Suzy's Sewing Blog

Winter clothes

Suzy J — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 15:55:48 +0000

I am having a bit of trouble committing myself to making any winter clothing - the material is thicker, harder to sew and I worry that anything I sew is going to be put to the test of the weather and not hold up too well! It’s easy in summer to think ‘I’ll just run up a little skirt to flounce around in the sun in’… (though anyone who just experienced ’summer’ here in the UK will read this with an rueful smile!). So trying to decide my next project is difficult.

I did love the check material I used for the bag and am considering making an a-line skirt from the excellent pattern in Sew U . Layers seem to be ‘in’ this year so this cute tank top from fitzpatterns is another very strong contender… I think I’d just make it fairly plain in black to wear over long sleeved tops for work.

I am very lucky to have a wonderful little fabric shop round the corner from my house, selling most cottons and plainer materials for just £2 a metre! (£4 for fancier things!). Only problem is, that they’re only open 10-5 Monday-Friday, and Saturday, so as I work full time, I have to try to remember to go on Saturdays, and try and get fabric for multiple projects, which inevitable I forget when I’m in there and just buy one bit… Am tempted to try buying online, but the prices can be slightly off-putting! Can anyone recommend a good online fabric store in the UK?

Making a bag

Suzy J — Sun, 28 Oct 2007 15:42:25 +0000

Following on from the previous post, I decided to have a bash at making one of morsbags lovely eco-friendly shopping bags. (Here is my completed bag!)

You can see some great animated instructions here. I decided after cutting out my strap sections that I wanted them long enough to wear over my shoulder, so I extended them to 28″ (as opposed to 18″). First thing to do, after cutting out, was get out the ironing board - why does sewing have to involve so much ironing?! and using these instructions, I found the straps really easy to make, and they were really strong with the triple stitching (though it was quite wonky, and I think one of my straps is slightly wider!) I was really lucky with my choice of material - check is great as it means it’s really easy to space things evenly and turn straight hems. Sewing the boxes to strengthen the handles is a good idea - they were so strong I even carried three bottles of wine back from the supermarket in it!

The only problem I had was at the end, sewing the two sides together. Very sensibly, the instructions involve sewing together once (wrong sides together), turning inside out, and sewing again, then turning back the right way around, to increase strength. A word of warning - in my initial sewing I sewed quite far from the edge, but then didn’t trim the excess before turning inside out and sewing again. The consequence of this was trapping some of the excess in my second stitch, which meant that when it was turned back around again it was a pretty messy result!! I resolved this by sewing the second time again, much further in. A valuable lesson I think as I ended up with a bag that was quite a bit smaller (a bit like when your mum trims your fringe when you’re a kid, and it keeps getting shorter and shorter in the attempt to get it even!) and with quite a lot of material gathered in the seam inside the bag.

Overall though, I’m very pleased with my first attempt! And I know I can use this all the time which gives a warm fuzzy feeling! Am vaguely considering making a load more and giving to friends and family - possibly Christmas themed??!

Make your own ‘bag for life’ cloth shopping bags!

Suzy J — Sun, 14 Oct 2007 14:03:48 +0000

I’ve just found this really interesting website called morsbags , which aims to ‘make reusable bags, socially! The general idea is to make cloth shopping bags (of all colours fabrics and other exciting variables), either just for your own use, or preferably in a ‘pod’ of people from your area, helping each other (whilst gossiping of course!) to make a bevy of beautiful/practical shopping bags for personal use, and to hand out to surprised shoppers! There is a helpful map to find pods in your area, and full instructions on how to make your own bag. I’m going to get some material and have a bash, and then maybe see if I can join a club in my area…

Alteration Queen

Suzy J — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 18:45:55 +0000

Ok… so it’s been a while since I’ve blogged, and in that time, a few projects have been started… and decidedly fewer finished. However, I have had a few successes with my first alterations.

The first was a beautiful deep-v neck dress I bought for a friend’s wedding (yes, I know I should have made it, but i’m not quite sure my creations are ready to be out at such a formal event yet!) which I bought from a little boutique in Chiswick. Rather than carrying the full range of sizes, the shop just dealt in Small, medium and Large, and whilst the medium fitted beautifully waist hips and bust, it was too long in the straps. But armed with the knowledge that my trusty singer was in the cupboard, I bought it anyway.

I was very pleased with my results - I folded a couple of inches on each strap, straight stiched, then tucked under towards the back with a couple of hand stitches. I know it doesn’t sound much but I was dead chuffed! Could barely see that it had been touched.

My other success was a pair of brown linen trousers, which fit everywhere… except happened to be five inches (yes, I’m very short!!) too long. There was so much excess material I had to fold once, then fold under again and stitch. Again, my work was seamless!It’s fantastic to know now that I can buy clothes that I love the look of, and alter them to fit me perfectly. It’s a great sense of freedom.

How to sew a zip - I did it and it works!

Suzy J — Sun, 17 Jun 2007 18:45:17 +0000

I am SO excited. I just sewed my first zip successfully!!

At the end of the week I took delivery of this book, Sew U by Wendy Mullin which, as well as being great for simply explaining key techniques, also comes with three free patterns - an A-Line skirt, a shirt, and a pair of trousers/pants - and this is in order of difficulty.

So I started with the skirt, which, if you follow the initial instructions (though there are loads of ideas for customisation) has a zip in the back centre seam and an interfaced waistband. We’ll see how I get on with that! My track record with this kind of thing isn’t great so far…

ANYHOO I followed the instructions given in the book for sewing on the zip… and I’ll copy them out here for anyone who is wondering:

Centre Zipper Application for Skirts:

1. Sew the centre back seam up to the notch point - where the bottom of the zipper will end (I used a standard 7 inch zip).

2. Change the machine’s stith length to the longest setting and machine-baste the seam from this point, all the way up to the top edge.

3. Press open and finish the seam along the back seam.

4. Place the zip face down on the pressed-open seam allowance so that the zip is perfectly aligned with the centre seam. The top of the zip should be 1/2″ below the raw top edge of the skirt.

5. Tape the zip down to the seam. I used masking tape. Place a pin beneath the bottom stopper of the zip so you know where to start stitching.

6. Remove the presser foot and insert a zipper foot. (this sounded complicated at first but I managed to buy a zipper foot very cheaply. Position it so that the foot guides along the plastic of the zip teeth edge and the needle sews 1/4″ away from each side of the seam.) Start from the bottom on each side.

7. Stitch a horizontal line beneath the end stopper to connect the two lines.

8. Carefully remove the basting stitch in front of the zip using a seam ripper.

I’m actually wearing it in public…

Suzy J — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 16:59:14 +0000

Just a quick post from work to say, I’m wearing my dress in public!! It’s a weird feeling. I felt kind of nervous this morning, but have had a few compliments today, and lots of surprised faces when I say ‘thanks, I made it myself’! I’m feeling much more comfortable this afternoon… and I’m so proud that I’m wearing something completely unique, and so ME! It’s actually very liberating and I urge you all to do the same.

Painting My Wellies

Suzy J — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 21:48:13 +0000

Ok, so it’s a little off topic, but I couldn’t help wanting to show off my new wellies! I bought boring blue ones for Glastonbury, because they were much cheaper than the absolutely GORGEOUS Cath Kidston wellies that I loved. So I painted my own! Ok ok… they’re really not quite as professional as the real thing but I kinda like them better because I made them!

In case anyone’s wondering, I used acrylic paint as it’s meant to be waterproof (we’ll see after the festival) and the circles are, *ahem* free form!!

Just noticed that this is still on topic really - look, my sewing machine is there in the background so this kind of counts as a sewing post!

My second tantrum…. and my first completed garment!

Suzy J — Sun, 10 Jun 2007 13:11:33 +0000

Ok… so I gave up on the top. I had literally been staring at the instructions for about 2 hours trying to fathom out the straps when I thought, ’sod it’.

So I logged onto fitzPatterns and downloaded their ‘Amy’ Summer dress pattern for the princely sum of about £1!I got it in the tiles format, printed it out at home, stuck the pattern together and voila! It took all day but I finally finished it. I’m so happy with it!

It was basically just three panels - front, and two back panels, plus an elasticated top and two bust darts. I deviated a bit from the instructions when it came to the elasticated top - instead of making a hoop of elastic and then sewing the casing around it, I found it much easier to sew the casing down first, leaving a gap, then thread the elastic through it, sewed the elastic together then sewed the gap.

After struggling for so long with the top I’m delighted that I finally made a whole dress! I will be donning it proudly at Glastonbury and dare I say, even before that at work tomorrow! I figure I can smarten it up a bit with a black cardigan on top, and it also looks good over jeans.

Oh and I forgot to say, I got the material from a tiny local shop which is rammed with material - just £2 a metre! Unfortunately they are only open 9.30-5.30pm during the week, so I think I’ll have to be a Saturday regular.

Progress on my sheet top

Suzy J — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 21:26:17 +0000

Finally got my neckline all sewn down. Very shabbily though - I’m eager for this practice to be over so that I can play with the pretty material. Here’s the neckline…

If you look closely you’ll see big ‘R’s written on the material! I was a little confused about my right and wrong sides as the material is the same on both sides.

I then made some headway with the next step - sewing the casing and elastic into the back, folding under 1cm of material before folding it over far enough to take the elastic.

Next step is the straps, which I’m not really looking forward to! More interfacing and complicated folding and clipping - argh!! Though I admit that I’m starting to feel happier about it all now - as I made my own adjustments to the sewing pattern for the neckline in order for it to sit how I thought it should, I realise that the patterns aren’t the be all and end all, you CAN play with them.

On another note - Sewing is officially back! According to THIS article in the Guardian. AND, in other exciting news, I’ve just discovered a tiny little material shop (though stuffed absolutely full to bursting point) literally round the corner from my flat, with all cotton etc £2 a metre! The only problem is that it’s hardly ever open, so I’ll give it a go on Saturday and see if there are any good quality bargains.

The Dress a Day blog has a great post here about shopping for fabric in London.

My first tantrum…

Suzy J — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 21:31:23 +0000

It happened: my first sewing tantrum. And only on the second stage of making my top! Stupid necklines. I must have stared at the instructions about pinning, interfacing and turning over and up and pinning again and layering for at least an hour, before throwing down the whole thing and declaring ‘that’s it, I can’t do it… it’s impossible.’ I was very, very grumpy. But then I opened my book, ‘Yeah I Made it Myself’ (see prev. post), and found out that what I was supposed to be doing was actually much simpler than the instructions made it out to be, and I triumphantly pinned it all together and completed the neckline. Thank God for THAT. My smile immediately matched the curve of the new, albeit slightly wonky neckline and suddenly this immense tiredness has come over me… the feel-good factor of solving the problem came in the form of a burst of energy, followed by just needing to sleep.

At the moment teaching myself is tough, but I know that once I know a wide range of techniques, and practise them, everything will become a lot more relaxing and enjoyable, and I’m looking forwards to seeing real results. Goodnight!