Mini wardrobe complete!

Here are the final two pieces for my daughter’s back to school mini wardrobe.  They are both from April 2008 Burda World of Fashion (views 136 and 139).  It’s hard to tell from the photo, but I’ve used the Alexander Henry print as an accent in both garments:  for the top I used it in the bow, covered buttons, and bias facings

; and the bows for the pants.  I did change the patterns a little:  they both had drawstrings (the dress at the waist and the pants at the top of the ruffle) and since I dislike drawstrings in childrens’ clothes I l inserted elastic in the casings instead.  I used buttonhole elastic in the dress:

so that I can adjust it to the way my daughter likes it.  She did want it looser than I had it, so there isn’t as much of an elastic tail as in the picture.

One edge of the casing I sewed to the seam allowance of the skirt so the seam allowance is completely undeer the casing–it makes a nice neat inside finish.  I also serged the edges of the casing instead of folding under.  It would have been too bulky to fold under the edges with the linen I was using.  I did the same for the casings on the pants

My daughter loves the outfit–yay!  I was a little worried that she wouldn’t like the pants because they have ruffles (she recently told me, after years of liking twirly clothes, she liked PLAIN clothes now) but I think the browness of the pants offsets the ruffles.  I think in pink or a floral, the pants would be too much. 

I’m thinking about doing a mini-wardrobe for me now.  Patternreview is having a mini wardrobe contest in August, which would be fun to enter.  Although I have no idea how to make a storyboard.  I love looking at the storyboards the contestants always make and keep promising to pick up a “Photoshop for Dummies” book one of these days.  I have two ideas for mini wardrobes:  one using “mod” pucciesque prints for tops  and black solid bottoms and the other idea is for a wardrobe with gray, white, and pink as the colors with solid tops, a gray with pink pinstripe pants, and a gray, white, and pink linen floral 10 panel skirt.  I want to use a neue mode pants pattern for the pants in either case, so I can work on the muslin for that  . . .

More kids’ clothes . . .

I’m trying to crank out a mini-wardrobe for my daughter before school starts in a couple weeks.  The first two months or so of school she’ll still be wearing warm weather clothes, so I am making it a warm weather wardrobe, made semi-transitional into fall weather by the addition of capri length leggings: 

These are from the 1/2007 issue of Ottobre Design.  I’ve made them twice before, so I know they fit.  Out of the same fabric I made the “hug” knit top from 1/2008 issue of Ottobre Design:

The trim is bias strips of the Alexander Henry fabric I used for this tunic and skirt.  The last two pieces of the mini-wardrobe will be a rose pink linen dress (more like a long tunic) and brown linen cropped pants with ruffles, both from the April 2008 BWOF.  I’ve started the dress and I’m using the Alexander Henry cotton for the bias facings, covered buttons, and the tie (the original had a drawstring, but I’m going to replace it with elastic and a tie for a faux drawstring look–a little safer too).  

Floor pillows, finally

Last summer I bought 3 floor pillows and the fabric to make covers for them at Ikea.  About 6 months ago, I bought three home dec zippers for this project . . . well, I finally got around to making them.  I’m such a procrastinator when it comes to home dec.  I made all three in a single afternoon using my Kenmore 52, which I hadn’t used in a while.   No pattern necessary–I just wrapped the fabric around and saw that I could use the entire width, minus selvage, and I estimated how much length I’d need and then ripped.  I “fit as I sewed” the pillow cover–I’d try the cover on after each seam to determine where the next seam should go, then I marked and sewed.  For two of the pillows, I sewed the zipper on last, but I tried it first for the third pillow cover;  I didn’t think either of the methods was really better than the other.  I like the zipper foot I got with the Kenmore (I got a box of feet along with it, which I think were made by Pfaff, but work just fine,)  Now each kid will have a floor pillow and, hopefully, when we have family movie night, we no longer will be all squished together on the couch.

A time machine . . .

Here’s my Kenmore 52,  formerly my great aunt’s machine (by way of my mom, who had it in her closet for 30 years).  I needed a new foot control, which I got from the sears parts website, and I cleaned and oiled the machine and it’s up and running.  Amazingly, the lightbulb still works after all these years.  Isn’t it a handsome machine.  My main machine is a lovely computerized Viking Platinum series, but I love my Kennie too.

I wish I had a better picture for you, but I have my machines on a double school lab desk I bought at a vintage furniture shop.  Only one side of the desk is visible in the photo, but there is a second desk part on the far side of the drawer bank (in the photo you can see the edge of my  covered serger, which is sitting on the other desk).  This desk was filthy when I bought it, and the black top kept rubbing off, but after a thorough cleaning and applying a sealer to the desk top, it really is the perfect sewing desk.  I have a stool on wheels so I can scoot from the sewing machine side to the serger side, I keep my sewing accessories in the smaller drawers and Onion patterns and my files of copies of  the “all styles” pages from Burda WOF and Ottobre magazines in the bottom drawer.  There is a writing surface that pulls out over the top drawer which I use for pinning.  The desk came complete with carved graffiti from the desk’s former life at a school.  It was apparently used with a machine that didn’t work well, at least that is what the graffiti mentions.  I wonder if it was a sewing machine in a home ec class or some kind of a  shop class machine;  I’d guess the latter, by the amount of grime I had to clean off the desk.  Both my machine and my desk have secret former lives that I’ll never know about.  I’m glad that I took the time to clean them both up and put them back to use.

Simple Sewing . . .

After all of those projects with buttons, collars, etc., it was time for some simple sewing–something to cleanse the sewing palate, so to speak.  I’d traced these patterns from the April 2008 issue of Burda WOF and finally got around to sewing them up for my daughter: 

 

Isn’t this lovely fabric?  It’s Alexander Henry cotton from a few years ago–the “Pixie” collection.  I bought several different fabrics in this line (including one with fairies on it, which became a sundress for my girl many years ago).  One of the prints I used for this blouse I made for the vintage sewing contest last fall.  This is the last of the pixie fabric–it does feel good to have used it all.

Burda gave these patterns one dot, and they were truly easy.  The front and the back of the tunic are the same, there’s a facing and ties.  No topstitiching even (although it certainly could be added).  There is no pattern for the skirt, only dimensions given in the instructions.  The original called for the skirt to be one piece of fabric with a single side seam but I was using 44 inch wide fabric so I cut two identical pieces and had two side seams.  I’d only advise this skirt with a thinner fabric so it will gather nicely when the elastic waist is inserted.  For a heavier fabric, I would make the skirt less wide so the gathers wouldn’t be as bulky.   These really would be great for a beginner trying to get used to BWOF’s sparse directions. 

I’m intending to make the child’s dress and pants from this issue too with coordinating solid linen, for a mini wardrobe.  I may add a t-shirt too, probably from an Onion or Ottobre fabric.   Up to this point, I’d only made one summer dress for my girl this year–but don’t feel too sorry for her because she has 16 mommy-made summer dresses and skirts in her closet that still fit her from last summer.  Although, some are rapidly approaching tunic length and can only be worn with shorts . . .

Finally . . . a shirtdress

I have been meaning to make a shirt dress for a very long time.  Well over a year, in fact.  I have several cuts of cotton fabric that call out to become shirt dresses and this fabric was one of them.  I love this fabric, a quilting cotton, because from a distance it looks like an abstract polka dot print, but up close you find that it is really . . .

bicycles!  Check out the buttons–vintage from the 60’s.   I am not a bike person myself (at the moment, at least) being more of a walker/hiker type person, but I adore this print.  I love the retro/vintage-y pattern and I really like that most people will look at my dress and just see dots and lines.  It’s almost like having a secret in plain view.  The pattern is from the June (08) issue of Burda World of Fashion (my favorite issue so far this year) and is a dress version of the flower power blouse that I posted about recently. 

I’m going to have to make more shirt dresses, I’ve found that it is a flattering style for me.  But oh, sewing on the buttons . . .  

It’s a wrap

I’ve been very productive this week and finished another  kwik sew blouse.  I then needed something to wear the blouse with, so I flipped through my patterns and found McCall’s 5430, which is a wrap skirt with a few different options.  I liked option A, which has a cascade, but the ties would be bulgy under my blouse, which is made to wear as an overblouse, not tucked in.  But on closer examination, I found that it would be a cinch to eliminate the ties and have a double button closure.  I didn’t fit the tissue or make a muslin, although in retrospect, if I had taken a few minutes to tissue fit, I would have had a better fit in the back (I was able to compensate somewhat during sewing by letting out the back skirt where it attaches to the contour waistband–at least my hem is even now.    Aside from eliminating the ties, the only change to the pattern I made was to make a rolled hem with my serger instead of a regular hem.  I used a dark brown thread for the rolled hem to co-ordinate with this blouse and with the blouse I sewed for the vintage sewing contest.  It was a very quick project–after making two button up blouses, it was nice to crank a project out.

Love my label?

The photo is a little blurry, but the actual label is not . . . My labels from Name-maker arrived and I’m very pleased with them.  Actually,  I’m beyond pleased–it’s just exciting to see my own label in my clothes.  Even if I’m the only one who will ever wear anything with the “girl with a time machine” label,  it’s still thrilling to have my own label.   Nobody I’ve shown them to understands what my label means (or thinks it’s as clever as I do) but I’m happy with them.  It’s a play on words with the “time machine” referring to my sewing machine and my love of vintage patterns and retro design.  Since I don’t stick to one particular era of vintage/retro (and generally mix and match), I feel my sewing machine is a time machine that can carry me from era to era.   I think ”Girl with a time machine” would have been a better name for this blog as well . . . Anyway, I’m trying to think of something to put on a label I can sew in the clothes I make for children . . .  maybe “gray cat” or “gray cat designs” or “gray cat/yellow moon”.  . . or something that refers to birds or nature?  Which reminds me, my bird feeder is empty so I’m going to go fill it right now–ciao!

Flower Power

I love this fabric–it’s Pimatex by Robert Kaufmann.  It’s hard to see the details of this blouse because of the busyness of the fabric, but there are some nice details to it.  There are two sets of two pleats in the front and back, a casing with elastic at the side waist (it wraps from front to back) and pleats in the sleeves.  There is a double folded facing at the front edge, to add additional support to the buttonholes or snaps without having to add interfacing.  I added some flower buttons, which you can see in one of the photos below (if you look closely you can see the pleats and the part the elastic is under).  The other photo is a close-up of the sleeve, which is very lovely and has a bound edge.   My muslin was for dress 108, which I intend to make a real version of, but the really nice thing is that this blouse, view 107, is a shortened version of the dress– a 2 for one deal after I fitted the dress.

I really wanted to use the flower buttons (yes, the buttons have 4 petals and the flowers on the fabric have 5, but I still liked them together) but I only had 5 so I left off the top two buttons/buttonholes on the blouse.  I would never have buttoned them anyway and since I made it as a casual, novelty blouse I think that it looks fine.   Plus, I got the approval of Sewing 911,  which is a wonderful book that I love because it’s message is that mistakes and problems are not the end of the world, be creative and you may find you like your solution better than the original design. 

Tying up some loose ends . . .

This little number is from Burda World of Fashion, 5/2008 issue.  It’s view 120 and my version came out much more low cut than what was shown in the magazine.

I made this as a “wearable muslin” because I was interested in making the dress view 121 of which this is an element of.  I have decided NOT to make the dress, although I’ve seen many cute versions at PatternReview.  My fabric is this possessed rayon-lycra–very stretchy and difficult to work with (the color of the photo of me wearing the top is accurate).  I had a lot of difficulty with the bands.  The front band would have benefitted from a knit interfacing perhaps and a bigger seam allowance than I gave it (for some reason I only added 1/4″)–note how it’s rounded instead of pointy at center front. I ended up handsewing the sleeve bands to the inside as my fabric would not cooperate, even with basting.    I do like the gathers at the shoulders–gives it an old-fashioned look.  At first I thought this top was a wadder for certain, but I’ve found it looks okay layered over other tops, so it’s wearable after all.