Emerald and Brussels Indigo Part II

I have a fix and a fail to share today.  The fail is the Made By Rae Emerald dress, from the Making Magazine #7.   I don't think the problem is down to the pattern--it is cute and well drafted.  I think I made a combination of strategic mistakes in fabric choice, cutting on the bias as instructed, and possibly choosing the wrong size.

So let's break it down.  First is fabric choice.  I've had this fabric in my stash probably the longest of anything currently in my bin.  I don't really have a stash per se, just a couple dress lengths of fabric that were bought for specific projects and scraps from other projects.  

So when I want to test a pattern, I either have to buy fabric for it, or make do with scraps from the bin.  Anyway.  I had five yards of this vintage rayon that was a scant 36" wide.  I had prewashed it at some point, and then didn't know what to do with it, because it was so thin, and it felt "precious" because it was vintage.  Pfft to that.  I'm tired of not using stuff because it is precious, and to be honest, I wasn't sure that the colorway was going to suit me anyway.  I tend to do better in cool-toned fabric, and this definitely is a warm color.

Second is cutting on the bias.  The pattern is drafted to be cut on the bias and seamed down the center, which is how I cut it.  The problem is two fold.  Because I used 36" wide fabric, I couldn't quite cut it on a true diagonal, and the fabric was so shifty that the second layer moved around a lot when I was cutting.  I even used straight scissors for cutting to make sure the fabric stayed straight, but it still happened.  I also realized after I had finished the dress and put it on that bias cut anything just doesn't look good on me.  My hips are quite round, and there is an indent where they come in toward my legs, which a bias cut bottom completely accentuates in a non-flattering way.  

This is where the third issue comes in.  I'm between sizes on Rae's chart for this dress--the S/M and L/XL sizes.  I knew from the finished measurements that I definitely needed a S/M on top, but I wasn't sure if I needed the extra ease on the bottom.  I measured another dress I like the fit of on the bottom and it was 46" at the widest point, and this dress was supposed to be a finished 48" hip in the S/M, so I decided to make a straight S/M instead of grading at the waist and hip to a L/XL.  For reference, my high bust is 35", full bust is 37", waist is 34-35" depending, hips are 45".  (And yes, I know, I'm up a bunch of inches from last year.  That 10 pounds had to go somewhere.  I'm working on it).

Here's what I like about the pattern.  I love the facings on the neckline and sleeves--I know, shocker right?  I'm always the girl who is converting facings to bias binding, but I decided to make this as close to drafted as possible, just to see how I liked it.  Because the facings are all topstitched down, they stay put and are a nice design feature.  I love the shape of the neckline--that soft v-neck is really nice.  

What I don't like: unfortunately, the pockets make the dress gape weirdly at the hips, so I had to cut them out, but I still don't like the fit because of the bias cut.  The dress was a pain to sew because the fabric kept wanting to warp along the bias, even with stay-stitching, and the hem facing was a total disaster.  I cut it off and put on bias tape instead. I don't think the 42" length was flattering on me, but cutting it 2" shorter (as I did when I cut off the hem facing) didn't really look better either.   So I think someone else can enjoy this dress who has a straighter figure than me.

I'm undecided about making it again and cutting it on the straight grain instead, which I think would fix a lot of problems.  I'd definitely grade out the hips, and maybe shorten the shoulder seam allowance slightly.  I cut a blouse version of this from a scrap of rayon challis I had to muslin it for fit.  I cut it on the straight grain, and took out the center seam and a lot of the extra ease (about 1 1/4" on the front and back) and I really like the look of it as a blouse. Trust me that it looks better on than flat.

 And finally, I fixed some things on my Brussels Indigo dress, and I'm happier with the bodice fit now.  I tapered the side seams from the waist to the underarm from 3/8"-1/2" and like that very well.  I also took up another inch in the hem, for a total of 3 1/4".  I could probably stand to lose another 1/2" on the hem, but I'm leaving it for now. 

I can't really raise the bust darts without major structural work, but I think they can pass as faux French darts for now.  Now to decide what to do with the purple Brussels linen I bought.  Should I make another M7353/Washi mashup or have another go at a straight grain Emerald?  Decisions, decisions. 

Brussels Indigo

After the success of my altered Magic Tulips and blue linen dresses, I decided I wanted to make a dress like that on purpose.  I like the bodice of the Washi pattern, but I find that the skirt is a little too full for my liking.  I prefer the straighter silhouette of the M7353.  I've mashed up these two patterns before (mostly putting the M7353 bodice on the Washi bottom) but this time I wanted to try it the other way around: Washi bodice on the M7353 skirt.  I bought some Brussels linen (it is a rayon mix, so it has a nice drape but is soft and cool in hot weather) and off to the drafting table I went. 

I sort of did the drafting adjustments on the fly, and if I do this again, I will probably make some adjustments.  I'm not sure if they are drafting errors on my part or just down to the fabric warping slightly as I worked with it.  First, the back bodice was already the correct width to match the M7353 skirt, so I just needed to get the underarm length correct.  My first attempt was off by 2 1/4", so I had to recut the back (after I'd sewn it to the front and finished all the edges.  Oy).  On the front, I had to add in enough width to make it match the width of the skirt.  In the Washi dress as drafted, the excess in the skirt is taken in with pleats, but in the M7353, the excess goes into the elastic waistband casing, and so the top and bottom seams have to match exactly.  

This meant adding about an inch or so to each side seam.  I used the bodice from M7353 to guide me, and I got the width correct, but the bust darts came out a bit wonky.  They are lower than they should be, and a bit floppy.  I also think the bodice is slightly too big overall (could be down to the 3/8" seam allowance I took, trying to match the skirt to the top.  I could taper the seam allowance from the waist up to the underarm from 3/8-5/8" for a better fit next time. 

My other complaint is the skirt length.  I cut the skirt at pattern length for the first time, and hemmed 2 1/4" but I still think it should come up another inch for optimal length on my figure.  I keep feeling like it is just a smidge too long and looks slightly frumpy.  (I could have gone maxi length and it would have been fine too, but this weird not-quite-midi-length looks strange on me).  An easy fix, but annoying that I have to go back and do it.  I'll probably fix the bodice at the same time.

That said, the fabric is super soft, and I really prefer the way the pockets on the M7353 are drafted, even if they are slightly more of a pain to install.  Because they are anchored on the waistband, they don't flop around at all in the skirt, and they are deep enough that nothing falls out.  On the Washi skirt pattern, the pockets are easy to sew, but I find that stuff doesn't always stay put in the pockets when I'm sitting down, and they flap around a bit.

So mostly a success, and I didn't mind wearing it.  Just need to make some small alterations to it.  Also, you can see by the shine on the photos how stupidly hot and humid it is outside right now.  The weather app keeps saying it is supposed to cool down, but it just doesn't.  It's downright tropical.  But that's August here.  Swamp city.

Alter It August: Part the Third

 I had a hard time posting these photos.  Not because I don't like the dress (I do!) but because I don't think these are particularly flattering photos of me.  My face feels puffy today and my hair is a hot mess from the heat.  Also: this is me with color in my skin.  I just don't tan (I don't mind, actually). #burnsinthemoonlight 

I keep trying to lower the carb load in my diet to get rid of the bloat in my gut and the puff in my face, but then I get stuck about what to eat since my options are still more limited than I like to admit.  I spent most of last month fighting a gastroparesis flare and was nauseated almost every day, no matter what I did.  I had to take Zofran for the first time just to stay functional.

But I'm trying to live in my brave, and to understand that my body is my body and this is how it looks.  And will probably look no matter what I do.  Pffft.  I had an interesting conversation with my kids' therapist this week about how to think about body image and how to communicate with them about their bodies and weight and so forth (this is something I'm very aware of, given my own issues, and it was good to discuss it with her too).  She basically said, don't talk about weight or size or anything like that.  Just talk about healthy habits, and how bodies change and grow, and that all bodies are good.  No qualifiers, nothing.  I like that because it goes so well with the lesson I keep trying to drum into my own head: ALL BODIES ARE GOOD BODIES.  Have a body?  Good.  

I keep getting stuck in my head about the cultural female ideal, and struggling.  Even though I try to make sure my visual diet is full of women of all shapes and sizes, and to avoid the cultural visual ideal, I still have trouble.  Maybe I always will, but I'm starting to see light on the tunnel, that I can think about it differently for myself. 

 

Anyway.  An alteration, albeit a very gentle one.  I thrifted this dress from ThredUp (it is from Old Navy, and a linen/rayon blend that is really nice).  The dress fit very well except in the bodice, which had a whopping four inches (4! inches!) of fabric around the bust area.  I almost returned it, but the color really spoke to me, and I like the style and unusual details, so I decided to have a go at altering the bodice to fit better through the bust.

It was a surprisingly quick fix!  I think it took all of 20 minutes to unpick the bias binding for a couple of inches to either side of the side seams, pinch out the excess fabric (2" on either side) and then sew a seam that tapered to nothing at the waist seam.  So basically I made a big wedge on the side seam.  I could have trimmed it, but I just folded it to the side and resewed the bias tape back over it.  It isn't as neat as the original because I had to lap the excess bias, but it looks much better on me now, and I've worn it twice already since altering it! 

Alter It August Part the Second

 

This week has been a rough one.  I ended up with a less-than-ideal camp schedule due to booking things too late (apparently, around here, February is too late for camps in August), so I had two kids on one end of the city and two kids on the other end all week.  I have basically been living in my car.  

 

In the brief moments of home time, I've tried to squeeze little projects in here and there (or editing a few lines here and there).  I decided to alter these ready-to-wear culottes I thrifted in June.  I bought them new with tags, and took them to visit my parents.  I wore them several times that week, and while I enjoyed them, they didn't quite feel like my style, as well as the fact that the rise was just a bit short.  (My rise is crazy long, so this isn't a great shock to me).  Fast forward to me washing them the first time and suddenly the rise was uncomfortably short.  Every time I put them on after that, I couldn't stand the fit, so I would immediately take them off.   (Sorry, I don't have any good photos of me wearing them as culottes.  Just take my word for it that they were awkward).

I had the idea to alter these into a skirt after seeing Helen's Winslow hack.  This is a hack to make on the front end of a sewing pattern, but I figured if I picked apart the center and inseams, I could make it work.  And I did!  The longest part (which wasn't that long, really) was unpicking the robust seams+serging/overlocking.  Once that was done, it was a simple matter of pinning the center seams together and cutting off the excess from the crotch curve.  I'm actually pretty pleased with the resulting skirt--it is cooler than the pants and more comfortable, plus it has pockets!  I think it will be a nice transitional piece in the fall too.

In other news, I finally watched Chernobyl, and you must run, not walk, to your nearest HBO provider and watch it.  The show is stunningly well done, morally complex, amazingly acted.  It draws a bit on Svetlana Alexievich's excellent book, Voices from Chernobyl (I highly recommend it), but many other sources as well.

Alter It August

*I normally do a big crafty post all together with my Yarn Along, but I ended up with so much sewing stuff that I thought I better split the posts in two.  You can find my Yarn Along post (with current knitting/reading here).

~sewing~

I rescued a Washi maxi I made in the late spring that I thought I hated (and never blogged--it went right back into my sewing bin for future cutting down).  I don't love it, but it is proving a useful late summer wardrobe addition.  The fabric is a mystery cotton I got on an instagram sale.  I made Birdie a little blouse out of the leftovers and could probably make her a skirt as well.

Another rescue from the bin was my Gzhel skirt from last year.  I didn't alter it at all (although I considered shortening it several times, left it in the end).

 But! I have worn it a few times in the last two weeks, so I think that's another good late summer addition!

 In the spirit of Alter It August, I also altered two dresses from last year that have been languishing.  (I found Mia's Instagram last August through this challenge--I highly recommend following her.  She is a total delight, and a Minnesotan to boot!)

Anyway, my Magic Tulips dress just didn't fit great in the arms, and it has never been the right weather to wear it--it is too thin for cool weather and the long sleeves and longer length made it too hot to wear in the summer. 

I cut off the sleeves using my Washi bodice as a guide and cut little caps out of the cut off bits with the Washi sleeve pattern.  The original sleeves were pieced, and I didn't have enough to cut them on the fold, so I used the seam line instead.  I think the print hides the piecing and the seam line is hidden on the underside of the sleeve, so I think it isn't noticeable.  

I also shortened the dress by 2.5" and Bob's your uncle.  Well, not quite.  I did a sort of slapdash job on my first pass (this is why I can't do this kind of work around my kids) and then went back the next day to fix it, adding in some small darts just above the bust to control some excess fabric that was flopping around there (remember that the original bodice on this dress was the M7353, which is designed for knits, but I modified it for wovens, but it was very unfitted as a result).  

I'm much happier with it and will wear it during these dog days of August.  It also feels like a dress a woman my age would wear (I turned 40 last month).  I struggle a lot with feeling like my clothes are either too "young" or too "old."  This one kind of hits the right spot in the middle.  I hope.

Likewise, my blue check linen dress was in my sewing bin to be cut down into something else.

In an effort to make the dress work for me for this summer, I had tried shortening it 3" sometime in the late spring, but it still just didn't suit my aesthetic, and I didn't feel good wearing the dress.  So into the bin it went for further mulling.  Sometime in June, I cut the top off to make the bottom into a skirt, but couldn't work out how I wanted to do it, and left it sit. 

After the Magic Tulips dress worked out so well, I went ahead and unpicked everything and put the dress back together and lopped off the sleeves and made caps from the scraps.

It was a bit of a squeeze to get the sleeves out!  But I think it is mostly wearable.  There is a bit of extra fabric at the high bust on the sides (where I put the little darts in on the Magic Tulips dress) but I think darts would look strange in the linen, so I'm just going to leave it.  The nature of linen is to be a bit unfitted and rumpled anyway.  It is thin and cool, though, which is just the thing right now.

~watching~

I caught Mary Poppins Returns on Netflix just before our trip to Greece in July, and while I thought it was cute, I didn't think it matched the original, particularly the song and dance numbers.  Emily Blunt was brilliant as Mary Poppins, but I didn't love the Bert replacement character.  I also thought at least one of the song and dance numbers was a bit questionable in terms of content.  But still.  A decent family movie.

(I will not bore you with a lot of vacation photos, but I will share three, just to give some flavor)

On Aegina, one of the Saronic Islands

On the flight to Athens, I saw Bohemian Rhapsody, and it completely blew me away.  The performances were amazing, and the story was compelling.  I put Queen on my regular playlist for the next bit.

Parthenon, obviously.  There was a lot of history here I didn't know and was pleased to learn this time.

On the return flight, I also watched Can You Ever Forgive Me, which I liked a lot more than I expected to.  Weirdly, it felt like it was of a piece with Bohemian Rhapsody.

At the Acropolis, overlooking Athens.  It was super hot.

When I got home from our trip, I caught up on Grantchester (I am enjoying Tom Brittany as the new vicar!  I loved him in season one of Outlander). 

From a Marvel costume exhibit at a local museum that the kids and I went to in April.  It was a super cool exhibition.

 I also finally caught up on all the Marvel films that comprise Phases 1-3, except Captain Marvel, thanks to a Prime Day promotion on the ones I hadn't seen yet (I confess I rewatched Thor and Avengers as well because I love them and they were in the promotion).  I enjoyed Ant-Man and Ant-Man and Wasp way more than I thought I would.  Super fun and mostly family friendly.

Also saw an indie German film that did well at one of the festivals this year called Toni Erdmann, which is a strange trip of a film (and super long!), but the last half hour or so is hilarious.

So that's it!  I am editing the manuscript like mad (I've been given a hard word count target of 80K words.  I've edited down from 113K to about 87K on the first pass or so, but still have to keep whittling.  It's picky work). 

I am going to try making a Misty Cami this week with some Rifle and Co. rayon I have in my bin (it is going to be a squeak to get it out, yardage wise) so we'll see how that works. 

Yarn Along: August

*I usually put my sewing and watching lists on this post too, but it was getting so long that I split them up.  Check back tomorrow for my sewing update!

~knitting~

Working on my Pabaigh after finishing the Lightweight Pullover shortly before our trip.  (And no, I don't have pics of the finished sweater--it's too hot to put on a wooly garment!)  Pabaigh was a good traveling project, since I'm not very far on it yet and it is lightweight.  I've just divided for the sleeves, but this thing is so boxy, I think the next bit should go pretty quickly.  That collar, tho.  Twelve inches of stockinette in the round.  Bleh.

~reading~

I finished MOBY in Greece, and read all of Harrison Scott Key's second book, Congratulations, Who Are You Again?, which I enjoyed almost as much as his first book.  It is a funny but honest look at the writing process.  I also started reading the iodine book that Ginny recommended.  I'm not sure what I think about it yet.  I read the very long introduction to Mary Eberstadt's How The West Really Lost God, and I'm not sure I have it in me to finish it, but I might poke along with it.  I'm a couple of pages into Notes From Underground and it immediately hooked me, so that's a good sign!

Linking with Ginny for Yarn Along!