Adventures in Sewing #4 - a revamped (now too small) skirt

Every now and then I like to do a tour of the local op shops to see if anything jumps out at me...or more truthfully to see if there are any bargains in my size. Sometimes I get lucky, but not very often.

I recently spied this GREAT skirt and fell in love with the 70s style fabric. The skirt was obviously home-made and the previous owner had done such a great job on it. It was pretty obvious looking at it though that it was going to be miles too big for me. So I bought it anyway.

I figured now that I had my own sewing machine at home...and now that I could sort of sew...I could perhaps unpick the skirt and remake it to fit me.  As I was unpicking I took very careful note of how the previous owner had stitched it all together. Even though the fabric is stretchy they didn't use an overlocker at all which was good to see as I don't have one. They just did a simple straight stitch up the sides and a finished hand sewn hem. Noice one!

I didn't have a pattern to use so I sort-of made my own by measuring around my waist and adding a few centimeters for the seam allowance. I attempted to make the skirt into a bit of an A-line shape...but I didn't A-line it enough as it's a tad...snug...on my hips/bum/thighs. I had SO much fabric to play with that I wish I'd cut it a bit bigger! I'm really annoyed with myself.

I was pretty chuffed that I got to bust out my new twin needle which I used to hem the skirt. It turned out pretty well, although the machine was "jumping" in a few places so the hem is a tad skewif in some parts.

So whilst I technically "made" a skirt I don't think I'll be wearing it.  Off to the charity bin it goes.

Watch this space as I am DETERMINED to make something soon that I can actually wear, something that actually fits me.

Adventures in Sewing #3 - another (unfinished) dress

I've returned to Sew Make Create in Chippendale to embark on attempt number two of making the poxy stretch dress t-shirt dress that I so unsuccessfully didn't finish at the Tessuti BYO project class a few weeks ago.  Will it be second time lucky?

After a 3 hour long visit to Spotlight where I dropped a cool $120 on fabrics without even owning a sewing machine yet I came home with (amongst other things) a nice stripy knit jersey that I thought would work really well in the simple t-shirt dress we were going to be making in class. I didn't want anthing "too thin" or clingy and this fabric had a nice weight to. Plus it is made in Japan and pretty much everything out of Japan is cool.

The very FIRST thing I noticed about the fabric after I washed it home before the class was that it had a great big hole in it...right in the middle of the fabric piece. D'oh! Luckily I'd bought heaps more fabric than I needed (because I'm OCD like that) so it didn't end up causing too many problems (other than me cutting out two left sleeves as I couldn't double my fabric over to cut the sleeves out ?!?!). That aside, the fact that the material had a great big arrow on it pointing to the hole boggles my mind. It means someone KNEW the hole was there, marked it out and then rolled it on the fabric roll anyway. And the Spotlight lady would've most likely seen this too and still sold me the fabric!

As always Pepper the Puginese was on hand to supervise our class...and when she got bored with us she feel asleep on the floor. Sewing sure is tiring work isn't it Pepper?

Our first two hour lesson was pretty much taken up with doing pattern adjustments for each of four students in the class; plus cutting out our fabric. Embarrassingly I was the only person who needed the pattern made BIGGER! But like our teacher Angie said, our measurements in sewing as just numbers to help us make a perfect garments...no matter what your size sewing is ultimately about making something to fit our own unique bodies.

Class two sees us pinning our garments together and sewing! I had my "new" second machine with me for the class and I'm happy to say that together did a pretty good job! The sewing machine belonged to my Mother-in-Law who was a quilter and I've named my machine Betty after her. Don't let me down Betty!

The order that we sewed the garment together in class was totally different to the Tessuti class I did so I'm glad I learned a few ways to construct this dress.  I'm also REALLY happy that I got to do all of the sewing myself (bar one little piece where Angie stepped in as I was about to have an epic throw-down tantrum).  I'm also pleased to say that I learned the proper way (not the cheats way) of inserting a sleeve (or two left sleeves to be precise) in a garment.

Alas, I ran out of time to hem my sleeves and the bottom of the dress so it's still not finished. I did have a go at hemming but this fabric is so roly-poly along the hems that I lost my cool and had to walk away...fast!

And you know what -- after all that time spent adjusting the pattern the damn thing is TOO big for me! Either the pattern measurements are wrong (I think they are) or my butt measurements are whack-a-do! I'm also thinking the fabric is too thick and heavy for this style of t-shirt dress anyway!

So...what now? I was thinking of turning both this dress and the red one from my 1st attempt into an elastic waistband skirt but I gave up on that idea and chucked them both into the charity bag.