I've been busy and I finished some things

On the sewing front, I was asked to make a wrap skirt from an elastic waist skirt. Also it needed to be a little shorter. The purple skirt was the example. I removed the waistband from the brown skirt and took out the elastic. I cut the skirt and lining down one side and finished the edges. The lining was sewn to the edge to keep it in place. The remaining skirt was stitched to its lining a couple of inches from the top and the excess cut off. This fabric made the new waistband. As an after thought, I should have gathered it slightly to better fit the customer's hips. Ties were made from the original waistband and a buttonhole was made at a 45 degree angle for ease in wrapping.

I finally finished my black shawl. I still need to write the pattern. The yarn is Aussi sock, 2 1/2 skeins. Needles are US #6/4.0 mm. I delivered it to the yarn company at the trade show Sunday, only a couple of days late. It's a trapezoid shape worked form the long edge to the short. The edging is worked sideways picking up from the edge in a defined manner. Fancy photos will be taken later this week and inserted in the pattern.

I've been working on a pair of socks since early May, or not working, because of the shawl and sewing deadlines. This is how far I am now. They are for a May 19 birthday. He'll get them when they're finished. Yarn is Zitron Trekking Pro Natura in a denim color. Needles are Knit Picks Harmony US# 1.5/2.5 mm. The pattern is vintage, adapted to the target foot. I didn't knit 10 1/2" legs.

I went to TNNA on Sunday, met lots of people, saw lots of things, got some ideas for new projects. I only came home with one book this year. I'll write about that soon.

Skirts are finished

The Spanish skirts are finished. Skirt #3 took almost 1000 inches of ruffle fabric, edged on both sides. That's 27.5 yards of fabric run through the rolled hem foot. The customer is very happy! Part of the reason for the yardage amount is that the fabric was thinner, so the gathering foot gathered it tighter. The dress form does lean, the result of a fall a long time ago.

I finished my green socks Sunday night. I've been writing about skirts instead of socks. The pattern was interesting. I like entrelac as a technique, but I don't think I'd knit these again. They are too fiddley.

I keep knitting the shawl. Black lace forever.

Today I got a box of sock yarn from Plymouth yarns. I need to contact them to see what they have in mind.

Another day, another skirt

I'm actually sewing three skirts, but the last one isn't as interesting, so I'll probably just show a finished picture. This is skirt #2, which I'm to copy and make in her size.

I use paper table cloth for many of my patterns. I was looking for plain paper, but could get a roll of this and it actually has 1" squares. This is the pattern piece for all the skirts. The yellow sticky note has ruffle information, as in how wide,and how long, so I know how many pieces to cut for a straight ruffle. The third skirt has two straight fabric ruffles. Originally the skirt top was too wide, so I altered the pattern. The skirts are all 8 gores. Today's skirt is shorter, so I just folded out the top part.

The stripes are cotton hem facing. I tried sewing the stripe to the edge of the hem and turning it up to the outside. It had too much sizing to ease in nicely, but I left it the way it was. The upper stripe is edge stitched to the skirt at the top, leaving the bottom edge loose. A line of stitching keeps the fold folded. I attached that after the inside ruffle.

You can see a little of the skirt in this picture. Under the paper are 16 pieces of ruffle fabric. Each edge is 48". That's 768 inches of ruffle edge or over 21 yards. All pieces were sewn together, seams serged, edges serged, turned once, and stitched. I flipped the ruffle back so you can see the edge. I misfigured the inner circle, so I gathered a little in attaching. The original had the same problem. Each skirt section had two ruffle sections. I could have just sewn the ruffle on and cut off the extra as I did on skirt #1.

Copy complete and shown with the original.

I have been doing a little knitting, but I'll show that tomorrow. Mostly I've been shawl knitting and there isn't much to show.

Skirts for Spanish dancing

The last few days I've been sewing dance skirts for a customer. Skirt #1 needed red fabric added under the ruffle for a fake petticoat. She also needed some bloomers.

She needed three skirts made. The floral skirt is like the black one, but 2" shorter and only one ruffle. By the way, could you line the ruffle so the other color shows when I dance? Start with an eight gore skirt in the proper size.

Cut yards of ruffle. Edge top edge of ruffle with rolled hem foot.

Close up of rolled hem foot. this is a great tool, but works best on straight edges. I sure have plenty of that here.







Next step is to attach the lining and understitch it so it will stay put.




Next step is to gather the ruffle. A special foot is helpful here too.


By stopping fabric movement behind the foot, the ruffle is fuller.

Here's what the foot looks like.




The ruffle lining was stitched to the ruffle below the gathering line. The edge was serged before attaching.

Next comes attachment. I usually ease the gathers so that the thinner spots thicken up. The finger behind the gathering foot eases up at times to move the fabric and the gathering is loose there.



Sew the ends of the ruffle together and the skirt is finished. The pink will show as she dances. You can see in the flat photo how close tot he edge it is.

Happy prom girl

I spent the after noon of my day off on the prom dress rescue. It was sewn by a friend of the family, who got in over her head. The dress is on the floor, because it didn't show much on a hanger. See the poof of sheer fabric to the side. The back skirt is cut too small at the top on that side. The zipper has a "nice" curve to it. The whole skirt torques like that. No more fabric was available in the right color.

I started with the bust, which was too tight. There was hardly any shaping. The girl is very small, but she does have curves. I let it out where I could and darted it in to fit the skirt seam. That part fit nicely.

See how short the zipper is! (14"). I couldn't match the color quite as well, but came close enough with a 22" zipper, of which I used 20".

The sheer overlay really looked funny. It's crystal organza, which is not the best fabric for a drape, but the girl loved the color. The dress fabric is lining fabric. There is a short skirt under the back for modesty. See the square edges on the train and the under layer of skirt. There are 1/2" seams to edge the organza and the "fashion fabric". UGLY!!!It is gathered into a bunch at the hem. The mother sent me a picture of the skirt they had wanted. There was such a difference!

I removed the skirt and completely took it apart. Most of the torque was in the sewing. I resewed the back and matched it up with the underskirt. The underskirt was wider, but I ignored the extra fabric in the seams, later trimmed and serged. It hung pretty straight on the dress form I used for draping.

Next up was the front. The split is actually in the center of the fabric. I removed all the wide edge stitching, and rounded the bottom edge. As you may be able to see, I used a baby hem. I cut the organza curve to match the lining hem curve. I put it on a dress form and pleated the top, lifting each pleat higher as I reached the edge, so it looked like a steep hill before trimming. There was a lot of organza to cut off the side at the hem. I had tilted the whole piece in the pleating and the seam had a lot of extra organza in a triangle tapering to nothing at the top seam. All the extra I found in the original hem was lifted out in the pleating. Sorry no picture, I was too busy sewing. It now looks nice and there is no fullness at the side. The half belt was in the original picture.

I put the back skirt on the top and put in the new zipper. Side seams were sewn and the front was placed as well as I could. The skirt front is off center because of the miscut of the back skirt. It still wraps to the back. The train looks nice, The side seams hang straight. I rounded the corners of the back and made a smooth transition into the train. I found a dress form that can be made small enough.

I like to leave a dress on the form as it shows to best advantage when the customer walks in. BTW when i got the dress, it had not been pressed, steamed, or anything like that. Delivered to the customer with the seams all wrinkled. I charged for steaming. They were going to take it to the cleaners for pressing, and I bought myself extra time. I'm glad I didn't need it. They got a dress ready to wear.

Prom girl came Friday after school and tried on the dress. It fit beautifully. It looked much like her dream. She couldn't stop crying, she was so happy. Her Dad took a stack of my business cards to give to friends. I could have done more and better with new fabric, but my husband still thinks I'm Wonder Woman. So does this family!

Oh No!!! Not another prom dress

I went to work this morning and found a message on my machine. There was a prom dress disaster. Could I help?
I had heard from the mother a couple of weeks ago. She was uncomfortable with the progress on her daughter's dress, being made by a family friend. She finally decided to let the friend finish the dress.

This really is a disaster! The skirt back is cut off grain and is too narrow. Everything is skewed and one "side" seam is where the back dart should be. The hips and bust are too tight. The dress was delivered unpressed and something funny is happening on the front skirt.

The store has no more fabric of the right color, so I have to work with what we have. I can fix the tight bust without affecting the under bust and waist. I lifted the skirt back until it hung almost straight. That may fix the tight hips. I'll take it apart tomorrow and make the lift permanent, adding a little to the hips. If they send me a picture of the front they wanted, I'll see what I can do. There's a crystal organza overlay that has some issues. I'll leave them if I don't get that picture. The prom is Saturday night. I'm supposed to be off tomorrow, but I'll be in the shop working on this dress.

And then there's the folk dancer who needs a number of skirts for a June 1 dress rehearsal. So far, I've altered one skirt and made a pair of Raggedy Ann type bloomers. She still wants 3 new skirts. I should be able to do 2 of them by late Monday. I hope she doesn't stop in before then, She's lonely, disorganized and a talker. Today, she brought in the fabric for the third skirt. I was sewing wedding veils onto combs, and kept on sewing while she talked. (Another customer sells veils and other wedding accessories). If I had stopped, I might not have time to finish her skirts. It was hand sewing and I explained it was another deadline.

Knitting continues, mostly on the green entrelac socks and the black shawl. I need more yarn for the shawl. I wonder when the yarn co owner will get it to me.

I'll take the camera to the shop tomorrow and get some pictures of the prom dress and dance stuff.

Prom dresses are finished, knitting can resume in earnest

First the prom dresses
First delivered was this purple one, designed by the prom girl and her sister. White piping on all the edges. Crochet cotton makes good filling for piping. It was a challenge to get all the pieces where the girls wanted them. I reinforced the "side seam" with twill tape. Thank goodness it will only get worn once. The back goes all the way down to a whisper train. They brought in a picture, which was modified as we worked. I don't have to like the dress!

Next up is a more modest dress. This was a combination of two RTW photos. I had to change the back a little to match the front she wanted. The dress is bias cut and the skirt is wider in back to give walking room. I'm much happier with this one. I ended up hand sewing the curves and them machine stitching over the hand sewing. In the background is the vest and tie for her date.

The third dress I made this year was made for a friend of the first two girls and had the same design input as the purple dress. We started with a cell phone image, which I insisted needed to be put on paper. The bra is connected in the front by crossed spaghetti ties. She originally wanted the skirt much shorter. No argument here, she just changed her mind when she put the dress on. The front hem is piped with dishcloth cotton inside. We had discussions about the train. I originally misunderstood what she had meant. This was a compromise. The train was too heavy to attach at the top of the skirt. No structure to hold the weight and that wasn't what she wanted anyway. The bow was a late addition. I hope she didn't get it tied too tightly. That distorts the upper skirt part. It is kind of cute as shown.

Knitting
I've been working on the shawl. All that sewing cut into knitting time, but it's coming along. The pattern will be easy to write, only two main charts. I don't know what's hiding in the computer right now as far as the charts go. The main lace pattern I'm working from needs a little tweaking. I charted the border lace and the corners with pencil and graph paper. that actually will be three small charts.

My April socks, which should be finished by May 30 to be eligible for prizes, probably won't be. Knitting time has been almost non-existent. I've wanted to make this pattern for a while, but it isn't a fast knit. I actually have one sock finished and am past the toe on the second. They're toe up, so that means I still have most of a sock to knit. The pattern is from a German designer who i recently discovered.

My May socks are going to be a late birthday present for a son-in-law. This pattern is vintage. It's a faster knit, but lowest in priority.

Our family get together was on Sunday. A daughter hosted and a great time was had by all. Today is a lazy day. I'm still trying to recover from all the late hours put into those dresses. If I do it again next year. I'll start late nights once a week or se as soon as I get the order and deposit.

In case anyone cares, my phone problems resulted in a phone exchange. The new computer is working well, with a couple of problems still. Life is fairly good.