New Look 6097: Wearable Muslin

My Simplicity/New Look patterns arrived in Saturday's mail. You should've seen the HUGE box that 6 patterns arrived in. Sheesh. But I digress.

I don't usually make wearable muslins. But since this pattern is straightforward enough, and I used my TNT Ottobre tee and Magic Pencil skirt as comparisons for sizing, AND I have brown/white and/or brown/ivory prints up the wazoo, I'm plunging ahead with real fabric. So this will either be wearable or it will be a wadder. And one piece of the brown prints will be out of the stash.

Even though the envelope has sizes 6-22 in the same envelope, the pattern pieces are not grouped all together so you can easily blend between neighboring sizes. What that means is I had to rough-cut the 3 groupings for each bodice piece (left and right are separate) and lay them over each other so I could have all the size lines visible through the tissue to blend between sizes. The waist edge at the front overlay was a little fiddly since it's pleated. I had to fold the pleats in place and then blend outward, make my blended-size cut, and unfold the pleats so the cut would include the extensions into the seam allowance. So, thumbs down to New Look for the non-consecutive groupings.

I had hoped to be further along but I had to re-do the neckline. Twice. Grrr. First I didn't stretch the clear elastic enough. Then too much. Then I was out of clear elastic so I just used regular 3/8" elastic and called it done.

Hopefully more progress will happen during the week after work since there won't be any sewing next weekend with my sister her visiting.

A Little Shopping

Today was Walmart day. You know how I love me some cheap crap from that place. Remember these shoes I recently bought?

Well, I just love them. So today, I bought them in brown too. AND another duplicate pair in black because, well, they're WALMART shoes and they won't last and I've been wearing the heck out of the first pair. Now I can delay the inevitable a little longer.

I also bought this dress. Seventeen bucks. I'm loving dresses for work, especially now that I've let the pantyhose go bye-bye. It takes me 4 minutes to get dressed in the morning. Not counting the shower, hair, and make-up, of course. ;-)

The last interesting bits from the Walmart run this morning are a new bracelet and ring. Excuse the wrinkled old lady hand. Good god, when did THAT happen? Tonight is the first of what will be at least monthly girls' nights out with a few single friends from work. We're going to go see Magic Mike (because who cares about plot when you have half-nekkid men on the screen, and one of them is Matthew Mc - hi Belinda!!). Did you know it's set in Tampa? That will be an extra fun bonus, although I've heard they've taken liberties with location accuracy. Then we're going for dinner and drinks. I'm wearing the new jumper/dress and the new "jewels." But probably flat shoes to keep things more casual, although I may cave for the brown shoes above. And next weekend my sister will be here sans hubby and there will be more going out on the town. Yay, I *have* a life after all.

After Walmart, I fell off the fabric wagon and got these ITY lovelies from Fabric.com. I'm in a brights mood and most of what's in my stash is earth tones. These WILL get sewn up before they become part of the stash. We still have MONTHS of summer to go, so once they're made into dresses, they will get plenty of wear.

Parting Shot: These goodies arrived from Japan from the Marine.The chocolates were melty, but still tasted fine. Oops. Did I just admit to eating them? All at once? ;-) Alex has taken over the beverages. I wish I could send him (Tyler, not Alex) on a Japanese sewing book/notions trip but I wouldn't know where/what.

McCall's 6397: Modeled and Nitpicked

So here it is. I just finished hemming it, but I'm not done with it yet. The seams where the pocket panels join the skirt need more reinforcement. There's too much bias going on there (read below) and they'll want to bag out, especially since there's no way I'll be able to keep my hands OUT of them.

Overall, the dress is OK. But it kind of feels like I'm wearing a full-body girdle. But that's due to the fabric. I think I would like this better with a NON-stretch woven. I also think I used the wrong cup size. I automatically went for the D and it's actually a little bit baggy. Not so much that it looks bad, but I think I could do with less room. That's a first. Hah. Or maybe a 14 with the D Cup for the upper bodice instead of a 16.

Speaking of bias, I thought I would be "creative" and cut the side panels on the bias so the motifs would change direction. A nice thought, but it hardly shows. Except the nap (what there is) does lay a little differently so it does provide some slimming shadowing. I'll take it. There should be more of the effect, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

This is the same rear view from the other night because I forgot to turn around when I had the tripod out. Just keeping all the views together.

I wussed out on making my own bias strips and used what I had on hand, which was black. But it doesn't show and got me done a lot faster. The zipper is one of my purse zippers but it actually works with this very well, both for color and length. Fancy zipper application, eh? That's what you get when you omit the lining.

Now on to the nitpicking. You can see the pocket/panel seam above, and the underbust dart.

And here they are from the right side.

Do they line up as in the line drawing above? Here, let me answer that. NO, THEY DO NOT.

It's not due to any dart manipulation on my part or combining sizes. I got the pattern pieces out and checked them. I even checked the untouched smaller bust pieces and the problem is there too. It's simply a drafting error on the two pieces that make up the front of the skirt section. When sewn together, the seam doesn't align with the underbust dart. Which sucks, because that's one of the features of the pattern that I really liked. Plus, if the pieces were drafted correctly, there would be more of a slimming effect (which is WHY I liked it). Losing that illusion really ticks me off.

It's not the end of the world for this dress. It stopped me from topstitching up through the dart as I had intended, but no one who doesn't know better will know better. And I suppose I *can* fix it if I make it again. But I shouldn't have to.

The Internet Is a Very Dangerous Place

I was very good at keeping my debit card in my wallet when Shannon posted pics of her New Look 6802 dress, even though I've had that posting open on my lappie in a separate window for a week and keep sneaking peeks at it every day. I think I even have that fabric.

But then today, Cennetta posted pics of her make of Simplicity 2181 (aka It's So Easy 1849) and I just couldn't help myself. I ran to the Simplicity website. At work.

Not only did those two patterns FLY into my cart, but four other friends of theirs followed along. So, these six patterns will soon be landing on my doorstep.

I got the cheaper It's Sew Easy version, cuz I really just want this one style.

With and without sleeves, it's definitely getting made this summer.

I really like both views a lot.

LOVE this. It will probably be first up.

I know I already have essentially this pattern at least two times over, but I still can't resist a twist.

For the drape neck top.

So, yeah. The internet is a very dangerous place. For my wallet.

Kwik Sew 3915: Modeled

I'll post pics of the dress and details on the pattern failure, but today I'm going backward a couple of days for the promised pic of KS3915 on me.

Can you see me here? I feel like I blend right in to my back yard. And sorry,  no jazz hands. This is kind of dressed down for me at work but it's Florida in the summer and everyone slacks off a little bit.

Close-up of the shoes. I love these, and it's been hard NOT to wear them every single day. They are soooo comfortable.

I'm not sure if I feel up to hemming the dress tonight. But if not tonight, it will be soon.