore this 'Knock off' top:

Day 3
Same top as yesterday

Day 4
Blue MyImage cowl neck top

Day 5
Colette Jasmine top

Feeling as blurry as the photo at breakfast!

Day 6
I wore an blogged top and as yet have no photos of it or me wearing it!

I also did really well on going through stuff in the first couple of days of May.  I have had a pile of clothes that Youngest has grown out of sitting outside her bedroom door.  The pile has also included various items of mine, and countless outgrown shoes from all family members.  I have been planning to go through the pile and work out what to keep for the fabric, what to offer to my friends daughter, and what to donate to charity. Locally we had a call out for donations to Nepal, specifically asking for warm clothes for adults and children, coats, duvets and towels amongst other things. Our Primary school managed to collect 3 7-seater cars full (with all the seats down) in 2 days and the people at the collections point were so grateful. It was heart warming to see people give so generously and it certainly made me be less sentimental about some of the clothes I gave, because I knew they were going to directly to people who needed them more that me.

As I suspected, my first week of MMMay15 has been mostly tops, and it is still too cold to wear most of them without another layer on top! I am greatly enjoying seeing what other people are wearing in the Flickr group too.