aperiodic check-in!

[yhlee]

Howdy!

What have you sewn lately? What are your plans for April? Any extremely pettable fabrics or interesting patterns or techniques?

I have aspirationally picked up a pattern for boxers and plan on tormenting my Long-Suffering Husband by making him be my guinea Joe. :) I've never sewn knit fabric before so this will be an adventure. Also considering a jacket pattern (McCall's M8474) although possibly basting it up in muslin will reveal that I AM NOT READY. I aspirationally picked up the matching pants pattern as well, but in looking at the fabric, uh, apparently I'm okay with my black-with-silver-glittery-things fabric for a jacket but not pants?

In a completely different direction, I am semi-seriously considering making a plush felt model of, uh, the muscles of the arm, complete with detachable velcro'd muscles and color-coding, because I am going to remember the coracobrachialis if it kills me. I took a figure drawing/anatomy for artists online workshop earlier this year and I loved it, but I have no visual memory so diagrams are hard. And this is the "for artists" version where they group things together and it's only surface anatomy!! But I have tactile/kinesthetic memory just fine, so I'm wondering if constructing a model would cement the anatomy in my head?? Y'all may now all flee. :)

Comments

[ewt]

I did some more sashiko mending on my jacket, reinforcing a very worn cuff with material from a charity shop cotton shirt. I put a patch of lumatwill (tweed with retro-reflective thread woven in -- I buy swatches from Dashing Tweeds and use them as patches) on a big of the back that had worn through, basically also sashiko but with the patch on the outside to show the reflective bits. I also added some retro-reflective thread along the collar seam on one side (ran out of thread, and time on that day, before doing the second side, but I do intend to do it at some stage). Soon it will be time to wash the jacket and put it away for the summer; I'd like to have all the worn bits reinforced by then, so that when I take it out again in the autumn it doesn't feel shabby.

I repaired a hole in the armpit of a linen jersey t-shirt. This fabric is too loosely knit for the darning loom to make sense so it also got sashiko.

I have some skirts and trousers to which I want to add elastic to the waistbands -- my size has been changing in the last few years and the skirts in particular are difficult to wear as they don't have belt loops.

I have a new dress with pockets, but the pockets are too small so I want to enlarge them. I would also like to add a couple of patch pockets to skirts I have that didn't come with pockets but which I couldn't quite bring myself to give away when I decluttered all pocketless trousers and dresses a few years ago.

[yhlee]

Oh, how cool! I need to learn how to add pockets to things.

I had to Google "darning loom" - I've seen them before (my mom may have had one) but I hadn't known the name (in English). :D

Using swatches as patches is so clever! I love it. :D

[nou]

You might be interested in this tutorial I came across the other day: two techniques for sewing lined patch pockets. I haven’t tried either of the two ways yet, but both sets of instructions look good to me.

[ewt]

Readers of this community might enjoy freesewing.org which has free printable patterns that adapt to the measurements you put in. It's all open source and free and no ads etc.

[yhlee]

Added to the resources post, thank you so much!

[shermarama]

Oooh, have you tried this, and does it actually produce viable patterns? I've heard about this a couple of times, but am always sceptical that software like this will accommodate unusually-sized people, and don't want to be disappointed again. I recall we're about the same height, though...

[ewt]

I have meant to, and made a pattern, but not actually yet tried the pattern that resulted. There is a fairly active Discord where you could probably ask about it.

I think Joost is pretty tall...

[shermarama]

Ah, nice, I should get Discord going again...

[nou]

I’ve made the Freesewing Bruce boxer briefs and they fitted very well. (They’re designed to not come all the way up to your waist, and I dislike that style, but I just extended the pattern up at the top and it worked fine.)

I’ve also attempted the Simon shirt both for myself and for bob and that worked much less well; in particular, the armholes were comically large. Joost (the designer of both Bruce and Simon) has said on Discord that Simon doesn’t work properly for all body shapes, but I do wish they’d put a disclaimer on the website too.

As ewt said, Joost is tall (and he designed a lot of the patterns), so the patterns are likely to adapt better to tallness than to fatness, but I can certainly sympathise with not wanting to be disappointed again (I wish I could get back all those hours and hours and hours I spent trying to make Simon work).

[shermarama]

The tallness is a good start, though I'm expecting fail around anything involving boobs, frankly, which tends to affect armholes too. I'm taken with the Cornelius breeches, though, and my measurements are likely to fit into typical ranges there...

[blythely]

Just started making McCalls 8449 in a big blocky print, and also have plans for the Tamarama set (in shorts) with some lovely white and bronze botanical print viscose. Good luck on the knit fabric - I'm not brave enough to take that on without an overlocker!

[yhlee]

Aww, that looks fab! I just bet it'll be smashing in a big blocky print.

I'm not...even sure what an overlocker looks like (or a serger), lol, so maybe trying to do knit fabric on a regular sewing machine is a horrible idea, but I wanted to at least see if it was possible before budgeting for another machine. XD

[via_ostiense]

Depends on the fabric; I've made underwear from cotton/spandex jersey using just a zigzag stitch on a sewing machine, and the undies have held up for a few years.

I also made a pair of culottes from heavy cotton terry, and the side seam stitches just fell straight apart after a couple wears.

[yhlee]

The pattern instructions recommend zigzag stitch (and give recommended settings) for a sewing machine, so we'll see!

[shermarama]

I went through a whole cycle of working out whether or not I needed an overlocker, because I was having such trouble sewing knits on a regular machine... but I found several things that helped, which were mainly a) if the machine is skipping stitches, try one needle further up along the continuum of standard -> ballpoint -> stretch and b) if you're getting over-stretched / frilly seams, or mismatched top and bottom pieces because one's stretching more than the other, get a walking foot. And, c) your machine may have several stretch stitches (lightning stitch and three-step zig-zag as well as normal zig-zag) and it's worth experimenting to find out what they do...

[blythely]

Super helpful suggestions - I was lucky enough to get a walking foot thrown in for free with my new machine so all signs point to giving knit a go.

[blythely]

That's really helpful to know that other people are taking the plunge on knit without extra fancy machines. Maybe I should pluck up courage and give it a go - good luck! Looking forward to hearing about your results one way or another :)

[nou]

I love your idea of making an arm muscles model! You absolutely should.

Re updates, I’ve mainly been mending and embroidering.

Mending: patching yet more bedding (as previous); and also since I started making myself linen tops, I’ve discovered that they mainly like to go in holes under the arms (by the time my t-shirts do this they’ve usually failed in several other ways too so aren’t worth mending), so I patched one of those as well. I’ve found the best way to do this is to undo enough of the seams that I can sew the patch in flat, then re-do the seams afterwards. (This also applies to patching the inner thighs of trousers.)

Embroidering: I finished the paisley trouser panels I previously posted about and started on a little narrow band to go below them at the trouser hem. My previous plan had been to use shisha embroidery for the band (I even bought the mirrors and made a sampler!), but then I learned about guilloche stitch and realised I wanted to use that instead. Photos of panels and part of the band are below (click to embiggen).

[blythely]

This paisley embrodery is GORGEOUS! I bet the finished project will look incredible. *admires*

[nou]

Thank you! I’m a little bit concerned it’s going to be a flop, but we shall see :) If I don’t like it, I can always take the trousers apart and use the embroidery for something else.

[shermarama]

I'm also right behind the muscle model idea! Just the process of making it and really having to engage with what goes where would really cement this for me, but my memory tends to be very spatial.

I am mostly knitting at the moment (it's autumn in New Zealand, and suddenly all the warm things make sense) but I did finish another go at the Superstar Bra, a crop-top / soft bra pattern, hacked to have a bra-style fastening in the band and slightly longer straps. I've damaged one shoulder and though I really like the Superstar's shape and comfort, I think it's putting more stress on my shoulder than is helpful... I may still not have made the straps long enough on this one either, because it's comfortable to wear for a few hours and then makes things hurt again.

I'm in the mood to use up stash fabric at the moment, and have just rediscovered some medium-weight olive French terry that I think I bought as a remnant, so I'm not sure what the composition is! But I'm considering buying another Waves and Wild pattern, this time for some quite fitted joggers, which I think could really work with this.

Um, however, I got suckered into my local excellent fabric import warehouse the other day and may have bought a metre of fluorescent yellow jersey. It's fairly thin, but 100% wool, which immediately says 'cycling gear that won't get stinky' to me. I'm thinking of making some sleeves, as in just sleeve tubes not attached to a garment, which are great for cycling (also I used to use them for running) because you can take them partially or completely off for temperature control without having to stop. The shop has a bulk deal on 5m lengths of this stuff, but I just can't quite think what I'd do with 5m, other than make head-to-toe fluoro cycling outfits for the whole household like some sort of team colours :D