Simplicity 2498

Yes, yes, it's been months... Still, I found time (and motivation, if not inclination) to sew the past couple of days. When I bought the fleece for THIS, I bought a cheap piece of green... something or other. Suiting of some sort. It's been sitting around just waiting for me to do something amazing with it. When I got it, I had a skirt in mind, but when the opportunity to work with it, I wanted to make a dress. My choice was Simplicity 2498. I've made this pattern before, but I chose a slightly different view - view A with adjusted sleeves.

Detail close-up. It's around the hem and under the bodice-skirt seam. I was trying to keep it from looking Amish. ;) 

Brown Bear, Brown Bear - Simplicity 3955

I finally took the plunge and ordered some fleece from Fabric.com! Seemed expensive to me, but it was cheaper than Joann's, I'm sure. Anyway, I had this in mind when I ordered, and I'm pleased with how it turned out. The pattern's not the easiest to follow, and I had to take out a bunch of my seams. Of course, the mistakes were just me being brainless, but the instructions just said sew this piece to that piece - not to make sure they come out to be the different sides of the bear (make sense?... I didn't think so.). You know, that the finished product was the mirror image of the other finished product? See? ... Ummm... Like, you don't want to come out with 2 left feet, so to speak. Now you see? I hope so, 'cause I'm not sure how else to 'splain it in the short amount of time that I have.

Changes (other than the obvious color difference): I added the tan pieces in the ears and on the feet. That was pretty much it though. I didn't trim all the seams before I cut them, only the ones on the face, but I can't remember if I was even supposed to do that now... :P

Anyway, like I said, I'm please with how it came out, and extra pleased that it only took me 2 days from start to finish!!! I cut out the pattern and washed the fabric yesterday. I got as far as having the head and feet and legs done yesterday, but I did everything else today. And yes, my thumb does now have a blister from all that cutting.

Gotta go now; who knows what project will be next!

Simplicity 4087

Sorry, these pictures are horrible, but I don't want to go try to take some good ones. Blame it on the terrible camera - you'd at least be partially right, though I dare say the person behind the camera had a good bit to do with it as well. :P

Here's my version of Simplicity 4087, which the Simplicity pattern site apparently considers nonexistent. I can't find it anywhere on there, but I found it HERE instead.

Front. Yes, it's got a yoke; I didn't just randomly add trim in that shape. The yoke is not mirrored in the back. Just FYI.

Side. The zipper's on the other side.

Details, details! You know I love 'em - especially when they're productive as well as pretty. :D

Stories. Pretty much every garment I sew has one. This one is a happy story. :) After lunch yesterday, I decided I wanted to sew. As I had nothing cut out, or even remotely planned, I thought I'd better jump on that inclination. If I hadn't, there's no telling when I would have sewn. Anyway, we've had this pattern for a long time. I actually have made it before... or rather, I started it before. Mama practically did it for me - because I begged, I think. The fabric I used back then was a stretchy, gray plaid, wool-blend. It's extremely comfortable, and I love it. I've often pulled the pattern out since then and almost started it, but the thought of that last time has always haunted me. So, I continued to put it off until I finally decided to conquer my unreasonable reluctance yesterday.

This time the fabric was probably easier to work with. It's thick and not stretchy at all. Probably upholstery fabric (my usual picks from Sir's...). It's sorta like a black brocade, but not really. I'm not exactly sure what it is, but it worked well, and, for me, that's all that matters. :) I'd determined to use this fabric for another church skirt. My church clothes are rather pitiful, especially my warm-weather clothes. Yeah, I know. BLACK upholstery fabric for a warm-weather skirt?!?! Well... that's me... :) Anyway, I was pretty sure I didn't have quite enough to do the whole skirt in that fabric and make it long enough, so I just planned on that from the start and found some black toile to add to the bottom for length.

I did everything according to the pattern except that I added the toile flounce, trim, and did the zipper like I do pretty much all zippers. For the flounce, I just measured the width of the bottom of the skirt's gores, the width of the toile fabric, and determined that 2 widths of toile fabric would be more than enough. Then I guesstimated how much length I would want to add, and measured 7" width across the toile fabric (folded in half, selvages together). I cut 2 of those, and gathered one on the front of the skirt, and one on the back before I'd sewn the side seams. Don't know about y'all, but I sure do prefer gathering straight strips of fabric as opposed to gathering rings of fabric.

After I got the flounce attached to the front and back panels, I sewed up the skirt just like the pattern said. I did my little trick/experiment, and sewed up the hem with a decorative stitch. At that point I was tempted to call it done. I decided that the gathered seam could use sewing down... er, up, as it were. In comes the purposeful pretty details! I dug through some of our trims and found a really long piece of trim that we've had for years. (We'd gotten it to add to a formal dress about 6 years ago, and never added it. Go. Figure.) It looked really good with the toile, so on it went. I sewed over that (just a straight stitch), which sewed down the gathered seam at the same time. Then I tried the skirt on. The trim looked a little ... odd... on there all by itself. So, on went the trim just above the yoke seam; I was then pleased enough with the product, though I wish it had pockets of some sort.

Things to note if you're thinking about making this pattern! I think it runs kind of small. I usually, almost on principle, make the smallest size a pattern comes in, waist-wise. True, this one comes with sizes smaller than most (4-12 or so, as opposed to 6- or 8-12). However, I make the size 6, and it fits me wonderfully! So, be sure to measure the yoke pattern pieces, subtracting the seam allowances, before you begin your project. Actually, that's probably a good idea to do with any project. But... I'm lazy, and only do it on the ones that strike me as seeming unusually small. :P

And there you have it. A far too lengthy post with rotten pictures as a reintroduction to sewing after far too long away from it.

Winnie the Pooh Toddler Dress

I found some absolutely adorable Winnie the Pooh fabric at Sir's last year! Not only that, but I found 2 coordinating Pooh fabrics! I couldn't resist that; I just didn't know exactly what I was going to make with them. :)

Here's what finally came about, using Simplicity 2985:

Front view, including coordinating diaper cover/shorts/whatchacall'ems.

Back view.

Close-up of the cute fabrics!

Okay, the changes I made were few. The main change is the ties. The pattern has you cut out a couple pieces about as wide as the ties are now, fold 'em in half, sew a 1/4" seam, and the turn it. Uh... can you say difficult! I couldn't do it, and I didn't want to spend the time to cut out a couple more ties and top-stitch them. So, I pulled out our "Ribbons and Trims" boxes, and dug around. I kind of like what I came up with. :)

The other obvious change is the piping. Can you tell I love that stuff? It's probably my favorite type of trim! It's so quick and adds something that makes it look more finished than if you just hemmed or otherwise left it off.

The less obvious change I did was to almost entirely ignore the single-fold bias tape instructions. I used double-fold, and just did it how I wanted to. Each armscye is done different. I was experimenting, you see. :P

All in all, I think the outfit turned out very cute! I did the largest size in the pattern, which, I think, is about size 18 months. Now, on to the next thing! :D

Denim and Toile Skirt

I decided to have a bit of fun, and use up some of the inordinate amount of toile I got on one of my last visits to Sir's, and make Simplicity 4188, view E. I also decided to add some decorative stitching to finish my seams and sew the hem. I love how it turned out!

Luke called it "flashy." :)

Aside from the obvious differences to the pattern I didn't really change it too much. I did do the yoke facings out of a piece of lightweight cotton instead of the heavy denim, but that's about it. It's a fun skirt, I think!

Simplicity 2926

I'm sewing up a storm while I'm waiting for my next study materials to arrive! This dress was one of the things I've made in the past week or so:

The pattern only lines the bodice and sleeves, but since my fabric was so thin, I lined the skirt as well. I love how it turned out! Oh, and I didn't have to hem the skirt!!! Here's a close up of part of the hemline: