auxetically

I decided a few weeks ago I had complained about fabric scraps for long enough, so I got to work. First, I ordered some Insul-Bright from Amazon.

Then, I practiced last weekend before the DnD game, and I made a mitten:


This turned out somewhat OK (you will be able to tell this hasn't been pressed at all though), so I decided to go a step further and make a trivet.


Here's a tutorial for how to make it!

Items needed:

1 x 25cm x 25cm rectangle of insulated batting2 x 25cm x 25cm fabric; I used scraps I had left overthreadpinsbias tapea 5cm tape

Method:

Step 1: Sandwich the batting between the two fabric pieces
Step 2: Pin

Step 3: Quilt. Now, a note about quilting: I found it extremely difficult to quilt. The problem was that even with an even feed foot the bottom fabric would gather. I had to unpick a lot to get to something that looked ok, and the way I ultimately did it was by pulling very tightly on each side of the sewing foot. In any case, it's difficult. Maybe I'm mis…

In my attempt to crack down on remnants, I decided to do something with the left overs from the Hippie Shirt. You see, the Hippie Shirt was supposed to be a shirt dress based on the M6035, but in the end I decided I like to have options when wearing this stuff so kept it in a shirt-only form. This gave me roughly 0.5, maybe 0.6m of fabric to play with - and what better way to use it than my modified Meringue pattern? As an aside, I had no idea that I could get the skirt done in so little fabric :)



I didn't actually have enough fabric for the full length, so I decided to add a white band at the bottom. The waistband is also only have in fashion fabric (you're supposed to cut 2xfront, 2xback, but I did two by two in fashion & white fabric). I added three other bands besides this: one white one between waistband and skirt, and two between skirt and bottom white band.



My modified pattern was a bit long last time, and this time I split it at the end of the flowery fabric, and t…

I don't follow fashion too much. Luckily, I find that the interesting things tend to break through the sewing blog barrier and I get to read them anyway.

Yesterday, I was looking at the BBC News picture of the day post when I came across an image from a Haute Couture show that reminded me of my World of Warcraft days, so I just had to put these two images together:



What do you think, are they similar or am I imagining things?

The Haute Couture show was by Giambattista Valli. The WoW image shows a night elf druid in Cenarion shoulder armour (circa 2005).

One thing I do want to do in the near future is keep going with making things from the fabric I have. I don't really have a stash problem, but at the same time I like to make things with the fabric I bought.

From the same fabric as the hippie shirt I have just enough to make most of a Meringue skirt (non scalloped of course!). I will use some white fabric as contrast for bits that don't quite fit in the fabric I do have left. I cut the flowery fabric today - no leftovers! I also put the white fabric in the washing pile, along with the left overs from the white silk I used for my pijama make, which I will use as lining for the skirt.

Even if I do not really have a stash problem, I do find that fabric scraps that are left from projects keep adding up. In the flowery fabric case it was easy enough to fix, because I had enough to make a real garment, but this is not always the case. I bought some Insul-Bright to have on hand in case I ever decide to make an oven glove or something…

OK it's not really hippie, as Mr T keeps insisting.:) But I like to call it that.

It seems ages since I last posted, probably because it has been ages now. Almost 2 weeks I'd say. In the meanwhile I went to France, got a very short haircut, managed to work a whole Sunday and not sew anything. I made this shirt shortly after my last post.


This is, once again, B6035. It's a very good pattern, although princess seams are still difficult to sew. The ease is great though!

I mentioned in my last post that I don't like the peplum on the previous version of the shirt and that I will do something about it. Alas, no peplum appeared on this version, but I did make several alterations.

Sleeves: I still used the puffy sleeves (too lazy to trace and cut the other versions), but rather than gather at the sleeve insertion point, I made a small inverted pleat. This works well and it is also easier to iron. I also used a 3/8 seam allowance on the sleeve band, rather than a 5/8: the prev…