Mabel pencil skirt

I'm on my last week of work before a luxurious five-week summer vacation. Summer is at its peak here in Scandinavia and it's nice to feel effortlessly relaxed while still slightly dressed up for work. 

I have just finished the Mabel knit skirt from Colette patterns, and it has been the perfect thing to wear to work in this weather.  

I sewed my Mabel in a charcoal-gray cotton-viscose sweatshirt-type knit fabric. I originally bought it to make a skirt for my daughter, but then found out that I could use another skirt in my summer wardrobe. Fortunately I had bought just enough for this pattern. 

I made the pencil-skirt length as I don't think I would feel comfortable wearing the short version except at the beach. I measured between sizes M and L, so I traced right between the sizes. When I first tried on the skirt before attaching the waist band, it looked way too small at the hips . I'm pear-shaped so pencil skirts are not the most flattering even though I love the look. 

Luckily, when the waist band was attached and the hem sewn, suddenly the proportions all seemed to line up nicely. Right now, I absolutely love the skirt, I'll wear it to the beach during my vacation and it fits perfectly as workwear in my fairly casual office. 

I originally envisioned it worn with tank tops at the beach, but it works with a variety of tops. Yesterday I wore a black cotton voile shirt blouse, and today with this viscose knit top that I made last year using an Ottobre design 2/2013 pattern. 

I'm quite certain there will be more Mabel skirts coming up!

For Amanda and Jonathan

I am the proud godmother to the daughter of one of my best friends. Amanda's mother and I somehow survived junior high together, in the midst of tape recorders, grunge style, Beverly Hills 90210, and other early 90's phenomena.

My friend knows all about my sewing hobby, because every time she calls and asks what I'm doing, I'm ironing, sewing, cutting... So she approached me to ask if I could make a vintage-style dress for Amanda, similar to what her own grandmother had made for her as a child. The style we were going for is best described by the Astrid Lindgren character Madicken or the Swedish painter Carl Larsson: early 20th century, rustic, and comfortable. I don't know what this style would be called in the English-speaking world, the only thing that comes to mind is 'amish' but I haven't heard that used in a positive sense when talking about fashion.

Here is the result:

The pattern comes from Ottobre Design 1/2013, the Mariken dress in size 104. I followed the instructions, the only modification was to put in a regular zipper instead on an invisible one. I didn't have an invisible zipper in the right size and color, and I'm happy with the result: the zipper adds a bit of interest to the back of the dress.

The fabric is a navy-and-white gingham cotton seersucker. I think it suits the style perfectly. After my last project in silk, it was nice to work with a more straightforward fabric! I added a small bow at the neckline, and a label at the front pocket. I recently bought myself a fantastic new sewing machine, a Brother Innovis 550. It has awesome features such as automatic threading of the needle, thread cutting, and alphabet stitches. I did not expect I would use the latter very much, a little cutesy for my taste. Here, I couldn't resist trying it out, and for a four-year-old I think cutesy is ok: 

Amanda has a six-month old brother, Jonathan. I wouldn't want to make him jealous, so after finishing the dress I pulled together these red corduroy pants:

This is another Ottobre design pattern, the 6/2012 Veijari pants in size 80. I skipped a couple of details: the back belt loops and the front pockets, to make them less bulky and more comfortable. 

I started sewing the waist elastic to the pants according to the instructions, but it turned out very loose. It would be a shame if the pants couldn't be worn because they were falling off. I decided to put in an adjustable elastic, like you find on a lot of ready-to-wear children's clothes.

This looks advanced, but with the right type of elastic, all you need to sew is a button and a buttonhole!

Making baby clothes is really one of my favorite type of sewing projects! You spend minimum time on the less inspiring parts of sewing such as trying to fit a large piece of fabric on the floor for cutting, and a proportionally larger part of the project on the fun stuff such as nice pockets and top-stitching. 

This back pocket with the Jonathan label is one of my favorite sewing details so far! I was contemplating which color to use for top-stitching and finally settled on this mustard color to fit the jeans-style design of the pants. I love the result, and I hope Jonathan will too! 

Time to get started!

I've been thinking of blogging my creative efforts ever since I began sewing clothes almost two years ago. The on-line sewing community has been a great source of inspiration an knowledge during this time. Whenever I plan a new project I turn to google images and always find some awesome inspiration.

When Sewaholic announced their give-away for the Belcarra sew-along, I thought it was about time to start that blog. Well, here it is!

And here's my Belcarra:

The fabric is a gorgeous Liberty satin silk. This was my first time sewing with a light silk fabric, and probably the first pure silk garment I've ever owned. It is amazingly comfortable, it drapes beautifully, and was easier to sew than I had feared.  

The Belcarra is also my first Sewaholic pattern, I was thrilled that it became available as a pdf. I have been eyeing envelope patterns on-line but I'm impacient and don't like paying for shipping. I have a bunch of Burda style and Ottobre magazines, so that's what I've been sewing so far. A couple of weeks ago, I tried my first pdf pattern: the Salme buttonless shirt dress. There will be an upcoming blog post on that one. 

The pattern is great! I cut a size 8 for hips and bust, and graded out to a size 10 at the waist. I lengthened the pattern by 2 cm at the waist. It fits perfectly! Working with silks, I made sure all seams were enclosed: french seams for the most part, and some improvisation at the cuffs. 

I personally love to wear blouses and shirts tucked-in, but most ready-to-wear shirts are too short for that to work on my body. That's a great perk of sewing my own, those extra 2 cm length make all the difference. 

The skirt is a stretch denim straight paneled skirt, loosely based on this Burda style pattern. I like how it makes the outfit more casual.

So, how was this for a first blog post? For the future, I foresee:

• More blog posts
• More sewaholic patterns
• More silk
• Hopefully some improvements in modeling and photo editing!