It's time to share your October finish.
This link up will remain open until October 31 at 11:55 pm EST.Want to see everyone's goals? Check out the October goal page.
My goal this month was to sew a piece of clothing. I did sew a piece of clothing for my daughter (view here) but my intent was to sew one for myself. I decided on Love Notions' La Bella Donna dolman shirt. I am using a fabric I bought online from Jo-Ann. It was described as "magenta solid double brush jersey knit", 85% poly, 15% spandex. I don't know that I'd call it magenta, but it's pretty nice fabric (read: nice hand and NOT see-through like so many knits). It matches Gutermann 345 thread.
I measured between a large and x-large on the pattern. I debated blending the pattern between sizes, but ultimately decided to sew a straight XL with the full bust front piece. I may regret this decision since using the full bust front adds two inches to the waist and hip measurements. My thinking was that I can always make it smaller in the waist and hips, but I can't add back fabric I've cut off.
I cut everything to the XL size with the full bust front. The picture below shows the shirt part sewn prior to adding all the cuffs and neckband hem.
Most of the sewing was fairly easy though I did end up with a few bunchy places in band and arm cuffs. I'm wondering if I should have made the waistband piece a little longer since I used the full bust piece, which added a couple inches around.
The neckline was a bit challenging. I used the method Sew Mary Mac recommended to sew down the neckline. My faithful Bernina 440QE sews through everything, but it did not like this fabric. I kept getting long stitches. I did use my walking foot to attach the neck binding piece and to do the topstitching of it, but it still came out a bit ripply. When I first tried on the finished shirt in the bathroom, I did not like how it looked. It was okay, but not particularly flattering. It was pretty disheartening. Nothing ready to wear fits me properly and I didn't feel like this one was that great either.
I had my son take a picture of me and it doesn't look as bad as I thought. My arms look way worse than I thought. 😬 Never in my life did I think I'd be complaining about fat arms, but here I am, a lady of a certain age with flabby arms. 😳😅
I think I need to do a round back adjustment because it feels like it pulls up in the back. Before I attached the band, the front also pulled up in the center, which led me to think maybe there isn't enough bust room. I don't know? You can see the neckline has some issues due to how I sewed it. The fabric is so soft, but I found it difficult to work with. The fabric also doesn't lay the best along where it's sewn to the band. The band is a size larger than I measure, but it doesn't feel overly large. I have so much more to learn!
It's far from perfect, but it's wearable and it doesn't have holes at the waist like many of my shirts do. I will try again and make a different version--regular hem, longer sleeves, definitely a different, easier to use fabric. Plus do the back modification.
Now it's your turn.
Take a few minutes to visit others, offer encouragement, and make new friends!
This link up will remain open until 11:55 pm EST on October 31. Make sure you add a link to this OMG post so others can find the OMG link up from your blog--just paste this link into your post:
Stories from the Sewing Room October One Monthly Goal Finish Link Up
Join me on November 1 to select a new (or continuing, no judgment here) goal.
Thanks for the link-up! The worst part of sewing garments is to get the fit correct, but if you make the same pattern again then you've already done the hard part. Can't wait to see it, all done.
ReplyDeleteSo impressed with your doing garment sewing! I was hoping to do some, but got intimidated. Well done. Good luck with the next iteration.
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