Thursday, April 8, 2010

My wonderful Easter break

Wow, 2 posts in one week, so here goes.

This year for once we didn't go away and DH had to work for two days as well, so I took advantage of 4 days of sewing, yippee.

Now over on Pattern Review they are currently holding a Mini Wardrobe Competition and one of my goals this year was to complete at least 1 competition, so I am going to give it a go. Needless to say this has been going since 16 March and finishes on 15 April, however after last weekend I am halfway there so fingers crossed.

This contest is to complete a 4-piece wardrobe in 4 weeks.

There are quite a few combinations for this and I first of all started to think along the lines of a dress, jacket, top and skirt.

I started with Simplicity 3775 which I had already traced off a size 4 at the shoulders and graded out to a 6 from the under arms and had done the following adjustments:

  • Round shoulder
  • Neck Gaposis
  • High round back
  • Sway back
when I cut the rather wild knit fabric out on Friday morning the pieces looked rather small so I used my Croverpro to Chainstitch the bodice together and I am so glad I did as it was a bit too tight with the 1.5cm seam allowances.

I ended up using 6mm seam allowances on the entire dress and this moved the front bands closer to the centre and the rest worked out perfectly.



Then I was thinking of using the Simplicity Cardi as the Jacket but after discussing this with Alison I decided this wouldn't work with the dress. So back to 2 tops and 2 bottoms.

On Saturday, Alison and I headed off to the ASG group at Alexandria and I cut out BWOF 04-2009-101 Skirt in a salt and pepper mini corduroy fabric that I purchased at an Industry Day at Martin & Savage quite a few years ago. The smallest size for this skirt is a 36 and I am a 34, however I didn't grade it down (still have to learn to do this) but thought with all the seams it should be okay. The only adjustment I did to start with was a swayback adjustment of 1.5cm.

Once I stitched the front yokes using Deb Thompson's great tutorial I basted the remaining seams together then had some great help from Alison in fitting this. Essentially I made the side seams and back panel seams 2cm and left the front ones alone.

Sunday started with adding the side and back yokes to the skirt and getting it ready for DH to level the hem that night.

I then cut out BWOF 02-2009-108 in the cream Mercury Jersey that DM and I purchased from Lincraft back in February.

I had already traced this pattern out and had done the following adjustments:

  • Added 1cm to the neck edge
  • Round shoulder 1.5cm
  • High round back 1cm
  • Gaposis on front 1cm
  • Reduced the sleeve cap by 2cm and redraw sleeve cap
  • Sway back adjustment of 1.5cm
This went together really well finishing it on Monday.

Here are both pieces being worn to work today.



I have now traced off the Jalie Scraf-Collar Top and have started to trace off BWOF 04-2010-120 Jeans. I'm not sure about the Jeans as I haven't made Burda pants/trousers before, so I may end up making a pair of casual pants instead, need to think about this one a bit more as the time frame will be a major consideration if I want to complete this competition.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Your Easter weekend sounds like heaven to me - who needs a holiday away when you can sew all weekend?
As I am a Burda size 44/46 I often have to grade up a size and have found this to be the easiest way.
Trace out the (in your case) smallest size (size 36), then lay each traced line onto the size 38 and redraw the size 36 line inside the original traced line.
Your mini SWAP garments look really good. The colour palette is great on you. Good luck getting it all finished on time.

Dilliander said...

Gosh, you are on a roll! They all look lovely. I've used the BurdaStyle tutorial before for downsizing a pattern and it works well. Your method worked well too. Here's the link http://www.burdastyle.com/techniques/make-a-pattern-larger-or-smaller

Anonymous said...

Sharon, everything looks fabulous but even better in real life! Love the skirt and the dress. You'll probably finish the contest before me and I've been working on it for 3 weeks.

gwensews said...

All your pieces are very pretty. I like the print of the dress. All your garments in what appears to be, your colors. Nice job!

Jenni said...

Everything looks fabulous on you. I adore the knit dress though. Such a flattering shape on you. if I ever get round to making my version of this pattern, I hope it looks as good.

Carol said...

This is a great collection. When I made that top last year I found the shoulders a little narrow. I have the skirt on my never ending list of things to make. I love, love, love the fabric you used for the dress. That would slot straight into my wardrobe like I'd picked it out myself. You've made some really lovely garments.

Sue said...

Fabulous skirt and top combo - I love the colours you have chosen!

velosews said...

I really love your skirt. It's so well made and the design + fabric is spot on. Your dress is really good. You've done some really good work with knits.

Diana said...

Your garments all look so well on you. I especially like the dress.Have fun finishing the mini wardrobe.

Rūta said...

The dress is very beautiful, fits just perfectly and I love the pattern.