January Projects

ctmidd
Jan 20, 2018
5 min read

In my last post I talked about making Christmas gifts, one of the things I made were eye hair clips for a friend. I had wanted to make the skull and cross-bone bows that she had on her wish list but couldn't find the fabric. I had used similar fabric in the quilt I made when she got married, I gave her a lot of the left over fabric as they were not things that I would generally use and she made bunting with them. I had kept a few things but none of the skulls, so I made the eye clips.

When I came to open gifts from my friend on Christmas morning I found that she had wrapped my new Totoro keyring in a scrap of the exact fabric I had been looking for. After Christmas when things were getting back to normal I used that scrap of fabric to make two bow hair clips. I carefully cut four oblong pieces of fabric and stiffened them with heavy interfacing. I folded them over and stitched the sides together and turned them right side out. I stitched the the open ends together in pairs so the skulls faced each other and gathered the middles. I made two little bindings for the middles to the width of one of the small skulls so there would be one skull right in the middle of each bow and stitched them in place. I got a couple of hair clip fittings and hot glued them to the back of the bows.

As I haven't got a job yet I have decided to use the spare time that I'm not job hunting clearing some of the fabric I have bought for projects but not used. I thought I might make the coat I was planning but that's more of a summer fabric so I'm going to make a top that I can wear straight away.

I got a T-shirt in a factory shop a few years ago for £3, it's really nicely cut, has a flair to it and box pleats in the back so it hangs really nicely. I've worn it a lot and washed it a lot so it's a little faded and bobbly, I do plan to redye it at some point. I decided to try and make a pattern from the item without taking it apart.

I don't have any pattern paper and as I'm trying not to spend any money at the moment I stuck together pages from a catalogue I was sent. I laid the top out on a flat surface, put my paper over the top and lightly drew along the seams. I then measured the seams and tidied up the shape. I cut out the shape, put it over the T-shirt section and reshaped it till it fit. I repeated this with the other sections and was careful to add in enough for the box pleats on the back.

It's quite a simple pattern as the original is a stretchy jersey fabric, I had to consider what fabric to use, as I don't usually buy jersey. I have a very large piece of soft loosely woven lilac linen curtain fabric, the local soft furnishing fabric shop has really good sales, I got the piece for £5. As the fabric is extremely wide I thought I would easily be able to cut my pieces on the bias. I washed and tumbled the fabric, there's nothing worse than making something only to have it shrink. Once the fabric was ironed I carefully folded it and pinned and cut my pieces, I cut the back yoke on a straight grain. Whilst the pieces were still pinned to the paper I did a basting stitch around the edges and used a little iron on glue on the corners to reduce the fraying and distortion, all within the seam allowance.

Then I got flu and was in bed ill for several days. When I was feeling well enough I would sit in bed and stitch the seams together by hand as I didn't have the energy to get my machine out. I started with the box pleats, marking them in with chalk then stitching carefully. I did French seams at the sides, shoulders and across the back in backstitch. When I tried the top on, the back was not sitting correctly, it was bulging slightly along the back seam. I pinned a little extra along that seam and it sat better so I re stitched a section in the middle, then trimmed the excess and stitched the raw edges out of the way. I did a small rolled hem around the bottom and neck, I will add some thin ribbon into the neck at a later date to stop it stretching out, I don't have any lilac ribbon at the moment, and I think proper interfacing would spoil the look of the sheer fabric. There is a slight stretch on the bottom hem that helps to shape the drape really nicely. For the sleeves I considered a cap sleeve and a basic folded one like the T-shirt. I tacked on one of each on and had a look, the folded one added so much more structure. I cut two rectangles and stitched them to the edge of the armholes and up the short edge. I folded the fabric inside tucked the edge under and slip stitched it in place. I pressed the whole top, then added top stitching around the armhole on the sleeve side of the seam. Then I folded the edge of the sleeve back toward the seam and stitched it in place 0.5cm away from the seam. The top is basically finished but I decided to add some pearl buttons onto the box pleats and on the sleeves opposite the seams just for a little added detail. I will leave it folded until I have done the neck as I don't want a hanger to stretch it before I've added the ribbon.

I think the top turned out really well, if I hadn't been ill I may have still sewn it by hand as my machine is very basic and occasionally chews light fabrics, and I found it easier to control the stretch by hand. There are a couple of issues, the armholes came out slightly different sizes, it's not massively noticeable, nothing that would make me do any unpicking, unpicking would have done more damage than any changes would have made it look better. Cutting fabric on the bias is always a gamble, the pieces can come out slightly the wrong shape no matter how careful you are. If I'd been making something more fancy I might have refined it more. The other thing is, with the lightness of the fabric the back seam and pleats add more weight that pulls it very slightly backwards. This will never be a huge problem as the fabric is too thin to not wear something underneath.