Category: Sewing

October 27, 2015

Halloween Skirt (And Official Voting Skirt)

Here’s Anya’s Halloween skirt:

It’s a basic circle skirt — the circle was cut for a 23″ waist. A 4.5″ strip of fabric was then cut to 24″ and made into a 2″ wide waistband and attached to the skirt. I then ran 20″ of 2″ elastic through the band & gathered the fabric. This allows the skirt to be pulled over her head or hips. Plus it means she might be able to wear it next year 🙂

And in a bid to not have a skirt used just once, it is also her official election day skirt — blood-suckers, skeletons in the closet, ghosts/mummies/reanimated corpses (how else would dead people vote?).

October 13, 2015

Christmas Dress (Kinda)

Anya’s Christmas dress is not actually a dress — I’d had a picture in my head of a cream colour shirt in a small metallic print fabric with a green skirt. I found a beautiful small print fabric (Robert Kaufman Winters Grandeur Metallic Small Vines Ivory) that I wanted to use for the skirt. Problem was that I didn’t really have a specific shirt pattern.

Random internet searching didn’t yield anything … and then, voila, Pinterest randomly e-mails me a picture of an almost-perfect pleated shirt. I say almost because it’s winter … so I need some kind of arm covering. I’d first through about making a green velvet jacket … but that is a little more effort than I could put into it. Seems a lot easier to make a long sleeved shirt than making a whole other piece of clothing.

I can order the fabrics!

September 18, 2015

Tutu

Anya wants to be a flying fairy for Halloween — figured I would make her a tutu and wings for her costume. Got real tutu net and some satin for the waistband. I don’t remember where I read it, but somewhere in my research I had read that at least one layer of contrasting color should be used to add depth to the finished product. But it seemed reasonable, so I purchased a deep blue purple and a pale pinkish purple.

I found instructions at http://www.cosplayisland.co.uk/tutorials/tutu that were wonderfully detailed. I cut the strips of net, I then cut a 16″ wide strip of the net ~23″ long. Folded it in quarters so I had a 4″ wide very sturdy 23″ strip. The strips of net were gathered along a length of embroidery floss and sewn to the 4″ wide band.

I affixed the satin to the top of the net band, and then folded it over to make a waistband.

A 20″ length of 2″ wide elastic was run through the waistband and the tutu was gathered down to Anya’s waist size. This allows the waist to stretch so it is easily pulled over her hips.

And we have a tutu! Now that I am looking at it … I’m really glad I added the contrasting color layer. It doesn’t really jump out at you, but it definitely adds depth to the finished piece.

(Yes, I did tack the tutu … just not in that photo)

July 4, 2015

July 4th

And she’s wearing her skirt!

June 28, 2015

Independence Day Skirt

WooHoo! I finished another sewing project — this one is Anya’s 4th of July skirt. It’s a fabric from Northcott’s Stonehenge Stars & Strips line (20159-30). I think the fabric is not so flag-like that it looks silly on the 364 other days of the year, but it is right festive enough for the holiday.

April 4, 2015

Easter Dress

It’s done!!!

March 28, 2015

Progress

And we are almost done with the Easter dress (just in time too)!

I had quite a time making the straps. Trying to turn the right side out, I wouldn’t get the layers right and ended up with two tubes sewn together at the seam. I finally stitched the two fabrics around a metal straw and then pushed the fabric through the straw. That worked surprisingly well.

I still want to make a wider belt, but the only thing that *needs* to be done is stitching the straps in place. They are pinned, at the moment, so I could get the proper length.

Too bad it will be so cold on Easter day – we’ll need sweaters!

March 12, 2015

Easter Dress

The front cover of the latest Chasing Fireflies catalog had this 225$ dress. Beautiful dress, but the price is outrageous. So I decided to order the fabrics and make something similar – a circle skirt with a spaghetti strapped fitted bodice.

First we used a trammel to draw a really big circle and cut it out — I used that to cut the yellow satin and the lace.

The circle skirt and lace:

The entire thing basted together and halfway on Anya so I can see how it fits:

I still need to sew up the bodice and make the shoulder straps, but I’m about 75% done with weeks to go.

December 12, 2014

Stars

A dozen little squares of paper later, I am starting to think that using a template and cutting stars is going to yield better results. I finally found a process that works for me (http://www.firstpalette.com/Craft_themes/Colors/foldingpaperstar/foldingpaperstar.html). And a little bit of wonkieness can be accommodated in the applique process … But I think I am getting more than a bit!

December 7, 2014

Star Quilt – Phase Zero

A few weeks ago, my mom sent me a picture of a pieced circle skirt made with rainbow colors:

That is fantastic, but with Anya being so small … seven different colors would yield very tiny little slivers along the top. So I thought I’d make something like this, but using Newton’s five color spectrum divisions. Even sharing the fabric with my mom so she can make another skirt, I’m going to have a good bit of fabric left over.

I think I’m going to make a quilt. It is possible to cut a five pointed star from a square of fabric with a bunch of folds and one cut (http://www.ushistory.org/BETSY/more/flagfoldcut.htm). The mariner’s compass will be challenging, and attaching all of the stars to the background fabric will certainly be time consuming even on a machine. But I think it’ll be worth the effort. Quilt design below – the rectangle is where a twin size mattress would be.

Below is a blow-up of the star. There are really three different triangles cut from two different colors. Piecing it together, though, is a challenge. I found a good paper piecing tutorial at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlF1J05OV4U … the process actually makes sense now. At least in theory!