Rescued Sweater Recon

I found this sweater at Goodwill a few months ago.  It was huge and long, but I could see the potential in the cute covered buttons and embroidery!  It's also 100% merino wool.

Before (I was a little overeager and had already ripped a sleeve off):

I chopped off the bottom below the buttons, resized the body and sleeves, reattached the sleeves with a little gathering at the top and at a 3/4 length, and made a bottom band out of the extra fabric.

I'm really happy with how it turned out!  The buttons aren't functional, it just slips on.  I thought about adding some colorful embroidery over the existing embellishment, but I think it'd be too much.  What do you think?

Next up: Simplicity 6459 in this gorgeous blue vintage-looking cotton.  

Corduroy Dress Disaster?

Well, I guess I should've taken the advice of other reviewers on this one.  I got this brown baby wale corduroy at JoAnn about a month ago and I knew I wanted to make a shirt dress.  I researched shirt dress patterns and even though a bunch of people said the collar on McCall's 4769 was really difficult, I figured I could handle it.  I was so wrong!  The collar stumped me for a good three hours even with the help of my new dress form, Matilda.  I've never made a collar with revers before.  The way I'm used to seems so much easier!  Eventually I ended up fudging it and doing my own thing which sort of works.  Looking at these pictures, I realize just how obvious the discrepancy is between the sides.  Oh well!

Otherwise, the fit of the dress was surprisingly good.  Usually patterns are a little short waisted on me but this hits perfectly.  I chopped a good 5 inches off the length even though I did view E, the shorter length.  I like the sleeves even though they confused me at first.  I did have some issues with fitting the sleeve into the bodice though...no matter how much I tried, I couldn't fit the sleeve in without at least a little gathering showing on the outside.  The bodice is also a little big on me, but I don't mind the extra space so much.

I like the look of this dress and I'm mostly satisfied with the finished product, but I won't be making this pattern again and wouldn't recommend it to others.  There must be an easier shirt dress pattern out there!

Sketchbook Cover for Dad

My dad told me he wanted a new sketchbook for Christmas, but I wanted to find a way to personalize it a bit.  I found this free tutorial at Bloom and adapted it for an 8.5" x 11" book.  I used a quilting cotton from JoAnn's and some fusible fleece, and did some simple embroidery on a few of the leaves.

The thin brown border wasn't intentional...the tutorial was fantastic, but somehow when I basted it together and tried it on the sketchbook for the first time is was about .5" too short on the top and bottom.  Agh!  I added the brown linen to compensate, but it isn't as neat as I would've liked.  Oh well, I don't think my dad will be too critical.  I think next time I'll make one for my planner!

Back to life!

Whew.  I guess it's been awhile.  Actually, I guess it's been a full quarter.  School kept me pretty busy and then I got mono around Thanksgiving.  I'm home for break now (and feeling much better!) and I'm working a lot but am still finding time to sew.  I whipped up my version of Simplicity 2512, the immensely popular Cynthia Rowley skirt, in about 2 days.

The only changes I made were eliminating the tie and the binding at the hem.  Instead, I finished the hem with some yellow lace from my Oma's stash.  I sort of made up the technique...I'm not sure if it's legit or not, but it works!  I also added a tiny bow at the front to cover up my less-than-perfect binding.

I tried my first-ever handpicked zipper, and it worked okay.  It looked good until I tried it on and realized that the fabric didn't quite meet all the way at the top.  Oh well!

I love this pattern and will probably be making it many more times.  I'm thinking a spring version next, or maybe one in some pretty brocade.