Burda Challenge 2013

A little recap of my Burda Challenge pieces, shall we?

January 01/2012 #110 – I wore this dress a few times on our Caribbean cruise. It’s comfortable and sexy.

 

February 02/2013 #109 – I like this top but I never wear it. It’s too tight to wear alone and I don’t wear many jackets.

 

March 03/2012 #126 – I wore these a lot in the spring. I wore them a bit in the fall too when school started back up. I get compliments every time I wear them. People like the coloring and the seam details.

 

April 04/2011 #122 – I like this top and have worn it several times. The color is a little scary. You really have to be ready for it.

 

May 05/2013 #107 – I love this top and I wore it all the time this summer.

 

June 06/2013 #110 - I plan to wear this dress to a holiday party we have coming up. Fun times with sparkle!!

 

July 07/2011 #110 – This particular dress was a dud in this fabric. But, and this is a big butt (har har), this pattern turned into my favorite dress of all time. It’s amazing what happens when you pair the perfect fabric with a pattern.

Same pattern, different dress! This is my most favorite thing I’ve ever made!

 

August 08-2012 #113 – I love this peplum top. I know that trend is probably here and gone, but I live in Alaska and we live in the past, ya’ll.

 

September 09/2008 #104 – I love this jacket and wear it all the time!

 

October 10/2013 #111 – The weird hip poochies still bother me. I get compliments when I wear it so other people must not be bothered by them!

 

November 11/2013 #105 – Ugh, do we have to go through this one again. To save myself the pain, just read my first post about it. DUD!

 

December 12/2013 #119 – I love this top. I plan to wear it to a few holiday parties this season. Again, fun with sparkle!!!

 

 

 

Some interesting observations:
7/12 are knit,
4/12 are dresses
only 2/12 are bottoms
4/12 are prints (I always think I use prints, so this surprises me)
6/12 are fabrics from the National City Swap Meet
6/12 are patterns from 2013 Burda magazines

 

I’m definitely doing it again this year. I think I will use patterns from 2014 only though. It was fun looking through my back issues of Burda though. I’m thinking of this for January . .

 

or these . . .
 

 

Happy holidays!

Jalie 2911 + 3245 in Merino Wool

 

How freaking cozy is this tunic? I used Jalie’s 2911 upper bodice with Jalie’s 3245 bottom to make it. I’m loving the tunic length tops with leggings and boots look. I’ve made several tops like this lately. This is my favorite. This is made out of merino wool and the fabric is fan-FREAKING-tastic. Oh, obviously we have been getting some snow. I think we are getting about 12” today. I had to take my pictures outside because it is so dark. The sun is coming up at 10:06am and setting at 3:39pm so there isn’t a lot of light. I’m working with what I have, people.

 

Love the booty coverage.

 

Lightened and with flash although with all the snow you can’t see much.

 

The 2911 top is considerable shorter than this and a little boxier. I narrowed it through the waist and followed the 3245 pattern. The length and rounded hem are straight from Jalie 3245.

 

Here’s an inside picture. The color is pretty close here. It might be a tiny bit darker in real life. It’s a thin merino wool that drapes well and has some stretch to it. You can’t really see it well but there is a very subtle herringbone design to the knit.

 

Here’s the inside. It’s a sport material with two faces (you totally can’t trust it! Get it, it’s two-faced? My humor is lame, I know.). The outer face is 100% merino wool and the inside face is antimicrobial 100% polyester. I may have a few bolts in different colors for those of you who are interested. I’ll set up my ETSY store with some goodies right after Christmas. I have some delish wool doubleknit too. Divine, I tell you!

 

Here’s the inside of the knit. It’s had to photograph inside with low light.

Happy, happy holidays to you people! Things are busy here! Hardly any time for sewing!!

Tis the Season

All three of my girlie-girls have gone crazy over my pencil case where I store my doodling stuff. As a Christmas gift, I made them each their own pouch, stocked it with fun pens, pencils, and markers, and found nice drawing pads. The drawing pad in the background shows off the famous Hokusai print. I bought the sketch books at Barnes and Noble for $5.99.

 

I will youngest daughter #3 the smaller purple notebook. She is really obsessed with writing out her name and her letters. Her notebook has lines in it. The other two girlies will get blank pages.

 

I used the same pattern as I used on my case. They turned out pretty cute I think. I love the quilting on them.

 

I love the embroidery too.

 

Here’s a size comparison for you guys. Mine is the big one. Notice that the fabric on the smaller ones looks a lot like gray wool? Notice some of it is topstitched? Hmmmm. I got my revenge on that stupid gray skirt, yes, I did. Mwaaaa haaaa haaa.

 

Here’s what I plan to put in the little pouches. Papermate should be sponsoring my buying habits.

 

I love these thick mechanical pencils. They are 1.3mm and are easy to use when I am doodling and sketching. The kids love them because they are really unbreakable.

 

I love these pens in general.

 

And these Inkjoy pens writes smooth and they come in vibrant, fun colors.

 

I think all the girls will love them. I’ll let you know.

December Burda Challenge–12/2013 #119

Slouchy, cowl-neck, giant-armed, sparkly knit top? Check. I gotta say, is a fun top. I do have to admit that Burda had me worried though. It says that the top, “helped by the generous cut and the small pleats at the shoulders, beautifully caresses the décolleté.” Burda is notorious for belly-button scratching, low-front tops. This one, surprising, isn’t bad at all. I do have a cami on but you can’t even see it. One change I made is to grade it a size smaller than normal. Instead of grading down to a 34 (the smallest size of this pattern is a 36), I went down one more size. I thought it looked very loose on the models and figured knocking the size down would fix the potential low-front issue. This fabric is from the National City Swap Meet. It’s a thin black sweater knit with metallic threads running through it.

 

You can see the arms are set in very low. It has an elastic waist band sewn into a casing. The front cowl is very generous. If you have sewn the Vogue 1250 dress, you know there are small pleats on either side of the cowl which adds to the cowl. This pattern has three small pleats on each side. If you make this top, be sure to use a thin and draping fabric.

 

Here is a pretty mundane back view. However, it’s interesting that the shoulders seem to fit me really well here. And remember, I sized down on this top!

 

Here is the inside. You can see the sleeves are huge! The cowl is interesting inside too. Instead of just stitching it to the shoulder seams, you also sew the inside portion to the sleeve seams. The really makes it so that baby is not flipping out to the front like some cowls are apt to do.

 

Hope everyone had a great holiday weekend. We had a ton of family over and ate until we were stuffed like turkeys.

Long Cleansing Breath

After yesterday, I needed some easy, fun sewing. I decided I needed a pouch for all my writing supplies. I love to sketch and doodle. Don’t think like good sketching. I mostly make glorified stick people. Regardless, I always have random pencils, pens, and markers rattling around. I made a pencil pouch for them.

 

I used this Sweet Verbena tutorial to get sizes. It’s really easy, not even lined, gasp!

 

Mine is a little larger than theirs. I may have a lot pens.

 

The fabric is what’s left from this disaster yesterday. It’s cozy wool and double-layered.

 

I used Urban Threads embroidery all over this thing. I quilted it when I was done with the embroidery.

 

About those sketches . . . see? Nothing special. This is me with my pencil pouch.

 

 

I made this for my daughter. She’s the grumpy one.

 

This is typically what I draw. The little girls go wild with coloring these. I make a LOT of princesses too.

 

I made a whole series for my girlfriend of her being naked in Alaska. These crack me up.

 

The whole fam-damn-ily.

 

Hee hee!

 

Me, with the stupid gray skirt.

 

 

No artist here but it makes me happy. I’ve always been a doodler. Papermate should give me a cut of all their sales. I go through a lot of ink.

November Burda Challenge 11/2013 #105 Skirt

Dud.

 

I’ve had so many of these lately that I’m starting to get discouraged. Is it me? Is it the pattern? Is it my ability to pair the fabric and pattern? Am I distracted? Gah. Whatever. Here’s the nitty gritty.

 

Love the skirt pattern in the magazine.

It’s the one on the right. Yada yada.

 

It looks okay, right?

 

The back looks okay too. It has some weird butt stuff going on, maybe, but not bad.

 

Nice topstitching? Check.

 

Skirt in action? Blech. The skirt is on the bias. I interfaced the back zipper portion. The more I messed with it, the more wonky it got. See the butt-bump? This is the best I could get it. Trust me, I put the zipper in a few times, I added space and took away space, I interfaced more of the back. These pictures are all lighten so you all can see the hideous wrinkles and lumps.

 

This is the best I could get. This is probably tighter than it needs to be at this point. It was, at one point looser, but then my butt just looked saggy. This is like the 5th version of this skirt. Let it out, take it in, let it out a little, take it in a titch. I think the seams that point away from the butt make it look wider too. That’s not where I want visual widening. Of course, I decided to emphasize it with bright white topstitching. Go, me!

 

I don’t know what happened. I’m an experienced sew-ist. I interface things. I staystitch when needed so things don’t stretch out. I am gentle. I know how to put in zippers. Sigh. Again, whatever.

 

Thoughts:
1) The front darts are widely spaced and are almost at my hips means the dart end pops out a little strangely.

2) I think I should have made the back piece on grain here. I think I would have avoided the stretching out and the pulls. I think that’s the main issue with the back. That, and me playing with it (hours of unpicking black thread on dark gray wool, fun!).

3) I started by interfacing just the zipper area plus a few inches. When the area below the zipper was sewn, the entire seam looks wavy like this. By the time it was done, the whole top to bottom was interfaced about 3” in. This helped the bottom immensely but not the area around the zipper.

 

 

 

Water off a duck’s back, right? Fucking ducks.