I made the Jalie 3461 Eleonores (stretch pull on jeans with faux front pockets and faux fly) back in May, in red. Now that the temps have dropped, I wanted to make a pair in stretch velveteen. I went into the stash last weekend, and emerged with this dark midnight blue fabric. Purchased during that brief period of time when I actually labeled my fabric, it's 3 yards from Chic Fabrics, circa Nov 2013, for $3 a yard. This fabric was more on the order of 45" wide, so unlike my Jalies in May, 1.5 yards would not be enough. 3 yards was plenty. I had 3 other velveteen pieces in stash, but two pieces were not stretch and the other piece that was stretch was not long enough to make pants.
I wrote extensively about making the red Jalies in May. All the gory details are in this post. If you are a pear shape and want to make these pants, I highly recommend reading that post (I have a 10" difference between my waist and hips). If you are a rectangle, don't bother. The pants will most likely fit you right out of the envelope with little tweaking.
This shot makes me laugh but there you go--functional back pockets!
Since I already had the curved yoke that I made last time, I forged right ahead. I had to make the waistband 3x to get it just right. My advice to myself for next time is when I try on the pants before putting the waistband on, make sure the fabric of the top of the pants is against my body, all the way around my body...ultimately I did take out a 3/4" pinch from the top at the CB seam grading to nothing where the yoke meets the rest of the pants. When I tried pinching out some of the excess at the side seam, it created a really ugly lumpy effect.
I really should fix the pattern to add more width to the fabric below the knee on the front and subtract an equal amt from the back...but I didn't!
It is really hard to photograph dark fabric. Some of these photos have a filter applied, and some do not.
This fabric does relax a bit during wearing, but it's not overly relaxed.
Back pockets during construction
Faux front pocket during construction.
Above I'm wearing them with my "Muppets" shirt--a Sewaholic Renfrew from a few years back.
So, they were comfy enough that I wore them twice this week and I will enjoy wearing them all winter. It is really nice to wear "complete" me-made outfits and by making pants I have expanded my winter options. I still have a hankering to make the Eleonores in stretch floral, but that is kind of a tall order, especially when I am really picky about florals--I want a small scale floral. (ETA: I want to make them in teal stretch velveteen with excellent recovery too--if I can ever find it).
I really wanted to get a picture of me and my Eleonores in front of this holly bush on campus but I didn't have my tripod and there was no one around to take pix...
The full moon after the gym on Tuesday night.
This was on Thursday. After last winter's freezy bits, I decided to buy a "real" cold weather coat for when it's under 40F, and this totally fit the bill. I look like I'm wearing a comforter, but it is warm and has features that make a difference, like cuffs inside the sleeves to keep the cold air from creeping in and a ginormous hood.
Last night there was snow and ice...which formed these mini-icicles outside.
I brought my hibiscus in a few months back to see if I can coax it to live through the winter. It is dropping its leaves pretty fast, but decided to bloom today, awesome!
One more week til I'm on vacation for 11 days--I can't wait!
I'm going to have a special giveaway starting on Tuesday--please check back then!
Be well!
