"Retro" Butterick B5748 in navy paisley

sometimes i go for a few weeks and get zero sewing done and other times i stay up til 3am working on a project. last night was one of those 3am nights. (i don't have to be at work til 10am, so it's not quite so bad.) when you're on a roll, you're on a roll.

Butterick B5748

no i haven't finished it yet, but i've made a nice dent. i'm doing the version without the bow and slit detail. wednesday night i traced my pattern onto my swedish tracing paper (awesome stuff, bought off amazon), cut my fabric, and stay stitched. thursday night i did the darts (using my masking tape method again), basted side seams to check the fit, looked ok, then i did the neck and arm seams, and a lot of pressing. that's where i stopped. up next is some understitching, then side seams, then skirt, possibly adding pockets, then zipper, them hem. when i break it down like that it doesn't seem like too much. i'm usually a fairly slow sewer. and i don't like to give myself deadlines. i have enough deadlines at work, that i like to have zero deadlines in my hobbies.

butttt, there's a friend's wedding next friday. i have several dresses that i could wear. but it's always more fun to wear something new to a wedding. plus there's a good chance of getting some nice photos taken. so, can i get this dress done in time? i probably shouldn't have decided to start this at the last minute. but i still have a week. so maybe i can get it done?

i think i bought this pattern during a 99 cent sale and i bought the fabric back in april. it's medium weight and opaque so it doesn't really need a lining, plus i'd rather not do a lining if i don't have to. the pattern calls for a lining. i considered finishing with bias tape, but decided to do facings instead. i know a lot of people hate facings, but i still like them! i just drafted my own facings based off the bodice pattern pieces. it's really not hard at all.

fabric in the center

i don't think i have enough fabric for a full circle skirt. i think i have a yard and a 1/3 left. what should i do: half circle? 2 front box pleats? gathers? and i think i might throw in some side pockets - if i have time. yeah, i'm not really sticking to the pattern! i didn't even bother to look at their instructions or their fabric cutting layout. although i was pretty careful to not get 2 of the paisley swirls placed right on certain parts of the bodice, if ya know what i mean ;)

i apologize for the 3am bathroom mirror headless selfies (at least my nails looked good, right!? what, you didn't even notice?), but i just wanted to post some progress =)

this is just with the sides and back pinned. i really love the scoop back. hopefully i'll make a lot more progress this weekend. and do let me know what you think would look best for the skirt style! if all goes well i could be wearing this to a wedding next friday. no pressure!

do you always wear a new dress to a wedding? and do you like to sew it yourself or  do you stick to store-bought? if i get this done, this would be my first me-made wedding attire. (again, no pressure, right?)

stripey dress

i posted one little preview photo of the top of this dress wayyyy back in may, and i think i finished it sometime in june? can't remember, but regardless, these photos are long overdue since it's now... august!!! i know i know. but at least i have worn it twice!! that's a record, as i'm still in the "i-just-sew-things-but-then-never-wear-them" phase of my sewing. yeah that top i posted about in the same blog post from may... never wore it out of the house. i feel like it looks like nurses' scrubs? i went to all the trouble to french seam the sleeves and bias bind the edges, but i'm not a fan of it. i'm thinking if i rip the sleeves off and re-cut the arm holes to make it a racer back tank top style and then bias bind those arm holes, that might help it become wearable? whaddya think?

excuse my tangent. so i never posted photos of this dress, which i actually do like although the stripes are kinda loud and it feels a little "jamaican maaan"... ("I see pride! I see power! I see a bad-ass mother who don't take no crap off of nobody!" anyone? anyone? is it sad that the most i know of jamaica is from the movie cool runnings? but that's such a good movie! you know you like it.) i was hoping to get some nice outside photos, but these inside ones were the best i got.

the fabric was suuuuper cheap from fabric.com and i didn't notice when i ordered it that it's not a cotton knit. i was expecting a soft cotton knit. major surprise when i opened the package! it's some stretchy poly lycra blend that could easily be a swimsuit. i hated it at first. but it was so cheap i decided to just go ahead and use it, because if i hated the result, i could pretend it was just a muslin =)

i made up my own pattern and used my super new swedish tracing paper, which rocks by the way. get some. i decided to be lazy and made the front and back bodice exactly the same! - since it's so stretchy it didn't matter, and i like the scoop in the back. i referenced a RTW dress and tank top as a starting point. oh and if you missed it, i totally aced the side seam matching, but the only side photo i have is the one i posted here. for the skirt i just did a big ole rectangle and gathered it. i had enough to make it a maxi, but when i held it up those stripes were just overwhelming. i knew i'd never wear it. so i chopped it off. and when i say "chopped" i mean i carefully laid it out a measured it and painstakingly cut it shorter and then did a very tidy job of hemming it. 

the bodice is fully lined with the same fabric because it made the fabric feel more substantial and it solved the issue of how i wanted to bind the neck and armholes. (i first typed "arm and neckholes" ha ha, that makes it sound like i have multiple necks but only one arm. love it!)

elephant pillow for a friend

i actually sewed something this weekend, go me! ok don't get too excited, it's just a pillow. but at least it's something! 

a friend of mine is having a birthday on friday and she loves elephants, so i knew i wanted to make her something elephanty. i searched for elephant prints and decided on this one: Valori Wells Karavan Marrakech Peacock. the elephants are pretty large in this print so i decided a cute pillow was the way to go. after conferring with some sewing friends, i decided to do a coordinating fabric for the back, and i picked this Valori Wells Karavan Savannah Peacock

i ordered a half yard of each fabric and actually you could get a whole pillow out of one half yard, so i had enough to do a second pillow, but decided to save the fabric and maybe i'll make her a boxy makeup bag or something with it for christmas.

the last pillow i made i discovered you really have to interface your fabric or the polyfill will try to start poking through your fabric, which leaves little fuzzies everywhere, and that's no good. this time i was going to buy some cheap white fabric and interline it rather than using fusible lightweight interfacing, which i thought made the fabric feel stiffer than i wanted. but then i was at joann's getting an invisible zipper to use (i picked a matching light blue), and saw they had a set of 2 pre-made pillow forms 50% off. so i decided to just save my time and use the pre-made ones. (plus this gave me another pillow form to use for another friend's birthday coming up in october.) the pillow forms are 16" square, which is exactly what i wanted.

And here's the final result, sitting on my bright red sofa, which will not be its final home. my friend has a mostly purple color scheme, so i think this pillow will fit much better in her house because there are purples in the elephant print, plus did i mention, she LOVES elephants.

front

side

back

i really hope she likes it.


almost forgot....

gratuitous dog photo! 
 

and then what happened to july and the beginning of august?

i'm really dropping the ball on this whole blogging thing lately. and i haven't been productive sewing-wise either. i've just been super busy. i should try to squeeze in 15 min a day to sew, but it just doesn't always happen. i should also squeeze in some time to exercise, but that's only been happening maybe once a week lately. ahhhhh.

i have been hanging out a lot with this little girl. she's precious. just the sweetest little thing ever. and she's making sooo much progress from the time we picked her up from the shelter in may.

but this is not a blog about my dog. it's supposed to be sewing focused. so here's the only thing i've made lately. and i whipped it up in one evening. little baby pajama pants for my cousin's baby that arrived several weeks ago. the fabric is a soft flannel type. i used this free newborn pants pattern from Made by Rae. i highly recommend it. it was very quick and easy. of course i don't know how well it fits because i didn't have a baby to test it on and my cousin lives on the other side of the country. i'm hoping the pants fit the baby and i have my fingers crossed that she'll snap a picture of him wearing these. but i know she's a busy new mama.

i have a million projects in my head and there are pattern pieces all over my sewing room floor and i just got in a package of some fabric that i'd ordered. i was dreaming up a dress to wear to a wedding at the end of the month, but who knows if i'll be able to crank that out in time. i am so slow. 

i seriously need to set aside blocks of designated sewing time. if only i wasn't sitting in an office all day, right! but i have been keeping up with reading all of your lovely blogs. ella (the dog) likes to play outside in the evening so i usually sit on the porch and read blogs while she sniffs around the backyard. (she doesn't understand games like "fetch" or taking walks on leashes yet). maybe i should set up my sewing machine on the back porch and get in some sewing time then...

what happened to june???

oh my gosh it's july. what happened to june? i just realized my last post was on may 24th! may 24th!!! i felt like it was more recent than that, but blogger just put me in check. shame on me.

so where did june go? well june was consumed by our new dog ella. luckily that's all she consumed - meaning she does not chew on the furniture, shoes, or anything else we might not want her to chew on. she's very well behaved. she knows to do all her business outside. yay!!! how did we luck out on that one? we wouldn't even know where to begin on potty training a dog. this is the first dog that we've owned all on our own. but she is very shy and likes to sleep alot. she is trying to take over our couch. but we're okay with that. we want her to be more like a normal dog. she has some issues because she is a rescued dog, we got her at the local shelter. she was very scared of doorways, she would stand in front of the doorway and shake like crazy, but now she trots through fairly confidently. so she's making strides.

but we did have a huge setback when she had a severe reaction to the heartworm treatment which is a shot of something along the lines of arsenic. so there were emergency trips to the vet and a lot of tears (mine). she was stuck wearing the "cone of shame" for a few weeks. it was rough. 

good news is that she is now doing much better, her fur has grown back in the area where she had the reaction. still no tail wagging, but it will come. she is very sweet and puts up with all of our petting. and i checked out a bunch of books from the library on helping your "shy, nervous, rescue dog" in hopes of channeling cesar millan.

and then last week i got sick. had to take 2 days off work (which is rare for me). didn't even leave the house from thursday morning after i got home from the doctor til this morning, when i drug myself back to work. i had all that time at home, but couldn't get any sewing done!! i felt too crappy. just a very nasty cough/cold/sore throat type thing. i'm taking a bunch of meds and i should be back to good soon.

sadly this will be a pictureless post i think. i did finish my striped dress, if you remember from the last post. it took me sooooooo much longer to finish than it should have. i re-attached the skirt twice in order to get the stripes to line up properly. had a fit in the process. and then reattached the elastic three times. soooo much seam ripping. luckily i really like the end result. and was actually EXCITED to wear it! so i wore it one saturday about a week ago. and got compliments, woohoo! but i didn't get pictures because it has been raining here nonstop! and i really wanted nice outdoor photos. i may just suck it up and take indoor photos. but yay! i actually really like the dress.

so my cousin is having a baby tomorrow, yes tomorrow. they are going to induce because she is a week past her due date. this will be my first nephew! i need to whip up some cute little boy baby gifts. so that will be my next project.

i still can't believe i completely skipped june. oh and june was my one year anniversary of taking up sewing. yay, one year!

current projects and other news

i haven't made time to post in the last week and a half, but i did finally finish hemming the last dress i was working on, and i used my blind hem foot, which was a first for me! it turned out well, but there were several spots that didn't catch, so i went over it again. i think it looks pretty good, but i haven't worn it yet.

and then i made this top, based on the sewaholic alma, lengthened by 2 inches, with modified sleeves, a lower neckline and contrasting bias binding. it looks cute in the photo, but i haven't worn it either. and the teal bias binding matched the centers of the little dots in the print. i wish the fabric was softer. i do like the print though.

anyway, so i wasn't super pumped about the final results of those projects. they turned out well. but i don't gravitate toward wearing them. if i saw them in a store i wouldn't buy them, probably wouldn't even try them on. so i'm hoping to sew something that i would snatch up if i had seen it in a store. something that i really love and get excited about wearing. am i asking too much???

so i'm using this striped fabric from fabric.com that i almost sent back. i do love the colors of the stripes, but the feel of the fabric was not at all what i expected. that's what happens when you order fabric online and don't know much about fabric. but hey, i'm still learning, well trying to teach myself. the description said ITY knit. i've heard that term mentioned before on other blogs, but still didn't really get it. when i read "knit" i thought soft knit fabric. what i got was slinky fabric that feels like it could almost be a swimsuit. 

maybe i should've just made a swimsuit? i should've looked for a cotton knit. anyway it was cheap, so i thought it'll be good to play with. and who knows maybe i'll end up liking it? maybe i'll end up loving it?

so i used a RTW tank top and dress to help draft a dress bodice, tank top style. i decided to just make it easy on myself and made the front and back pieces exactly the same. this fabric is super stretchy. it's also slightly see-through in the white and yellow stripes, so i fully lined it with the same fabric being very careful to match the stripes. this also solved the whole problem of how i'm going to bind the edges. yes i planned that.

i'm super proud of my stripe matching and yes the other side looks just as good =) in that photo the shoulder seams are just pinned, so i need to finish those and then attach and hem the skirt. i have enough fabric that this could be a maxi dress. or i could make it knee length. and i'm running the stripes vertical on the skirt, just for fun. what do you think? maxi dress or knee length?


in other news, we added a new member to the family last saturday! we had been talking about this for awhile, and we finally took the leap... and adopted a dog!

we named her Ella after Ella Fitzgerald (my husband picked it) and she's a rescued dog. she was found lost or abandoned on the side of a highway. at the shelter she was hiding in a corner, scared and shaking. she's a little beagle mix, about 5 years old, they guessed. she's also undergoing heartworm treatment. who knows what else she's been through.

but she's adorable and we're in love with her. she's very sweet, but very shy. she's making small progress every day. here she is curled up in my lap. (note to self: go pee before holding the dog in your lap because after she gets comfortable and falls asleep, you won't want to move her.)

new favorite sewing notions

so i had several gift cards from my birthday, and i've been trying to think of what to buy. i finally settled on 2 sewing notions, but that barely made a dent. so i'll share what i picked, and maybe you can help suggest what else i need to own.

first up is the bobbinsaver! in my head i was imagining building some sort of wall hanging thing to store my thread spools and bobbins together. but i'm not too handy in the building things department. i can barely hang a nail on a wall. although i did semi-successfully put together 2 dressers and managed to hang up curtains. i received a power drill from dad awhile back and it is kinda fun, although intimidating. anyway building a thread storage thingy was one of those projects that i would just keep on the back burner forever and it would never actually get built. 

i have my thread in a glass display case from grandma see here and all the guttermann, which i use more frequently, in a cigar box that looks cool. but the bobbins just can't hang out in the cigar box. they go everywhere and start unwinding and it's just chaos. i can't have chaos, so the bobbinsaver came to my rescue. this thing is amazeballs! (funny how i'll type a word that i never really use in real life.) it's this rubbery doughnut shaped thing. your bobbins pop right in and out and the thread stays in place. it's pretty genius. love love love.

 

that's a photo of mine, with all my bobbins in place. i ordered it off amazon, just type in "bobbinsaver" and it should pull up a few results. the exact listing i used is no longer up. i paid all of $2 plus $4.99 shipping.


next thing - sewable swedish tracing paper. i've read it mentioned in multiple blog posts. i finally broke down and bought some. and it's awesome. light-years ahead of the parchment baking paper i've been using for tracing patterns and making adjustments. it feels almost like a lightweight interfacing, kinda cloth-like, and very easy to draw on. i have yet to actually sew on it, but i bet it works fine. all the photos i took were lame. it's a roll of paper, so i bet you can imagine it. again, i ordered from amazon, here's a link, but the price and vendor changes from time to time. i think i paid $10 plus shipping, and one roll is 10 yards long by 29 inches wide. the size is sooo much better than the parchment paper and it doesn't curl back up on you like crazy. so if you're tracing patterns (what? you don't trace your patterns! shock and horror!) you should try this stuff.


do you have a bobbinsaver or use sewable swedish tracing paper? or is there another sewing notion you swear by? and what else should i buy with these giftcards!?