>365 Days Later (and a very, very exciting new toy for me!)

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One year ago today Mr. Bug and I, along with a smallish horde of indulgent friends, rose early to finish the final primping, organizing, cleaning and other hair-brained activities necessary to host a backyard wedding. A three-backyard wedding, as two neighbors were kind enough to share their backyards with us. I’d kept myself relatively free of wedding-planning psychosis, although our budget had ballooned and there is certainly some sort of strange wedding-frenzy that takes hold and makes reasonable people able to discern the most expensive cardstock at a glance and at the same time fills one with a certainty that the decision to go with the flimsy cardstock obviously made by child labor out of not-eco-friendly 1,000 year old redwoods will cause the marriage to end disaster.

With a year’s time to give me some perspective, here’s my tips for hosting a garden wedding.

the rehearsal dinner

don’t forget your clipboard

check that the maid of honor’s footwear
coordinates with the mulch

Utilize child labor to keep
the hound under control

Assign a friend to ensure your mother
remains amused for the duration of the rehearsal dinner.
(Note the line of obedient ducklings following me in the background…)

Make sure at least one friend NOT in the
wedding party is present in order
to ensure constant beverage service.

Do not allow anyone to eat until
they have reviewed your 18 page schedule.
Encourage questions, but don’t feel
you need to answer the impertinent ones.
Especially from smirking husbands-to-be.

The giving of gifts is an important part of the rehearsal dinner.
A fancy-pants poker set is a classy choice.

Alternately, bass fishing books from the used book store will do.

Try to refrain from staying up all night for one last hurrah.

Be sure to take time to snuggle with your intended. 
Awesome picture of me, isn’t it?

The day of the wedding

{getting ready}

Enlist friends. Preferably ones with sewing skills.

If you are part of the man-side, impersonate the ratpack in someone’s basement.
Do not remove coats, even if it’s steaming hot.

If you try a last-minute run-for-it,
watch out for paparazzi with giant zoom lenses.

{the ceremony}

Force your most easy going girlfriend
to team up with the basset hound.
(the man is not a groomsman, he’s my very
obliging neighbor/wedding host who
made sure the girls didn’t fall over in their heels)

Talk your soon to be husband into
going for the slimmest cut
custom-made suit available.
Do not attempt to make it yourself.

Talk through the gender politics of wearing a veil
and who will lift it away from your face until all
your friends get a glazed look even hearing the word ‘veil’

It’s true. You’ll probably be grinning like
an idiot in all the pictures, which will make
your double chin disappear and give you
a general good-picture day. It’s some sort
of wedding magic that unfortunately
I have been unable to
replicate for blog-photo-sessions.

{the reception}

Instead of renting furniture,
just drag it out of your house.
Pillage your neighbor’s white picket fence
for good sign-making materials. Force mother
into garage the day before the weekend to
paint said signs. If she doesn’t do it
perfectly, make her do it again.
Do not allow her restroom breaks or water.

Make sure all of your friends wear coordinating colors.
Send them photos from the garden so they do not
pick shades of red that clash with the roses.
Note the absence of children at the reception.
This can be achieved by including the following wording on the RSVP:
Circle number of attendees
1 or 2 Adults
1 or 2 Dogs
Due to allergies, Cats not permitted.

Utilize country-inspired décor items
to hold the supplies for the open bar.

Since you’re having an open bar, you’ll
need a security detail. 
Engage the gay mafia for the night.

If you are only providing beer and wine,
expect that some will sneak in a bit of the harder stuff.

Also anticipate that some of your guests will be
unable to resist filling up 2 glasses
full of delicious two-buck-chuck at once.

STAY WITH YOUR NEW HUSBAND!! Do not be separated.
This ensures lots of good pictures of
the two of you together.
In the same vein, it might be nice
to sit by your mom at least once.
Otherwise you will end up owing
her for the rest of your life for
not having any wedding day
photos of the two of you together.

Force the wedding party to assume all
responsibility for your unruly hound for the entire reception.

To save money, only serve food that can be
eaten with one’s fingers.
General rule of thumb for ordering cupcakes:
3 cupcakes per guest.
Two extra per dog.

Ask your friends to take lots of pictures
of the crowd and send them to you
as soon as possible.
Seriously, these were the best pictures,
because everything went by in a blur for us.

When the latex gloves come out,
it’s probably time to leave.

When the party crashers show up, definitely leave!

Off we go!

Happy anniversary, papabear!

{too much for you platypis?}

As a palette cleanser for my completely off-topic post… check out what I got this weekend! It wasn’t exactly an anniversary gift, perhaps more of a anniversary celebratory gift. I was complicit in its purchase.

Look at this awesomeness – it opens all the way up! It’s SUPER easy to thread! On it’s first night home with us I finished a TON of scarves I’ve had in my to-do pile and I finished a dress! Yay! A serger!

It’s a H Class 200S by Husqvarna Viking, the most basic model they offer. It does 2, 3 and 4 thread serging and has some features I love! You’ll be seeing lots more of it, I’m sure!

>(bi)weekly what I’m wearing–Me Made June edition. And vote on what I should blog about!

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Morning Wiener Schnitzels! I have to admit that June has been a poor month for me, blog-wise. Take my present-making activities (quilts and baby gear) – totally off-topic for the blog AND, especially in the case of the quilt, not very blog-worthy as progress is infinitesimal compared to regular garment sewing… add in my catch up on making sale goods for the shop and top off with an overgrown garden calling my name and FINALLY semi-cooperative weather and what you have is a pretty half-As**#D sewing blog! Although, I bet my MOM has been enjoying posts, as I’m working on projects more up her alley! Although, funny mom story – the day I posted my May dress – the tribal maxi – she called me and ‘ordered’ one. General community announcement (mom) this is a sewing blog, not a shopping catalog!! Tee-hee.

Ah well, there’s an end in sight. The baby gear is in the mail, the wedding is next weekend so one way or the other, quilt updates are nearly done and I’ve entered into a weird obsession with the Claire Cami dress. Indeed, I cannot make just one.

While this blog has been off-track and odd, posting to my daily outfit (snugbug365) had come to a screeching halt! This is sort of amusing, as it’s ALSO Me-Made-June and I’m (sort of) participating! I’ve been feeling pretty guilty over the complete lack of posts – not only are the two regular followers of that blog left with a gaping hole in their hearts, but I just hate not keeping up with something I’ve assigned myself to do! I DID keep notes and yesterday finally threw on all the outfits (eight days worth!!!) and did a bunch of catch-up photos. My daily outfits are now (nearly) documented – I couldn’t remember what I wore on the 7th of June – and the Me Made June Flickr pool has been updated. Here’s the month so far…

I’ve found the warm-weather me-made month to be more difficult than anticipated! I’ve always slogged through the other months (September, May, March) thinking that it’d be a CINCH in the summer as I make so many dresses!! Turns out I may make a lot of dresses, but when the weather gets hot, I live in store-bought camis and some variety of shorts (see the outfit from the 8th…) Both are items that I have little interest in sewing as I view them as 100% utility clothing that I can buy cheap and would be bored making. I’d rather make 18 versions of the Claire Cami dress, after all! Also, at this time of year I spend a lot of time in the garden on my knees, hind end waving about in the air… not totally skirt-appropriate (I DID garden in the outfit on the 16th. It wasn’t horrible.) When I’m not digging in the dirt, this is serious Lucy walking season and I don’t love walking Lucy in a skirt in the hot, humid weather. First, it’s uncomfortable to walk a few miles without wearing bike shorts or something like that under my skirt. And I don’t own any bike shorts. Second, I wear my birthday-sneaks on Lucy walks and while I love the look of a flippy skirt and a pair of Chucks, I’m not sold on the skirt and the Nikes… So while I HAVE been putting on ‘real clothes’ for part of the day, I also spend a lot of the day in camis, shorts and my McGyvered crops!

I really love how these me-made months help me analyze what I’m wearing and why!

What should we talk about?

OK you delicious breaded veal chops (ewwwwww, actually) I don’t have my normal, accompanying picks of my three favorite posts from blogland… I’m hopelessly behind in my reading blogs. Newsrack (my ipod app) is showing 1776 unread posts. Sigh. In lieu of that, I decided to play with Zoomerang, a poll-building website. It’s time for your voices to be heard… lemme know what you’d like to see more of on the blog! I was constrained to twelve choices, so it’s not the best list in the world. If I missed something, check off the last option and let me know in the comments! You SHOULD be able to choose as many topics as you like and once you click ‘done’ you can see the results from everyone else’s vote! So go forth and vote. Photo ID’s not required…

**Updated 6/19 Hey Guys! This survey was FUN!! I’ll post results soon, but in the meantime, zoomerang only allows 100 responses, so the survey is now closed!**

Online Surveys – Zoomerang.com

>The goldilocks dress (Serendipity Studios #110 Claire Cami dress)

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Greetings panda bears! Today I have a real, live, finished dress to show off! I’ve made another version of the Claire Cami from Serendipity Studios (the same designer behind the book, Sew Serendipity.) I made the first version shirt-length and I like it, but I knew when I finished the first version that the dress-length version would be more up my alley. And here it is!

Yay! Isn’t the fabric fun? It’s a quilt-weight cotton from Joann’s – at least, the main fabric is. The trim at the bottom is from Sewtropolis. The little white, um, things (are those pussy willows?) have just a tinge of blue in them, so I thought a blue ribbon would work well on the waist. I also did most of my topstitching in blue – hard to see in pictures!

I had not intended to have a contrast band at the hem. The skirt pieces have multiple cutting lines for different lengths – tunic, above the knee, knee-length, calf length and above the ankle. I chose the knee-length and only checked the length once by holding up the pattern piece against me. Well, all you pandas know how un-helpful that can be! When I got to the trying-on stage, the skirt was scandalously short! And I think you bears know that I don’t mind short skirts in the least. It was show-off-your-bloomers short. Cheerleader short. Extra steps were necessary unless I wanted to convert this to a naughty Halloween costume. Goldilocks and the three bears, indeed.

I pawed through my stash (actually, my piles of fabric already selected for sample sewing, I owe myself a half yard of this to finish ANOTHER sample now!) and I liked how these two fabrics looked together. The instructions for the bands are very free flowing – no pattern pieces, just ‘cut a length as long as the hem of the skirt’. The actual instructions have you cut the length, double the width you need, fold wrong sides together the long way, then sew on to the outside (right side) of the skirt, which leaves an  unfinished seam on the inside. If I’d been serging that would have been fine, but I was at home, so serger-free.

I really wanted the inside more finished so I sewed one layer of the band to the right side, pressed under the other long edge 1/2”, folded to the inside then I zig-zagged on. It would have looked nicer had I stitched-in-the-ditch, but I wasn’t 100% certain I’d be able to catch the fold on the inside perfectly. Note I went with the gold thread rather than the blue to tone down my zig zags as much as possible! I was also watching a chase scene on Numb3rs (my current netflix streaming obsession) and apparently got overexcited and veered wildly off the seam. See why me and stitching in the ditch don’t mix?

I really like the fit of this dress! It has that sort of retro fitted bodice with full skirt (OK, fit’n’flare. I HATE THAT PHRASE!!) while being a super easy dress to sew and comfy to wear! In fact, I had picked a different pattern for the ‘retro full skirt dress’ class to teach in July, but due to some pattern supply difficulties, I think we are going to sub this dress out for the class. Not a true, vintage full circle skirt style, but a great pattern for beginner sewers who want a fuller skirt-style frock.

Since I was working without a serger, the inside finishing took a bit of extra effort. I used a mix of bias tape, french seams and the afore-described method of attaching the contrast band. I do love me a nicely finished inside.

I bound the edges of the facings with some bias tape I had on hand. I was planning on doing the sew-the-interfacing-to-the-right-side-turn-and-fuse trick, but I wanted some fun contrast on the inside so I went with the bias tape.

I attached the bias tape the lazy way. I tucked the facings into the fold (it was double fold bias tape), making sure the longer side of the bias tape was to the back. Then I sewed everything together at once by ‘stitching in the ditch’ using a decorative stitch – both to make sure I caught everything AND to cover up my sloppy stitching-in-the-ditch techniques!

I love that the neckline and arm facings are separate! Sure, it’s a bit more bulk in the shoulder area, but I HATE sewing one-piece facings onto sleeveless dresses. I have yet to find a way to do it that looks nice and while not requiring copious amounts of hand stitching.

The ribbon casing is attached to the bodice first, sandwiching the bodice between the two casing layers and leaving a nice finished seam, but the skirt is attached by stitching the bodice/casing piece and the skirt right sides together which would have left an unfinished seam on the inside. Again, fine if I was serging but I wanted to avoid to I attached using a french seam. Wrong sides together, trim, press, turn to right sides together, press and stitch again. It looks nice, but was a bit annoying to do since the skirt is gathered at the top which made it tricky to sew the more shallow seams required for a french seam.

A close up of the waist casing – the french seam is on the bottom. You’ll notice a lot of lines of stitching. Kay Whitt (the designer) includes LOTS of edgestitching and topstitching in her patterns. This really gives a nice finish and helps whip the quilt-weight-cottons into shape!

Another picture! I wore it to work the other day. Cute, isn’t it?? A double plus of the fabric I picked is that with some tights and boots this’ll make a great dress into the fall. The colors are very fall-like, no?

Alright you pandas! Off to your bamboo snacks. I’ve got coffee to drink.

>Makin’ pincushions…

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Morning spectacle bears! My long drought of blog fodder continues. Yesterday’s main project was assembling pincushions to put in the shop for consignment. This time around I snapped some photos for more super-fast-pic-torials. Here’s the new batch!

Filling up the cushions!

In this batch I made some regular old tufted tomatoes and a few apple and pear shaped cushions. They all start out the same way. Cut the fabric, interface and stitch. One tip for assembling the cushions: first sew together each half, then sew the halves together leaving a space to insert the filling. It’s the best way to match the points.

I like to use walnut shells for the main filling. This is a bedding material for lizards (or something) and available in the super-creepy part of PetSmart. It’s heavy enough to give the cushions some nice heft and cleaner than sand. I know a lot of people mention emery powder as the ideal filling for the cushion to help sharpen the needles and pins, but after researching it seems that the whole emery thing is a relic from the past. Today’s needles and pins do not need the constant sharpening as they are made from higher-grade materials that are fine with any old filling. Plus, emery powder is hard to find and pricey. Each of these cushions takes between two and three cups of walnut shells. I top off each cushion with some regular poly batting (and occasionally wool felt scraps). The batting allows me to get the cushions VERY full, and it acts as a sort of ‘plug’, keeping the free-flowing walnut shells from spilling back out of the cushion.

For the rest of the filling up process, here’s my mini tutorial.

Here are my cushions, all filled and stitched.

Trims and stems

Once all of my cushions are filled, they’re ready for trimming! This is my favorite part – I get to paw through my stash of buttons, yarn and felt. I love wool felt – it feels nice an beefy and the colors seem more vivid. I buy most of my wool felt (actually a wool/rayon mix) at Treadle Yard goods in St. Paul. They also carry some nice bamboo/rayon felt that is softer and more flimsy, but comes in great, bright colors. I also use a few flannels and wools for trimming.

Before I can start trimming and tufting the cushions I have one more thing to do – make stems for my fruits. Basically it’s sculpting with wool. Here’s how.

Tufting the fruit

The pears and apples are assembled in the same way. Fill, tuft, attach leaves and stems. Here, I’m working on one of the pears. My favorite pear. Oh, how I love those colors!

Before I start, my #1 tip for tufting and trimming pincushions is to stock up on specialty needles. A 5” doll needle (thin enough to get through the holes on buttons) and a curved needle (normally in the upholstery section) will make the whole process a LOT easier.

OK, now for the pic-torial.

Assembling the tomatoes

The tomato cushions are a bit more involved to assemble, but they’re my favorite to use. In my example I’m using contrasting yarn to tuft the cushion and I used a shank-style button on the top. It’s a bit easier to tighten and secure the yarn if you use the 4-hole style button on the top, but I like the shank-style buttons more, looks-wise.

When putting together a tomato first wrap the decorative yarn, then add the felt and buttons – that way the felt sits over the yarn. Using two buttons on the tomato is key to get a nice, secure tuft and solid cushion. The two buttons act as a sort control on the yarn, adding some tension and helping to secure the yarn before even tying knots!

Here they are…a nice little family of pincushions! It was hard to bring them in to sell –especially that pear! But I already have a pincushion at home that I love. Hopefully they will all find good homes!

Lucky for you bears, my SECONDARY project yesterday was making a sundress. I’m almost done, so lord willin’ and the crik don’t rise, in tomorrow’s post we’ll be getting back to our true love…dresses!! So clean off your specs for the reveal!

>What I’ve been up to. And my new toy: the walking foot.

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Morning chickens! I’m up and bleary eyed, having spent the weekend working, sewing and rooting about in my garden. What with the wedding-quilt project and the procrastination-induced mad gardening frenzy, I’m still low on the blog fodder, but I’ve got a bit for you!

Most exciting for me is my new toy – a walking foot! I was hoping to not have to get one for this quilting project. Mostly because I’m cheap. But my boss, Nikol, she of much quilting expertise, encouraged me to get one and I like to listen to those wiser than I am. Also, Most of my quilt backing is silk and a lot of my quilt strips are silk, so I was anticipating some problems keeping the layers under control. Here it is!

I hope you like the shot framing, including Mr. Bug’s American flag, some fine morning sunshine and a ton of fuzz!!

The Mechanics of a walking foot

OK. Walking feet. Why they exist and why even NON-quilters should get one… Most sewing machines – at least the ones us home sewists are using – draw fabric through and under the presser foot by the action of the feed dogs – those little metal ridged things under the presser feet. I’ve made one of my super-nice drawings with a pink arrow pointing out the feed dogs. They move in a circular motion which grabs onto the fabric and lugs it on through.

Since the feed dogs move and the presser foot doesn’t, the layers of fabric will move under the presser foot at slightly different rates. The layer closest to the feed dogs moves faster, the layer closest to the presser foot moves slower. This can cause wrinkling and bunching, especially when sewing long, straight seams or annoying, slippery fabrics. Most of us compensate for this by swearing and holding the fabric taut, which will ease those wrinkles away.

A walking foot has moving parts that help move the top layer of fabric along at the same rate as the bottom fabric. I’m not 100% sure of the mechanics, but here are the basics. First, this is a foot that has to be attached by a screw – not the nice little push-button action that a lot of feet use. I have a standard Singer machine and my walking foot came from the Viking dealer inside Joann’s – just a regular generic foot.

The action of the foot rather cleverly makes use of the screw that secures the needle – see the metal arm I’ve indicated with the pink arrow below? You just sort of line up the whole contraption with the two screws and tighten (only the screw above, not this one) and you’re set.

It’s sort of hard to take photos to show how the monster works, but I’ve tried. There are two parts – the white plastic part and the metal foot part. Here, the needle is partway down and the plastic parts are pressed into the fabric.

Here the needle is all the way down and the white plastic pieces have moved into an upright position. The plastic pieces move in a circular motion which draws the fabric through in the same way as the metal feed dogs. You can see in this photo how the plastic pieces are ridged to help grab onto the fabric.

Here’s a 10 second clip showing the feed dogs at work. I’ve finally braved the user-side of You Tube, ya’ll. Get ready for endless videos of Lucy playing with socks!

Walking feet for garment sewing

I assume most of you are primarily interested in garment sewing and just putting up with my foray into quilting with slight annoyed bemusement. These walking feet are helpful to all you annoyed hens as well! Since it moves both layers of fabric at the same rate, imagine the possibilities while sewing charmeuse or super-thick fabrics such as boucle! I’m also looking forward to trying it out for my own personal sewing demon – matching plaids and lining up sideseams. No matter how well I pin and sew slowly, I can never quite get those waistband seams to line up perfectly with sides of my skirts and trousers!

As a last note, you may have seen these giant feet for sale in bags with a bunch of other metal bars. Those bars are probably seam guides – attachments you stick in to the side of the feet to nicely sew lots of parallel seams without having to mark them in any way – here’s a picture I swiped from somewhere (I closed the window and can’t find it again!) showing the general idea – see how that little side extension is following along with the already-stitched seamline?? I can’t really think of any non-quilting application unless you were doing a ton of decorative top stitching on something. But it’s nice to know what all those strange bars and pieces are, isn’t it?

Sneak Peeks!

As I said, I’ve been working away on my quilt. So far I’ve finished the pieces and basted – thanks to Ashley, author of excellent quilting blog Film in the Fridge for her inspiration and tutorial on using 505 spray adhesive for making the basting process WAY less painful than the safety pin riddled process I remember. I’ve finished almost half of the quilting – just simple straight lines a bit away from the seamlines. It takes forever!! I’m pretty pleased with the quilt so far – there’s lots of silk, flannel, a bit of wool and leather and even some hand stitchery with silk yarn!!

And I’ve been spending a lot of time with my other love, gardening. Yesterday I finally finished most of the spring rearranging and planting, clean up, patio arranging and Mr. Bug helped with my least favorite gardening task, putting down mulch. I’ve still got a few more veggies to plant today. Here’s a few shots from this morning.

>Quick tip: Pencil skirts and those pesky top of the thigh folds (tilted waist adjustment)…

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Greetings muskrats! I almost skipped posting today – I’m deep into quilt-making and didn’t think all ya’ll would be interested in following down this dark alley… isn’t it weird when your favorite bloggers all of a sudden-like change their focus?? Ho-hum. Not to worry, I will BURY you with quilt pictures when the time is right. Today I thought it’d be nice to at least stick our heads into the garment-making room and say hi. To that point, I’m sharing some BAD photos illustrating a recently discovered trick for getting those pesky pencil skirts to fit better… a tilted waist adjustment (at least, that’s what I’m calling it).

Here’s the problem I’m addressing:

Egad! Those terrible folds under the tummy at the top of the thighs on some skirts. I often have this problem and have tried to compensate by adding more width at the hips, which hasn’t always worked great. I ended up with baggy hips and I STILL had folds highlighting my abdomen and the odd dip at the top of my thighs. Here’s a fix for muskrat shapes like mine.

If you’ve already sewn the skirt together, take it off and unpick the stitches holding the waistband to the skirt front. You can leave the back alone – and if you’re doing a faced waistband you can skip this part (obv).

Cut off a wedge from the skirt front, taking the most from the center front. I know from experience that 1.5” is a good place for me to start on this adjustment. If you’re not sure, you could try pinching out the folds while wearing the skirt to get a sense as to how much extra fabric is there.

Reattach the skirt! I was being lazy, so I just eased the skirt into the waistband. When I trimmed off my wedge that made my skirt front seam slightly longer, so the waistband was a bit too short. I should really have cut a new, slightly longer waistband (which I will work out for future versions of this pattern.) Since this skirt has a waistband that won’t be working with a tucked shirt too often** I figured I could live with a few wrinkles – plus the fabric is 100% wool, so very responsive to steam!!

**seriously, could there BE a worse look for me than the one I’m sporting in this photo? Waistband at the natural waistline with a shirt tucked in? Great Googly Moogly.

Before and after – very effective (for me)! I still have a few wrinkles going on – that’s partially because of how I’m standing, but I probably could have taken off even more in my wedge.

 

That’s it for now muskrat friends! Have a great day, I’ll be obsessively working on my quilt. Almost done – and there’s silk, cotton, wool, leather and embroidery involved. With SILK yarn, you semi-aquatic rodents!

>Classes! June and July… shirts and dresses.

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Hey there cats and kittens! I’m calling it in today… I spent yesterday working in the garden and this morning I’m updating my class page and am just re-posting it here, too. It’s pretty exciting around Sewtropolis this summer – we’re taking a break from our normal mix of classes and we’re devoting each month to a specific garment. June is shirt month and July is the MONTH OF DRESSES! I’m totally excited for July!

Here’s my upcoming class schedule – you’ll see a lot of the usual suspects! If you’re ‘round Minneapolis come join us! And to see the FULL class schedule (these are just classes that I’m teaching!), check out our class page.

Sweet Button Front Blouse

Mondays, June 13th and 20th
6-9 p.m.
$65 + materials (10% discount on materials!)
Skill level: 3/Advanced beginner

Ready to tackle your next project? Why not the Sweet Button Up Blouse? We’ll use Colette Pattern’s new pattern, Violet, to create this darling button-front blouse with a gentle fit and a peter pan collar. We’ll work on version 1, the short sleeved version, during the class. Techniques covered include darts, buttons, buttonholes, gathering and attaching a collar.

Princess Seam Blouse

Tuesday, June 21st
6-9 p.m.
$50 + materials (10% discount on materials!)
Skill level: 3/Advanced beginner

Tasia Pona of Sewaholic patterns has created this beautiful semi-fitted pullover blouse (meaning there is no complicated closures to master) and our very own Patty will walk you through the steps of how to create it. You’ll learn all about princess seams and finishing seams with bias tape.

Full Skirt Dress

Thursdays, July 7th and 14th
6 – 8:30 p.m.
$50 + materials (10% discount on materials!)
Skill Level: 3/Advanced Beginner       

50’s style dresses with full skirts were have been all the rage and make perfect summer sundresses! For this class we’ll use the Monique pattern from Serendipity Studios. Choose to make yours in all one color or mix and match prints for a unique look! The dress has an invisible center back zipper, scooped neckline, a super flattering raised waistline and a full skirt.

 

Pattern Reading Workshop

Saturday, July 9
1-2:30p
$30
Skill level: 2/Beginner

Do patterns look confusing? Not sure which size to choose? Come join us for the Pattern Reading Workshop! We’ll go over different pattern companies, reading a pattern envelope, understanding the markings on the pattern pieces and the instruction sheet. Particular attention will be paid to choosing the correct size and making use of the multi-size pattern lines, with some basic information on adjusting the pattern to get the perfect fit.

Come to the workshop with questions and a pattern you’d like to work on!

Perfect Wrap Dress

Tuesdays, July 12 & 19
6-8:30 p.m.
$65 + materials (10% discount on materials!)
Skill Level: 2/Beginner

Take your sewing skills to the next level with the Crepe wrap dress from Colette Patterns. This sweet dress wraps in the back and is easy enough for advanced beginners and flattering for all body types with its cute vintage vibe, full skirt and scooped neckline. In this class you’ll learn garment construction basics such as working with facings, staying a neckline and sewing darts.

The class will meet for two sessions and some outside sewing time will be necessary.

Maxi Dress

Tuesday, July 26
6 – 9 p.m.
$50 + materials (10% discount on materials!)
Skill Level: 2/Beginner  (woven fabric), 3/Advanced Beginner (knit fabric)     

This summer’s hottest look is the maxi dress and we found the perfect pattern! This super-easy pattern is a perfect next class for those of you have taken Sewing Essentials and are ready for your next project. For more advanced sewers, choose a drapey jersey and learn the basics of sewing a knit garment. The dress is a pull-over style with a deep V neckline, cap sleeves and an empire waist. For an elegant 70’s vibe, go with the full length version and pair it with a pair of wedges and some chunky jewelry. If that’s not your thing, the shorter view B makes for a great casual summer dress or even an easy beach coverup!

Please come to class with your fabric selected and paper pattern pieces cut out. You should be familiar with sewing machine basics to take this class.

Materials: Pattern (Kwik Sew 3856), thread, 2 – 3 3/8 yards of fabric depending on size. All materials are available for purchase at Sewtropolis. Use of our sewing machines, rotary cutters, scissors, mats, and rulers are included for class sessions.

A note on skill levels! We are offering this class as a level 1 and a level 3 class!!

Prerequisites for a level 2 class: Sewing Essentials or equivalent experience. Students taking this as a level 1 class should choose a woven fabric.

Prerequisites for a level 3 class: Level 3 students have taken at least one level 2 class at Sewtropolis or have sewn a few garments from patterns independently. Level 3 students will choose a knit such as jersey or interlock for their garment

No Fuss Knit’n’Cotton Dress

Friday, July 29
6-9 p.m.
$50 + materials (10% discount on materials!)
Skill Level: 3/Advanced Beginner     

The Knit’n’Cotton dress brings together the comfort of a T-shirt and the pulled-together look of a party dress! The close-fitting, scoop neck tank bodice merges with the full cotton skirt and waist tie. Learn the basics of sewing knits as well as putting together a full gathered skirt and head out at the end of the night with a new dress!

Please come to class with your fabric selected and paper pattern pieces cut out. You should be familiar with sewing machine basics to take this class.

Private Lessons

Contact me for information regarding private lessons – pattythesnugbug {at} gmail {dot} com.

PS: some non-sewing pictures…

For those of you interested in my garden… yesterday’s project made me SO HAPPY! We have a paver-patio in our (very small) backyard that’s lined by narrow flower beds. Since there’s always patio furniture in the way, it’s hard to keep up the beds and I’ve been planting veggies in one side so the bed needs tending! I finally rearranged existing plants and added a new barberry shrub and some nice blue fescue. All perennials, low maintenance and my favorite colors! No more struggling to weed and harvest around patio furniture. It looks a bit rumpled as I haven’t mulched and those poor catmints have been smushed by something or other… but here’s the before and after…

Before
{Weeds and lettuce reseeded from last year’s crop. I am SO behind this year!}

After
{Purple and green!}

And now find let’s find the basset hound…

>Babymaking. Burp cloths and ribbon blankets…

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Ha! You bumblebees, that title caught your eye, didn’t it, you nosy parkers! Before we get to today’s project I’d like you to pass on a message to your rose-eating bug friends. I have a bottle of bonide and I’m not afraid to use it. Stay. Away. From. My. Roses. That is all.

OK, down to business. I’ve finished project #1 in my outside-the-comfort-zone gift making bonanza that this June is shaping into. This is for the baby shower coming up in a week or two. Wow! The other day when I asked for suggestions you guys came THROUGH!! I have yet to go back and comment, but thanks for all the great ideas! You guys are all brilliant! After perusing your comments, my inclinations and the interwebs I decided to make a tabbed blanket as suggested by fellow Minneapolis blog-sisters, Two Birds. I liked the idea of playing with ribbon and we have some awesome cuddle fabric (like minki, different company, different name) at the shop. Since I like to overdo everything, once I got going I thought I’d make some coordinating burp cloths from cloth diapers as suggested by Angie – she even linked to a tutorial on her blog Quality Time! The tutorial is beautiful (with very cool packaging ideas!), but unfortunately for me was aimed a little too high for my small brain. There was a tiny assumption that one knew what a burp cloth was. Or what shape cloth diapers are (rectangles, btw.) Her beautiful photos didn’t really show any full length shots and since I’m baby-ignorant, I couldn’t quite figure out what to do. I found a similar tutorial on A Chelsea Morning aimed for the UBER-beginner that filled in the gaps and I was off!

I find taking photographs or large flat things (like quilts, blankets) exceedingly difficult, nevertheless, here’s some pictures!

Seriously, honeybees, looking at those colors makes me feel a bit high!

For those similarly baby-dumb (like me) a tabbed blanket (also found on the googles as ribbon blankets and sensory blankets) are not really blankets. They’re more like toys. They’re sold in sizes from 7” on up – 22” (the size I made) seemed on the large side, I suspect due to the prevailing width of fabric and the ability to make 2 blankets from 2/3 a yard of fabric. Anyway, they tend to be VERY soft on one side (minki) and pretty soft on the other (flannel) with ribbon loops (or some variation) around the edges. Supposedly, the texture of the ribbons is stimulating to babies and they’ll play and chew on them. I suspect the popularity of this blanket has less to do with the baby einstein-like effect on the teeny fingers groping the grosgrain and more to do with our own childlike love of ribbon. I know that’s why I chose the project – how often does one get to mix 11 different ribbons in one project??

And burp cloths? Apparently babies actually exude goo after they eat and for some reason must do it on your shoulder. This seems like some sort of arcane testing ritual hardwired into the baby by the higher powers to see if we REALLY like the little creatures. Nevertheless, burp cloths are slung over the shoulder as a landing spot for the goo. The ones I made utilize cloth diapers which are made out of a material that reminded me of cheesecloth, but much thicker. Very open weave. The middle 5 or 6 inches of the diapers (well, the size I got) is padded somehow. For those interested in doing a project like this, cloth diapers are in the baby section of Target (but not actually with the diapers – more with the tshirts and stuff.) In all honesty, I’m not convinced these are going to be super functional – they’re not that big. The ones I got are about 16.5” x 11” after a wash and dry. I’m not sure how far this post-feeding goo travels, but I figured that they’re absorbent and since babies are messy little things anything absorbent should be handy, right? OK. The Snug Bug’s current installment of babies for dummies is now over.

Alrighty, I snapped some photos along the way and while I won’t do a full-blown tutorial, I’ll do the abbreviated version for both projects! Grab a nice fat flower and settle down for a pollen snack while I share some more euphoria-inducing photos.

First off, I gathered my supplies. Wash and dry all your supplies prior to working on the project. I skipped that with the ribbon, but I use ribbon on a lot of wash-and-dry projects and haven’t noticed any excessive shrinking. You’ll see I have giant rick rack. I didn’t actually use the rick rack, but if I HAD used it, that should definitely be pre-treated for the burp cloths. It shrinks. I wasn’t as concerned about shrinkage on the tabbed blankie – who cares if the loops shrink?

Alright, let’s start out with the tabbed blanket, shall we?

The making of the tabbed blanket

Supplies

• Blanket dimensions: 21” square (finished), 22” square (unfinished)
• Two coordinating fabrics – big enough to make your blanket. I used a Michael Miller turquoise polka dot flannel that I got at Treadle Yard Goods (available online here) and a cuddle fabric in a print from Shannon fabrics from Sewtropolis (available online here)
• Ribbon – I looked at a lot of pictures and some of these blankets looked really, um, weird and wonky to me. Worthy of posting on Regretsy. The ones that I liked had more closely spaced ribbon and the ribbon was all in the same color family or otherwise harmonious (like, all red white and blue.) It also looked better when all the ribbons were around the same width – I didn’t follow that rule, though. To get a blanket with ribbon spaced like mine, plan on spacing the ribbon every 2” along each side. Each of my loops was 5” long. SO for my 22” blanket, I needed 11 different types of ribbon – 20” of each type (5” per side.) Most of my ribbon is the stuff they sell on the roll at Joanns (which I could have gotten MUCH cheaper at Walmart, had I been able to bring myself to shop there…) I also had some orange rick rack and cute ‘yardstick’ twill tape that I’ve been hoarding all winter.

The “pic-torial”

That was fun, wasn’t it?

My main tips for this sort of project are…

• Pin. Lots.
• Square up your fabric when you start. Square it again after the ribbons are basted on. Pin. Lots.
• Arrange ribbons from dark to light.
• Pin. Lots.

OK, let’s move on to the burp cloths.

The making of the burp cloths

Supplies

• Size: mine were a finished size of 16.5” x 11.5” From what I understand, cloth diapers vary greatly in size.
• I made five burp cloths because that’s how many diapers came in the package I got. As I said above, the diapers came from Target – I think it was around $6.99 for my package of five.
• Contrast fabric: you’ll need a strip that’s between five to seven inches wide by the length of the diaper + one inch for seam allowances. Mine were 7” wide by 17.5” long. For most diapers, you could probably get two strips from one fat quarter.
• Ribbon – you’ll need around one yard of ribbon for each cloth. Technically, the length of your diaper + 1” for the seam allowance/fold times two. My diapers were 16.5” long, so I needed 17.5” x 2, for 35” per diaper.
• Thread, of course! I had blue and orange and played with them to up the contrast.

The “Pic-torial”

Tips!

• Again, press and pin. That diaper cloth is sort of a bug-aboo.
• I wrapped the ends of the ribbon around the contrast fabric (but not around the diaper!). The ribbons are centered on the edges of the contrast fabric so that one edge is completely over the contrast fabric and the other edge is just on the diaper.
• Sew the edges of the ribbon covering the contrast fabric first, then the outer edges of the ribbons. Sew the ends last.

 

So there you are, my baby project! It was fun to do something different than my normal baby project of sweater and booties. Although, a customer at the shop told me about a washable cashmere yarn that has me excited for my NEXT baby project!!

If you have any questions on my sketchy how-to pictures, let me know. Otherwise, just enjoy the eyecandy honeybees! And thanks for all your help on this project!

>A surprising conclusion to the drawstring tank… it’s all in the styling. (Kwik Sew 3610)

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Greetings gryphons! As everyone knows, those in the presence of gryphons are unable to tell a falsehood, and so I must admit that I was not 100% certain that I would like one of my recent projects: Kwik Sew 3610, the drawstring tank (AKA the pillowcase dress.) This is a super-simple beginner project that we’re offering as a class at Sewtropolis, and while I LOVE the potential for mixing fabrics, I wasn’t sold on the boxiness of the style or strap situation which didn’t seem to allow for the wearing of proper foundational garments. I have to a bit of surprise at how much I ended up liking the finished shirt!

Of course, part of the shirt-love is all about the fabric -e. Isn’t that the most awesome print in the history of prints (excluding polka-dots, of course!) Alright, moving on.

As I said, this is Kwik Sew 3610, a dress/tunic pattern similar to the pillowcase dresses that seem to be super popular for little girls and their dolls. Here’s a photo from the envelope.

[Kwik Sew 3610]

And in case you’re not up on shabby chic styles for the Amercian Girl doll set, here’s an adorable pillowcase dresses. I’m down with anything with so much potential for pattern mixing and rick rack usage.

[image from Etsy shop Creative Bee]

As you can see, this is pretty much two rectangles sewn together with some sort of casing and drawstring configuration, making it a great beginner project. The Kwik Sew version uses facings to finish the edges and create the drawstring channels. And it has a bow-at-the-shoulder and no-bow instructions.

So, great for beginners – learn about patterns and understitching and go home with a simple summer top. Of course, with the complete lack of shaping and odd strap configuration, leaving no coverage for straps, I really thought it’d look great on someone with a more lean, boyish figure than I possess (meaning, going braless is a viable option!) But when I actually put it ON and snapped a few photos I liked it way more than I anticipated! Even in its right-out-of-the box view! Here it is – untucked, unbelted and sans-sweater. It’s pretty cute after all!

Of course, that’s not my most favorite silhouette in the world. It’s a bit weebelow, after all. And good LORD, someone get me some sunglasses, my blindingly white legs are hurting my eyes!

But what REALLY struck me with the shirt was how well it worked when I tried it out with a few of my regular tricks… tucked, belted and sweatered. Look how nicely it pairs with a high waisted pencil skirt…

That’s a nice summer, look, isn’t it? The skirt gives me a waist, and the shirt has just enough blousiness to make everything look nice and balanced. When I threw a sweater on and fussed with the bow a bit to make a ‘corsage’ sort of look, I was doubly happy!

I’m digging the early 80’s corporate cravat look-meets-stewardess – meets tropicana look. I’d wear this to the office, if my office was something other than the sofa in the living room with a basset hound sleeping on it. I’d probably skip the necklace in real life, though. A bit too much going on in the neck area. Also, my fun grey flatforms are more orthopedic looking than normal in this getup.

Of course, as usual, my favorite version. Belt and short skirt. I tied the bow more towards the back. And, it doesn’t show a lot but with the non-sweater looks, I’d still prefer a strapless bra or one with either clear straps or lacy, bright, meant to be seen straps!

Seeing these pictures really struck me as to how even very simple projects can be made super cute by just adding a few accessories and wearing with the right garments. I’d NEVER try this as a dress. Well, maybe with a cute belt… But this could make an EXCELLENT second project in place of the ubiquitous pajama bottoms or apron and could jump right into a wardrobe!

OK, enough fun for the day. I’m off to the penury of quilting and burp cloths…

The last word – Kwik Sew 3610, drawstring tank

 

fabric: quilt weight cotton (Art Gallery from Sewtropolis)

 

pattern: Kwik Sew 3610

notions: thread, interfacing

time to complete: 30 minutes to cut, 60 minutes to sew, 30 minutes to mess with drawstring, 15 minutes to hem

likelihood to make another?: fairly low – it’s pretty unique! A great style for making a top from one of the super-cute printed cottons out there,though!

curvy girl score – 3. The lack of proper sleeves with coverage for straps PLUS the lack of any shaping make this one a tricky style. Totally cute if you use some adding-a-waistline tricks (belt, tucked) but will still need sweater coverage or special undergarments (strapless, clear straps) to not show off the intimates!

>The May dress… the tribal maxi dress or the Mrs. Roper dress? You decide…

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Morning dragonflies! It’s a late, late post today. I spent the weekend obsessing about quilt strips, obsessively cleaning the house and engaging in various other obsessions that don’t immediately come to mind, but avoiding winged insects such as yourselves was up there on the list.

But it’s Monday and here I am, back at my computer. I FINALLY finished my May dress, wore it to a graduation party, brunch and afternoon lounging and I can report that covering oneself with swaths of cotton and silk voile is actually BETTER than it sounds. And I know it sounds awesome, right? Right. So here’s a picture.

The uber serious expression is due to my using my mind rays to ensure the skirt would flutter properly to just GET THE &*()#&) PICTURE ALREADY!! While I like the dress just fine when it’s sitting calmly and not showing off all the underskirts, it’s really best in motion. And you ALL know how hard it is to get something to flutter appropriately using the self timer, right? This was compounded by my having about 5 feet of floor space in which to move around. So while I include a few photos where I appear to be striding about confidently, feel free to amuse your dragonfly fancies by knowing that a majority of the leg shots were obtained by my awkwardly kicking out my leg, hoping for the perfect amount of arty motion-blur, flashes of pink and yellow, minimized cankles and relatively upright posture. And don’t even ask. The outtakes have already been deleted.

But let’s get down to business, there’s a lot of details to get through here. For the background, this is my May dress, with the bodice loosely based on Burda 7697 (an envelope pattern) and the skirts sort of just cobbled together. Here’s the two previous posts: Inspiration and the bodice muslin & Finishing the bodice and draping the skirt.

More pictures? Ok. First, here’s a few from the front, showing the skirts in different stages of flutter.

And from the back – I made a clever little belt (well, I thought it was clever) out of some completely-not-matching-but-works-ok green and pink iridescent dupioni silk. More on that below.

The skirts. They move.

When I started plotting out my maxi dress I ran into a bit of a conundrum drafting the skirts.

1) I wanted them to be flowy

2) I wanted to avoid a lot of bulk (like with a dirndl skirt*) at the waist and the hips

3) I wanted to be able to move my legs (check out this post from stitchywitch of Green Apples to see the inherent problem with maxi dresses with dirndl skirts!)

3) I wanted to make my own pattern (well, I couldn’t find a pattern that I liked) and am too lazy to draft an actual, long flared skirt piece.

4) Even if #4 didn’t apply, I wanted to use the fabric as efficiently as possible and flared/gored skirts use more fabric with more waste.

5) If if #s 3 AND 4 didn’t apply, I wanted to use the selvages as the hems, so I wanted a straighter skirt to retain the straight hemline

6) Since I was working with sheer, light (um, easily unraveled) fabric, I wanted as few seams as possible with good finishing since they might be visible through the layers.

7) I was working with sheer fabric and wanted to wear the dress without a slip

8) I had started with the main print, which is silk and cotton and lovely. I found the yellow butterfly print that coordinated PEFECTLY, but my legs were angry that the eyeballs would get to look at the pretty silk fabric while while the dress was on my body, but the legs wouldn’t be able to feel it.

9) I was using an elastic casing, so I needed the top of the skirt wide enough to stretch over my bust so I could get the dress on, but with as little gathering as possible, for a more sleek look.

*For those of you that don’t know, a dirndl skirt is a basic rectangle that has been gathered in at the waist. Very, very easy, but not the most sleek or flattering of looks for many of us flying insects.

OK, that’s about it. I was trying to balance the need for movement against the desire for a very simple skirt style for ease of sewing and hemming. Plus mix my funky fabrics AND still get to have silk against my skin! To tackle the fabric mixing and desire for silk (#s 6 and 7), I got some nice hot pink silk/cotton voile to use as a lining. I played with the fabrics and here was my final game plan:

Skirt #1 (the lining) Standard dirndl with a slit for movement, ONE seam, the ‘offset center seam’, slightly offset from the center.

Skirt #2 (the yellow contrast) This skirt was attached to the bodice with an overlap, which took some of the width/gathers out of the waist, but provided for very free movement.

Skirt #3 (main skirt) I used a drapey trick to provide LOTS of movement at the offset center front slit/seam area. Also, I attached at the front by gathering the BODICE into the skirt, so the skirt front was very smooth. There’s still lots of gathers in the back, though. The entire front is left free, only attached at the top to the bodice, so again, lots of freedom for movement!

The mix of skirts worked well! I LOVED wearing the skirt. It has a gypsy vibe, doesn’t it? Mr. Bug called it the egyptian princess dress. No offense to Cleopatra, of course. I think he may have been responding more to the nail-studded flips I wore yesterday, though! Here’s a buncha pictures of the skirt on the move…

Drafting the skirt lining

A bit more detail on the skirts. You can click on any of the illustrations to (hopefully) see them more up close. First, for the pink lining skirt. I started out with a big rectangle of fabric that was about 60” long (from cut edge to cut edge). This fabric was 60” wide, so I cut down to 46” – the length for my skirt. I finished both cut ends with a narrow double folded hem and left the long edge unfinished.

I sewed the finished ends together from the waist to about knee length. I secured with a zigzag set with a length of 0 – I was nervous about this part ripping and it’s mostly hidden under the other skirts.

I pressed the seam allowances to the side. The seam allowances looked like a french seam, since they’d been hemmed prior to sewing together.

As a final step, I stitched the seam allowances to the skirt with a decorative stitch – sort of like doing a flat felled seam. Then I held up to figure out where I wanted to slit to hang on my body – it’s about 5” from my center front. I stretched between two fingers to find the ‘sides’ and cut notches at the two side spots, then ran gather stitches between the notches and sewed to the inside of the bodice so that the inside of the dress was smooth with no seam allowance showing at the waist. Here’s what the top of the slit looks like – see my excessive zigzag anchor stitch there??

Next up, the underskirt

I’d chosen the easiest method for the lining– a simple gathered rectangle. For the underskirt I wanted something with a bit more movement so the lining would show while I was moving. Also, I wanted to ease off on all those gathers at the top of the skirt and I was a bit concerned about the slits tearing. For the underskirt I decided to do an overlap at the top with some pleats to take out a bit more width as well as add to the drapey effect. I also hoped that by bringing in the waist so much I’d cause the hem of the skirt to flare a bit.

I hemmed the cut ends and cut the fabric down to 46” as I did with the lining. I used the selvage as the hem on this skirt as well. I’ve marked below where I placed the pleats (on the right) – I folded out about 6” total with the pleats. I’ve also marked the overlap sections on the skirt piece.

Here’s how the finished skirt looked!

Below is a shot of the actual skirt close to the top edge. I embellished the hemmed ends with the same decorative stitch as I used on the lining for some continuity. I’ll tell you what, this poly chiffon was a BEAR to sew – especially compared to the cotton/silk voile! And don’t get me started on ironing it. I ended up using steam a seam to keep the edges under control while I was hemming.

I found the center in the same way as I had with the lining, marked the side seams and ran gathering stitches along the back. I didn’t need much gathering in the front as I’d removed so much width with the pleats and the overlap. I sewed the underskirt to the RIGHT side of the bodice, so at this point there were NO seam allowances showing on the inside OR outside of the dress – they were sandwiched between. It would have worked better had I sewn the underskirt to the inside of the dress so the lining and underskirt seam allowances were both pointing towards the right side, but luckily I’d cut these skirts slightly too long, so my quick fix (more on that in the next section) when attaching the main skirt helped by shortening the skirts about an inch, although it wasn’t the cleanest finish…

The main skirt – all dangly ends!

The main skirt was definitely the most fussy. The method I used to construct it was new for me AND since it was all going to show, I wanted it to be nice!

First I trimmed the fabric down – I trimmed this a bit shorter – around 44”, because I wanted the other two layers to show AND because the other two skirts had been a bit long. Also, since a lot of the dangly bits in the front would be from the TOP edge of the fabric, I decided to attach the selvage edge to the bodice, so the nicely finished selvage would be shown off. I hemmed the hem and sides with a narrow double fold hem.

I’m not sure if this is clear, but basically, the stars in the illustration below show the points ‘offset center front’ – all of the fabric between the stars was attached to the bodice, the rest was left to hang free. Once I attached the skirt, I cut away the shaded areas and hemmed the raw edges. The points that I cut away were long and dragging on the ground.

Here’s a sketch of how the skirt hangs. See the stars at the top of the skirt. The black hexagons show (roughly) where those cut away corners would be. The shaded area shows the drapey part of the fabric, much of it the wrong side of the skirt.

When I attached this skirt I didn’t want ANy gathers on the front, so I pinned the starred points in place on the bodice, then smoothed the skirt to the bodice as far as the side seams on the bodice. I clipped at that point to mark, then ran gathering stitches between the two clips for gathering on the back.

When I started to sew the main skirt on, I realized that I should have sewed the underskirt to the inside rather than the right side of the bodice in order to cleanly sandwich the bodice between the skirts. Since the fabric was so thin and I could do with a bit less length I just neatly folded the underskirt to the inside of the bodice, effectively encasing the seam allowances of the underskirt AND the lining skirt. Then I sewed the main skirt to the outside. This meant I was sewing through a LOT of layers – all the seam allowances PLUS an extra layer of underskirt and main skirt. It was easy to sew through, but hard to get a nice, straight seam. Since I was planning on covering/embellishing I was OK with that. For this project.

Here’s the skirt with the ‘drapes’ pulled out to the sides.

And here, with everything hanging willy nilly. I really like the effect – it moves when I walk to show off that crazy butterfly polyester!

Ah yes! The belt.

I had been planning on a self-braided embellishment, but when I experimented I didn’t really like it. I’d been thinking of the braid along the neckline with a  long, long belt piece that could wrap around me a couple of times. I didn’t like it along my neckline because I’d rather wear jewelry than have an embellished neckline and I thought the braid would look funny on its own around my middle! I dug through my stash and found about quarter yard of some lovely dark green and pink dupioni silk. I made a quick belt.

I wanted something wider that would keep its shape, so I decided to use some boning. Here’s a quick rundown of the steps I used making the belt.

1. Sew long edges together, turn and press
2. Fold short ends together to find center. Quick press to mark.
3. Center needle on pressed center mark, stitch first edge of center boning channel.
4. My belt piece was 4.5” wide and I wanted a gathered effect, so I cut boning 2.5” wide and slid inside the belt.
5. Switched to zipper foot, stitched other side of center boning channel.
6. Gathered belt to same width as boning piece – I just used my fingers, although I could have run gathering stitches as well. Stitch again across gathers on both sides to secure.
7. Checked for side positions be holding belt up to me and centering the center boning on my midriff.
8. Repeated above steps to sew in side channels.
9. Folded one end in, pressed and topstitched.
10. Attached the buttons that ‘show’ to the topstitched short end.
11. Topstitched the other short ends – I left unfinished because I like how the selvage looks!
12. Checked length and then put in snaps so that the belt fits snug.

I like the belt and may do something similar for other full skirted dresses where I want the sash-like look – the Crepe comes to mind!

In closing… thoughtful and introspective, or  inattentive navel gazer?