Hits, misses and neutrals in 2018

I seem to have been quite busy with sewing this year but with very little to show for it! I have quite a few craft items which have been successful in their own category and some knitting - oh and repairs and refashioning. As there is so little to show, I’m doing one post for both successes and failures for the year. I'm not including failures that didn't get as far as being made up - and there are quite a few of those!

I will do them in order from the start of the year, all together in one category. Click the title to get to the appropriate blog post where the pattern number and details will be listed.

As before, I'm linking to  Crafting a Rainbow’s Top 5 of the Year.

January

Kimono - success

In January, I made a kimono for myself. I like the kimono, feel it fits well and do wear it. There is a but - the colours are not right for me and I have been intending to remake with a fabric more suited to my colouring and my other clothes. I tried to get a similar fabric but haven't been successful. Nevertheless, I consider this a success.

Chanel-type jacket - neutral

In January, I finally finished the Chanel-type jacket I had been working on for some time, after starting it in a two-weekend class I attended with Margaret of The  Crafty Creek in the autumn of the previous year. I think the jacket looks great but I haven’t really worn it. This is mainly because I feel it is a bit snug (I have put on weight, alas). I feel it is snug around the biceps and it lies with the two fronts quite far apart. I learned such a lot from this exercise, though - very much including what I would do differently next time. The main thing I would change would be to overlock raw edges before started construction. I’ll have to say this is a neutral as it hasn’t been worn in the way I had intended – so neither failure nor success.

February was a very unsuccessful month with several items and pieces of fabric being rejected. March was a more successful month

Jasper sweatshirt - success

It was cold in March. We haven't had much cold weather yet this winter.

I made the Jasper sweatshirt and have worn it a lot though it’s only getting cold enough now to think about it again. I like it but it was criticised on the style website I’m a member of for being too dark for my colouring - while I didn’t want that to influence my view of it, it has to some extent. I plan to make it again but in slightly lighter weight fabric

New Look 6481 tops - 2 x successes 1 x fail

I’ve worn these tops a lot. The fail was as a result of using a fabric with insufficient stretch and it was too tight for me. It went to my daughter who wears it, as far as I know so not a total failure. Operative error.

Blackwood cardigans x2 - successes

Regularly worn. I like one better than the other - the one that has slightly more stretch - as it feels more comfortable. Same fabric as the NL 6481s

Trousers - epic FAIL

For the whole year, well until autumn really, I was trying to make well-fitting trousers. The closest I got was making up a pair of trousers that I was forced to wear for golf matches as I had no other suitable trousers which still fitted me. I did get to wear them but they were neither stylish nor comfortable.

I intend to solve the problem in 2019!

 

I have so many awful photos of the various stages - this was the least bad
I haven't linked to a post

Self-drafted top - failure

I finished this but have never enjoyed wearing it. The fit just isn't right.

Cashmerette concord Vneck tunic - neutral

I made another Cashmerette Concord, this time with a V neck, tunic length. I’m not really wearing it - I think because the neckline is a little loose/stretched and a bit low for my liking. Operative error again.

Items for my daughters - successes. Probably

I made another pair of culottes for Joanne. While she was visiting for Christmas, I made some repairs to a much earlier pair of these culottes (she loves this style) and has told me she hasn't started to wear the most recent ones as yet.

I also made another silk dress for Helen. 

I am sure these will be successful but it’s too early to say as yet.

Gosh, that’s not much to show for a year! The trousers took up a lot of my time and made me feel completely despondent so I had to give up. I did a lot of garment refashioning, garment repairs

Machine embroidery - successes

I started to use my embroidery machine and enjoyed it. There is quite a big learning curve that I haven’t mastered yet, but I’m beginning to produce items that I have enjoyed making and the recipients have liked receiving.

Classes 

I attended a few classes - working with leather; silks and sheers and corset making. I have taken something from each class. My oldest daughter likes the corset I made (a standard size 12 with a D cup, clearly not for me!) and even though it is a sample speedily made up a couple of days before Christmas, she has taken it home with her. My youngest daughter found a little too much space in the cups - she added a couple of cooking apples to fill the cups out! She liked the waist shaping it gave her, though - she has a fairly straight figure

WIPs

I have some WIPs, ready to restart in January

Make Nine Project - failure

I signed up for the make nine project and have not succeeded in making anything like 9 items. This is because quite a few of my items were going to be trousers/pants and I haven’t got the fit right as yet. Is it possible that I won’t be able to? I didn’t make the jacket as that was to go with the trousers.

RTW Fast

I have been more successful with the RTW 2018 Fast, depending on how you measure success! I have done the fasting - but have not managed to fill the gradually increasing holes in my wardrobe.

7 Steps to Style and Evolve Your Style - failure

I intended to put everything into this but found I just didn’t. This was partly because I was on the RTW Fast and so wasn’t buying new clothes (or even charity shop clothes for refashioning). I had a huge bundle of old clothes that needed restyled but they got me down, I had little idea how to proceed (Lots of trousers) so I abandoned that idea.

I haven’t seen much point in buying new fabrics when I have huge stash or new patterns ditto. So this coming year, I will concentrate on making what I have manageable and reflect me.

February Fails!

Camellia flowering in snowy branches (it was thawing earlier)

I'm not now entering the PR wardrobe contest. No real surprise there! I thought that to make 1 topper, 2 bottoms and 3 tops that coordinate was both achievable and desirable, that is it fitted in well with my plans. I had time to test fit before the start of the real sewing, TNT patterns were of course allowed, and there was/is six weeks after the start of the actual sewing (the end date is 15 March). So not too difficult! Yeah, right.

I thought I'd start with the bottoms. As mentioned elsewhere, I'm doing a PR Sarah Veblen pant class, have her book and read her article in Threads last month. In the PR class, Sarah does post some replies to your queries but is clear that she will not give individualised or personalised answers. She does provide this via her personal platform but of course you have to pay extra for that.  I haven't achieved a suitable fit yet. David is helping me, which isn’t ideal as he really doesn’t understand/agree with the process. I'm sure I'll get there. I hope. I'm not going to rush for an artificial deadline.

I did not want to substitute skirts.

I also made a top from what I thought was a TNT pattern but it didn't work. I think I’ve mentioned this elsewhere, probably with a photo on IG as it didn’t merit a blog post - briefly, it was too tight as the fabric I was using had much less give and drape and I have put on weight. I modified the pattern and tops are on my (near?) horizon.

                                                                 

I'm in the middle of a Paprika Patterns Jasper sweatshirt. I messed up the welt pockets and was forced to redo.

I cut into the welt in the totally wrong direction and couldn't salvage it, though I tried.
The pencil is pointing to a raw end and hole through to the inside of the sweatshirt

Overall view didn't look awful but wasn't right - I would have left but for the hole, above

They look great now but I'm not going to finish in my timescale as there are too many other things going on.

Poor photo on my phone tonight - take my word for it the welts are much better!

I was due back at class tomorrow after midterm holiday, but I can't go as I'm in Scotland with my mother. (I was as I wrote that, last week) Anyway, the sweatshirt would be better with jeans. I have RTW jeans that it will work with - but of course that's no good for the PR contest! Until I get my pant block right, jeans are not on my horizon.

I bought some nice but rather heavy double cloth wool in navy/grey for the topper part, which I've shown before, again on IG, though I also have a Blackwood cardigan ready to cut out. I thought in the end that the cardigan would be better for the wardrobe contest (read speedier!) but the wool would be great in a reversible version of Butterick 6244 to showcase the double cloth nature of it - when I noticed that there was a PR reversible garment contest coming up on 15 March, I thought okay I'd enter. I thought I'd make a toile, though, to get a bit ahead (this is permissible) partly to get the right size and eventually to practice on the fabric to work on the reversible seams before working on the real thing. I thought that getting it truly reversible could be tricky. 

Butterick 6244. A nice pattern, great reviews but just not my style and the fabric was just too heavy, too

Anyway, I modified the pattern for larger hips and larger biceps, cut out from calico and sewed up the toile - and hated the result! I'm not showing you a photo! I did learn a few things from sewing it up - don't forget any of the notches for one thing!! Another thing I learned was to trust my first judgement. I hadn't been at all sure about the pattern for me, or for the fabric, but couldn't find anything more suitable. When I said this to Rory and showed her me wearing the toile, she said she had hoped to find some redeeming feature to mention but couldn’t! She said there was nothing flattering about it for me. She sees me as someone who suits more tailored garments (that’s true) and that normally we’re pulled towards things we suit, particularly as we get older and we know what suits us. Things outside our usual, with a few exceptions (she’s not advocating in the rut thinking) are generally not for us. I also thought this was going to be an easy pattern, but I didn't find it so. I have abandoned this idea. There is nothing whatsoever wrong with the pattern, which came together nicely once I had marked the notches correctly.

At least I still have all the lovely fabric left, unharmed! As I started preparing this post in Scotland, the sun had quite a lot of warmth in it, so I reckoned I'm really thinking about next winter before I use the fabric. Today we have thick snow with more forecast all this week because of the ‘Beast from the East’. It’s chilly outside too so more sewing forecast!

I did get to Sew Club last night (Monday), before the snow proper hit.

I bought some jersey fabric and decided to make a Blackwood cardigan from Helen's Closet, among other things (my originally planned fabric probably wasn't going to work as it had less stretch than the pattern suggested). I planned a matching tank and cardigan. I know matchy matchy isn't ideal these days, but I thought the style wouldn't look like the old style twin set so would work okay.

The fabric was pre-washed and dried. Did I do this incorrectly I wonder?

I sorted out the Blackwood cardigan pattern. I did a small FBA following the excellent instructions given on the sew-a-long. Although I'm tall, I didn't think I needed to lengthen arms or body as it seemed long enough as it is designed super long. I cut out the pattern paper ready to apply to fabric and cut out proper.

I took the fabric to Sew Club as there is a bigger cutting table there.

I found the printed pattern on the fabric is WAY off. As the pattern will be lying horizontally on my body, this is important. 

Yes, it's that far off!

Trying to fold the fabric using patterns as guide - well, you can see the twisted folded edge.
To fold with a nice fold created very off ends

Rory showed me how to try to try to get the fabric on grain (block square and steam). This improved the small piece we were able to do (space, time) and Rory felt it was workable with. She advised cutting out pieces larger than each pattern piece and blocking the pieces individually.

I think I can do that at home as I think I have a cardboard cutting board somewhere. I normally use a cutting mat and rotary cutter but Rory advised against this in this instance. I found that the piece from class had sprung back to the wrong shape.

I wish I had just returned the fabric. This is a lot of effort. I have emailed the company I bought it from to complain, but as the fabric is washed and dried and now has a chunk cut off, I won’t get anywhere. Still, I didn’t want to just let it go. It’s a lot of money even if bought in a sale.

I can't say anything about the Blackwood cardigan as this fabric is a long way from being ready for it! Lots of good reviews so I'm hopeful. Good instructions. I might see if another fabric I have would work - the first I looked at had insufficient stretch. I’ve gone off this fabric big style!!

Current plans

• Complete pant fitting process - then there's no limit! I wanted to make some winter weight pants but by the time this is finished, I'll need to use lighter weight fabrics so those fabrics will get stored away too. I had planned to use navy and burgundy wools. (On that note, Fabworks online has some fabulous wools in a snap sale lasting until next week I think. I don't need any so have resisted the temptation. There are some great buys though)
• Complete Jasper sweatshirt - I’ll post separately about that.
• Make a Blackwood cardigan (plus or minus tank, depending on fabric chosen)
• I do have need, not urgent, for a workout top to go with my workout trousers. The top I tried to wear last time is no use.

Then, who knows? I'd still like to complete the wardrobe contest garments but in my own time.

I've had a few things I've abandoned this year so far for one reason or another (they don't fit the FLF description - Fit; Like; Flatter) but I don't feel bad about them (though I do feel bad about that off-grain fabric - and I have a coordinating piece from the same range which I finally dared to check and it’s off too!).

I'll have to re-look at what I want to do.