My New Wardrobe: First Item

Ok, so I am still in the process of trying to figure out what the heck I'm going to make for my New Wardrobe. So far, it mostly consists of a variety of knit tops in various colors or prints, with a few woven shirts thrown in, all on top of a bunch of black skirts. The slideshow at the side of the page gives you an idea of what I'm thinking.

Yes. I am very boring. In my defense, I'm a Winter so I can get away with lots of black and white clothes.

Anyway, since I haven't really been able to focus myself well enough start fitting a pattern, I decided to begin with something simple. Really simple. Astoundingly simple. So simple, in fact, that it only took me twice as long to complete as predicted by the authors of various books and patterns. This is something of a coup for me, as I am The World's Slowest Sewer.

Um. That would be the slowest sewing person in the world. The World's Slowest Sewer, as far as I can tell, is in my old house in Papakura. Seriously. Flushing there was always a Russian Roulette experience. (Ha, see? I was going to say "a craps shoot" but I restrained myself. Admirably, in my opinion.)

My point is, I bought this panel of poly jersey from Fabric Mart (for a whopping $1.99!) with no clear idea of what I was going to do with it. However, since it's black and white, I couldn't really see any reason why it wouldn't fit into my plan.



OK, so that whole long intro is to say: "I made this skirt and it was really simple."

Here's how: I trimmed the two-yard length at the pattern repeat and then cut one side so that I had a rectagle that was 2.5" wider than my widest measurement (in my case, my lower hip). I seamed it up the side with a 1/4 seam on the serger. Then I measured and sewed together a piece of 1" elastic about 3" narrower than my waist measurement. I put this elastic loop around my waist and marked the top of the waistband so that I had an even hem (I always have to pull up quite a bit at the front waist). I sewed a fold-over waistband with the elastic inside and hemmed up the bottom with a narrow hem to preserve the white border.

Viola! Insta-skirt. Sort of. This all actually took me waaaay longer than it should have.





These are really bad pictures. I took them myself and it did not go well. Plus, I did say that I have not one appropriate thing to wear and I meant it. In these photos I'm wearing an old t-shirt that is way too big and also I don't think I would wear black with this skirt. I probably would wear a white top. I think (or hope) that it would balance my shape out a little.



And then after all that, I'm now a little unsure that I can include this skirt in my new work wardrobe plans. Does it look too... tropical? I thought the print was sort of interesting, but the more I look at it the more I worry that it looks like beachwear or something.



Thoughts?? Cool for the office or only for a cruise?

Polo, onward!

I'm already sick of them. However, I will perserver... persever... holy crap! How do you spell that?

I will continue on.

When last we left our story, I had made a very odd little blue polo shirt using KwikSew 3226 and added a vast array of alterations to the pattern. I decided in retrospect that KS 3226 was not the pattern for me, so I moved on to a different one.

Here, then, is my Second Polo Shirt. Despite her many many appearances on Go Fug Yourself, I used this Hillary Duff pattern from McCalls.



I liked the looks of the line drawing for the shirt and the jacket. I thought it would work out for the Great Uniform SWAP. I should have noticed that this shirt is veeeeery narrow in the body, but I didn't.



I find that I am repeatedly fooled by the line drawings of Big 4 patterns. You'd think I'd learn my lesson, but no. This instance was no different. The body was veeeeery narrow indeed. Even The Big One, whose ribs are showing, only just fit into this shirt. TLo would never have gotten it over her head.

In any case, I followed the instructions very closely for this first shirt, which is unusual for me. I usually glance through the pattern pieces and the instructions and then decide what I'm really going to do with the pattern. This time I followed the instructions as written (mostly) and the white shirt was the result.



This is actually much cuter in person, it did not photograph well. It has cute little ruffle details on the hem and sleeve hem, which I made from some scrap yardage of white seersucker I had leftover from summer.

I wasn't very happy with the collar opening on this one, because the heaviness of the collar drags it open and the slit is very low on the chest. I did like the cut of the shirt, however. It fits Skinny Minny Big One just right (this is seriously a bad sign about the actual design of this shirt, as that child is positively scrawny).

On the to the next trial: I decided to leave off the extra frills and ruffles on my second version and I used a standard rugby placket instead of the v-neck placket from the original pattern. This is the result.



NOTE: You may think that all my shirts are horribly skewed or lopsided or something. It's actually the camera angle, these shirts really are even on both sides, I promise! I take the photos on my cutting table, which comes well past my waist (good for a cutting table, not so good for trying to take photos). I guess I should get out a stepstool or something, but instead I hold the camera waaaay over my head and then try to get the correct angle through the screen display.

You won't pretend to be surprised by this amazing display of laziness, right?


I'm really pleased with this shirt, it fits The Big One perfectly and looks quite feminine. I also made this from an old long-sleeve t-shirt that I got from my mom (I think it was from Talbot's or Neimans or some such; the fabric is very beefy and of good quality).




So that's it for tonight. I'm off to watch Flash Forward.

And yes. I have MORE polo-related things to share. Next time on The Polo Channel: All Polo, All The Time.

H1N1 Doesn't Strike Back

So everybody in our house has been ill. Really ill. Horribly awfully help-we-all-have-the-black-death ill... and none of us even had swine flu. Does this seem fair?? I mean, we're all hacking up lungs and feverish and whatnot and we still have the potential TO HAVE IT ALL AGAIN if we get H1N1. This is Not Right! I protest! Someone should DO something about... well... something.

Hmmph. So what with having some sort of bronchitis or pneumonia or the plague or whatever and a lovely variety of other highly stressful situations cropping up all month, I have done zero blogging, reviewing or sewing for several weeks. Well, I made a simple sundress as part of The Big One's Halloween costume. That just about did me in.

Hey, here's a picture of it from this morning (it was Parade-the-kindergarten-and-first-grade-kids-around-the-school-like-prisoners-of-war-in-Halloween-costumes Day at school today). The Big One is, if you can't tell, A Cat. This is like a dream come true for her. I thought she would pass out from sheer joy.

She is a really weird kid.



Sorry for the bad photo, I used our new teeny tiny video camera. Did I mention that this week our computer was also completely hacked by a virus and I had to wipe the whole thing and reload the OS? Yay. So I haven't reloaded my Photoshop software yet and I couldn't fix the photo either. Oh, the trials of modern life.

Anyway, TLo was, as you may have guessed, A Princess. Who carries a magic wand. She would probably have gone for the Princess-Who-Carries-A-Magic-Wand-AND-Has-Fairy-Wings look, except that I cleverly hid the wings last night before she remembered that she owns them. I'm a mean mom like that. I did not make that costume either.

Just to keep up the pretense of writing about sewing, the sundress I used for the cat costume was Ottobre 3-2009-18.





My devious plan was to use "real" articles of clothing and purchase a $5.00 ear and tail set from Walmart. Mission accomplished! Even though the tiger-print is a bit over the top, The Big One can certainly wear it this summer. In fact, I'm sure she'll be thrilled.

I've made this dress three times now, once with an adjustment to the width of the front and back pieces to allow for more fullness and add some pleating detail to the front. It's a very simple dress design and it tends to look a little Susie Homemaker to me, but the girls adore wearing it so I can't really complain, as it takes all of an hour to cut out and sew together.

Anyway, I'm hoping tomorrow or Sunday I will be able to get back on track for "Polo: The Most Popular Mediocre Shirt...EVER!" if I can get organized. I'm also in the middle of trying to design a new work wardrobe, as I will (possibly) soon have a new job and I own (literally) not one office-appropriate piece of clothing. Yay. I dread sewing clothes for myself, so this should be horrifying.