Widgets

Trying to get the Pattern Review widget on my blog and completely failing. Grrr.

Widgets

I'm trying to add a widget to this blog, but not having much success here.

Widget

Vogue and Butterick

Seriously fell of the pattern wagon. Vogue and Butterick are having a sale on their website, so I had to get some. I hadn't bought a bunch of patterns for probably a year or so. I guess it was time. Got mostly blouse and top patterns with a couple of wardrobe patterns. Designs are starting to look good again. For quite a while everything has looked like big squares sewn together. Not much shape or design in them. Not a good look on anyone.

Stash

I haven't posted for a year. Argh. My sewing has been sadly lacking lately. The projects that I have worked on have not turned very well. The problem here is working with cheap fabric. I experimented with a raglan sleeve tshirt and the knit was too flabby. It looked like a first project gone awry. This was using a sweater knit remnant purchased from a well known (in the sewing world) estore that supposedly sells fairly nice product. Well, not this one. The knit pilled and pulled and was generally a mess. So into the round bin it went.

My next knit top was better because it was a much more stable knit. I'm not sure it's really a knit because it ravels badly. The top will get worn as long as it lasts.

Back to raglans. I'm trying to draft a raglan top from my PMB top because their raglan is atrocious IMHO. It's definitely a learning curve. I also have a couple pieces of knit that need to leave the stash because I will never use them.
They're too flabby and have no recovery or body to them.

URL for tops

http://picasaweb.google.com/mastdenman/February2010#

Wild Ginger knit tops

I uploaded pictures of a couple of knit tops drafted with PMB. The first is a cotton poly knit three quarter length sleeve top, tunic length. The bust dart is rotated into the shoulder. If I make another one of these I will move the shoulder seam towards the front because the gathered dart has a tendency to slide off the shoulder. If you cut off an inch or two and tape it to the back shoulder, that problem is eliminated.

The second top is a design from PMB too. I was in Mitsua Marketplace looking at Japanese patternbooks. This one was in either Mrs. Stylebook or Lady Boutique. Since this was the only style that appealed, I made some notes into my cell phone and took them home. This is a tunic length top with a flared side seam, cap sleeves, bust dart rotated into the neck line. Then you get rid of the bumps in the neckline caused by the dart fold and add an inch onto the center front and center back. The center back is gathered in and sewn in place under the self fabric edging. The front bust darts and extra fabric is gathered by sewing beads into the neckline with the fullness pulled around the beads. It looks quite a bit like the magazine, except for the side seam bottom. It is supposed to have the pointed ends hanging down on the side, but I didn't get them long enough and probably should have curved them down.