Tim Archives - Handmade by Carolyn

Arthur’s backpack

27/12/2021 3:12 pm \ 1 Comment \ Carolyn

I also made a back pack for Arthur, for Christmas …

I’ve made this pattern a couple of times before, for my own children, and Tim particularly loved his backpack when he was tiny. He wore it all the time and would toddle about the house with it on his back, with a few precious toys stashed inside… it was very cute! and he still has it today. It was Tim who suggested one for Arthur too.

Fortunately I still have all my Topkids magazines, including the one the pattern was in! I still flick through them sometimes, and while some of the patterns might be considered a tiny bit dated, especially some of the ones for older kids; there are still plenty of cute ones in there. I’m never throwing them out! Love my Topkids magazines!

I had the dark grey denim in my stash already, and also the red check cotton I used for lining throughout… the latter given to me by Mum when she cleaned out her stash.

I hand drew the letters for his name… transferred them to interfered cotton, cut them out, and stitched them to the pocket piece with narrow, closely spaced zig-zag stitches. I had the velcro, wadding, D-rings and little swivel clip for closure already, but had to buy all the other pieces for the backpack; the red webbing, stops for the straps, and cording. Still though, it’s been amazing to me what I do have in my stash already and am capable of finally putting to good use!

If you’d like to see Tim’s own backpack, I blogged about his yonks ago here, back in the early days of my blog. He still has it today and loves it! This is so heartwarming to me, and I just hope Arthur loves and enjoys using and wearing his own backpack too. If I get a nice picture of Arthur wearing his own backpack I will certainly update here, and put it in 🙂

Posted in: Uncategorized \ Tagged: arthur, backpack, bag, Tim, Topkids

och aye

27/12/2019 8:27 pm \ 12 Comments \ Carolyn

My final creation for the year! and a couple of other things too, since of course I found/have recently finished more unblogged items which I am including although technically I didn’t “make” them. But first things first… I shall start with my new tartan dress. I did make this!

I think I’ve had a bit of a thing for a voluminous skirt lately, and this one is also on the flooffy side! I used a pattern I’ve had on my “want-to-make” list for years; Burda 10/2009;119, but altered it somewhat:

A) mine is longer and at the same time, more voluminous, more of a midi length than the knee-length in the magazine,

B) I added in extra seaming, to showcase both a bias and an on-grain tartan layout, and making it more user-friendly to put together, and

C) I changed the width of the skirt panels so I could pattern match the tartan across the skirt pleats and still get the correct width panel into the waist.

(A) needs no further explanation, so I’ll move straight on to B …. The pattern has you cutting a full-dress length centre panel that is pleated from neckline to waistline… rather than have a whole lot of, possibly unnecessarily bulky pleats in my bodice, AND having to pattern match the darn things… I cut the centre panel of the bodice separate from the skirt, and as a finished width, with no pleats.

I also cut the back bodice in three pieces similarly to the front; with a centre back centre bodice on the fold, and two bodice side pieces; and put an invisible zip in the left side seam of the dress. Not only does a side seam zip make it easier to put on and take off the dress, but obviously … no pattern matching of plaids along either side of an invisible zip!! Since I was cutting the back bodice in this way, I took the opportunity to rotate out the waist-shaping darts, incorporating the shaping into the seams.

I’m doing the Burda styling thing here…

The back skirt pieces were cut similarly to the front skirt pieces; so as to have two side pieces and a generously pleated centre panel. Maximum skirt volume!!! Oh, I also cut all pieces so the bodice seamlines would match up vertically with the skirt seamlines… it just looks a lot neater. OH! and also my skirt side pieces are just a touch more flared all round, not by much, just a few inches at hem level each side, but multiplied over the four gores and it adds up nicely!

As for point C; I carefully folded and basted the plaids together so as to pattern match the tartan perfectly across them, and then cut the centre front and back skirt panels at the finished width as indicated in the pattern. Because of the width of my plaids, the skirt centre panels ended up a lot wider than those in the pattern, which is fine with me #maximumflooff

Originally I kept the pleats stitched together vertically for a little bit at the top of the skirt, but in the end decided it looked nicer for them to flare out immediately out of the waistline.

The skirt side pieces, as with the bodice side pieces, are cut on the bias.

can I just point out… ^^ those little Sophie-ears!! ^^

The last modification, which almost goes with saying because I’m a well-documented pocket freak, was… well I guess it just got said! I used my most used pattern piece for this, which is one I drew up to fit my own inelegantly large hands. I cut it from an old Vogue magazine cover, which is a nice thick glossy card; and it lives permanently stashed in a handy place adjacent to my sewing machine.

My fabric! is a really nice, poly-viscose suiting from Minerva. I realise poly-viscose might not sound very nice, but it really has an extraordinarily realistic wool-like feeling to it and is lovely and soft against the skin!

One of the things I really like about this dress is that while it definitely has a winter-y vibe to it, it’s sleeveless and not body-hugging either, so I think it’s going to be ok to wear it in spring and autumn, and even cooler summer days too. In winter it would definitely need a long sleeved skivvy or tee underneath, and tights, and I’m looking forward to wearing it like that too!

The next thing! I didn’t make this dress but I did devote an entire day to making it fit for Kelly to wear so I’m totally OK with documenting my creative input here… I remember now it was presented to me basically a few days before I flew out the the US for my holiday with Yoshimi, which is why it slipped my mind to document it here before! 🙂

Tim and Kelly were groomsman and bridesmaid respectively for their friends T and G; who were likewise their groomsman and bridesmaid respectively! and together Kelly and G had ordered the below dress off the internet … and btw, can I take this opportunity to say? never ever ever order a dress off the internet at the last minute! Kelly had specified “for maternity” and sent in her measurements and it was “supposed” to be made to measure – inverted commas there because of course when it turned up it was instantly apparent that it was not at all suitable for maternity and also, nowhere near made to measure. For a start, there was an insurmountable gap of five inches between the two sides of the invisible zip, and obviously poor Kelly with her pregnant belly was going to do even more baby-growing in the two weeks before the wedding!

She brought it around for some urgent adjustments…

When I opened it up, I could NOT BELIEVE the innards of this dress… it looks so soft and floaty and comfortable in the modelled picture, doesn’t it? well far from it; the insides were built like a Sherman tank…

The bodice lining AND the underlining were interfaced with firm and inflexible horsehair stiffening that had been securely fused to the fabric. The princess seams were boned, believe it or not, with the boning going directly over the bustline. SO uncomfortable! The skirt looks softly gathered into the waistline with a little self-fabric belt, and you might think it had an elastic waistband? well NO, of course the skirt was gathered into a securely stitched and totally inflexible waistline. The neckline/off-the-shoulder ruffle was very not-Kelly too, she’s just not a ruffle person at all. So the first thing was to cut it off, as neatly as possible close to the neckline edge, leaving a chic little spaghetti strap.

I actually needed to harvest fabric from somewhere to put some wedges into the side seams of the inner skirts anyway, so was glad to be able to get some so easily from the ruffle!

I opened up the side seams of the two inner layers: the underlining and the lining; and inserted wedges to add in the needed 5″ of extra width, so the zip could close at the back. I had a bit of pretty-good matching linen, which I used for the bodice; these wedges needed to be strong because these were the layers that had been stiffened with iron-on interfacing, I also ended up using the linen in the skirt underlining for opacity, and the chiffon from the ruffle in the lining, so it looked nice on the inside. I know it didn’t really need to “look nice” on the inside because this was emergency butchery at best, but you know; old habits die hard! After all this, the ribbon hanging loops needed unpicking and repositioning too.

just to clarify; this is the INSIDE of the dress!! I needed to say this because yes indeed I’m aware it all looks a wee bit scrappy… 😉

For the shell; I unpicked and opened up most of the waistline seam and let out the gathers for the required 5-6 inches of needed extra width, then restitched it up. And re-inserted the belt loops.

Finally, it’s hard to see from the before picture, but the bodice had too much vertical height, and horizontal folds of chiffon ballooned out quite unattractively over the bust and waist seam… so I turned up as much of the extra volume as I could into a sort of horizontal “cuff” just underneath the top neckline edge. Cassie kindly hand-stitched this down invisibly for me 🙂

It was all a bit rough and ready really, but at least Kelly was comfortable, and carried it off beautifully, plus I think she looked lovely! And look at my handsome boy!!

The last thing, that I worked on yesterday actually! was binding this baby quilt… When we went down to visit Craig’s parents for Christmas, his Mum took it out and asked me if I could please bind it for her as she was not going to get the time or the opportunity to finish it herself. Of course I obliged!

She had appliquéd and embroidered all these cute little motifs on squares of calico, and patched the quilt top together, and quilted it with decorative stitching, stitched around the edge where the binding was to go.

She couldn’t find any more of the blue fabric that she had wanted to use for the actual binding, but I assured her I could probably find something that matched.

It took a bit of searching because I didn’t actually have a nicely matching plain blue cotton after all, but I dug out this old shirt of Tim’s? Sam’s? I’d thought it was one of Craig’s old shirts but he assures me it wasn’t his. I’m not sure now which of the boys it belonged too, but I thought it was a lovely colour match for the quilt! checks in soft green and yellow, and blue too. I cut strips on the bias and bound the quilt by machine on the top edge, and by hand underneath. It was quite interesting to me that the sleeves were plenty for the job! I’ve always marvelled at how men’s sleeves take up a TONNE of fabric, and here’s more proof!

btw, I could not find a good tutorial online for a nicely mitred corners for a quilt; all the ones that popped up had you encasing the edges in the folded-up bias strip and just machine stitching the lot, catching the underneath edge along with the top edge all in one go. Maybe I’m a snob, OK I probably am! but that just isn’t nearly neat enough for me and you run the risk of the machine stitching underneath looking all wonky, and maybe even not catching the underneath edge at all, since you can’t see what’s going on under there. In my opinion. So I worked out my own way which I think turned out quite neat, and think I’ll write a tutorial on here sometime, when I get time. If I get time. Next year, no doubt!

SO CUTE! I think Tim and Kelly are going to love it!

Posted in: sewing, Uncategorized \ Tagged: babywear, burda 10/2009;119, daily outfit, dress, Kelly, maternity, own design, quilt, Tim

box of socks; the October edition

01/11/2019 1:16 pm \ 4 Comments \ Carolyn

I meant to post this yesterday, however I’m … ok I’m NOT going to complain about being busy. The dreaded B word. It’s annoying. Sorry!

However, ta da! I finished these socks during my holiday away in the US with Yoshimi. Here is the incriminating evidence of me in the act of conversational knitting while in San Francisco with Shams and Yoshimi… and I can assure you we’re actually sitting in our air bnb here and I’m NOT actually humiliating us all while out in public..

I took my bamboo needles away with me, because I knew airlines are ok with skinny little bamboo needles. However I did not knit one single stitch while on the plane!! Nope, upon getting on the plane I proceeded to watch movies, eat dinner, sip champagne, and sleep. I did absolutely nothing constructive whatsoever. Ha!

it’s a tough life but somebody’s gotta do it

I bought the sock yarn while I was in Japan in April… it’s Opal yarn in the Van Vincent Gogh “Vase of Sunflowers” colour way 5432; and the pattern is kinda my own, heavily adapted basic sockette pattern in a Patons pamphlet from the 60’s, no C11. I completely adore the warm swampy mossy yellowy, browny greens. So very moi.

#thePerilsofBeingaPetOwningKnittingBlogger

Before I drag out ye olde updated box of socks picture, I just want to put up this picture Tim sent through.. I’m rather thrilled he’s still wearing that outfit for Hallowe’en!!

Also I thought I’d share here my own Hallowe’en post for this year although you could not call this a costume, it’s just an outfit that I would wear on any other day. Sophie makes the whole thing, imo… that darling little powder puff.

And now… finally. Le box of socks is looking rather gorgeous, I reckon!!

Posted in: knitting \ Tagged: clementine dress, daily outfit, fancy dress, forget-me-not patterns, Knitted, knitting, Patons knitting book C11, socks, Tim

funsies with onesies

30/07/2019 2:05 pm \ 9 Comments \ Carolyn

I’ve made another little onesie! Looks a bit goth, you say?? well, there’s a story… 🙂

The sewcialists blog had this fun, little mini-challenge last weekend; you spun the wheel to get a colour and then you had the weekend to whip up something with your colour. I spun and got:

I’m sorry to say I felt very uninspired at first, and just left it for a few days. And yes, it did say you could spin again and again, in fact as many times as you like to get the colour you want! but that’s just not me… I’m a stick-with-what-you’ve-got, kind of a person, and spinning a second time would have felt like cheating. Stubborn? oh yes, but you know, gotta own what you are!

Then it occurred to me… make something else for the new baby!! Now if that’s not a fun motivation I don’t know what is!! So, you know I’ve got a huge bag of the family’s old clothes that are still very good quality fabric, and I fished out this old T-shirt of Tim’s…

I had this idea he might like for his new baby to have a little something of Dad’s when he gets here… pretty cute idea, huh? Well, I thought so. 🙂 No sooner did I post a picture on instagram, than Tim sent me this one picture of himself wearing the T-shirt. The grim-looking persona here is all an act, honestly; he’d dressed as a rocker for a dress-up party, haha.

Pattern; I again used the pattern Tim and Kelly had given me; Burda 9434, the 1 month size, except this time I cut the front as one piece, so as to maintain the cool tree/crows motif on the front of the T-shirt; and put 3 snaps in the crotch for closure.

I also made the little ivory beanie; using part of an old dress of Cassie’s. No picture of that one in its original condition sadly; and it’s already been cut up in the past for a heap for other things; in any case, this is totally a very recycled and eco-friendly outfit for the new bub!

Just some boring construction thoughts: I did have to cut and piece a little bit near one shoulder, because for some reason the motif had been placed super high on the T-shirt; so close to the neckline edging that you couldn’t possibly cut out the narrow baby onesie piece AND keep the motif intact otherwise. You’d think the manufacturer’s would consider that people might want to cut out a baby onesie when they print their T-shirts, wouldn’t you; sheesh. So inconsiderate! Really, in retrospect I should have pieced BOTH shoulder pieces, which would have centred the motif better, but oh well; you live and learn. I think it’s super cute, and honestly, I can hardly wait for Tim to be holding his new baby wearing this onesie! seems like full circle, you know? That is; the baby wearing the onesie, not Tim, obviously!

addendum; aaaaaaaaand, I’ve just finished another shortie onesie… and matching beanie. Reason number one; Kelly and Tim really did buy SO MUCH of this fabric! and reason number two; because I’ve made a salient discovery; you can never actually get tired of making baby onesies.

So, the beanie matches the very first “long-ie” onesie I made, obviously, because it’s from the same fabric; and this onesie also matches the above, ivory beanie; because I used the ivory fabric for the binding… I stitched on miniature sew-on press-studs for the closure on this one because I’ve always had a love-hate relationship with the hammer-in ones, and am currently residing in the hate phase…

Posted in: Uncategorized \ Tagged: baby clothes, babywear, burda 9434, Tim, Wardrobe Refashion

metallic silk damask skirt

15/04/2018 7:01 pm \ 21 Comments \ Carolyn

With less than 24 hours remaining until Tim and Kelly’s engagement party, I suddenly realised I really wanted to wear my new skirt. Only problem was, the new skirt was at that moment a flat, albeit lovely, piece of fabric with as yet unrealised dreams and mere aspirations to being a skirt. A potential skirt!

The fabric is really beautiful… Cassie and I had seen it in Fabulous Fabrics and mutually admired it… then she secretly took it up to the counter and bought a length of it for me for Christmas. Aah, my daughter is the most thoughtful sneaky fabric buyer, ever! I couldn’t have chosen better myself 🙂 It’s a metallic silk damask; in the loveliest sunset-over-the-ocean shades of coral pink, gold, metallic gold, navy blue and charcoal, and I absolutely love the slight wonkiness of the stripes! although it did make stripe matching a tiny bit of a challenge. I managed it, but!

I used an old favourite Vogue 8363, modified quite a lot as usual This is a hall-of-fame pattern for me, despite the fact that I’m pretty sure I’ve ever made anything faithfully to the pattern, ever! but I’m totally ok with that. It’s got great bones and that’s enough.

My nearly-always modification is to cut one of the fronts of the pocketed view on the fold, and the back piece with an added seam allowance to the centre back so as to incorporate a zip, and insert the waistband so as to have corresponding closure at the centre back. Also, the shape is ever so slightly pegged, which I did not want for this skirt; so I cut the side seams to be straight below the hips.

Some other mods; well, I point them all out in my video below, but it is a non-speaking video, pretty boring maybe, sorry, because I’m just so awful at speaking, every time I started I’m immediately tongue tied… so I just didn’t. Maybe I’ll get better at this and next time actually speak. However, for those who like The Deets, they are, in the order shown:

I wanted for the skirt front to be unimpeded by the visual distraction of a dart, but at least one dart and/or pleat is actually necessary in this design for a good fit and so you can shove your hands down deep into those pockets without distorting the shape of the skirt… I moved the dart right over to adjacent to the pocket opening. Actually, I fiddled with darts and pleats SO MANY times over, this final arrangement was probably attempt number six, at least, but fortunately I am satisfied with this arrangement, at last! Pleats looked absolutely dreadful… “boinging” out over my tummy in a most unflattering way, but the single discreetly placed dart looks nice. It gives a nice flat front to the skirt, visually almost dart-less, while allowing the room for your hands when shoved in the pockets. Oh, please notice the perfect print placement on the pockets, as well as all the other seams too.
I kept the double darts on the skirt backs, and put my deep forest green invisible zip in the centre back opening. The skirt closes at the waistband with a bar hook and eye.
I added a navy blue polyacetate lining, cut using another old favourite Vogue 1247, and folding the darts in pleats rather than sewing them down. Zip and lining were both from my stash. I attached the lining to the zip tape by hand, and staystitched and cut the lining in a square “box” at the lower end… I’ve written before how I’ve found this has practically eliminated the lining ripping at the lower edge of the zip, something that used to happen a lot with my skirts until I figured out why.
The silk damask frays with all the speed of a raging bushfire, so first thing after cutting I hastily finished all the raw cut edges on my overlocker, using navy blue overlocking thread. I didn’t have enough of the silk to cut the pockets in one piece and still have the print matching at the waist, where the print shows in the pocket opening, so I pieced the pockets to have a self-fabric facing, and the rest is in the lining fabric.

Oh, the party? did I hear you ask? thank you for asking! Yes, so Tim and Kelly are engaged and we hosted a party for them last night. I cannot take any credit for a great evening though, since it turns out that Kelly is a Party Organiser Extraordinaire, and we had the most beautifully styled and decorated party I think this house has ever seen! and Kelly made the most spectacular cake imaginable. And look at this!

This has 150 balloons in it…! and is the brainchild of Kelly, and the combined handiwork of Kelly, Cassie, their friend Georgia and myself. We had great fun, and I feel so lucky that I’m the one who gets to enjoy it in my house!!

I’ve shared the below picture on instagram back in February, but have just realised I haven’t put it here yet, this was The Moment! it’s been such an exciting time for our family and we are sooooo thrilled for our darling Tim to have such a lovely lady as Kelly in his life. No doubt I will be sharing lots of wedding attire spam both here as well as on IG pretty soon…. fair warning!

I was pretty confident I’d have time to get a nice picture of my new skirt, and whole outfit at the party last night … BWAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA! oh dear, *wipes tears of mirth from eyes* obviously when one is hosting a party you’re flat chat … we took precisely zero photos during the party! Kelly has already contacted me, asking if I took any, so we’re planning a little post-photoshoot of the two of them with the still beautiful balloon arch. But I’m totally happy, still on a successful party high; we had an absolutely fantastic time, and I’ve spent most of today cleaning the house and it is delightfully spick and span again. SO I’m even more happy! Craig wore this shirt, Cassie wore this dress. And this is what I wore!

Outfit details:

Skirt; Vogue 8363, heavily modified, silk damask, Vogue 1247 for the lining
Shirt; Burda 7767, white linen… originally made for Craig, it still lives on his side of the wardrobe but I tend to be the one wearing it nowadays! details here
Shoes; Zomp, from Zomp boutique

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Posted in: sewing \ Tagged: daily outfit, Kelly, skirt, Tim, Vogue 8363

Christmas pressies; a sewing marathon

29/12/2017 3:33 pm \ 31 Comments \ Carolyn

Tim and Kelly…

As usual, I made Christmas presents for my family… I started late October, so I was giving myself plenty of time, or so you’d think! I’m a fairly efficient seamster, and I still only just finished a few days before Christmas! it’s been a little intense and stressful, actually; every year I underestimate how busy the lead-up to Christmas is and how I just don’t get as much time to devote to sewing presents as I thought. Plus, I’m a lot more finicky and particular – maybe excessively so?! about my sewing now too. I think this is a good thing, but I have to accept that I’m taking longer to make things, and should start sooner! Or maybe make less?

Anyway, it got done! *phew

Listing everyting in the order I made it…

First thing to get made was a shirt for Tim… He has a job now where he has to look smart, so I decided to make a business shirt… I bought the really lovely deep maroon, mini-scale gingham cotton shirting from Tessuti’s in Melbourne, and used Burda 6874, my kinda go-to shirt pattern since I semi-retired Burda 7767. d’you know I made that pattern 37 times… can you believe it?! that tissue paper was wearing pretty thin in some places and in some other places I’d trimmed off the cutting lines altogether, woopsies!!

what sleeve placket…? of course I busted a gut matching those teeny little checks everywhere, took me two days before I could see straight again…

I made the buttondown version… see how the collar up there buttons down onto the shirt? This is what qualifies it as a buttondown, folks! I don’t wanna get all grumpy and pedantic here, being Christmas and all, but the number of times I’m reading about someone’s very lovely, but NOT A BUTTONDOWN shirt erroneously labeled as such and have to hold myself back, because we all hate a little lecture, right? I’m gonna stop right now otherwise I’m going to become that painful lecture-r.

this is the inside of the shirt… I’m pretty proud of my flat-felled seams… and I use the burrito method for the yoke so that’s all nicely enclosed too

All seams are flat-felled, using my own tutorials here and also this one here… yes you can flat-fell every single seam in a shirt! and it’s so much better and nicer… although I’m starting to realise that this is probably why what used to take me maybe two days to make a shirt… now takes me double that time at the least! but anyway. My guys appreciate the tailoring, so I’m happy that they’re happy.

Sam’s shirt…

I’m just SUPER happy with how my buttondown collars are looking nowadays! It’s pretty hard to get that sitting just right and perfectly symmetrical; and I think after all the shirts I’ve made I’ve finally got it down…

Next up; I made a matching top for Kelly. I’ve previously made matching tops for the two of them and noticed that they wear them together a lot! yes, it’s super cute… I did a little bit of subtle inquiring as to whether matching clothes were still something they liked before I went there and got a positive response. Alright then!

I had to be far less subtle about fitting it though! I’d previously taken Kelly’s measurements for when I made a Kelly anorak for her… it’s impossible to do this without it being obvious! and made a block for her, using my Pattern Magic book to help me. Yes, this is a pretty involved thing to do, requiring protractors and algebra and such-like! but honestly I’ve always found it to be a hugely worthwhile exercise when drafting new patterns. Then I mocked up a quick plain bodice, and got her to try it on, and made the necessary changes. In Kelly’s case, the block fitted but the armhole/bust dart had to modified considerably… the famous full-bust adjustment. I regret now that I didn’t take any pictures of the mock-up bodice and the changes I made because it was a new learning curve for me that I wish I’d documented!

For Kelly’s top, I’d chosen the asymmetrical cowl top from Pattern Magic 2; the shape of the cowl is dictated by the shape of the facing. It’s always a bit of a challenge to draft your own patterns, but well I love a challenge! and I knew the shape of this top would be super flattering for Kelly and suit her beautifully… I cut the pieces on the bias and inserted a maroon invisible zip in the left side seam, so it zips down undone… however Kelly says she can squeeze into it without having to undo the zip which is cool. I think the bias-cut is what gives it that little bit of stretch.

Next up! a business shirt for Sam! He has also started a new job which requires business dress everyday… I’d noticed a lot of young men wearing gingham shirts while we were in Melbourne… a good sign that gingham is super on-trend! so hot right now! which is basically why I bought gingham for both my boys in the first place. It’s a bugger to pattern match though, even worse than stripes! gnnnnnnn but oh well…

Again I used Burda 6874, flat felled seams throughout, same links as for Tim’s above… aaaaand so not much else to add. Both Sam and Tim have been working out some lately, so I think I’m going to have to make some small adjustments to their shirts in the future.

Next up! I made some little things for Cassie, she needs more work clothes so this was another practical gift really. I made three things for her…. I just want to say here; it might seem unfair that I made one top plus TWO skirts for her, when compared to just one shirt for each of the boys, but it really does even out because the TIME I spent making these three little separates is actually the same as the time I spent on EACH of the boys’ shirts. I know, crazy right?! it’s all that tailoring bizzo that takes so much time…

Likewise, Kelly’s top needing a block made, plus the fitting muslin, plus drafting a pattern, also took about the same amount of time as making three tried and true things for Cassie!

Anyway; Cassie had already chosen this lovely crackle-y hand-painted cotton from the Fabric store in Melbourne while we were there, and I secretly bought the mustard gingham printed silk from Tessuti’s while she was looking elsewhere. So the little top was a surprise! The crackle print really is gorgeous, it is hand painted in Zambia and has that handmade naturalness to it… LOVE this but pattern matching those hand-painted stripes was never going to happen! of course they are all different widths and thicknesses which just adds to the charm of course. I just shut down my inner-obsessive for a little while and did my best… at least I got the centre back seam to match!

The other little skirt is a cityscape print, maybe New York City by the looks of that Lady Liberty in there! We’d seen the fabric in the upholstery section of Spotlight, so she’d known this one was coming too…

for both skirts I bound the lower hem seams using some leftover purple pin-striped linen, the leftovers from when I made this shirt for Craig a few Christmas’s ago.

I have also taken to binding the bottom edge of the zip and stitching it down to the seam allowances… often the bottom edge of a zip has a slightly scratchy bit which can be extreeeeeemely irritating when you’re wearing it… so I’ve taken to doing this whenever I made an unlined skirt with an invisible zip. Such a small thing that greatly increases the comfort factor when wearing the skirt!!!

Oh! patterns! I used the Inari tee pattern for the little top and Vogue 8363 for both of the skirts, and since I’ve made both of these patterns for her several times already they were super quick and easy to run up. For both skirts I added belt loops so she can cinch in the waistline a bit; in self-fabric for the Zambia striped one, and in black denim for the cityscape one.

Next up! a short-sleeved white shirt for Craig! also using Burda 6874 and a white cotton broadcloth from Spotlight, this was intended originally to be the same as this little shirt that I made for him a few years ago and which happens to be his most worn shirt … then just before making this I’d whipped up my little yellow/black&white lingerie set and had the gingham ribbon sitting out, and suddenly had this brainwave as to how I could use a bit more of it! I stitched the gingham ribbon carefully down the button line of the button placket, and used a little bit to trim the pocket.

To match this gingham detail, I lined both the collar and collar stand with some cotton gingham that I’ve had for aaaaages, and used black buttons to finish the shirt. Note; IT’S A BUTTONDOWN SHIRT! Also, of course it’s nowhere near a clone of the other white shirt any more but I still think he’ll wear it a lot…

Next up! a pullover/sweatshirt for Craig! truth now… I was running out of time, and steam! and this fair near killed me!

Craig with a much much smaller Sam and Tim…

So, once upon a time, nearly twenty years ago, we went on a summertime camping trip down south and it was blooming’ freezing, our tent nearly blew away, we got rained on, hailed on and fair near froze to death! In pure survival mode, Craig drove to the nearest town bought a red sweatshirt that he has since LOVED and worn about a million times, almost to bits since it’s getting reeeeeeally worn and threadbare now. At some point he asked me to make a clone of the famous sweatshirt…

Of course it’s easy to clone a sweatshirt, but the challenge is in finding suitable fabric! I found this blue marled French terry in Spotlight, and while the colour is a teeny bit blah and the texture is not as nice as his original sweatshirt, it’s going to make a reasonable stop-gap until winter rolls around, the winter fabrics come into the shops, and hopefully I can find something nicer. I busted a gut finishing off all the seam allowances off beautifully inside though… imitating the exceptionally beautiful finishes that were in the original. For the pockets and bias binding I used some of the leftover navy/white gingham that I used for Sam’s shirt, above. The pockets are French-seamed and the rest of the seams have an interesting amalgamation of HongKong bound AND flat-felled seams… not sure if my method is the same as in the original but I worked out a way to do it and took a few pictures along the way.

First, stitch the seams, then figure out which way you want the seams to be stitched down and apply bias binding to the topside of the seam allowance… ie. to stitch along the same stitching as previously you will be pinning/stitching along the UNDERNEATH,

OR alternatively you can save yourself a step here and stitch the bias binding on at the same time as you’re stitching the seam; your choice.

Press the garment seam allowances open, then press them to the side where they will be felled, with the bias binding on top. From the other, right side, of the garment, pin through all layers.

With the right side facing up, topstitch the garment to the seam allowances plus binding, through all layers, just to the side of the garment seam…

view on the inside…

Keeping the bias binding free and clean, trim and grade the garment seam allowances…

Turn under and press the raw edge of the bias binding down so as to encase the seam allowances of the garment, pin in place.

With the bias binding facing up, and following the previous stitching as a stitching guide, topstitch the pressed edge of the bias binding down. Since you’re using the previous stitching as a guide, the width of your double-topstitching will be nice and even from the outside.

Voila! Such a nice neat finish! at first I thought it might be overkill, but it is rather classy, if I say so myself; looks pretty good both inside and outside. I will definitely be using this one again!

As seen above, I also applied bias binding all around the zip tape and stitched it down with double top-stitching the same way to match… this really does make a nice, neatly finished look when the zip is down. Which it will be, most of the time.

And, last but not least! I also made a few more little hardback notebooks… just fun little things, however I do know that the recipients do actually use notebooks regularly so I know they will be useful too! I used mostly a mixture of leftover and old papers; from old scrapbooks, some with the children’s scribbles still on them! I’m sentimental that way 😉 , various papers, musical paper, some pale coloured wrapping paper, writing stationery; just lots of different stuff.

The notebooks are covered variously with linen, velvet, printed cotton. The one I made for Mum is covered with raw silk hessian.

So! Yes, it was quite a lot of stuff to make and I was working on it all like billy-o from touching down after Melbourne right up until I finished right on the wire only two days before Christmas… I’ve been thinking about this… why am I taking longer to achieve less nowadays? and I think it’s because I used to be happy and content with a slightly more unfinished approach… slapdash is maybe too strong a word? whereas now I am far more, possibly excessively? finicky and particular about perfect finishes on the insides. I think I’m ok with this… I feel like well-finished clothing is what I’m into right now.

However, to avoid the Christmas stress maybe I need to start making Christmas presents a LOT sooner! Each year I start way ahead of time and think by doing so will relieve the stress, each year I get super stressed out and have at least one “I CANNOT DO THIIIIIIS!!” moment. But I did. And now for a break from deadlines!!

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Posted in: sewing, Uncategorized \ Tagged: bookbinding, Burda 6874, Cassie, Craig, handmade book, inari, Kelly, mens shirt, named patterns, own design, Pattern Magic 2, Sam, seams, skirt, Tim, top, tutorial, Vogue 8363

3 hoodies

27/12/2015 2:33 pm \ 28 Comments \ Carolyn

In other Christmas “making” I also made hoodies for my three menfolk; Craig, and for Tim and Sam. For the last few years I’ve made summer shirts for them, but this year I wanted to do something different. And all of them love wearing hoodies! so bam! easy decision really.

Hmmm, yes, I had to get Bessie to model them, who is shaped very differently from each of my guys, of course!! but I took these pictures before I wrapped them up to pop under the tree and haven’t had the opportunity to get the boys to model them for pictures. Not to mention that it’s been 30C+ every day… phew! so no one wants to wear them just yet! Pictures with them actually IN their new Christmas stuff will have to wait for a little while…

I used my pattern taken from an old hoodie of Craig’s, that had a really cool style of hood/collar combined; it sits really nicely and looks a bit more stylish than the regular two-piece no-frills hood. If anyone’s interested I once wrote a tutorial on this collar/hood, with pictures of the pieces if you’d like to have a go at it.

Over the years since I first drew the pattern out I’ve had to slightly alter it and custom fit to each of my boys each time I’ve made it. They keep doing annoying things like working out and growing taller with longer arms and gaining a bit here, losing a bit there as time goes on. So it’s always a bit more of an exercise than just whipping out a pattern and zooming it up with the greatest of ease…. NOT!

Anyway, I’m not complaining. I love making stuff for my family 🙂

I went to Spotlight and bought up big on stripe-y, fluffy jerseys in a winter weight. And the beanies in the previous post? I chose the colours to match so that each man’s hoodie/beanie is a nicely toning ensemble in their colours.

Sam’s hoodie, at top; is light grey and white, with a grey beanie to match, because I think he looks great in grey. I bought some pale grey marled lightweight jersey to do the hood and the kangaroo pockets, because I feared it would look a little too pyjama-y, or sort of juvenile or something. I don’t know what it is about the pale grey stripe that made me worry about this, because… it’s funny, can’t logically explain why I have this thought, but I reckon you get away with a full hoodie in a blue stripe whereas in pale grey not so much, looks bit cheap or something. Can’t explain it. In any case I just intuited having a contrast in this particular colour would be a good decision and I’m glad I did it.

For Craig, I chose a muted air-force blue, with a small white pin-stripe. And with a red beanie for him, because he likes red and blue in winter and tends to wear them together a lot.

The air force blue looked pretty cool and right up his alley and it’s a very nice weight, I loved it upon first sight. However, after washing it and hanging it out to dry, then laying it out for cutting, I discovered to my amazement that the “stripe” actually was more of a gentle, slight “wave” of stripes across the fabric looking like this ” ~ “, NOT a straight horizontal stripe. AAAAUGH!! and being “slight” of course, means it really comes across like a bit of a boo-boo, rather than look like an intentional wave, which I could work into the design somehow. Nope, this just looked OFF.

Grrr. Anyway, I did my absolute best with it, pulled it into shape in some places, cut out a wee bit dodgily in other places where it didn’t matter, like the kangaroo pocket. I know the pocket appears to be not drastically far off straight in the picture but trust me, that’s an optical illusion created by clever cutting and placement!! Also the side seam stripes don’t match, the most obvious area where the fault can be seen. He really likes it though, so I’m putting aside my dumb perfectionist tendencies and just enjoying that he enjoys it 🙂

For Tim, I chose a navy blue with ivory stripe and his beanie is the matching navy blue. This fabric was the thickest of the lot, slightly ribbed, and is toasty warm. For the drawstring in the hood, the fabric was too thick to work and so I used a strip of Craig’s hoodie fabric, folded outwards so the solid coloured blue is on the outside.

Oh, the hoodie strings… in each case I made a self-fabric drawstring for the hoodies, bar Tim’s, as explained. To make a drawstring in the jersey, I cut a 1-2cm strip of fabric across the grain. Most jerseys have a natural tendency to roll or curl up across the grain, and you can use this to full advantage while making your drawstring.

Just allow the fabric to curl up just like it wants to, and stitch it with a zig-zag stitch in a width set to just under the width of your finished strip. Start from the centre, because it looks neater that way with the central start/stop point hidden inside the hood casing, and finish at each end.

Thread the flat drawstring through a wool needle and pull it through the hood casing; cut both ends equally to size, then tie off in a simple knot, so they won’t slip back through the eyelet at all. Easy peasy, and colourwise looks like it was tailor-made to go with the hoodie perfectly, which it was, of course, haha. Well, by that I mean that we all know how difficult, if not impossible it can be to get drawstrings to colour-match our fabrics perfectly? mm hmmm.

Problem solved!

The first three hoodies that I made from this pattern can be seen here, here and here; hoodie tutorial here

Posted in: sewing \ Tagged: Craig, hoodie, own design, Sam, Tim, tutorial

a bevy of beauties

28/12/2014 3:49 am \ 28 Comments \ Carolyn

I can now share the fruits of my Christmas shirt-making bendah!! Old news? oh well…
I made four shirts recently. Yes, four! *phew* all since I returned home from Melbourne. I know. Sheer insanity. I has it.
Actually I did have different Christmas pressie plans, firm intentions to do something else for them all this year. And then couldn’t find the specific fabric I needed. And then the Fabric Store in Melbourne had such a gorgeous quality linens in stock…
resistance was futile. Shirts it was. My other plans will keep for next year 😉
All are made using Burda 7767, all with short sleeves, all felled seams, with those tricky curved armscye seams felled using this tip. The linen had no right or wrong side, enabling me to fold the buttonhole bands out, rather than under. This makes a rather nice distinct buttonhole band, which can be further emphasised with piping like I did here, or a coupla double rows of top-stitching, or both. This is my favourite way of doing the buttonhole band.
Burda 7767 has three collar variations; the button-down, the Kent and the shark. I’ve used all of them at one time or another in my 30-odd versions of this pattern, but haven’t ever pointed out the differences specifically when blogging about them. So this time, I shall do so 🙂

Shirts 1 and 2, above and below: Tim’s and Sam’s pale blue shirts both feature the “shark” collar, more traditionally known as the cutaway collar. It was a collar designed to accommodate a large or widely knotted tie, but I think it makes a nice collar for a casual shirt, worn open with the top few buttons undone. Which, lets face it, is how my boys wear their shirts, like 99.99% of the time.

Tim’s shirt

They are both of sky blue linen, with piping inserted in under the buttonhole band, the pocket and sleeve hems. Tim’s piping is pale blue and Sam’s is creamy pale yellow; these fabrics harvested from two of Craig’s old business shirts. I cut both the boys’ shirts a little slimmer in the body and a little shorter of sleeve than I’ve done in the past, because I’ve noticed the fashion in young mens’ shirts is for a slightly shrunken look at the moment.
btw, Cassie made Sam’s shorts in the top picture; I think she did a brilliant job and they look gorgeous! The fabric is Batman cotton from Spotlight, and she drew up the pattern herself using some of Sam’s shorts to guide her. They have two welt pockets on the back as well as two inseam side pockets, and an elastic waistband.

Shirt 3; Craig’s blue linen shirt has a Kent collar, considered the classic collar. I originally made the sleeves on this shirt a little shorter like the boys… However! upon first try-on my conservative husband immediately requested a lengthening, ahem. *sigh* I complied and added a long cuff, with a decorative metal button sewn on the top edge.

This shirt has a longer back than front, and split side seams felled with a long bar tack at the top. The other three shirts all have a regular, shaped hemline.

Shirt number 4; Craig’s emerald green shirt has the rather difficult to execute button-down collar.

To my mind the button-down collar has the most formal appearance of the bunch, but actually this is considered the “sporty”option in collars.
So there you go! a short compilation of collars.
Haha, bevy of beauties, compilation of collars, I’m so alliterative this morning. Sheer poetry, wot.

All buttons were harvested from off of some of Craig’s old business shirts. RTW mens’ shirts nearly always have great buttons, good colours, good quality and in a difficult to find small size. Only the Craig’s blue linen shirt has new metal buttons, from Spotlight.