Thursday, September 5, 2013

Sewing and Altering

Last summer I made McCalls 6559
 
which fit me for about a week.  After that, I gave it my niece to wear.  This summer she returned it - she was "over stripes".  I looked at it and thought, all it needs is about 4 extra inches in the side seam for it to fit me without standing straight and sucking it in  - which you know only happens for about 3 seconds in front of a mirror.  So I cut off the bottom to make it shorter and inserted a godet in one sideseam with the fabric that I eliminated.  I now have a new summer dress to wear to Kauai in a few weeks. You can see the godet on the right side of the photo. (For some reason I was having static issues at the hem.)  Here's the front and back view.


My sewing has been a bit slow the past couple of weeks.  My mom fell and broke her hip, so I've been going back and forth to the hospital everyday to cheer her on in her rehab and to just make sure she is being taken care of.  (Only after her blood pressure kept going up, did I realize they were not giving her her blood pressure meds (I gave them her prescription list of meds when she was admitted - didn't think I needed to check their list), and then it took 2 days to get the doc to put it back on their list, but that's another rant.) My mom gets to go home saturday where I will spend another couple of days with her and my dad to get her situated and comfortable walking with her temporary walker at home).  I think I will bring some fabric and patterns to cut out while I'm there.

I also managed to make the Sewing Workshop's  West End Top which I think is more like a jacket/hoodie.
I used a ponte knit which seems to be perfect for this jacket.  The front of the jacket is unfinished which I am not crazy about.
The band goes to the forward side seams and the hem on the front is unfinished.  I continued the top stitching through this unfinished area to the zip.  (I see I have a thread to trim.)
But I do think it is a cute jacket/hoodie that is very loose fitting. 



The Sewing Workshop patterns have some nice instructions.  I made a S/M.