Project of the Week - McCall's 7118

Fourth of July weekend was a great shopping haul for me! Apparel fabric 50% off at JoAnn's and McCall patterns on sale for $1.40 each, plus the time to drive to a second, better JoAnn's yielded a great haul and the set up for some projects I'm super excited about!

As soon as I saw that bolt of blue water, pink flamingos, and green palm trees, I knew I had to make a vacation dress. A breezy sundress with super cute crossing straps would be perfect for Galveston. Hence, McCall's M7118, view B!

But boy was this dress a doozy. Here's what went down...

I know my self-taken measurements aren't accurate, so I decided I'd trace a size 10 and cut a muslin. The muslin flew together in 45 minutes, but I didn't like how tight the skirt portion of the dress fit. I weighed two options: retrace a 12 or retrace a blended 10 on top and 12 on bottom. Not confident in my abilities to mix two sizes, I just retraced a size 12 pattern and then set to work cutting it out. 

And that's where the fun began. For some bizarre reason, the back piece isn't cut on the fold. No. You get to cut the back pieces out separately. For fabric with a nap like the flamingo/flower/tree pattern, this quickly became a problem. See, the pattern on the fabric repeats... but it's got a really wide spread between repeats. I cut out one back piece to use to find the place to cut the second. Which ended up being, like, the middle of my fabric. Since this was such terrible placement, I wanted to lay out the rest of the pieces to make sure I would be able to fit everything.

Determined, I started cutting out the other pieces, being careful to not cut into my very precisely placed back piece. Two pieces in, the unthinkable happened. I cut a chunk out of the bottom corner of the back of my dress. I had to walk away. 

I finally got the rest of the fabric cut out the next day and started sewing the day after. The sewing went pretty quickly. I did have a couple of hiccups sewing the front facing on, because I didn't pull the straps out of the way and sewed them into a weird place. A few minutes with my trusty seam ripper and I was good to go. 

And then there were the side seams... According to the pattern, the front and back facings are supposed to line up at the side seams and you sew from the facing and down. The end result is that everything folds up nicely on the inside of the dress. That was not my end result. I took out some stitches and tried again, but gave up.



After trying the "finished" dress on, I realized that it was HUGE on top and just fine on the bottom. I shortened the straps (which was possibly the easiest part of this whole dress debacle). I did not finish my side seams, and due to the chunk I cut out of the bottom of the hem, I had to do a faced hem with commercial bias tape to preserve some of the dress' length. You can see a little bit of the raw edge at the hem in that cut spot, but I'm so done worrying about it.

I wore this dress to dinner on our trip, and it's currently in the back of my closet. Where it'll stay.

Project Costs:

Raw Materials Cost	$   15.68
Sewing Time Cost	$   68.97
Total Cost	$   84.65

Looking forward to my next projects!

Project of the Week - Simplicity 1810

Emboldened by my success in creating my first wearable blouse, I turned next to creating a wearable dress. Like a shirt, but longer! Huzzah! And hence, Project of the Week: Simplicity 1810

I made view B, size S with a lovely, navy (almost black) and cream floral linen blend. Overall, I love this dress because it is my first publicly-wearable dress (and by extension my first publicly-wearable outfit). Also, it's ridiculously comfortable because it's a sack with a built in belt. And it's a fantastic length. That's my problem with commercial dresses, they're always two inches too short and I feel like I'm going to flash everyone and their mother when I move.

Interesting design elements include:
- little yoke piece in the shoulder strap
- ties are built in to the back dart
- little pleats on shoulder

 


A few firsts for me with this dress:
1. Making pleats. There's pleats in the shoulder which are adorable, but for some reason I had trouble figuring out what the instructions were asking (I know that's silly - just match up the lines and sew.... but for some reason I psyched myself out).
2. Applying a facing. I'm gonna jump on the I-hate-facings bandwagon. They're floppy, flappy, annoying. I should tack them down to the side seams, but I haven't done that yet.
3. Applying commercial bias tape. I'd watched a TON of tutorials for bias tape when I was making Simplicity 1589, but I hadn't used any yet. It went fairly well until I added it to the last armhole. Unfortunately, I grabbed a bit of the facing when I was sewing, and it pulled the shoulder a little. It just leaves the shoulder with a bubbled appearance rather than lying flat. Boo.
4. Used my rolled hem foot. YAY ROLLED HEMS.

All in all, I'm pleased with the outcome. I wore it out to get groceries and buy more patterns at JoAnn's (Butterick was on sale!). At JoAnn's I had a lovely conversation with a lady about the sergers that were on sale. She asked ME (little old me) about my opinion! WHAT?! It was so cool.

Next project is another dress for my family vacation to Galveston!

Project of the Week - Simplicity 1589

This week, I decided to re-attempt a previously failed project. When I say “failed,” I mean not to be worn in public. Ever. But with Attempt #2, I made my first garment I can (and do) wear in public!! Big win! 

The failure of Attempt #1 (view B) was a combination of being super new to sewing (my first attempt at making a blouse), rushing to finish, disastrous sizing, and bad fabric selection. Really, it was my first lesson in my burgeoning “the fabric makes the pattern” mentality. 

With Attempt #2 (view A), I fixed some of those issues. I made this blouse out of a linen/linen blend so the fabric was much easier to work with. I still really love the pattern of Attempt #1′s fabric, but it was a somewhat stretchy woven - if that even makes sense. 

Details are so important (duh), but details take time (of course), and I’m still learning to allow myself that time to get it right. This particular pattern calls for you to make your own “bias tape” (albeit without a bias tape maker… hence the quotey quotes) to finish the neckline and armholes. With Attempt #1, this “bias tape” was a complete failure (poor cutting, poor fabric marking, poor stitching). I was about to forgo cutting the bias tape strips for the second time, but I didn’t have time to go to Joann’s for bias tape for the project. I’m happy to say the bias tape worked just fine this time.

When I made this shirt the first time, I did make a muslin before using the actual fabric - which was good because my “measurements” did not yield the correct size. In fact, according to my measurements, I’m supposed to be a size 14, but I thought that was ridiculous so I made a size 10 muslin. That was too large, so I made the actual garment (both first and second attempts) in a size 8. In conclusion… I either suck at taking my own measurements (which is the most likely conclusion) or pattern sizing isn’t that accurate (which I doubt).

My only complaint (and this could be due to the fabric) is that the front bubbles out, for lack of a better word, and doesn’t drape as nicely over my boobs/front as I would like. Maybe the fabric is too stiff? 

All in all, I’m really pleased with this top. It’s light, it’s airy, I love the fabric. 10/10 would make again!

Time to complete: 6.42 hours
Raw Materials Cost: approx $18.29

Project of the Week - Simplicity 2061

For this project I wanted to tackle two fears: pants and knits. You know what? Neither are all that scary. Kind of a let down, honestly… but in a good way. In fact, these pants were WAY easier than the Simplicity 1589 blouse I attempted in early June. 

I chose view B because I liked the length and the cool leg bands and because it used the knit fabric. The goal was more study pants and less something to wear out like it’s modeled on the pattern envelope. 

Here’s my final project: 

Pardon the dirty mirror. They’re a little big - I haven’t quite gotten the hang of taking my measurements by myself and I haven’t brought myself to asking someone to help me yet. I made these in a size 12, but I think next time I’d make a 10 or maybe even an 8. 

They came together pretty quickly. I did almost sew the two front pieces together instead of a front piece with a back piece, but I got kidnapped to go to dinner before I sewed the seam and when I got back, I realized my mistake and repinned the pieces. 

The insides look a little shabby since I don’t actually have a serger and I was rushing toward the end. My machine was also doing this weird thing where it’d sew the zig-zag stitch just fine most of the time but then would occasionally skip a stitch… I changed the tension, but that didn’t really fix the problem. I think I should have used a stretch needle rather than a ballpoint needle. Oh well. 

Overall, I enjoyed this project. I’m less scared of knits, but ready to finish a project and feel comfortable wearing it in public. Soon!

Hello

I wish I were British because then I could call this blog “Mind the Nap” (like “mind the gap”), but I’m not British so that wouldn’t really make sense. I am, however a medical student. I neither know how to suture (yet) nor own a serger (yet). But the name was catchy.

I decided to learn how to sew in January after watching this John Oliver diatribe about fast fashion stores and the conditions in their factories. While I can’t afford to not shop at places like Old Navy and H&M, I figured I’d be able to make some changes to my wardrobe and how I think about the clothes I wear. All that being said, I definitely just spent a ton of money at the Old Navy sale last week. So there’s not really a social impetus behind my sewing habit.

Since I’ve got the summer (mostly) off, I’ve decided to do a project a week for the rest of the summer. This blog is mostly for me to document my progress and to share with friends (without spamming my FB page).