Creative Cate Cabled Sweater Dress

I finished the Creative Cate dress I blogged about last here and it's just as beautiful as I imagined it would be (maybe more)!

 

The fabric is slightly sheer (you can see it in some of the pictures) because it is somewhat of a loose knit but I didn't bother lining it since I'm going to be wearing the dress with a layering shell and half slip anyways.

 

You can see in this photo at the bottom left that the dress is
somewhat sheer. I should have put a slip on Freeda too! 

I hemmed the dress with a coverstitch hem first but wasn't happy with the look. So I cut it off and created a band cut from one of the cables going vertically. I really like the finished look it gives to the dress. It also added back the inch of length which I removed when I cut off the hem. (I tried to rip it out first but  the loosely knit fabric was so wavy after ripping the coverstitch that it just needed to be cut off.)

 

 

 

The belt is a TJ Maxx find as are these shoes:

 

The shoes were very hard to photograph since they are silver. I did my best.

 

The necklace is one I've had for a while. I think it works perfectly with this dress. I'm using a lightweight rayon lycra knit layering shell in gray underneath. I tucked in the sleeves for photography purposes since they looked silly just hanging there. Some days I wish Freeda had arms lol.

 

I "hemmed" the sleeves with Design Plus ultra soft double sided fusible. This stabilized the sleeve hem and hemmed it in one. I had planned to do some invisible handstitching to reinforce but once I was done fusing I realized that it wasn't necessary. The dress is going to be handwashed and never see the inside of a dryer so the fusible web is not going anywhere.

 

 

 

 

As usual the dress fits me better than Freeda. I removed some padding from her in an effort to get her to match my body better but I just can't get her to be my exact double no matter how hard I try. One day I'll get a tripod and a better camera and then we can have some pictures of me wearing my creations...

Who am I kidding photography is not my hobby, SEWING is! The best I can offer for the near future is some mirror selfies or maybe once in a while pictures taken by my 11 year old... If she's willing...

Turn me into a dress!!!

It's been bitter cold outside so it's understandable that the beautiful cabled sweater knit I bought a little while ago at Metro Textiles has been calling to me. What's a complete surprise is that it's been begging to be made into a nice cozy.... DRESS?! What? Huh?

For some background, I'm not a huge dress wearer. I wear skirts every day,  but dresses..  not so much. Mostly because it's impossible to find a RTW dress that fits me off the rack. When I walked into a local boutique a few months ago and they ask what size I was so they could help me I listed three sizes that correspond to three parts of me. They laughed. Unfortunately it's true. I have never found a dress that fit me properly on top yet still fit over my bottom half (1-2 sizes larger). So dresses have been relegated to more formal occasions when I have been willing to fork out the time and money to get a dress taken in and/or out to fit.

Though I've sewn quite a few for my girls I had never yet sewn myself a dress. I'm not sure why not... probably because I never wear them. Ergo, I never bought myself any dress patterns.
Suddenly, recently, I've had a hankering to sew some dresses. I think it's the sewing blogosphere that has done it. I've had the opportunity to see different dress patterns on all shapes and sizes which really helps to figure out what will flatter me. So now I have two Style Arc dress patterns on the way and the By Hand London 'Anna' dress pattern recently arrived.

But when this stunning, cozy fabric called to me "DRESS!" I had no pattern on hand remotely appropriate for the type of dress it was asking to become.

For a reminder here's the photos I took of the fabric after my last Metro Textiles trip:

Having no pattern for the dress I was envisioning, I had the idea to find a top pattern and lengthen it. I trekked up to the attic to look through my pattern stash. I found a few sweater/sweatshirt type patterns that I briefly considered using but none of them were special enough to not be boring, yet simple enough for the fabric to still be able to shine. So I turned to my newest favorite... The Creative Cate! I used the skirt back from the "Ali Knit Skirt" pattern (that I haven't even sewn yet) as a guide since I had already added to that pattern to bring it to my preferred below knee length.

So where did the dress idea originate? I can possibly "blame" Kashi. I should have taken his advice. (I usually regret not listening to his suggestions) When he told me he had something beautiful I would love, and showed me this fabric he told me "Make a dress" I was like "Me? A dress? I think I'll make a nice warm top, I'll take a yard" He tried to suggest I take a bit more but this fabric was over 72" wide, a yard was going to be more than enough for a top. Bless his soul, Kashi cut me a 47" yard of this one. Good thing... because I have just exactly enough.

Anyone else ever had a fabric that just "told" you what it wanted to be despite your original plans for it?

Style Arc Creative Cate

I don't think I have the words to express how much I love this pattern. This is the first Style Arc pattern I have sewn up and it is wonderful! It is actually drafted true to the size/measurements it claims to be for. Wow!

The only change I had to make is adding some width at the waist and hip to account for my pear shape. I simply checked the size chart for my size (size 14) and figured out what I would need to add to bring the waist and hip measurements in line with mine. Divided by four and added that to each side seam (pivoting out the side seams). I shortened it by 1 1/2" since I am not that tall. And.... it fits beautifully! I am officially a Style Arc convert! (enough exclamation points for you today?)

The instructions were perfectly adequate for me, though I can see them being a bit terse for a beginner. I'll report back more on the quality of their instruction when I have sewn a Style Arc pattern that is a bit more complex.

I "muslined" this top first. You can see it in this blog post.
I used this cool snakeskin print from Gorgeous Fabrics (she still has some left).
Here's a link to the pattern (just in case you've been living under a rock).

I bought this particular pattern because I liked the style and feel that it flatters me and it does. I actually have bought a few tops with this type of neckline in the past couple of years so when I wore this top last Friday (I sewed it on Thursday night) my kids who had seen the fabric in my stash didn't comment. When I mentioned it to my 11 year old her answer was. "I didn't realize... you wear that type of style a lot... I think all your tops look like that?"

I can sew these up in about an hour including cutting! My Mother complimented it (thinking I had bought it lol) and I sewed her two of them in fabrics of her choice as a gift. (Only a small token of the appreciation I have for her. I owe her so much, she helps out tons) Sorry no pictures of those as I immediately gifted them to her. She was delighted!
I have two more of these planned for myself. One in a gray knit and one in a teal/black/silver burnout stretch velvet.

More pictures: (I had to restrain myself from posting another 50 pictures... I really love this top!)

 

I styled the top the way I wore it, with a 3/4 sleeve layering shell and necklace.  

Half slips and Kwik Sew 3155 : Hoodie Pajamas

Last week was mostly taken up with boring useful sewing. I started by drafting a pattern for, and sewed myself three half slips (well actually four but the first ended up in my donations bag since it was way too big.) I used this tutorial: Gertie's Half Slip Tutorial which was great. Just don't add any ease (she calls for adding 3" to the hip measurement before halving it) if you're using a knit fabric and you'll be fine. All the materials for my half slips came from Sew Sassy including the nylon tricot, picot elastic for the waist, and stretch lace trim for the hem. Black half slips are pretty easy to find in the stores around here but not in the length I wanted (always too short or too long. Now I have some in the exact 26" length that I wanted (three inches less than the 29" I tend to wear my "shorter" skirts at). No pictures because I found it impossible to get a decent picture of black half slip. I think I could draw a better picture in Paint.

Something like this LOL:

Next I sewed up a pair of pajamas for myself using my TNT Kwik Sew 3155. Unfortunately it seems to be out of print now. I don't even know how many times I have sewed this one up in the past decade. All I can say is I have many different sizes traced with different alterations including one for maternity, another for post baby, and another in a size I would need to lose close to 20 pounds to fit into. I sewed this up again recently when I started sewing for myself again but decided I needed another since it seemed I was wearing that one almost every night, washing it in the daytime so I could wear it again at night straight out of the dryer. There's nothing like super comfy pajamas :-) I like my pj pants with lots of ease, so I always cut them about a size larger than my measurements.

The pattern with a swatch of the fabric I chose for the top (sitting on top of the bag full of this pattern traced in various sizes)

 

 

For the hoodie I used a soft rayon/lycra jersey knit I bought from fabric.com in November. For the pants I used some black cotton french terry I had lying around for who knows how long. I *may* have bought it from Wazoodle years and years ago. I had just exactly enough. It was so close that I laid out the fabric flat on the floor and traced the pattern pieces onto it first. I wanted to be sure I wasn't going to be off by one inch. Only then did I transfer it to my cutting table and begin cutting.  All I have left now are tiny scraps for my kids to turn into doll clothes, school projects (and who knows what else they do with the fabric scraps I save for them)

 

I've made this one so many times that I don't look at the instructions anymore but when I sewed it the first few times I followed them and they were very good, as Kwik Sew instructions always were. (I have no idea how they are now as my Kwik Sew pattern stash was acquired before Kwik Sew became part of McCall Pattern Company.)

 

There are a few changes I always make when I sew up this one. Firstly I leave the drawstring off of the pants. I did sew it the first time, but since then I don't bother.

 

 I also self line the hood. To do this I cut four hood pieces, instead of two. Sew and press the back seam in each set. Then sew them together right sides together around the top and front edges only leaving the bottom free. Turn right side out, press, topstich at 1/4" around the top and front edges. Line up the bottom edge and machine baste them together. Sometimes if I'm in the mood I then carefully line up the back hood seams and "stitch in the ditch" along the seamline, but not always. I then treat the lined hood the same way I would an unlined one and sew it to the neck edge. It doesn't go all the way to the front edges anymore since the hem allowance of the hood is no longer there (because it is used up in the seam when the two hoods were sewn to each other). After sewing in the hood I simply press in the v-neck edge of the top, secure with Design Plus double sided fusible tape, and then topstitch at 1/4", meeting the topstitching of the hood at the top of the 'v'.

 

Everything else is sewn pretty much as in the instructions. I coverstitch the hems but before I had my coverstitch machine I used a twin needle. (The very first time I don't think I had any double needles yet so I zigzagged the hems and it worked fine too)

 

 

The picture isn't super. I can't get the pants onto my dressform so they are hanging from the top of the closet door on a bit of an angle which makes them look wonky.