Lane raglan #1

Hey, I made myself something! It's a Lane Raglan from Hey June. This is my first attempt of the pattern and it's happily a wearable muslin. Hopefully, it'll be perfect with a couple tweaks.

 

This is linked up over at Pattern Revolution's Sew Yourself Some Love. I won a prize pack! 

I added wrist cuffs and a band at the bottom (per the pattern) after the pictures were taken but I was losing light and unsure what I wanted to do. This is a size large. I think I'll grade out to an XL around my food baby next time.

The fabric was fun for this one. My grandma died almost a year ago and she was a prolific sewer and fabric stasher. My aunts, mom and I went through her stash and I brought home bags of fabric. It was really neat to have that experience with my aunts -- there was yardage and scraps leftover from high school and their weddings! Some of what I brought home was really neat (a whole bag of Pendleton wool!!), and some of it I was immediately questioning why I brought it home.

This fabric was in the "good for muslins" category. The strip is a pretty old jersey with very little stretch, and the navy is actually nice stuff (probably ponte).

This is my "I don't know what to do with my hands" pose. Because I didn't know what to do with my hands.

This was my biggest problem with the pattern. What is all this extra fabric doing under my armpit? (Or this is my "I'm a monkey" pose. Either way.) How do I get rid of some of it? That will be the goal of my next muslin. My plan is to compare it to the plantain tee. Which I really like and will finish whenever I get around to switching thread colors on the serger.

 

Addendum: Almost immediately upon publishing this post, the updated Lane Raglan was released. I downloaded it and we'll see if it solves my fit issues.

 

The fitting issues of sewing clothes for me makes children's sewing a lot more appealing, but it's so fun to wear something I've made. I'm looking forward to alterations becoming a little easier.

PR&P: Metallic hearts skirt

I wasn't planning on playing along with this week's theme over at project run & play. I don't have any glittery fabric or notions and I'm trying hard to stick to my sewing budget this year. No unnecessary fabric purchases! But then the stars aligned with a failed project for me and the need for a new skirt for Stella ...

Reflective tape hearts on a half-circle skirt!

I made the photo extra large because it's super blurry. Heheheh. (No, I haven't been drinking.) It's a half-circle skirt out of ponte de roma double knit from Urban Sew with a gray rib knit waistband. I cut the hearts out of reflective tape (from Joann's) that was leftover from failed running leggings. They are quite reflective.

This was why Stella needed a new twirly skirt. We went to a OSU Women's Basketball game for Valentine's Day and Stella was jealous of Charlotte's cheerleading outfit.
I'm not buying cheerleading outfits in bigger sizes because I'm trying to encourage the girls to love basketball and volleyball. It's totally backfiring. On the way home from they decided Charlotte was going to play basketball and Stella was going to cheer for her.

The only other photo of the skirt. I'm having trouble adjusting my camera's settings before the girls declare the photo session over.

The Beavers played well and beat Utah. It was a fun game to watch! They're doing really well this season.

These sisters have so much fun together. They kind of make my heart explode a lot.

Next week is the last week of PR&P and Kid's Clothes Week. I may just have to make something else! Maybe it's Charlotte's turn...

PR&P: Nothing but Knit

Season 11 of Project Run & Play is here! The theme of week 1 is Nothing but Knit. Which is great, because I love sewing with knits. Stella wants to wear them, they're fast, easy and forgiving to sew, and I'm still in the honeymoon phase with my serger.

I let Stella guide the fabric choice and she chose a dress ("that is very twirly whirly, momma") from her options of dress, shirt and skirt. The pattern is the Uptown/Downtown Dress by Sew Straight and Gather (size 5) and the fabric is some I stole from my mom's stash awhile ago. It didn't melt on the cotton setting of my iron, so it's probably cotton. The pattern calls for quite a bit of stretch, and the fabric only had about 25% stretch, so I placed the pattern about an inch away from the fold line, gathered the middle front and pleated the middle back to gain a little wiggle room. I also wanted a puff sleeve, so I moved the sleeve about 3/4 inch away from the fold line and gathered it as well. Then I banded the sleeves instead of the self-lined sleeve the pattern called for. I forgot to cut the neckline higher than marked as previous dresses have been a little low-cut for my taste (no, Stella, you can't wear that to school, it shows your nipples), so I added a thick neckband that made it perfect.

A word about the pictures: Sorry. Kinda.

Getting Stella to put on a dress and take a posed picture after brushing and fixing her hair takes more caffeine than I had this morning. I was pretty happy when she wanted to put on the dress before breakfast (which is why she still has pj pants on) and then they started looking out the window (woohoo, natural light!).

This is real life folks. With blackberry jam on her face, and a little bit of pink eye.

(And your eyes aren't fooling you, she's a little cross-eyed. Thankfully the glasses correct it.)

Charlotte wears a sleepsack 50% of the time at home. She love loves them. Probably more than she loves us. When you put it on her in the evening, her thumb pops into her mouth and eyes start closing. It's magic.

Checking out the birds. And the neckline has a little gap-age, but this is probably my best neckline yet on a knit shirt.

The hair this morning was quite impressive.

I hope you take some time to watch the birds today!