Birds – Hopefully Creative

Blue Bird Dress

Two versions, one winner!

As usual around this time of year, there was a large event looming and I wanted a new outfit. My recent Simplicity sewing magazines had asymmetrical dress patterns and they spoke to me. They were Simplicity Naaimode 72, model 24-26, which is the equivalent of Simplicity 9886 (and the plus size version: Simplicity Naaimode 74, model 28-30, aka Simplicity 9887). They also spoke to my stash of 10 lengths of 1 meter of Scuba Crepe Jersey Fabrics that came in a Surprise Box in 2022. Since I hoped I could combine three of those fabrics to make a nice dress.

Asymmetric dress with dark gray, medium gray and light blue sections

I started by copying the pattern and cutting it out in a dark grey, lighter grey and light blue fabric. I made two alterations to the original version. 1) I didn’t put in a zipper, since this is all stretch fabric. 2) I cut the light grey back pieces in one since I didn’t have to accommodate the zipper. As you can see, this one was just too big, especially in the back. I pinched out around four centimeters on the side and that was a lot better, but the pockets were also way too low, the colours seemed a bit muted for a fun occasion and I was just unhappy with it.

Asymmetric dress with black, blue with birds and light blue sections

Then came the most complex alteration I’ve ever done in my life. Trying to make this thing smaller along strategic points instead of just the side seams. In the end: I took out 2 cm along center front and center back, tapered the side seams in from 1-ish cm to nothing in the waist, removed the pointy bit around the center back because there was still no zipper, took in the darts and princess seams by a cm, raised the pockets by about 5 cm and made them bigger, shortened the sleeves and scooped out the neckline. I made adjustments to every paper pattern piece there was, and some are a little bit fudged, but it fits so much better!

These pockets are at a much more comfortable height and the back fits so much smoother than the original version. I just turned the neckline under once and stitched it down, and same with the hem. The hem was with coordinating thread colours and I’m quite proud of it. It looks very neat. I also added some belt loops to the sides that almost disappear into the fabric, which is nice.

While working on the pockets, they gaped a little bit more than I would have liked, so the inside of the fully blue pocket was visible on that side. This bugged me so much that I ripped part of it out, added a patch of the light blue, and sewed it all back together again. So much better! The pockets also really wanted to just float around anywhere, so I anchored them with little straps to the approximate center front of the dress. Now they never end up on the back of my hips and I can put stuff in there, it’s supported and basically invisible.

I like this dress, it’s appropriately swooshy and has pockets and this colour combination is so much better for me than the original. I felt I learnt a lot with the alteration and now I’ve at least used some of that mystery box fabric!

Warm Birdies

A while ago, I found a bit of fabric that was black and green with birds, reversed on both sides. The black side was somewhat more fluffy and felted, the green side looked more like threads. At some point, again, a while ago, I was cold and wanted to make something warm. This fabric seemed to fit the bill. I chose a pattern from Simplicity Naaimode 31 – patterns 1-4 (also known as New Look 6474). I chose the smallest size, shortened it by a lot to make sure it fit on my limited piece of fabric and started sewing.

Once the basic shape was finished, I put it on and it looked horrible on me. I can’t even describe my feelings about it. Still, I liked the fabric and wasn’t sure what to do at that point. Then I thought of something, perhaps it would fit my mother better. She’s also generally cold and likes colourful things. So wearing something green with birds on, shouldn’t be an issue.

I brought the thing to my parents and asked her if she liked it. She did, so I decided to finish the seams. All seams were folded inwards and sewn down, so it now looks quite nice on the inside. This means that it can be worn with the black side out.

The outside edge and sleeve edges have been finished with bias tape, this also looks neat on the side. I made a little loop at the outside neckline edge, so which ever way it is turned, it can still be put on a hanger. There are also pockets on the green side, which can be used when worn.

I hope she’ll get some joy out of it, and if not, someone else might. I’m just happy it did not end up in my corner of shame…

Larp Shirt for Real Life

The larp shirt was finished and wearing it was quite agreeable, so I decided to make another version to wear in other situations. I used the bird fabric that I’d also used for multiple circle scarves. Since that fabric is extremely shifty, I used quite a lot of spray starch to get the pieces to cooperate. In contrast to the larp version, I did French seams throughout, which was a lot easier since this fabric was much thinner and did not fray as badly. I did not put elastic in the sleeves as of yet. I may decide that it needs it, but I first put it in the wash before trying to wear it out.

The ‘string’ used for the neckline is stitched down at the front, such that it can never undo accidentally. Apart from that, no modifications were made. I am debating that it might have been nice to add some more shaping and/or bust darts in potential future versions. I will have to see how this one wears before deciding.

Red Birds and Foxes

A year ago, I added a piece of light coloured fabric with grey leaf-ish things and little deer, birds, squirrels and foxes to the stash. On the hunt for a project, I re-discovered this fabric and decided to finally make (at least part of it) into a top of some sort.

Enter Simplicity 9, model 59 minus ruffle. This pattern came in size 38-40 at the smallest. In general, that tends to be too big. However, I hoped it would work anyway without resizing the pattern beforehand – spoiler alert: dumb choice.

In order to get it to fit, I made a 2 cm pleat at the back, ending at the small of my back. The shoulders were lowered 1.5 cm. I redrew the neckline at the front and back to correspond to the original size. So in total I probably managed to shave of more than 8 cm or so. I now like the fit a lot better. The fabric does crease like crazy and I don’t like ironing, so this is why you see it in all its wrinkly glory.

The fabric is super cute though and those five buttons also came from the stash. The original pattern had more buttons, but I was not going to let such a good match in buttons go to waste, so five it was. The button bands might have a little to much interfacing for the thickness of the fabric, but all in all, it wears well and it’s very cute. So far, so good!

Tantalus Scarf & MMM ’18

I seem to have been quite productive in the past few weeks and have managed to churn out four finished projects and one knit sweater that only needs half a sleeve and a hem. So prepare for the onslaught of posts in the coming few days.

To start. the most boring one: another circle scarf. This one has cats and birds. So it is a in a Tantalus state, never catching the bird and never getting truly away from the cat. As usual, these types of scarves are quite a quick little project, so after finishing this I actually started to go through all my pattern magazines in search of tops and pants. I made notes, copied patterns onto pattern paper and then called it a day.

I’ve also decided to participate in Me-Made-May ’18 again.

While I may have forgotten that May started yesterday, I did actually wear something me-made. Namely the straight sports-skort, which definitely fits into the ‘keep & wear’ pile. Today it was the eighties revival sweater with polka-dot scarf, also keep & wear. Only 29 more days with potentially a lot more non-pants items since I tend to not wear the dresses and skirts nearly as much.

Birdy Waterfall

After the origami cats shirt, I also cut out the pattern from some blue with blue and white birds fabric. This was a very fluid fabric that shifted even more than the cats print. The walking foot was truly essential in this project and it worked very well.

Since I figured out the order of construction during origami cats, this one came together easily with the only hurdle being the shedding of the fabric that made the French seams more difficult. It seems to be a little tighter than the other one, but it also flows very nicely so I hope that it will be good to wear. This one was also spray starched to a plank in order to get it to cooperate, so it will wait for service just a little longer. I do like the print and I hope it will be nice to wear.

Birdy Scarf Repeat

Dinosaurs are awesome, unfortunately nice fabric with dinosaurs on is hard to find. Birds are the descendants of dinosaurs. They are quite nice themselves too, and fabric with birdy prints is really easy to find! The local market stall had two really nice bird print fabrics, one white with hummingbirds, one navy with white swallows, which I clearly needed to have in my collection. They were both soft and slightly see through and combined beautifully with each other to form a scarf.

A friend of mine has a hummingbird tattoo and it was her birthday. So although I didn’t finish it exactly in time, there is now a circular scarf waiting for her neck. I also wanted one for myself, so there are now two double-birdy scarves in existence. The recipient of the other one seemed to like hers, so I’m happy.

The proof is in the wearing as they say, and I have worn this one every day since it has been finished. I’ve determined that navy is a neutral and must thus go with everything. In contrast to the light blues and greens in the previous circle scarf, I’ve decided that I can wear this with red too.. In any case, Happy Easter!

Birdy Scarf

After my failed skirt project from the last post, I wanted something quick and easy that was useful and I could finish and wear quickly. Winter is coming (and/or arriving), which means that I’ve been layering up with a scarf daily again. One of my favourites is a double sided scarf from something cottony that is just a long loop. It has a blue and white plaid on one side and a different yellow and blue plaid on the other. I found that it wears really nicely and that you never have an end hanging in your food. Clearly I needed another and since I have a number of thin fabrics in the stash it seemed like a perfect solution.

Now, have you ever heard of the Dutch proverb (loosely translated) ‘A donkey doesn’t walk into the same rock twice’? Well, I’m most obviously not a donkey, I’m way, way worse. I tend to walk into the same thing at least… oh 5 million times. As I did now. I should have remembered from previous frustrating attempts that you cannot just turn something inside out and expect it to be good. I made a tube, but it was the wrong way round, somehow. Instead of it being a loop of birds on the inside and a loop of stripes on the outside, it turned out to be half a loop of birds on one side and half a loop of stripes on the other side. It also didn’t fit comfortably over my head anymore. So I gave up and chucked it into a corner.

Cue a few hours ago.. I unpicked one of the long edges, ironed out the other long edge and edgestitched around. Then I ironed the other long edge and folded both sides inwards and edgestitched those around too. Magic, I had my scarf. I used 65 cm and the full width of both fabrics for this scarf.

Just the coverage of something around the neck helps tremendously with the cold that’s coming. I need to see how the little birdies hold up, but I hope that this project will be successful. Both sides will show a little but they go with nearly everything (if you ask me, which you don’t but I’m telling you anyway), so I have high hopes.

Tag: Birds