McCalls 3006 done, and New Look 6034 muslin

It's been weeks since I've sewed. I wanted to pick up with an easy, guaranteed success, my TNT pj top pattern, McCalls 3006.
I was basically recreating this pj top I made 4 years ago, which has been worn so much, it's pretty much worn out:


I had thought about daisies:


but went with roses instead:









I like to wear pj tops with a t-shirt underneath. The turquoise is stash flannel; the rose trim was from Joann's clearance; it came up 10 cents a yard!

I used the feather stitch for the hem.


Then I made a muslin of New Look 6034, view E:

Look at how close the leggings are to the model's body.
I went with the 18 because it matched what I thought were my hip measurements.
They came out looking like carrot pants:

I measured my hips and will make the 16 next time as the 16 more closely matches my hip size, as it turns out.

Here's a closeup of the rouching on the pant legs:

And I decided, after 23 years of sewing, it's time to try the "cut-on waistband with topstitching" technique as it securely sews the waistband down (unlike the casing/stitch in the ditch method which still sometimes results in waistband flippage). Someone recently had a tutorial on her blog about how to do this; I thought I remembered who it was but I was wrong. So I used the directions in the Singer Complete Photo Guide to Sewing book instead.

Lesson learned: You really want the elastic to go to the edge of the fabric when first sewing it on to the fabric, otherwise when you flip it to the inside, you will see the elastic.


So the leggings are too big and too long so I will wear them as sleep pants and possibly take them apart next weekend to cut them down to the 16.

Ok, eating.  I made chicken tacos from Cook This Not That 2011:

I said "made", not "cooked". The chicken is a rotisserie chicken from the supermarket. The salsa verde is from a jar; the tortillas from a package. But the cilantro was fresh chopped and the lime is fresh. It also has feta cheese.

As for the rest of my vacay, I visited my great-aunt; had the worst back flareup since November; saw my chiro; was really, really tempted to buy a dress in a store (something I haven't done for years) but ultimately decided not to because I felt it wasn't well made; went walking a lot; had my ab/kidney get better, then worse, then stabilize; have some new problem with the pad of my foot/middle toe feeling weird/numb which comes and goes; slept for 7 blissful continuous hours two nights in a row, then reverted back to waking up once a night; had a really bad headache; but as you know I sewed finally and that was great!

It's back to work tmw; good night!