Glamourpuss

Pattern: Saturday Night Silk Jersey Set from Weekend Sewing by Heather Ross
Size made: Small
Fabric used: 3 yards (actually, probably closer to 2.5 yards as called for in the pattern–I didn’t measure my leftovers) of a screenprinted cotton t-shirt knit fabric I got from Hancock Fabrics for $3 a yard
Date started: March 29, 2009
Date completed: March 30, 2009
Mods: Substituted fabric; added the pockets from the Trapeze Dress pattern into the side seams of the dress (cut 4 pockets, sew pockets to edges of front and back pieces–right sides together–then when sewing front to back, sew around the edges of the pockets instead of straight down the edge). Since I added the pockets, I didn’t sew French seams for the side seams.
Notes: Verdict: awesome! I love this dress! (not really a dress. A “set.”) I wasn’t even planning to make it–I felt like it was kind of impractical (I prefer dresses you can comfortably wear a bra under) but when I was tracing other patterns and saw this only had 3 pattern pieces, I couldn’t resist trying it out. (Bonus: since it’s sewn with a knit fabric, there is no ironing involved, and hemming is optional.)

It took only an hour or two to make. Really, really easy and fast. If I ever see some silk jersey at a halfway reasonable price, I think I might splurge and make myself another one of these. The cotton knit is fairly drapey but I think it’s still a little stiffer than a silk, rayon, or bamboo fabric would be, especially because of the slight stiffness of the screen printing ink.

The set looks like a Marilynesque halter dress, but is really two pieces: a super-comfy elastic-waist skirt, and a tie-neck halter top with a draped cowl front and long, wraparound waistband ties, so you can wear the two pieces as separates if you so desire. The top is really short–I wouldn’t wear it by itself unless something miraculous happened to my abs–but I’ve already worn the skirt in public separately with a nice brown sweater, leggings, and boots; I rolled the waistband over itself a few times and wore it lower down, since for the set to work properly without a gap between the top and the skirt, the waistband for the skirt needs to sit in old man pants territory, i.e. at the “natural waist”.

The pattern is incredibly easy, and since it’s a stretchy knit fabric, with elastic waist and adjustable ties at the neck and waist, it can be easily adjusted to fit the wearer perfectly.

The front could be immodest, so I need to be a little careful when wearing this–the drape neck dips really low. There’s a ton of fabric in the front there, so it seems to cover everything pretty well, but I do wish the cut of the dress allowed for wearing a camisole or putting in a modesty panel or something. It does seem to fit well around the sides–I’m not concerned about it gaping under the arms.

I sewed all seams with a zigzag stitch, and repurposed the waistband elastic from an ancient, fraying pair of underwear for the waistband of the skirt. I skipped the rolled hem and left the bottom unfinished. If you wanted to make the pattern even easier, and use less fabric, you could probably skip the facings for the front and waist ties, and leave all the edges and seams unfinished.

The waistband instructions were a little confusing, so I’m not sure I sewed the waist elastic on exactly as intended, but it looks and works fine the way it is. The elastic is sewed directly to the fabric, so it’s really easy, no casing or facing to deal with.

Here is how it looks from the back.

Pretty great, right?

Sewing FO: Summer Blouse

Making a summer blouse is total wishful thinking right now. It seemed to be all warm and nice here for a little while, and then it snowed a few inches over the weekend and went right back to the cold and deceptively sunny weather we’ve had all winter. But I couldn’t resist the allure of a breezy cotton blouse in cheerful colors, so I went ahead and sewed this up, to be squirrelled away for another few months.

Pattern: Summer Blouse from Heather Ross’s Weekend Sewing
Size made: Small (bust: 36″, length: 23″)
Fabric used: 2 yards Full Moon polka dot in Yellow, 1 fat quarter Tree Peony in Sand, both Amy Butler Lotus fabrics
Date started: don’t know!
Date completed: don’t know!
Mods:

• I found the blouse really gigantic, and the cotton I used isn’t very drapey, so I added darts to the back in an attempt to tighten up the silhouette. It is still pretty gigantic and billowy (but at least it’s comfy).
• I only had a 1-inch bias tape maker, so I used this instead of 3/4″. I think the 1-inch measurement is before it gets folded in half, so actually my bias tape is 1/2″, narrower than the 3/4″ bias tape called for in the book.
• Did not add a button at the neckline.
• Had to cut the button loop a lot wider than called for in the book–at the specified dimensions and seam allowance, it was so narrow I couldn’t get my loop turner through it to turn it inside out.
• Ran out of fabric, so I cut the sleeves a little short–bracelet length instead of “to the base of the thumb” as the book recommends. I would have liked the longer sleeves, but I think they still came out fine.
• Instead of hemming the lower edges of the sleeves and body, I used the extra bias binding to hem them.
  
  I think this was fine for the sleeves, but the stiffness of the bias tape adds to the excessive flare of the body. Unfortunately, the blouse was on the short side, so I didn’t feel like I could hem it without baring my midriff.
• Accidentally sewed the bias tape on wrong, because I didn’t read through the directions carefully. I was supposed to sew it on one side, then fold it over and top-stitch to secure the other side. Instead, I folded it over and sewed just one seam through both layers of tape.

Notes:

• As I mentioned, I think there’s a problem with the button loop directions as written. The loop needs to be cut wider, or the seam allowance smaller.
• I think there’s also a mistake with the yardage requirements and cutting layout shown in the book. There was no way to fit the sleeve above the fronts/backs on the 45″ fabric, so I had to move it down along the fabric, with the result that even with an “extra” 3/8 yard of fabric (I had about 2 yards) I ran a little short and cut the sleeves shorter than the pattern specified. I think the math confirms this: the 45″ fabric is 22.5 inches folded in half, and 1/2 of a front or back for a 36″ bust (without any ease taken into account, even) is about 18″. That only leaves 4.5″ for the width of the sleeve (which is cut out flat in one piece, not folded in half). So if you are planning to make this, buy extra fabric.
• If I make this again, I will see if I can figure out a way to take out a couple of inches from the body without making the shoulders too tight. It just felt too big for me. Alternatively, I might try making it in a drapier fabric. I’m a sucker for pretty quilting cotton, but it’s maybe a little too stiff for a non-fitted blouse like this.
• And I really want to make it again, and figure out a way to make it work as a somewhat fitted garment, so that I can cut it longer and make an awesome sheath dress like Heather’s.
• The body, aside from being too big, was also too short. If I make another blouse version, I will lengthen the body by probably 4 or 5 inches, and hem instead of binding with bias tape.
• Another problem I had with the fitting was the neckline (check out that awesome contrast placket, btw. I loved the construction of the placket): The problem with the neckline, which may not be readily apparent, is that it is super high and chokey. I don’t really understand the photo in the book; the blouse (as made by me) has a really high, tight neckline, not the wide bateau neck shown in the photo. It doesn’t matter much, since it looks nice with the lapels turned back, but it would be absolutely impossible to wear with the button fastened. Looking at the few other finished objects in the Weekend Sewing Flickr pool, it looks like other people have had this issue, too. So next time around, I would lower the front neckline by about 3 or 4 inches.
• I think the bust darts are slightly too low for me. Not sure if I would bother changing this.
• The pattern mentions sewing a gathering stitch between the markings on the sleeve cap. These seem to have been accidentally omitted from the pattern paper. I just fudged it by sewing along the top part of the sleeve cap. Check the errata for more information about this.
• The pattern was really simple and well-written (aside from the issues noted above). Aside from not reading the directions carefully enough, I had no particular problems with the pattern instructions. Note that all the patterns in this book are printed on giant fold-out sheets stuck into the front and back of the book. Before you can use them, you need to trace the pieces on tracing paper and cut these out, instead of cutting out the pattern pieces directly. I went on a little tracing spree last night and traced/cut the pieces for another three patterns, and sewed up one more (the Saturday Night Silk Jersey Set, which only has three pattern pieces!)–I’ll have pictures of this one soon; it came out great, but is even less suited to the weather than the Summer Blouse. I am keeping the pattern pieces for each pattern labeled and folded up in a gallon Ziploc bag. Unlike Built By Wendy’s Sew U, there is no envelope included in the book to hold pattern pieces.

New Knit on the Net is up

There’s a new Knit on the Net up and I am really impressed by the modeling/styling/photography this time around. So beautiful! I especially like Quadrato, Joan Crawford, and Ava–that last one designed by Jennie Atkinson of the Rowan Butterfly dress fame.

also, chemgrrl finished some brand new orata socks! How great is that? Pretty great, if I do say so myself. Go look at them–they’re pretty! ah, feather and fan goodness.

Yarn Harlot!

Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, The Yarn Harlot, was in Madison on Saturday at the Madison Knit-In! She was great, as was the event overall–I just wish I had gotten there earlier so I could have spent some more time browsing in the marketplace. When I walked in, I immediately gravitated towards the Plucky Knitter’s piles of glowing cashmere and merino and was unable to tear myself away, so I spent about 90% of my time rubbing skeins of cashmere against my cheek and about 10% dashing through the rest of the marketplace looking at stuff.

And guess what, I won a door prize! The Yarn Stash Workbook. I walked in and as I was looking at my map, Gina, whom I’d met at the Harmony Bar knitting group, walked up to me and said “Guess what, you won a door prize!”

I made a beeline for the back of the marketplace and picked up my prize.

Wandered over to the Plucky Knitter where I met Miss Plucky Sarah herself and had a chance to ogle the Yarn Harlot’s fantastic handspun February Lady Sweater close up as she was talking to someone nearby.

Wrecked the budget I’d set for myself within the first 10 minutes of being there by picking up some semi-solid aran weight cashmere and being unable to put it back down.

Ran over to the Briar Rose Fibers booth–Mary couldn’t come, but she asked me to keep an eye out for some Briar Rose fiber, so I picked up some gorgeous huge bundles of BFL (spring green and icy blue).

Stopped to pet the angora in the Kimmet Croft stand, then grabbed a color card from Blackwater Abbey, whose yarns are sort of crunchy and rough but the colors are fantastic (and I love this free cardigan pattern, Faery Ring).

A couple of fellow knitters stopped me to ask about the Noro The Water is Wide scarf I was wearing. “Oh, and did you know you won a door prize?” they said. I had never met them before, but I guess they remembered my name and recognized it on the name tag.

It was 1 PM by then, so I rushed off to see the Harlot, completely missed out on the lunch that was included in my ticket (I did get a muffin and a Coke) and spent a happy couple of hours listening to the reasons knitters are awesome, and laughing my ass off over her story of getting locked out of a hotel room in Calgary while wearing only a pair of powder blue panties with the word “Cowgirl” written on them in lasso rope.

Here is Stephanie,

and here is a view of all the knitters behind me:

I actually didn’t have any mindless knitting on the needles, so instead I spent the time spinning on my new(ish) toy, a 1.2 oz. Jenkins Turkish spindle made of spalted tamarind wood (the fluff is some awesome Type B pygora from eXtreme Spinning):



Saw Jaala of Knitcircus on the way out (keep an eye out for their interview with the Harlot in their next issue!) “Hey, did you know you won a door prize?” she said.

I went and patiently waited in line to see the Harlot, got my copy of Knitting Rules! signed, and got a picture with Stephanie as well. See? I’m holding the sock! Yay!



Rahul had come to pick me up and he asked her if she would also sign his copy of The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature, but she said she would only do it if she could sign it “Steven Pinker.” (Sadly, she didn’t follow through. Too bad. It would be even more valuable than a rare photo of Sean Connery signed by Roger Moore.)

It was a really lovely way to spend a Saturday, and that’s lucky, because the rest of the day went rapidly downhill from there–we were headed to his parents’ house in southern Missouri for his spring break, but took a wrong turn along the way and only realized it when were were nearing O’Hare, with the end result being a 3-hour detour, a bunch of toll roads we had to pay for twice, a lot of grouchiness and yelling, and what should have been a 7.5 hour trip turning into an 11-hour ordeal that landed us in Missouri at about 3 AM.

Anyway, at least we’re here and relaxing with his parents now, and it’s about 10-20 degrees warmer here than it was in Madison–crocuses are out, lawns are green, star magnolia and forsythia bushes are flowering, and we don’t have to wear massive down jackets at all times. And hopefully the trip back will go more smoothly. (We are putting some serious thought into buying a GPS before we go back). We’re spending next weekend in Chicago with some friends, should be fun!

Happy St. Patrick’s Day, Erin Go Bragh, etc.

I will leave you with some Dutch commercials for a candy called Super Dickmann’s! These are really hilarious if you have the sense of humor of a 12-year-old, which apparently I do.

1, 2, 3.

New knitty! New seaming technique! New books!

I found this seaming technique via the Daily Chum: the Bickford Seam. I’d never seen this method before. Supposedly it looks flat and nearly invisible, like mattress stitch, but from both sides. I really want to try it out!

The new Knitty came out today! I love the Aeolian shawl to pieces. I think I have a lace crush on Elizabeth Freeman (she also designed Laminaria). And speaking of lace crushes, did you know Lacis is coming out with a whole book of reissued Herbert Niebling designs? It makes the heart go pitter-patter. It’s a translation of Gestrickte Spitzendecken, corrected and re-charted.

The knitting I’m doing is mostly of the secret or swatchy variety right now, so I don’t have a lot to share, unfortunately. I am working on reknitting this Arrows cowl to make it smaller, with the intention of putting it up as a free pattern:


(see? cowl too big for my taste, and it was too sunny outside. but hey, o w l s !)
It uses 2 skeins Mirasol Miski, a super-soft baby llama blend with all sorts of feel-good social justice benefits. The old one is Bluebell, the new one is Coral.

I got Heather Ross’s Weekend Sewing in the mail and I love it! Can’t wait to start on the Summer Blouse, (I even traced and cut out the pattern pieces last night. I’m not looking forward to making the bias tape, though) and I really really want to make the Obi Dress and Trapeze Dress, but don’t have suitable fabric in suitable yardage for either.

I am thinking of using my Amy Butler Lotus yellow polka dot fabric for the blouse, with facings in something else from the collection, maybe this peony fabric or blue damasky stuff. I only have a fat quarter of each, though, so I don’t know if that will work, it’s probably not enough.

And Yarnmonster is modeling in the book! Not that I know her aside from reading her blog, but I thought it was cool to recognize her.

The big knitting news in town is that the Yarn Harlot is coming to town for the Madison Knit-In. Rahul thinks this is kind of hilarious and keeps saying “ooh, the Yarn! Harlot!” in this little squeaky voice. He has no idea. I think he would be shocked at how many people will be there. I’m excited to see the Harlot, of course, but also excited to take a look at the marketplace. Among the vendors: the Plucky Knitter, Creatively Dyed, Briar Rose Fibers, Black Water Abbey,  and Kimmet Croft, makers of the angora-blend yarn for US-variety Bohus sweaters.

Happy Friday

Man, I have all kinds of interesting fibery stuff to share today.

Most important thing first: here is the best knitting photo I’ve seen all week. Enjoy!

Also–I am very excited to announce that my Savile Row vest won a prize in the Vest-uary knitalong! Very very exciting, and I have a sweater’s worth of blue Patons Merino headed my way from the Charitable Charity, aka Northernknitter.

I went to see Coraline 3D tonight and was really excited about the miniature starry sweater knitted by Bloomington micro-knitter Althea Crome.  Unfortunately, I was so engaged in watching the flying 3D (spoiler here) during the credits, I forgot to look for the knitting credits. You can download the pattern for a full-sized version here (PDF link) but ultimately perhaps Ysolda’s beautiful Coraline cardigan with the smocked yoke is more appropriate to the book/movie?–it has more buttons, after all.

As for the movie itself: the animation was wonderful, it was great seeing the movie in 3D, it was wonderfully creepy and visually stunning, but it seemed neither here nor there in terms of overall tone and mood. Too scary to truly be a kids’ movie, too simplistic and kid-oriented to truly appeal to adults (beyond the visuals).

I liked the fact that it seemed to be set in Ashland, OR! It’s a day’s drive from the Bay Area and I’ve been up there many times for the Shakespeare Festival. Despite the knitting connection, though, sadly there were no yarn shop cameos.

I got my Singer spool knitting machine in the mail yesterday. It was immensely overpackaged. I haven’t had a good case of wrap rage for a while but this had the works… clamshell packaging, boxes inside boxes, tons of sticky tape, really long twisty ties threaded through plastic washers. RRRRR! HULK SMASH! It came with a bunch of crafty extras that I didn’t really want, but would be good if you were buying this for a kid, I guess: 3 spools of plasticky yarn, a barrette, a plastic tapestry needle, pipe cleaners, more twisty ties.

Also, it was HUGE. I was expecting it to be the size of the Embellish-Knit, the only example of one of these hand-cranked i-cord machines I’d seen in person. It’s probably 3 times as big. The cord, maybe about the same size, but the whole machine setup is pretty humongous. I’ll have to take a picture to demonstrate the hugeness. I’ve only made an i-cord using the fakey plastic yarn that came with it (worked pretty well once I got it all set up right), but have plans to make a Booga bag or similar with my miles of i-cord after I’ve had a chance to play with it some more. Oh, and the Woven Cords scarf from Knitting New Scarves. If you have any great ideas for other things to do with miles of i-cord, let me know.

FO: Savile Row Vest for Vest-uary

Pattern: my own; I’m calling it Savile Row for the moment, for the obvious menswear inspiration in the herringbone pattern and vest shape
Size made: me-sized
Yarn used: Cascade Ecological Wool in 8020 Gunmetal, about 1.16 skeins (290 grams/555 yards)
Needles used: US size 9/5.5 mm Knit Picks Options
Date started: No idea, actually–sometime in early February, but I forgot to write down the day I actually cast on.
Date completed: February 25, 2009
Mods: You would think there wouldn’t be any “mods” in a self-designed pattern, but I accidentally messed up the math when I was doing the decrease rate for the v-neck. I started out with a certain number of stitches on each side and knew I had to get to a width of about 3 inches at the shoulder strap, and the math was all neatly worked out until I got to the desired number of stitches when I was still a few inches shy of my shoulder, and realized I’d forgotten to take the underarm bindoffs and decreases into account when I was calculating how many stitches to decrease. So I just worked straight from that point upwards and it’s not too noticeable.

Notes: I cast on for this as part of the Vest-uary knitalong started by PrairiePoppins on Ravelry: knitting a vest during the month of February.  Also, Jenny and Nicole talked lots about vests in the See My Vest! episode of Stash and Burn, so I was inspired! Especially by the part where you don’t have to knit sleeves.

It was a fun design challenge. I knew I wanted to use the beautiful herringbone stitch on the front of the vest for a few reasons–the look of it, of course, but also the dense, stiff, and sturdy texture, which makes it perfect for a tailored piece like this.

However, the herringbone stitch was a little challenging. It has stitches slipped over multiple consecutive rows, and the direction of the zigzags reverses every 10 rows, which was a pain in the ass because 1) I kept getting confused and going the wrong way when I wasn’t paying enough attention (the pattern reverses on a WS row), and 2) it takes a LOT of rows of herringbone to equal a single row of stockinette, so the front of the vest felt interminable.

I knit this in two pieces and seamed them, which meant I had to be pretty sure about my row gauge in order to match the shaping properly, since there was a large difference in the number of rows on the front and back. I did the waist shaping at the side seams, one stitch in from a garter st selvage, and seamed using mattress stitch. The shoulders are shaped using short rows, with the herringbone stitch maintained all the way up. This wasn’t the best idea–it was fine on the back, but got a little confusing in the front, with the combination of multiple slipped pattern stitches and wrapped stitches for the short rows.

I tried to think of a way I could knit this in the round, but due to the differing row gauge, I couldn’t think of a feasible way to do it. The best idea I had was to keep swatching on different sized needles until the row gauge in stockinette matched the row gauge in herringbone, and knit it in the round on two circulars of different sizes… but then I would have twice as much to frog if I screwed up. At least by knitting flat and seaming, I would only have to frog one half of the sweater if I totally messed up.

After seaming, I finished the neckline with applied i-cord, which took a really really long time. (I used the method with the extra YO as shown on the Purl Bee.) I went on and finished one armhole with applied i-cord. But then when I tried it on, I found that the applied i-cord around the armhole made it kind of flare out weirdly, like a retro-futuristic airship hostess uniform, so I ripped it out.

This was easier said than done. Nobody ever told me that removing applied i-cord was such a pain in the ass. It seemed like it should have been easily froggable, but somehow the process of applying the i-cord (I guess passing the stitches over) kind of welds the i-cord into the body of the work, and it probably took me just as long (about 2 hours) to remove the i-cord, with Lizbert’s patient help at knitting night, as it did to put it on in the first place.

I replaced it with a crocheted slip-stitch edging, which was faster and seemed to work much better, and crocheted around the bottom edge as well.

The yarn I used, Cascade Ecological Wool, is wonderful. Sturdy but fairly soft, with good stitch definition, and very economically priced at about $15 per skein… the skeins are 478 yards each, so this is a much better price than you might initially think.

For this project, I accidentally cannibalized the yarn I had earmarked for finishing a jacket that’s been hibernating for about two years. I guess maybe it’s a sign that I should really either frog it or finish it. There’s still a bit of yarn left, so I might be able to finish the jacket with at least 3/4 sleeves…

Or I could buy more. The thing about Cascade Eco Wool, I learned from a chatty Cascade rep when I was trying to get a dyelot match at Yarns Unlimited for the first skein of Eco Wool I’d bought, is that since it’s undyed, there aren’t really dye lots per se–according to her, the fiber is sorted into different color numbers based on its inherent natural color, if that makes sense. So rather than trying to recreate a certain color by dyeing the wool, they compare the wool they have (whatever color it is) to a color card and decide what existing Eco Wool shade it’s closest to, and throw it in that bin, so whenever you buy a skein of 8020 Gunmetal, it should always be pretty much the same shade (or as close as possible) as any other skein of 8020 Gunmetal. I have only tested this on two skeins (bought on opposite sides of the country), but they do look the same.

The only gripe I have about this yarn is that the suggested gauge on the ball band seems pretty far off. They call it a chunky yarn, but it knits best at an aran or worsted gauge. On size 10s it looks very loose indeed.

OK, ready for some pictures after all that talk? It was about 15 degrees out today so despite the sunshine, it was so cold it hurt to take off my jacket and scarf so the vest would be visible. The Selbuvotter mittens look a little ridiculous with the rest of the outfit but I couldn’t stand to take them off. Too cold! We snapped a few quick pictures in Vilas Park and then I bundled up again. The close-ups were taken inside (due, again, to the cold) so the light isn’t the greatest.

Herringbone goodness:

Thin ice and giant mitten hands!

The back is plain stockinette and scoops down a little:


A closer view of the front:

and the back:

Applied i-cord at the neck:

Crocheted armhole edging:

And more herringbone: