Mishmash

Two of my uber-fans complained to me yesterday about my lack of recent posts. One I could’ve ignored, but two. Two seemed like a message from the Universe to get to work.

The problem is the work. What I’ve been working on lately is hardly noteworthy. In fact, some of it is downright embarrassingly ugly.

First up: jeans. I think I’ve got a pattern that works! It covers most of the flabby bits and shows a wee bit of shape (the wee bit I still have), so I am happy. I have to hem them and attach the waistband button, then they will be good to go. Photo coming.

Second up: doll clothes. You’d think this would be a fast and easy project. Hahaha! It’s painfully slow and rather difficult. Seam allowances must be teeny tiny to look in proportion. Finishing the raw edges is a nightmare!

Jenny, Mandy, Jenny and Mandy keeping me company
in my sewing room.

I’m making clothes for vintage Fisher Price My Friend dolls. My Friend dolls are similar to American Girl dolls, except 30 yrs older and 2” shorter.  Mandy (followed by her friends Becky, Jenny, Nicky, and Mikey) came out in the late 1970’s, just before the Cabbage Patch Kid doll crazy hit. The Cabbage Patch Kids dolls totally eclipsed the My Friend dolls and my poor beauties were discontinued soon afterwards. To me, this was a pity because My Friend dolls were the nicest dolls I’ve ever seen. They had sweet little girl faces (verses teenage tramp or alien morphed), could stand and sit on their own, and were machine washable, with stylable hair. Fisher Price even included sewing patterns with the dolls to expand their wardrobes. (Please note: I’ve never seen an American Girl doll in person, and they may be equally as lovely. But it’s hard for a Canadian to get excited about something called an American Girl doll.)

Anyhow, figuring out the world of doll clothes has been an unexpected challenge. I found a vintage McCall’s pattern for My Friends clothes on Esty, and snapped it up. But guess what? The shirt/blouse doesn’t have enough overlap for a fastener. So even doll clothes patterns have to be adjusted and fitted. Bum-mer!

Last up: shirts. I’m teaching a shirt-making class at the end of the month. It’s called One Shirt, Two Ways. Each half of the sampler shirt will be constructed using different techniques. In other words, I’m teaching two ways to do a collar, two ways to do a collar band, two ways to do cuffs.... You get the idea. To prepare, I’m sewing a shirt for my Stud Muffin, but it’s been slow going because I have to stop and write the notes and do research. There are far more than two ways to do each section, so I’m auditioning the possibilities. Picture shortly.

That’s it for now. Thanks, DD3, for the suggestion to do a mash post!

               -  Lady T

Goldilocks' Jeans, A Sewing Fairytale

Once upon a time, there lived a (middle-aged) girl named Lady T Goldilocks. One fine day, she wandered into her sewing workshop and decided to sew a perfect-fitting pair of jeans. With a heart full of optimism and a hand full of denim, she started off.

Snip, snip went her scissors. Whirl, whirl went her Singer. A spool of golden topstitching thread later, she was done. So she slid them on.

“Oh no!” she cried, when she zipped them up and spied the funny things happening to her midriff fluff. “These are too small! They would fit Baby Bear.”

Poor Goldilocks was so disappointed! All that hard work! Project 3 was a disaster.

Gathering her supplies, Goldie tried again. (I told you she was a stubborn miss.) Determined to do better, she grabbed her best fitting books. Betzina, Palmer/Pletch, and Zieman had much good advice to give. Carefully Goldilocks altered her pattern, widening the waist and lengthening the crotch curve.

Snip, snip went her scissors. Whirl, whirl went her Singer. A spool of golden topstitching thread later, she was done. So she slipped them on.

“Oh no!” she cried, when she zipped them up and they slid down. “These are too big. They would fit Papa Bear if he didn’t mind wearing girly jeans.”

Poor Goldilocks was so disappointed. All that hard work! Project 4 was another disaster.

How sad, how sad, how sad. She stomped around her workshop. Bloggers Beth, Debbie, and Peter had made sewing great fitting jeans look so easy. It wasn't!

Finally, Little Miss Goldilocks sat her tuffet, comforting herself with a bowl of curds and whey. Along came Self-doubt, the Spider, who sat down beside her, and chased Goldilocks’ pluck clean away.

So, gentle reader, is this the end of the story, or just today's installment? Is Goldilocks an idiot for starting this project like the spider said?

Will she squash that spider, find her mojo and try again? Or will she head straight for the mall?

But the big question is: Will poor Goldilocks ever have jeans that fit “just right”?

-      Lady T

Something Fun

The tack (whack) buttons: stars, swirls, and pearl-inset

My stud muffin returned home bearing gifts – including more stud-like things! He brought me several styles of jean buttons, aka tack buttons. (Personally, I think they should be called whack buttons because you hammer them on.) He and DD3 scoured Toronto’s fabric district to find my treasures.

While perusing the fabric stores, they came across some fabulous non-stretch denim. Bless their hearts, they rummaged through the piles and found me three beauties: dark wash, pale pink, and flowered denim. I’m especially tickled with the flowered denim. They’re about to become jeans. Yes, flowered jeans. Even though I know people will point and snicker whenever I wear them, I want, want, want them. There’s no accounting for some people’s taste.

My new denims: dark wash, baby pink, pink flowered

The baby pink denim has a soft spot in my heart. When I was in elementary school, I desperately longed for blue jeans. My mother was horrified – only laborers wore jeans – not little girls. Girls wore skirts or dresses, or on the rare occasion, slacks. (This was right before the hippy movement propelled denim into the fashion world.) Tomboy that I was, prissy slacks just didn’t cut it. One day, the unimaginable happened – my mother brought me home a pair. They were pink jeans, her nod to femininity.

Fast forward two-and-a-half decades. The tomboy is now the mother of two little girls and one baby girl. Mom and I go shopping, and what do we find – pink jeans, identical to the ones I had! Plus matching pink jean jackets! My mom whisked two sets to the cash register and before you could say Bob’s your uncle, both girls were dressed from head-to-toe in pink denim.  In time, they passed their outfits down to their younger sister, so I have sweet memories of all three of my daughters wearing pink jeans.

Once again, fast forward two-and-a-half decades. Pink denim has reappeared my life. Is there any doubt about what I’m going to make with it?

                   -      Lady T

The Dream vs Reality

What’s the biggest difference between a dream and reality? In a dream, everything is perfect. In reality, there are flaws. Lots of them.

In case you haven’t guessed, I’m talking about my newly finished jeans, Trial Pair #1, made from Stretch and Sew #716, the Trouser Jean.

Included for your viewing pleasure (and amusement) is the front view. Yep, they’re Mom jeans. Exactly what I wanted; the top of the waistband covers the bellybutton. I’m thrilled to say this is the one area where dream and reality overlapped.  

The legs do not thrill me. I thought I was getting a straight leg. Instead they taper. Easy fix. Next time, I will widen the leg from hip to hem.

Now the picture you’ve all been waiting for – the backside. Hmmmm. There’s still a lot of fabric at the back of the leg. I definitely don’t like the decoration on the pockets. (Or maybe it’s just the butt they are resting on.)

Front and back, the fit around the crotch doesn’t look great. I will ponder the wrinkles a bit more.

But the biggest problem is the waistband. Inserting it really changed the fit and the comfort level. Before the waistband addition, my pants slid up and down my rectangular body, free-floating so to speak. Afterwards, the pants were locked in place. Cinched in waist is too mild a description. When I sit, my soft spare tire is pushed up and out, much like a tavern wench’s  bosom in her corset. It feels just as bad as it looks!

All in all, I give them a C-. Sort of wearable but not great. Mind you, they are a great diet/exercise incentive. I liked them better when they were a dream.

So ends Project 3.

Missing Stud

Indulge me for a moment, please. When my out-of-town husband (one of the faithful followers of this blog) reads today’s title, he’s going to experience a little zing, thinking I mean him. Of course I do, dear readers, of course I do.


It has nothing to do with a missing stud package. The Prym stud rivets I need to reinforce the stress points on my jeans. The finishing touch that will magically transform my jeans from home-made to custom-made. Most garments have subtle details like this that take them to the next level. Topstitching, size of buttons, angle of a hem. Many of these finishing touches are so small the eye doesn’t consciously notice. But the brain does.

So I want my stud.

Which one? That’s for you, dear reader, to figure out....

     -      Lady T

I Dream of Jean(nie), Part One

Today's entry has a soundtrack. It's the theme song from I Dream of Jeannie, an old, old television show about an astronaut who ends up with a sexy genie and her bottle. I’ve been humming it under my breath all day while assembling bits of denim.

Rumour has it that jeans are hard to sew, which is why I’ve never tried before. Let me dispel that myth here and now. They’re not. At least I haven’t found the task difficult so far. (I hope I'm not jinxing myself....)

Perhaps I should amend that: jeans are not hard to sew provided you have a sewing machine that can handle the job. An old-fashion, basic, straight-stitch machine, like Lady Singer (my new-to-me vintage Singer 15-91) is perfect. A modern machine may have the power for the job, or it may not. The only way to find out is stick a wad of denim under the presser foot and see if the machine chokes or chugs through. Be careful, though – you don’t want to break the machine or the needle.

Personally, I think the hard part of sewing jeans is getting a good fit. Most people wear their denim snug, so there’s not a lot of wiggle room for getting it right. <groan, bad pun> Seams can be taken in or let out, provided there’s enough seam allowance. But some fitting issues must be dealt with in the cutting stage, like the baggy bit under my butt shown in an earlier post.

While I was researching sewing jeans, I came across Jennifer Stern’s blog. Jennifer has her own pattern line, J Stern Designs and is a fabulous instructor (Sawyer Brook, PatternReview, and her blog). She believes if you’re between pattern sizes, go with the smaller one because it’s easier to add a little at the side seams than it is to get rid of the excess fabric that comes with a larger size. Interesting point and totally opposite to the go-bigger-just-in-case theory of pattern sizing. Jennifer also suggests taking key measurements (high hip, thigh) from a good-fitting pair of RTW jeans, and comparing them to the pattern. Peggy Sagers, from Silhouette Patterns, also champions taking measurements from clothing you like and comparing the numbers to the pattern’s. (Maybe if I hear it enough, I’ll actually do it.)

Unfortunately, I did not read these excellent bits of fitting advice until after I had made my muslin. Oh well.  

Here’s my progress thus far:

Simple pocket detail for trial pair

Topstitching at 1/8" and 1/4" from seamline

Pocket in, fly finished

More tomorrow!

           - Lady T