It's now a dress...

I made the skirt to go with the top for Helen's queen costume, but when she tired them on, there was a lot of tummy showing when she moved around. It was obvious that it would be better as a one piece dress. After I persuaded her to take off the skirt, I removed the waistband and sewed the skirt to the top. It sounds simple, but it actually took a lot of work to make everything sit right. There was also a lot of hand sewing involved so that the stitching wouldn't show on the outside. It would have been a lot simpler to make it a dress right from the beginning! Oh, well. Done now.
Definitely a hack job, but here it is:



Apologies for the overexposed photo - the centre panel is a deeper gold than it appears here. I found her a pair of gold ballet flats to wear with the costume. I might have to buy the crown rather than make it, as things are pretty crazy here with moving house.

Sleeves

I worked on the sleeves today for the queen costume. I have virtually no experience working with very sheer fabrics, and none at all with crystal organza. The stuff is evil! It frayed like crazy, but eventually I got the sleeve seams and edges done (with the same gold braid as the bodice). I just hope it holds up ok. The next step is to set them into the bodice.

Queen costume progress

After a few more calicos, last night I got stuck into the real fabric. Cut and sewed the main part of the bodice. Rather than fiddling with facings, I decided to do a full lining. We are getting some very warm days already, so I used the lightest fabric I had on hand for the lining - a very thin muslin. Ideally the lining would be red, but hey, it's just a costume!
I realised when sewing this up that my construction method has some bad mistakes (the way the centre panel is attached). Again, it's just a costume, so I fudged it and forged ahead, rather than spending more time trying to figure out a better method.
The trim didn't handle the tight curve on the bottom front edge as well as I'd hoped. Might redo that part if I get time.
It still needs sleeves and a zipper/other fastening.

Queen costume: bodice and sleeve shapes

I mentioned yesterday that I'm making a queen costume for Helen. I decided to make a seperate top and skirt to make toileting easier.
Below is a photo of my first calico mockup for the top. The sleeve on the right is my first attempt - definitely not puffy enough. After that, I googled for puff sleeve tutorials to get a better sleeve shape. You can see the result on the left - much better! The bodice is still too short, although it would probably be ok if I was going to sew the skirt to it. The fit is fine otherwise, at least for a costume, although I might modify it a bit to better accomodate her tummy shape.



Here, you can see how different the pattern pieces are for these two sleeves. (The piece on the left is cut on the fold, with some width added at the fold).

The finished apron

The photos aren't great, but you get the idea:




Yup, the ruffles are definitely too wide! Hands in pockets so you can see where the pockets are.



Rear view.

Apron - day seven

I managed to finish the apron tonight! The last few steps went quicker than I expected, except that I sewed the buttons on the wrong side, so I had to take them off and sew them on the correct side.
I'll take photos tomorrow when the light is better.

My next project is a queen costume for Helen - she's been invited to a "Majestic Princess" dress up party. I've heavily modified a vintage dress pattern and sewed a calico test bodice today, but it was too short (even though I lengthened the original). Hopefully the next draft will fit and I can squeeze in sewing the whole costume before we move, since the party is only a few days after the move and I'm sure unpacking will be the priority in that time.

Apron - day six

Actually, it's partly day five continued, as I sewed a bit more last night after I posted.
Last night I sewed the waistband to the bib and sewed the ties to the waistband.
My internet connection was down for most of today and I couldn't access the tutorial, so it was either do no sewing or wing it based on my hazy memory of reading through the tutorial when I first found it a few weeks back. I gave it a go, and now that I can see the tutorial again, can see that my memory was pretty much correct. I managed to sew the skirt to the waistband, which means all the pieces are sewn together. I am part way through hand stitching the inside waistband section in place.
I'm not sure if I'll achieve my goal of completing the apron in seven days, given that tomorrow is Saturday and we have to do some packing, which could limit sewing time. It will be close either way.
Sorry, no photo today.

Apron - day five: Construction has begun!

Heather slept well today, so I was able to attach the shoulder ruffles and straps to the bib section (steps 9-11). Well, except pressing the seams at the end.

Straps sewn to bib and ruffles basted on:


Strap seams completed (this was tricky!):


Now that the top section is basically put together, I can see things I'll definitely change next time. I think the ruffles are too wide - almost ridiculous, actually - and the straps are too narrow. Maybe I made the hems on the ruffles too narrow, but either way they're still too wide. Widening the straps will also make construction easier, since the bib and other strap has to be tucked inside the strap tube when sewing the second seam (this is what made that part tricky).

Apron - day four

My mum came over to help me start packing for our move, so I didn't get sewing time today. I couldn't go to bed without doing something though, so tonight I pressed and sewed the hems on the shoulder ruffles (step 8). Step 8 also has instructions to sew the gathering stitches for the ruffles, but that will have to wait.
The last few steps have involved preparing individual pieces. I'm looking forward to actually assembling this thing!

Apron - day three

Today I completed steps 6 and 7: preparing the ties and assembling the bib section. The narrow hems on the edges of the ties gave me fits. I actually have a narrow hemming foot that makes a 4mm rolled hem (like a shirt hem), so I tried that first, but kept having problems with it. I didn't persevere long enough to be sure, but I suspect that the weave of the quilting cotton is a bit too open to work well with this particular foot. Shirting cotton is certainly thinner and more tightly woven, and I've successfully used this foot before with a somewhat more tightly woven printed dressmaking cotton fabric. In the end I pressed it manually and then stitched the hem, as per the instructions.
The other sewing frustration of today was discovering that a certain little person had taken to the hem of yesterday's skirt section with her craft scissors :/. Thankfully she didn't do a huge amount of damage and it was not in a prominent spot. She admitted, when questioned, that she'd been trying to make a bandage! I was able to fix it with some makeshift machine darning using a 3 step zigzag.
Sorry, no photos today.

Apron - day two

Today I completed steps 3 to 5 (going by the tutorial page numbers) of my apron. I hemmed the skirt, sewed the gathering stitches on the skirt (not gathered until a later step though), prepared the pockets and sewed them onto the skirt.

Due to the busy print, you can barely see the pockets in this photo. It made me realise that this was probably a good fabric choice for an apron - apart from having pictures of aprons, kitchen equipment and food on it, it will hide any stains really well!

Time for an apron sew-along!

A few weeks back, I decided to make aprons for some family members for Christmas gifts. A few people on EB have joined in too - some are making aprons for their kids, and others are making adult sized aprons.
I started mine today. I'm using a free retro apron tutorial I found here. I bought enough fabric for four different aprons from Hawthorne Threads, and some coordinates and trim from Craft Depot. However, to try out the pattern for the first time, I'm sewing an apron for myself using an apron print that was in the clearance bin at Craft Depot.

Here are my fabrics. The paper is the pattern cutting diagram.


Ready to cut (and label):


The pieces all cut out:


That's it so far.

More undies...

The other day I finished a few more pairs of side snap undies, like the ones in my earlier post.



There may be one or two pairs in the wash in addition to the four shown here - I didn't keep count. Unfortunately Heather doesn't want to wear them, though she may yet change her mind. Target has underwear on sale this week, so I bought two packs of ordinary undies for her and we're just having to be extra careful taking them off when there's a number two miss.
Next up is an apron sew-along (through EB), starting on Sunday. I hope to be posting daily for a week while I work on it. I have several aprons to make, but my goal is just to complete one next week. Any more will be a bonus.