2 dresses

I've made a couple of dresses using the free pattern for a wrap dress at So Sew Easy.  The first I made as a maxi version.  I've never owned a maxi dress but have recently thought it would be nice for around the house.  The fabric was an ITY jersey from the special table at Spotlight and was just $12 for 2m at 148cm wide.  I needed all the fabric for this dress.

 

 

The second one I made was from the wrap dress version, but I still lengthened it so it is below the knee.  I loved this fabric from Morelands Fabrics so paid a bit more than I usually pay. This was $32 for 1.8m at 150cm wide.  This fabric was slightly heavier and I found that the neck was gaping too much, not sure if the extra weight is pulling it down. To get around the gaping I had to top stitch across the front bodice where the pieces overlap. 

 

Another page finish on Spirit of Winter.

 

 

New Sorbetto top and WIP's

I made a pair of trousers from some blue chambray using Simplicity 1699.  I don't have a photo of those yet, so will post separately when I get around to that.  I had enough fabric left over to make another Collette Sorbetto top.   I added red bias binding to the central pleat and around the neck to make it more interesting.   I toyed with the idea of using mismatched red buttons down the centre pleat, however I decided less is more, and just used one button at the top, again for a bit of added detail.   This time I lengthened both the top and the sleeves.

As always I have a few WIP's on the go.  This is from an adult colouring book, Enchanted Garden.  I haven't joined in the current craze for adult colouring, not really my thing.  However some of the designs would look really good done in embroidery.   I first made some copies of the page I wanted to embroider so I had copies I could colour in and one to trace the design onto fabric.  Once I was happy with the colour scheme I found threads from my stash that matched.  This is the embroidery progress so far on the owl I am doing.  Stitches used are detached chain, rope stitch, feather stitch, fly stitch, satin stitch, fishbone stitch, french knots and buttonhole stitch.

 I am also doing a Hardanger.  It is on a purple fabric with white thread.  In hindsight I wish I'd used a white fabric, but with so many hours invested already I don't want to stop and change now. This is using an old Burda pattern. I want this to go on top of a scotch dresser in my bedroom so needed to change it somewhat so the dimensions are the correct size for the dresser.

left-over makes

This week I've made 4 tops out of left over fabric.  It feels good to make something that essentially hasn't cost anything as it was just scraps.

The first make was a Kirsten Kimono Tshirt.  This is a free pattern offered by designer Maria Denmark.  The very first garment I sewed was a pink t shirt.  I had also done some leggings in an eggplant colour.  There wasn't enough of either to do a full t shirt so I combined both.  There also wasn't enough to cut on the fold, so hence the centre seam line.

The next was another Kirsten Kimono T made from left over fabric from that first pink tshirt and another pink fabric from a tunic.

The next two tops were made from a free pattern offered by Colette Patterns, the Sorbetto top.

The first was made from left over fabric from the purple polka dot dress.  I added sleeves from the pattern provided by The Seasoned Homemaker.  I love the centre pleat down the front of this top, it turns it from a plain top into something with a bit of style.

My mother had given me some old headsquares and silk scarves for using in my crazy quilting.  Among them was a huge square headscarf with a fringed border and around each edge a flower pattern and in the centre a paisley-esque design.  I thought it would be great if I could somehow turn it into a top and the Sorbetto pattern seemed ideal.  There wasn't enough to add sleeves, and again not enough to cut on the fold.  I managed to piece it together so that the pattern 'flowed' and I am pretty pleased with how this turned out.  The central pleat requires the bottom of the pleat to be stitched, but as I intended to use the fringe from the headscarf, rather than hemming, I though the pleat would look odd stitched at the bottom, so instead I inverted the pleat, stitching partway down and leaving the bottom free flowing which gives a bit of a swing to the top.

Front view:

Back view: