A top by my daughter

 It's been so nice to hear some of you just like to read my posts. I do realise I've been here before in the past years, which is probably something that happens occassionally when you have been doing something (in my case blogging) for so long. Sorry to have bothered you with my uncertainty and indecisiveness. 

There are a few things I will change in the near future but I'll come to that when I do it. Let's start with showing you a project that has been made recently. Partly by me, partly by my daughter.

My daughter is one of my "students". Of course she's not a paying student and it's not a weekly thing but she really likes to learn to sew. My son's girlfriend too, lucky me! I like to pass the sewing bug along and we've been sewing together a bit lately. 

She selected this top from an older Patrones magazine.

  

It was labeled "Couture facil", which means it should be an easy sew. Really? With this button placket in the back? This kind of button placket even makes me a little nervous. It's about very precise sewing and cutting and if you do it wrong, you really can see it or worse, even be so bad you want to throw the pattern piece in the bin. There was no fabric left, it had to be right first time round.

Perhaps needless to say that I did sew the placket. My daughter watched the process clearly and said she could not (yet) have done it. But the rest, from tracing to cutting the fabric pieces and finishing the neckline was done by my daughter (with a bit of guidance). She's ever so pleased with the result and has worn it with pleasure. Receiving compliments for it too!

The placket before finishing the neckline and completely sewing with buttons

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The sleeve with pleats

My daughter wearing the top

  

The fabric is from Atelier Brunette and bought in a shop in The Hague. What's nice about this brand is that they have notions matching their fabric. In this case the buttons!

Patrones pants

Today I was able to get some pictures for the Patrones pants on me, which I finished yesterday.
The PR review is here.
In general I'm quite pleased with these pants: the front is good, the pockets went in smoothly and the fabric feels very soft on my skin.



I'm not so pleased with the back. This is an issue I presumably always had with pants, but that I only became aware of because of taking pictures for my blog. I will stop making pictures from the back ;-).








Look at this picture of the back. Wrinkles, and though I have read a lot about fitting pants, I'm not sure what to do about them. Is it just taking pictures and am I being too critical or is this a problem that can be solved? If you know what could help, please let me know. I would like to make a pair of pants without these wrinkles.

Patrones pants

As said in a previous post, I really need some new pants and I managed to get three cut. And instead of sewing the most easy one first, which I originally wanted to do, I started sewing on the most complicated one. That's the Patrones pattern. As in BWOF the pictures just don't show the details clearly. I would think you want to see the single welt and the detail in the back, but a large belt hides these details in the magazine pictures.

For me this is the most complicated because it has
a. Single welt pockets
b. I've never made a Patrones pattern before.

The single welt pockets are not so difficult, but just a little more work than any other pocket.
Though the pattern seems quite in line with BWOF pants, (laid the pattern pieces on top of a TNT Burda pants) I cut with large seam allowances and traced the seamlines like I always do with tracing paper.

Other changes

• The back yoke (?) I made smaller at the waist by folding the pattern piece together. I took the BWOF pants and took out the space that I had in darts there.
• Made the side seams a bit straighter than the pattern, just personal preference.

Then I put together the pants yesterday evening with the largest straight stitch possible on my sewing machine.

The result is encouraging. Great fit (not bad it's a stretch fabric) and the only thing that needs alteration is making the waist a bit smaller in the front and attach the waistband a bit higher. The last is only for my own comfort, I just don't like low waistlines on me. Don't know if you can see it in the picture, but the waistline is also machine basted in a lighter color. The uneven part on my right side is the pocket facing, that still extends above the waist. I hadn't even finished the pocket insides when this picture was taken. The wrinkles are from sitting behind my desk in a too much time consuming effort to re-establish the internet connection for DH, who liked my pants very much.