Horizontal Stripes - Faux Pas?

...I think not.

Hi all,

I've been away from blogging for a while now, I have to learn to be a little more consistent.
I have however been keeping myself quite busy sewing throughout the summer.

I went shopping the other day and saw a simple tank dress but I couldn't bring myself to buy it. I have to work on my giant stash and don't need any RTW items that I know I can make myself. So I went home drafted the pattern and recreated it. The fabric is a polyester knit I got from Fabricland for $2/m.

The peek-a-boo black is the lining which I should have understitched.



Trying to show my beaded sandals...I love them.



I love how the vertical stripe insert gives the illusion of an hourglass.

I've decided I don't care what the experts say...I am a big girl and I like horizontal stripes.

Vogue 1250 Dress....well sorta...

I love this dress!
Of course I had to put my own little twist to it.
Let's start with the pictures, I took them at night and I hate the shadowing effect, if anyone has any ideas on how to avoid this I'm all ears.

Vogue v1250

Yeah, when I make this again I have to shorten the bodice to bring that seam up at least 1.5-2 inches.

Sorry for the blurriness, I was moving aroung too much.

Changes I made:

-Length, I'm in love with maxi dresses right now and it was an easy change.

-The dress is fully lined in a thinner rayon knit, I have lumps and bumps that don't do well without lining.

-The only pattern left at the store went up to size 14 but I took it and added 2" then ended up having to taper the waist in about 1.5"

Besides this it was a very easy dress and I am planning to make a couple more.

Simplicity 2337 Redo

Do you remember my previous post of this pattern? It was not a pretty sight!
I loved the ease of the style though and decided to try it again putting into consideration my current size and shape...not the one I want...lol.

Instead of a wrap-style bodice I went with a standard round neckline that would be more demure. I also made it in a size 20 and it now fits great.

I love the result!

I belted the dress and the fabric used is another purple ponte polyester knit from my gigantic stash. It is interlined in a jersey interlock.

Another Bathing Suit

I am on a roll...yes...another bathing suit.
I had no idea how much fun it was to make these, my 11 year old daughter is usually unimpressed by what I make but she's totally taken with the bathing suits.

The black tights are not part of the suit, she just happened to have them on. The fabric is just a polyester knit left over from another project, I used less than a yard.

Me-Made-March ....Finally

I pledged to wear self made in March and I had not done it yet, I realized that I like to make elegant dressy clothes and right now I have nowhere special to go.
Today I wore my self-made African lace dress with my thrifted purse and favotite coat.

I had forgotten how much fun the self-timer feature on my camera was!!

Bathing Suit

Yesterday I made my daughter a basic bathing suit. She's at an akward stage where she can't fit the clothes in the kids' section and all the bathing suits in the women's section are too revealing. So what's a mom to do???

I pulled out this pattern from the Freecycle box. She had picked out this fabric in all her favorite colors last summer.

I had to shorten it at the waist as she is 5'2"

I absolutely love this pattern, it does not ride up at all.
I believe this pattern is from around 1969-1970 or thereabouts.
This is a good TNT base for my daughter and I and I will for sure be making several versions this summer.

And while I was on a roll I made some boxers for my boys, they gave me the strangest looks when I presented them.

Simplicity 2337

Today I spent the day on Simplicity 2337

This was a wake up call for me...I made a size 16 and it's clearly too small.

I used a ponte knit fabric lined with a lighter weight polyester knit.
I made a couple of changes
- Added the black triangle to cover all the spillage
- Reversed the pleat directions on the sleeve as well as the front
- Lined the dress

Let me know what you think.