The middle of Me-Made-May 2015 #mmmay15

Now that we're approaching the end of May, I figured I better get my act together and post my pix for days 13-25 of Me-Made-May 2015 before they pile up too much.

New Look dresses....

• I don't think that brown dress is so pointy in real life--it was sooooo windy that day....that was the best shot of the bunch and my photographer that day had to lend me her sunglasses to use as a headband to control the poof...
• I love the purple with the scarf collar.
• The gray dress with the points is not a favorite of mine--I don't like the skirt.  Am tempted to remove the skirt and make the front just straight without pleating.

Simplicity / New Look / And a PR pattern

• Definitely want to make more of those pants and maybe the top again too
• Love that skirt--you can't see the crosshatch pattern but I just love it
• Love the turquoise New Look dress--I made it in three colors that summer--will wear one of the other colors again soon.

Three pix for one outfit

• It was really cold suddenly last Thursday.  Perfect day to wear my quilted panel dress and my corduroy jacket.  That quilted dress is like wearing armor.

Vogue and McCalls dresses  (and my fabric stash in the middle) + Jalie shrugs

• You would laugh if you could see the rest of that sculpture
• There's most of my fabric stash!
• Love that teal dress and shrug
• I've worn that gray shrug almost every day since I've made it.  or, at least it feels that way.

Gym bonuses

• I really love the day 18 top and skirt combo.  I really want to make a dress out of that stretch lace.
• Day 20 tank:  the underlayer needs to be stretchier so that it is smoother
• Definitely want to make more of each skort, though I would put the dark color on the sides next time instead of the lighter color.

How's it going with your Me-Made-May?  Are you suffering from photo fatigue yet?  Just 6 more days to go (including today!)

Be well!

Back in the saddle: Jalie 3246 in teal sweater knit

I finally sewed again on May 17.  The last time I sewed was on April 21, so it was great to be back at the machine again!!

It was mid-80's this past Sunday and steamy in my sewing room, so why not sew up a sweater knit shrug?


I knew it was going to cool down this week, and ever since I made the Vogue 1351 dress last fall I wanted a matching cardigan / shrug / sweater.

After loving Jalie 3246, and wearing it almost every day, I decided it was a great way to get back in the saddle again.

It's perfect for when you need to add sleeves to an outfit

"Just add sleeves!"

Sleeves completely down



This time I added a ribbon so I can hang the shrug in my gym locker...and also to serve as a second visual cue to wear it right side up! (Yes, the collar is much wider than the back band, but I have worn the gray one upside down, uhmmmmmm....)

Dressform pix:




The only thing I forgot to mention the last time I sewed this up is that it was the first Jalie pattern I traced where the lines were in color!

That's the shawl collar piece above.  The color coding made a BIG difference as far as ease of tracing.  Thanks Jalie for that HUGE improvement!

There's a three day weekend coming up for those of us in the US, and I plan to hit the sewing machine again....how about you, wherever you are?

Be well!!!!

Unintentionally Me-Made-May-ing, Days 1-12

My most editorial photo ever, at the Hedgehog and the Fox outdoor sculpture at Princeton.

I've known about Me-May-Made for a few years now, but have never taken part for various reasons (lack of self-made clothing to carry me through an entire month, lack of time/interest, etc).     I've always felt that May would be the month to do the challenge because I make mainly warmer-weather clothing, as opposed to September when the descent into cold weather starts in NJ.

On May 1 this year, I realized that I happened to be wearing something I made and I happened to be lunching with someone who wouldn't mind taking my picture, and that I happened to have a minute to tweet it and hashtag it with #mmmay15.

Then it kind of went from there.

So here are 8 pictures from Days 1-12.

There were skirts from the same pattern:

I love my New Look 6843 skirts.  I'm also wearing the Jalie 3246 shrug on day 1.

And also dresses from many patterns:

And this dress with the scalloped collar and self covered buttons that was the #SimplicityTweetoftheDay


I have still not vowed anything regarding Me-May-Made 2015.  I've been wearing at least something Me-Made on the weekends, but not taking pictures.   The documentation process has been weekdays thus far.

Impressions:

• This made me dig deep into my closet and re-examine why I'm not wearing certain dresses
• I love that there is a garment from each year spanning 2010-2015 as well as an outlier from 2007.
• I enjoy looking at the #mmmay15 tweets on Twitter.  I'm still not on Instagram but it appears that's the place to be, as most tweets about #mmmay15 are from Instagram.
• It's really hard to take a decent photo in bright sunlight without shadows.
• Flickr does not provide any mechanism for producing photo collages which is disappointing but I have added that suggestion to their suggestion page.
• I've had 5 different photographers (including myself) for these 8 photos and it is always interesting to hear the others opinions!
• The folks @sewsimplicity are enthusiastic re-tweeters.  I've gotten new Twitter followers because of that. Thanks!  Love that enthusiasm!

In other news I had to take a day off  today.  It is gloriously, delightfully beautiful from my current location, writing this in my backyard.  Yay Spring!  

So are you doing #mmmay15? 

Be well!

Jalie 3246: Shrugalicious, in about 2 hours.

If you've ever thought, "I made this sleeveless dress/shirt and need to cover my arms because it's cold outside/in my office but I do not want the added bulk of a bolero/cardigan/waterfall cardigan around my torso/waist/hips and I don't want buttons/snaps/closures and I only want to take 2 hours to make it" then this shrug for you!  Just the arms, ma'am, just the arms...and part of your back.  But not much else.  Which is exactly what I wanted.  Sign me up!

Sleeves pushed up a bit.

It think it's such a flattering shape.

Sleeves completely down.  I cut about an inch and a half off the sleeves before blind hemming.

Dressform pix:


front

The back.  The main thing is before you attach the back band, make sure the back is going straight across.  This is your chance to "level it out" by cutting it straight across before attaching the band.

The wrong side of the sleeve hem.  The sleeves are blind hemmed. Thank you to Leslie In Austin for telling me about blind hemming sweater knits. First I serge the raw edge and press up the hem, then I use the stretch blind hem stitch on my machine.  Then I press again with my Elna Press.

So then it looks like the above on the right side.

Inside out. I only basted the CB seam and used my serger on it and all the rest of the seams. Whee!

I also want to say "Trust in Jalie".  If your fabric is stretchier crosswise compared to lengthwise, then you will want to follow their cutting diagram.  Trust.   (If you do not Trust,  you will not be able to get the sleeves onto your arms if your fabric is not stretchy in both directions, particularly if it is not stretchy at all in one direction.  This will make sense after you've made your muslin not trusting in Jalie.  Ask me how I know.)

I made the size V which was perfect for my gray sweater knit with x crosswise stretch and y lengthwise stretch.  I bought this sweater knit during PR weekend 2014 in Austin.  I'm pretty sure it was from TexStyles.

I've worn this shrug practically every day since I sewed it and also have worn it upside down for a 30 minute stretch of PR weekend, enough to be photographed, sigh.

I will be making this again in many colors!  I had been looking for a gray shrug/cardi/bolero in RTW and could not find one.  Now I have my own.

Fun fact: I made this between 6:30 and 8:30am on Tuesday, April 21, in a mad rush to include it in my PR weekend LA wardrobe.    I had traced it and muslined it the night before.

The skirt is blogged here.
The shirt is RTW.
Be well!