Skirting the issue... A Refashion, 3 Ways.

So, I accidentally did it again, disappeared from the face of the internets (sort of) for a month. But let's not talk about THAT! Oh no! Let's talk about refashions instead. Yah LETS!

Does anybody else miss Wardrobe Refashion like I do? I'm all sad and sigh-y about it over here. Got any go-to sites for inspiration? Do tell! (No really, please do tell, I need some inspiration in the worst way).

So, my most recentest piece of sewing of any description has been this skirt...
Here's the before*:

It's a bit big see? I bought it a while ago, when I was a bit bigger too, but it was always pretty big on me. And I prolly should have tossed it a couple of wardrobe clear-outs back. But it's cord, and paisley and soft and dude, I am about 3 pairs of shoes and a couple of meters of tweed away from an episode of Hoarders. So it's been sat in the to-be-fixed box for ages.

This morning I got onto that.  In the super-easiest way ever. 

I tried out three different styles before I settled on what I'd do with it.

Exhibit 1. The mock-wrap. I just folded the extra skirt over to one side see? If I was going for this option I would add a button and run a topstitch down the flappy egde.

Exhibit 2. The Sailor Gurl, two little pleats, a mess o' buttons = cute nautical funtimes.

And Exhibit 3. The 9 to 5. (because it has that Lily Tomlin in 9 to 5 thing going on. I just dragged the excess to meet in the middle, see?

This is the one I went with, SO, once I'd pinned it to size I just topstitched the pleats down like this: 

(and I would have done the same thing with any of those other versions, ALSO! There's no chopping or hacking so if I change my mind and want to go back to one of the others I totally can just seam rip and re-do)

And that's it. A skirt that fits me. 

And here's how I wore it:

That is with SUPER BRIGHT fuchsia tights and my favourite shoes and crazy-lady hair. (No really, there's a pencil crayon jammed up in there. Kelly Green, actually. It's my kids "bestest colour ever".)

*huh. Turns out that yeps, I did just post a picture of me in my chopped-up-Old-Navy-boy's-tee running shirt on the internetses. huh.

Pillowcases to Women's Shortie Pajamas Tutorial - OR MC Hammer Loves My Jam(mie)s

Not Hammer Pants

So. You know how sometimes you're getting your kid ready for bed - teeth are brushed, residual funk has been hosed off, softie chums extracted from who-knows-where - and it's time to wrangle an unwilling human into footie jammies? Yes?
And sometimes you're all,
"Break it down, OH-OH OH OH OH-OH OH OH OH. PAJAMA time. Can't touch this. WOAH WOAH WOAH OH OH OH OH. Can't touch this"
Because MC Hammer is hilarious and awesome, specially when you sing the lyrics to U Can't Touch This in a Jeeves and Wooster accent?
No? Just me?
Well anyway, this has nothing to do with that. This is a half-assed sort of tutorial on how to make a pair of womens shortie jammies from a pair of pillowcases.

So. Onward!
First you need to procure a pair of pillowcases. Mine came from the Dollarama, so yay for the cheapest ever. But it seems like random, last-pair-in-this-design-no-matching-sheets pillowcases are always around and on crazy sale.
Got yer pillowcases? Here're mine:

The first step is to unpick the stitching on your piller'cases. Have at them with the seam ripper; go on, you can give it some women's-tennis-grunting if you like, I don't mind.
Now you should have EITHER two great big rectangles or 4 smaller rectangles. We're making the top first, so put that other pillowcase someplace safe. But not TOO safe.
Hokay. So the next step is to make a few snips so your big rectangles resemble a camisole shape, sort of. Like this:

I eyeballed how wide the back piece should be and was off by prolly 4 inches. Because apparently in my head I have a giant Quasimodo hump? Maybe?
The front section will be gathered so it should be about 4/5 inches bigger than you are.
And SEW! Right sides together and whip up yer side seams. You could get all fancypants and french seam them for prettiness sake. Let's pretend I did that, kay?

So now you fold over and hem the raw top bits like this see:

And here lets pretend I folded them twice instead of leaving them raw edged like this. (Man, pinking shears made me lazy. Also, laziness made me lazy).

Ok. Time to do a spot o' gathering. And I'm using the sew-along-some-dental-floss method for this. I can't for the life of me remember where I saw this; but whomever invented it might need to go and collect their Noble Prize for Awesomeness. I've heard Stockholm is lovely this time of year.
Anyway, you sew a wide-ish zigzag along a piece of dental floss then gather it up all super smoothly. Like this see.

Then sew over your gathers to hold them in place.
Should be starting to look like a cami about now.
Time to add some straps. You could use a bit of bias binding, sewn over the gathers then extended to make straps (if you see what I mean).
But I happened to have this crochet trim and a powerful yen to use it. So I made straps like this:

Then stuck some more trim over the gathers and sewed up the bottom hem. An voila. Jammie top.

Now here's where the tute gets REALLY half-assed. There are about a million tutorials on making short out there in the interwebs. my very favourite is this one here by Dana of  MADE. It makes sense and has pretty pictures and everything. My shorts look like a pair of elasticated waist short shorts. Pretty uninspiring, they just happen to be made out of a pillowcase.  And there's not a power in the 'verse could convince me to model them on the intertubes.  But lookit, this is what the jammie top looks like on your's truly

And that's it. I'm going to have Cant Touch This in my head for WEEKS. Awesome.

This is it, for a winner Dance to this and you're gonna get thinner Move, slide your rump Just for a minute let's all do the bump, bump, bump 

Oh, and I shared here:

And at the new link par-tay over at Mine For The Making - DIY Diva Thursdays. You guys! FASHUN diys! I'm all over it like a bad smell!

Raspberry Lemonade Mittens

Hey are you guys keeping up with Grosgrain's Embellish Your Knits Month? So awesome and she makes it look super easy. You might remember how I was having a hard time with some cardi refashions (and a unicorn)? WELL, I like to think I'm an adaptable sort of girl. I figure if life gives you lemons, then you make raspberry lemonade martinis. And then whine loudly.

So in the spirit of THAT I decided to use some sweater refashion leftovers (read "collateral damage") to make me a set of THESE:

Mitties!
They were super-simple, gratifying and ridiculously quick. AND these might be the girliest things I've ever made; even though this sweater used to belong to my sweetie, (yes it's pink, but he's plenty comfortable and confident enough to wear pink. And look super hot. Really. Yum.).

Anyhow, I think they'd make pretty good gifties. For guys too, if you made them out of a not-pink, rugged, marled, lumberjack/fisherman/bear-wrestling sweater and trimmed them in something manly? Like iron fillings and shark teeth maybe?

Either way, here's how you make them:
First you'll need a felted sweater (I just hacked the arms off of this one and stuck them in the hot wash and dry with some towels. Job done.) One with ribbing at the cuffs or the bottom works best but it's not essential.
Then you'll need to turn your sweater arms inside out and figure out the shape of your mitts. Like this:

Mark the length you want and the space between your pointy finger and your thumb.
(You can totally make them a tighter fit by drawing more closely around your wrist and sewing new seams instead of using the existing seams. I wanted mine pleated so I didn't.)

Your markings should look something like this:

Next you cut along the blue line there (but not along the red one).
Then you sew along the red lines. I reinforced the join of the "v" by sewing over it a few times.
Now you should have something that looks like this:

Next you carefully snip the V shape out (as far down as you can into the valley of the V).
If you're making new side seams it might be an idea to turn them right side out then try them on before you sew up the new shape.
Here's what that might look like:

If you're making a version for guys you could stop here. Or maybe finish off the tops with some manly manly blanket stitch or um, barbed wire or something.
I hand stitched a little pleat into mine. Then popped a button on the pleat. I also added a bit of dollar store cotton crochet lace, (same stuff I used on my duvet cover rehab). And voila, warm paws and girlyness.

Unbreakable

Today I had to do something unbreakable. Not like the movie. I'm kinda "meh" about that movie; and I am both a super hero fan and an M. Night Shyamalan apologist, well, except for The Happening. That was brutal. Seriously? Naughty trees? SERIOUSLY?
Wait... where was I?

Oh yup. So today I had to get me a super quick fix of something unbreakable to try and regain my mojo. Over the last two day's I've irrevocably pooched two cardis in attempts to make them more awesometastical (it looks so EASY when Kathleen does it).
So, I needed easy (really really easy) confidence-boosting, instant gratification.
Enter this guy:

It's a shirt see?
With kind of a ruffly bottom and a ribbon belt tie. (Also a weirdly cropped photo. I have a messy house and hair that looks like it was styled by angry monkeys).
I of course forgot to take a before picture (been that kind of day) but I do have an example of what it was like.
The bottom had elastic shirring like this:

Which can look the cutest. But not on me. On me it makes a shirt look puffy. And ball shaped. And rounded. And completely undefined. Which is not my best look ever.
So I Just unpicked the 'lastic thread (and actually I managed to get it all in one piece, so a shirred scarf is next on my list).
I ironed the newly un-elasticated ruffle bit.


Then I tried my new shirt on. It was still a little shapeless, so I stuck a belt around it; but that squished the center ruffle. So I grabbed a couple of pieces of grosgrain ribbon and stitched them on under the ruffle,and voila, new shirt; nothing broken, no wet kitty poop.

The Skirt That Was In My Head

HAH. Got it done!
You know, the musing I was doing in that earlier post? About what I want to be wearing now?
Well for the last AGE I've had a skirt in my head.
A high-waisted, a-line, red one. Made of soft corduroy. With a Lily Tomlin in Nine to Five vibe (in my head that's cool).
Kind of like this one, Anthro's Hop, Skip and Jump skirt $78 - which is not too crazy expensive.

Or this one the Finishing School Skirt , also by Anthro also $78

But you know what's cheaper than $78? A meter of red corduroy I picked up at Goodwill last year for $1.98. And a pattern I already happened to have, McCalls 4783.
Here's my version:

I extended the waist UP an inch and a half (using the "meh, looks close enough" method of pattern adaptation).
I made the skirt less froofy and more gentle-a-liney.
And I added kind of off-center line thing (yah it IS a technical term) by folding over a little pleat and topstitching it down.

While I was making it the skirt tried to kill me a couple of times (I have pin-related WOUNDS!) but it came together fairly easily and now I LOVE it. Love Love it. I want to hold it's hand at a midnight showing of Pulp Fiction and make it mix tapes. Here's it in action today:

I had to wear thick tights, but it's super comfy and I managed to wear heels all day. Which is a win for me!

More thrift store karma, and some musing

This might just be me, but there is totally something about this time of year that makes me want to scour thrift stores. (Not like clean them, just look around in them, scour is a weird word...)

I think maybe it's because autumn makes me want to dress like my Auntie M or my ma in the late 70's. Which, doesn't mean a lot to you guys, so um, think west coast, granola, feminist, whip-smart, potty mouth'd, sexy. With paisley. And good boots.
Still not clear?
Like this:

Germain Greer, 1974, Tuscany( image)

And this:

Margret Atwood, 19??, but she STILL dresses with enviable badassery, (image)

And lookit these suckers:

Ms. Atwood's shoes. Swoon. (Image)

So, thrift stores is where I'm shopping (H&M also has a few things but I'm still off the buying new - WR4life baby!).
A few weeks ago I had a couple of bear-free hours, a giant vat of sugary coffee beverage, comfy shoes, pointy elbows and some steely-eyed determination. Prerequisites for a successful thrift store haul.
But I also reckoned I'd hedge my karmic bets. That is, I figured out what we'd been buying for the bear most urgently, (footie jammies, sweaters) grabbed some of his old ones and took them with me to drop off. I was mostly thinking how crappy it would be to need warm fuzzy jammies for your baby and to not be able to afford them; pretty crappy I imagine. We really are lucky.

Anyway, apparently the thrift store dryads were happy enough with the trade, 'cause I scored these
(badly photographed) goodies:


The first one looks way better in person, I've worn it a BUNCH already. The second dress is kind of a tough one for me, I love it, and it kind of makes me feel like a Shieldmaiden of Rohan (heh, ubernerdy!); but it's tough to find the right situation to wear it.
Got any tips for Good Thrift Karma?

The Democracy Tunic to Dress Tutorial

Yesterday was a bit gloomy you guys. We have a new mayor, and I'm not a fan.
I love me some democracy, it's a privilege and I am thankful for it. Even if sometimes the result sucks. And to folks who don't vote I say "pheh" (and I totally roll my eyes).
Yesterday there was a polling station in the lobby of our building (yay for LAZY democracy!) Which means I could have gone and done my voting in my jammies BUT I have a "no jammies farther away than the garbage chute" rule , so I threw on this instead:

It's a tunic. You can tell on account of how it barely covers my bum. And is shaped roughly like a potato sack.
Now, tunics and I are not really friends, in fact we're barely even passing acquaintances but this is different. This is something I've had since I was pregnant and it has some pretty crazy history for me. But it is quite obviously too short, and I would have felt really uncomfortable going any farther than the lobby in it. So a refashion was in order.
I did this to it
Want to see how? Hokay!
Firstly of all I just happened to have some lightweight black cotton from another dress refashion project that exactly matched the tunic. You'll need a fabric that matches (or contrasts if that's how you roll ) depending on how much length you want to add a meter should be plenty.
Then you'll need to
1. Fold your dress in half straight down the middle.
2. Pop your folded-in-half dress onto your extra fabric, matching up the folds, like this see:3. Mark out however much more skirt you want, making sure you follow the line of the existing skirt (in this case it's a slight A-line). Replicate the curve at the hem on your new skirt bottom, and match up the curve at the top too. Don't forget to add a bit to your sides for a seam allowance (the solid line should be farther out. Oops!)
4. Mark out you skirt with chalk or pins. or just go crazy with the scissors if you're brave.
5. Snip! You'll need to cut out two skirt pieces.
6. Whip! Turn the new skirt pieces right-side-together then sew up the side seams so you have one piece of skirt. Press the seams open.
7. Pin the new skirt into the bottom of the old skirt, right-sides-together. Like ZIZ see:

8. Sew around the bottom of the skirt, where you've just pinned. Press the new seam UP. Try it on, admire your handiwork then hem it as you normally would.

And voila! Tunic to dress. Giving that sucker a waist instead of a sack shape is the next step. (I'll stick that tute up tomorrow, on account of some WAY to dark pictures and some shenanigans with Ernesta the body double).

If you don't have any fabric that matches your tunic you could go the obvious clash route and stick two different prints on the bottom, (kind of like in the original of this tunic).

Not a Quilt

Poking through other people's stuff without the B&E and subsequent costly legal fees = Yay!
What I'm saying is that I love a bit of yard sale action. Where we live doesn't have a lot of actual yards; BUT when the buildings around here have a yard sale they co-ordianate days and they go large. 700-1000 units in a relatively affluent area with a majority gay, aging population - BINGO for yard sale awesomeness.
So that's the backstory, this is the result:

I scored three fat quarters of this floral cotton for the princely sum of 75 cents. It was tucked into the bottom of a box of other fabrics (I bought most of them too) I love it crazy much. In fact I might have found it, squealed, ripped it from the box, cradled it protectively and cooed mineminemine at it whilst growling around me. Maybe.

I'm not much of a quilter, but I knew from pretty much the second that I plucked it out of the box that I wanted it to be a dress. A dress a bit like this one.

I used New Look 6803, (I happened to have bought it for another project, but that's a whole 'nother post) and meddled with view C.

I had to hack the pattern a bit to make there be enough fabric, there's a seam down the front but it gets a bit lost in the florallyness. I also had to piece together the bottom otherwise we'd have been talking tunic or indecent exposure, but again the print makes it barely noticeable.
This is it with different accessories, And the worlds glummest expression

In my head it's more sort of 60's with the kitten heels and skinny belt. I'm giving some serious thought to a pair of cream ribbed schoolgirl-type tights. But that might be... gack? weird? costumey? Opinions are welcome folks.

Yoga? MAYBE!

Hey remember how this used to be a blog where I made stuff and sometimes even used my sewing machine? No, me neither!
So. Lovely sunshiny weather and athelticalalal feats aside, I made something!
Actually it kind of related to both of those things... it's a hack down of a long sleeved tee (because it is hot NOW and I am in total denial about the existence of Winter . Winter? WHAT WINTER? tra la la!) into sleeveless yoga tee. As discussed before I don't actually DO yoga but I'm thinking I might have a stab at it, maybe. And this shirt just seemed yoga-y to me. So there we go.
Here's the before:
A hand-me-down from my lovely chum Sarah. In a colour I like a lot.
I whipped the sleeves off and tidied up the edges. Ruched the shouldery parts, which took care of any gappiness at the front (pretty sure nobody needs to see my uh, "Asanas" when I'm doing my downward dog).
Then I ruched the sides too. It's not showing up so well on Ernesta here (she's not terribly flexible, she really COULD use some yoga). But it is pretty flattering when it's on. Disguises the lumpy with more lumpy, if you see what I mean.

So that's that. if you want a play by play on the physics of whipping sleeves off then give me a shout. (Or check out make it and love it's tute. A-dor-a-bul!)

CURED!

I, like The Prodigy, have THE REMEDY. The pulsating rhythmical remedy. Except not Pulsating or rhythmical. And also "Pulsating"?... kinda gross.

Wait, what was I talking about?
Oh yup! 'Member I had the yips? Where everything I touched turned to wet kitty poop? Well I CURED them. With a dress. THIS dress.


And it's a refashion, in fact it's a refashion of a refashion. And even the elastic I used was pillaged from someplace else. (jammie pants maybe?)
The bottom part started life last year as a smocked tube-top maxi dress. Bought for all of $3 in the Old Navy sale. I wore once but it was WAY too big. Just for the record - tube-tops + too bigness = a recipe for disaster.

So I made it into a wrap skirt. And it was... meh. So meh that I wore it once and then it sat in the refashion basket for a year.

The purple thing on top of it is a dirt cheap Old Navy ribbed tank that some genius (moi) splashed bleach on.
I whacked them together using Little Red Roost's awesome tute. And voila. I'm cured of the snausage-fingered foul-up-itis sewing yips . I'm also pretty happy with how it turned out and I predict a BUNCH of wear out of it.

Oh hey, I don't know it you've noticed, but I kind of like dresses. I was thinking about that because I've just signed up to do this:



And I'm having trouble getting fired up about sewing anything but dresses.
I THINK it's because dresses are my yoga pants.
Not that I do yoga in them. ( I don't do yoga in anything... wait... I don't mean I do yoga nekkid, I mean I don't do it at all!)
But you know how some women can throw on a pair of yoga pants and a tee and look adorable?
Me - not so muchly. I put on sweats and I look like I forgot to get dressed. I feel 10 lbs fatter and three inches shorter in yoga pants. And really. Who needs that?
This frock has the same kind of throw-it-on-and-you're-dressed thing as sweats but I feel DRESSED in it.
So that's that. Dress made, yips cured.

Invisible Extras

More dresses MORE AND MORE AND MORE. I seriously don't want to wear anything but dresses these days. Maybe because the winters here are so anti-dress. Or maybe 'cause dresses make me feel like dancing a bit? Or because I'm lazy enough to like the one-item-and-I'm-dressed routine?
Either way. I am on a dress kick. My only requirement is that they be long enough. I'm 5'9" and my leggies are... let just call them a "problem area". They get me from place to place (good job with that guys) but my thighs are the first place that cake goes to. Also flashing my undies has never really been my favorite thing.

So that's the back story. This is the dress/tunic in question:


Do excuse the blur and weird pose. Teddy and I were playing the giant squid game with the waist ties. (You know, where you wobble something fabric on your kids' head and go "OH NO. The Giant Squid got you! NOT THE GIANT SQUID!" Just me? really?)

Anyhoo, I'm wearing it with jeans because it was those vital 2 inches too short. BUT it did happen to have those (giant squid) waist ties.
SO I whipped the ties off. Unpicked the seams, ironed them flat, then added them to the bottom of the dress. Like so:


I'm pretty pleased with it. It is, of course, a compromise; I love the border pattern but adding the lenght above it was just WAY more complex. and I'm lazy. My real point here is that I'll be keeping an eye out for the "invisible" extra fabric in ties and straps to make stuff longer from now on.

To Mangle a Mockingbird

What a brill weekend. Really. Started Friday with a dash of inspiration and a spot of mad refashioning. (And got another-post's-worth of awesome from there).

The inspiration part came in the form of THIS tute from Grosgrain (Kathleen is all about the inspirational stuff; have you seen her sew-alongs? So awesome).
She calls her's The Mama's Going to Buy You a Mockingbird Dress, and as I have a tiny fraction of her sewing skills mine is the To Mangle a Mockingbird dress.
I love the embroidery on her shirt but I don't happen to own anything half as cute. But I did happen to own this fellow:


It's... wrinkly. And WAY too big. I bought it from the Gap ages ago (two years maybe?) and it had this little 'lasticy waist thing going on. It was... "puffy" on me, and totally unflattering so I unpicked the 'lastic and wore it as is. A lot.
It's now too big but I love that ruffle so I planned on doing SOMETHING to it.
I did this:

Kathleen's tute is really easy to follow (and holy cats is her baby ever the sweetiest!)
However, I didn't do a circle skirt like she suggested; mostly because I hadn't enough of the blue print left over from the Sundae Frock. In fact I had to use some piecing together and swearing to get the skirt out of what I had left.
I also put my zipper in at the side rather than the back. (I always do that, even if it means hacking the pattern a bit. I just prefer side zips).
This would have gone together about a squillion times more easily if I had a dress form. I think maybe it's time to try making another one. yeesh. scary.
Anyway, here it is as I'm wearing it today. I'm pretty happy with it.


I shared over at Melissa's place. (And have you seen what those clever girls are sewing up next month? Eeep! Upciting!)