Summery Tank Top and Lunch Tote

I was supposed to examine today but, after waiting 40 minutes for my partner to show up, she finally answered her phone and informed the organizer that she wouldn't be coming. Which sucked a little for my pocket book but was actually okay for my sewing. The place where I was supposed to examine is just down the road from Season, so I plodded over there (I was wearing my new H&M gladiator-esque sandals, which, while having excellent heel support, are causing blisters on the balls of my feet) and went a little nuts. But it was awesome and I ended up spending about 800 rubles (about 27 dollars), which is way less than I used to spend on "I have nothing else to do" shopping sprees. Here's my take:

I got some fabric for the lunch tote project in Sewing Green, which I had with me in my purse and made me feel like I was ordering things from a catalog (the swirly purple and yellow will be the outside of the tote, the yellow raincoat material [which I'm quite pleased with] will be the lining and I'll make sandwich wraps, another project from Sewing Green, out of the pink and the yellow). I also got some fusibile interfacing and fleece, to insulate the bag, some grossgrain ribbon for the handle, some rickrack for a pillow case dress I plan on making for my niece and some pink ribbon also for the dress. I finally purchased some pink thread because I realized it's mildly embarrassing that I don't have any and pink is my most-used colour. OH! And I bought a super-huge bias tape maker because I can't use the needle-and-ironing board trick for that thickness. Awesome.

First I worked on the summery tank top, which I made from the skirt I took the elastic out of for the Ikea Fox Skirt.

I cut the skirt along one of the seams (which it turns out I didn't need to do) and trimmed off the bottom two blocks of colour. Then I folded over the top strip to create the top of the bodice.

Then I used the same colour from the bottom of the skirt to make the straps, which I then attached using one of my new shades of pink thread.

Then I used the lighter pink to add some detail to the top bit:

...and made a bow out of the rest of the light pink bit. I fitted this while wearing my strapless bra and I must say it's quite cute.

Here I am in it:

I think it'll look really cute with a high-waisted skirt (probably my white one, which I have to fix the zipper on).  The bow looks a bit unfinished but I don't mind too much.

Then I started working on the lunch tote. I cut all the bits out and then fused the fleece to the outside of the bag. This was when I ruined one of my irons (thank god I had two). Apparently you can't directly iron on fleece because it's melt-y. Lesson learned.

So after that mild debacle, this is what I had:

I sewed them, right-side to right-side, then boxed the corners (like I had done with Vaskova's birthday bag).

Super cute, right? Then I did the same with the lining...

...which I stitched into the bag. I folded over the excess to bind the top of the bag's edges.

I trimmed the excess and then added two bits of the grosgrain ribbon so I can pull the tote open (they're uneven, I know)...

...and then I added the velcro and the strap for the handle. Ta-da!

I adore it, I think it's super cute. Now I just have to go grocery shopping so I can start bringing my lunch in this bag. Yay!

The Tiger Lily Tank

Project: The Tiger Lily Tank

Goals: have the tiger lily generally be recognizable as a flower, not to beat myself up for it looking amateurish (this is my first time, after all)

So, as mentioned in the previous post, I decided to cut bits from my skirt and add petals to the tank top. As you can see from the left, I first cut out a section of the skirt's fabric.

I am not, by nature, an ironer, so it was clear I had to dust off the iron and the ironing board and straighten that fabric out...

...which I kind of did. I'm not the most patient person in the world, so once it seemed fairly well ironed I was like "done." You could picture me on an aircraft carrier with a huge "Mission Accomplished" banner behind me for all I cared, I was done with ironing for the day.

Mainly because I also managed to burn myself in the 3 minutes I was working with the iron. C'est la vie, I guess.

So then I decided to sketch some stuff out, get some ideas of petal size, and I made these "patterns." I made three thick petals and three thinner petals to be alternated in the flower, much like a real tiger lily.

The time had now come to rethread Ethel (which is my machine's name, by the by) with black thread. So I got to do the one thing I'm unashamedly good at: threading bobbins. Each time I do, though, I imagine the Project Runway kids being like, "I threaded that bobbin why did you use it?"

...and I giggle because the only one I'm likely to get all pushy like that with is Pebbles (seen here sniffing around the box), who keeps sniffing around the peddle and I'm terrified she'll just hop right on it.

Ok, so I decided to do a test run of stitches on the fabric I'm using (I make that sound like it's my idea, but it's recommended fairly strongly) and one of the stitches ended up looking like this, which I was briefly disappointed by until I realized it would do for the tiger lily's spots. Improv!

Then I decided to use one of the hem stitches to sew down the middle of the petals. This may have been one of my less-good ideas; in the end, the petals look a bit busy and cluttered and I blame this step.

After doing the middle stitch on all six of the petals, I arranged them how I wanted them to look on the top. I'm still quite pleased with this arrangement, even if it's not how they ended up looking (that might almost classify as "foreshadowing").

So then I decided to make some spots on the petals before attaching them. Which can probably be counted as "misstep number 2." Talk about looking even more busy! I should've just stuck to the original plan of only using the spots to attach the petals to the top.

Alright, then I plotted out the circumference of the flower and at first I thought I was a little too generous with the dimensions (before I tried the top on). I think this came from my not having decided if I wanted the petals to overlap or be separate; looking back, I should've made a decision.

I laid out the petals on the top and was still somewhat pleased with the look of the thing, so I prompty got to stitching. I attached the ends of the petals first, so they'd have a bit of a 3D thing going on, to mimic the tiger lily's natural curling-under tendency. You can see from this picture that they are not evenly spaced; I'm gonna have to get me some tailor's chalk.

And this is how it looked, curled back on itself. I'm still feeling okay with it at this point; I feel like the little bit of purple in the middle is palatable and it looks roughly flower-like. Then I went CRAZY with the spot sewing.

Which ended up looking like this. At this point, I'm not a happy girl. My decision was to try to find some yellow fabric I don't need and sew it in the middle, star-shaped, to cover up that whole business. The problem with this genius plan? I don't own hardly anything yellow because it washes me out. So the search was on, through my old clothes pile to try find something that I could use.

The yellow problem was quickly solved, though, when I remembered I was making a tiger lily out of old skirt material with a sewing machine and I'd already taken some artistic liberties. So I made the executive decision to use bits of an old pink jumper I've got and use that in the middle. Maybe a horticulturalist will give me some gruff for not being accurate but damn them, it's a fake flower I can do what I want. As evidenced by my tone I'm STILL a little defensive about this.

I decided how big the patch should be and trimmed it...

And then sewed it on. I was pleased with how it turned out: a little homemade-looking (well, a lot homemade-looking) but the colours went well together and I was pleased with that at least.

But then I put it on and realized it looked like the flower is some sort of sea creature trying to eat my breast. But after staring at it for awhile I've decided I don't care that much, it looks nice with that skirt and it's definitely something. Also, the size is pretty good, since if it were smaller it would look a little ridiculous considering its location.

The lessons I've learned from this project are: keep things more simple and try to remember that tank tops and boobs equal stretching. BUT I don't hate it as much as I thought I would, which is fantastic.

As for my next project, I'm still not 100% confident to try the dress mod so I'm instead going to try using the button-hole feature on Ethel and modify a stripey jumper I have into a stripey cardigan.

Early days

After months of deliberation (and saving money) I finally purchased my sewing machine, a Brother XL-2610, which is admittedly a very basic machine. Seeing as how I'd never so much as touched a bobbin before last night, though, that is exactly what I need: simplicity. And now I have threaded a bobbin (thanks in large part to the instructional DVD that came with the machine).

I could, in theory, go into a detailed review of this guy (or you could just go here and see what other people have to say; my personal favourite is the poster who wrote about her "sowing" machine) but let's be honest: I bought this machine because it's got pink bits. The end.

I did some practice stiches, as the DVD suggested:

And then I mended a skirt of mine. Now, the thing about this skirt is, it's really supercute but also has a tendency to be a bit short. So, whenever I stand up, I tug on the back of it to pull it down, for modesty's sake. Since I clearly don't know my own superhuman strength, sometimes I rip the stitching on the gathers. So my first real project was to regather the two gathers I've split in the past (once at Heathrow Airport, which was okay though because I happened to have a safety pin on me and I could close the immodest gap which showed my underpants and once yesterday, after getitng off at Belorusskaya metro station and tugging and then hearing that horrifying "rrrrrrrrrrrip" which caused me to stand on the platform and twist the skirt around my waist to see if I was now a shabbily dressed slut; I wasn't). So I quickly made the gathers again on my machine (mine is on the left, the original is on the right), and all is well again!

My first big project is to take an old skirt I have which I never wear because it's a bit on the long side and use the fabric to make the petals of a tiger lily flower.

After that, I will attach it to a new purple tank top I bought yesterday during Shopping Spree 2010. The plan right now is to attach it by using black thread and sewing in little circles to create the spots of the flower, so the petals aren't completely attached to the top. That will probably change but we'll see.

So, to sum up, this will be a blog I use to mark my progress in sewing. I have four big projects on the horizon (not including the flower one outlined above):
1. making an amazing zipper-pencil-case like Nikki's, which I can't find a picture of on the interweb;

2. sewing a zip in my new giant TopShop bag so I can use it as a fancy-tartan-bag-style carry-on/overnight bag;

3. combining an M&S dress I bought years ago

with a skirt I bought in January so I can actually wear it without feeling like a prostitute;

4. and an apron from the rest of the bits from the skirt.

All I've got are the internet, my machine, and this book which I adore

Time to start on the flower.

PS I don't know how to format this thing so it's a bit weird, I apologize.