Red Scissor Shirt

I have had this red material with scissors on it for quite a while, probably about 6 months.  It was always earmarked for a 3/4 length sleeve shirt.  After we got the Singer 206 back up and running I decided I would make this shirt up on it.  I used my usual shirt pattern, Butterick 6085 in a size 10 with adjustments and no darts.  Below are pictures.

After the collar insertion

Seam finishing using the overlocker

The bottom hem

Topstitching

The scissor buttons

From the front.

Instead of spending forever trying to figure out how to make a buttonhole for scissor shaped buttons, I fastened the shirt with press-studs and stitched the scissors on top.  The sleeves have a slit in them and above each slit I stitched another scissor button.  While the weather is probably not quite right for this shirt yet, when it is, I'll have it ready!

Today is also the birthday of an actress from a film I rather like.  The actress is Donna Reed and the film is It's A Wonderful Life, which was lent to me by a friend, much to my pleasure.

The Finished Butterick B5281

After many hours badgering my sister, I finally have a finished picture of the red dress, Butterick B5281.  It is a lovely dress but I am not sure it is very flattering on my body shape and the photo makes me look like I have very long arms and very short legs.  I also take hideous photos as I am very self-conscious and it is probably just as well I've cropped my head out!  Anyhow without further ado, see below for the true horror  look.

It looks better if I stand up straight too!

I hope to have more scintillating posts soon!

Curtains

My Grandmother wanted new curtains in the laundry and kitchen.  Blockout in the laundry but anything in the kitchen.  After four hours trailing through shops to get material and curtain tape (we had a wait of over an hour just to get served for seven metres of curtain tape, which transpired to be the wrong stuff anyway) I made a start on the laundry curtains.  The laundry curtains were made on the Necchi Supernova Ultra mark 2 and it did a very good job.  Because of the blockout I couldn't use pins and I ended up 'pinning' everything with masking tape, which can just be ripped off around the stitches.  The finished laundry curtains are shown below.

I sewed the kitchen curtains at Grandmas and took the Singer 306 up there.  Despite the material being crepe like the machine behaved very well and other than the final hem (which has gone very awry) they are finished.  Hopefully I'll finish the hem soon and we can hang them next time we go up there.

Measuring the material on the lounge floor

Pattern matching with a little help from the dog

Makeshift sewing set up in the lounge, the iron was diagonally opposite.

In other news I have just returned from watching Night At The Museum - Secret Of The Tomb at the movies for the second time.  I love the film and must buy it on DVD eventually.

Night Fun

Believe it or not I quite like making night dresses.  I'm not sure why as I do not make frilly fancy nighties, just plain simple A-line sorts.  When I cannot think of what to make someone I often settle for a nightdress.  This is exactly what happened when my Nanna's birthday came around.  Nanna is a little shorter than I, so I shortened the pattern accordingly.  The material is some lightweight stuff that I picked up at work, before I actually worked there.  I use bias binding on the neckline and armholes for a neater finish.

Completed dress

Close up of binding on armholes

I ended up using the Vesta again for this and was very pleased with the results, I am starting to get the hang of steering and treadling at the same time!

A Christmas Shirt

Unfortunately I did not finish my shirt in time for last Sunday however I had a good time on that day.  I ended up catching up with a relative for lunch after I finished volunteering and we had a nice lunch together before I did some more shopping.  During the week following I managed to complete the shirt and it is shown below.

Other than the buttonholes I sewed the entire thing on the Vesta with seam finishing by the overlocker as I find that to be the most effective with garments like shirts that I wear a lot.

I cut a self facing 6cm wide with the sleeves and turned it up and top stitched, I'm quite happy with the results.

I chose light green buttons as they were the best match I could find.  The collar turned out much better than I expected it to, even though I try hard my collars are a little hit and miss.

The buttonholes were stitched on the Singer 306.  There is no buttonhole setting you have to manually adjust the width and direction but if you have the patience and nerves it makes a lovely buttonhole.

In other news I brought this lovely ring home from work today, I'm considering buying it as I really like it.  It is German, Sterling Silver and marcasite apparently.

Brief Catching Up

I have finished my red dress and I wore it to the awards ceremony today.  I was still finishing it this morning though and I am not really very happy with the hem.  Hopefully I will have some photos of it completed tomorrow.

I also couldn't miss two important birthdays from today and yesterday!

Yesterday's birthday was Andy Williams and today's was Deanna Durbin, both favourites of mine.  Should be more coming tomorrow!

New Garments

I am technically on holidays.  I'm actually still flat out, however I took a couple of days off and did some sewing.  First of all I finished off a purple shift I had.  I found this shift half finished at work and I was about to send it out as a rag when I thought that as it was my size I could finish it and wear it.  The previous owner had assembled the dress and put the zip in, really only the hem was left to do.  However, they hadn't under stitched the armhole facings and in finishing the outer edges of these facings had stretched them out of shape so that there was no way they were staying tucked into the garment.  I ended up topstitiching the facings to the dress.  It looks fine and there is no chance of them rolling out.  I also had to refinish the outer edge of the neckline facing as it had been hemmed by hand and was undoing.  I then hemmed it and I had a nice new shift dress.  I used the pretty silver Godfrey for this task.

The next project was a very pretty 1940's blouse with a peplum. It is a Simplicity reissue and extremely lovely!  I made it in a lightweight seersucker like fabric on my adorable 99K knee control machine.  This fabric has a line of damage running down its centre and is only approximately 90cm wide anyway, it makes cutting things out very difficult.  I got it (all 5 metres or so) free from work as it was only going to be thrown out and it was rather pretty.  I managed to find a piece that was fault free wide enough to cut the back out but it was difficult.  The buttonholes were made on a Singer 71-30 industrial buttonholer and came out very nicely, after about 20 trial buttonholes!  Although a size 8 I think it is still too big for me, the fact that it sits comfortably on the mannequin pictured below which is set to a size 12 probably backs me up.

In other news I have a gorgeous new machine, although unfortunately it is unusable at the moment.

Finished Projects

Today I'm showcasing two finished projects!

The first is the blue shirt I was making on the Godfrey, it fits very nicely and I really like it!

From the front

Close up of collar and buttons

Close up of sleeve slits

These were the first sleeve slits I had made and I was very happy with how they turned out.  I made the buttonholes on a Singer buttonhole attachment for straight stitch machines but not with the Godfrey.  The Godfrey decided buttonhole attachments were simply awful and made its feelings felt.  I ended up using an Alfa instead.

The second finished project is the blue rose print top.  I bought the material just over a year ago, knowing exactly what I wanted to make with it, it just took me forever to get around to it.  I used an old Style pattern (the number of which escapes me) but added buttons down the front and contrasting binding on the sleeves.  I know it looks really shapeless but when it's on it isn't as bad.  I wear it with a belt or tucked into my trousers.

From the front

Buttons

Binding and the best likeness of the actual material!

I know I never posted pictures of the finished Galactic Satin dress, maybe I'll get around to that too!

I'm Back....Kind Of

Sorry for my long absence I have been helping my Father.  Things should be settling down now and hopefully I should be able to get back to usual blogging soon.  In other news I have finished the galactic satin dress.  I'm not 100% happy with it but I will post pictures.  In the meantime I'll leave this, one of my favourite songs.

Rose Pinafore Dress

The completed rose pinafore.  From the front.

The dress has 4 darts in the front and a centre front seam.  There are gathers just under the bust.

From the back.

I tried to match the print across the zip and I hand-stitched the zip in place so that the focus is entirely on the print.

The bodice is lined but the skirt isn't.

I've also made my poor long-suffering overlocker a cover.

And I've washed some material.

I'm intending to make a  skirt out of the tartan.

My friend B wants a shirt out of this for Christmas.  As B is approximately a size 14-16 and all my patterns are in sizes 8-12 this is going to be interesting!