Burda August....Finally Here!

Since the magazine FINALLY arrived, this weekend I finished BurdaStyle 8.2010.140, a shirred dress with cross-over front. I decided to use the animal print knit I had for that rather than use it for another version of the Muse dress. The Muse dress is great, but so distinctive I don't think I really need more than one. So, I used the knit for the Burda dress instead.

I have to say that I am a touch on the fence about this dress. I made some changes because the original was, as is always the case with Burda, rather revealing. Here is the image on the model:

The first thing that I did was raise the neckline. As you can see on the dress, the cross-over falls under the bust:

Does anyone else feel like slinging that neckline under a very large bust just looks....questionable? To me, it just looks like "the girls" are trying to escape. I changed it so the crossover actually comes up over the bust, making for a much less revealing front:


I also changed the finish on the edge of the neckline from a facing, which I was afraid would "flip out," to a binding. I stretched the binding as I was attaching it so the neckline wouldn't gape. I also used a slightly beefier doubleknit..which I thought would be better at hiding the "hail damage."

Here is the finished dress (with head chopped off because while I could bring myself to wriggle into the spanx on a Sunday, I couldn't bring myself to fix my hair):


Overall, the shape is nice, and it is comfortable, but can you see one of the issues? If you look at the model photo:


You can see that the shirring/draping makes a series of U-shapes, my dress does this, too...but what happens on mine is it makes the front skirt drop slightly:

I don't know if this can be fixed by more artfully arranging the shirring, or if I should go back and try and hem the front shorter....I am torn as to whether it even matters or not. You can also see something else in this photo, and that is the nice shaping in the back. The back is sewn with princess seams:


The center back seam is very nicely contoured, and the fit was great for someone with a backside like mine.

The arranging of the gathering was a bit of a pain. I ended up laying the whole thing out on the floor pinning, basting, and gathering. The first attempt I ended up with some weird bunching in the armpits and ended up taking the basting out and redoing it with the gathering pushed slightly lower, and taking in the front width slightly. I have to be honest, I don't know if this is an issue with the Burda draft, or the result of my raising the neckline. I am leaning towards it being a result of my tinkering, since Burda is normally drafted much better than the Big 4 patterns.

However, in the end I think I will wear this for a while before I make a final decision....it is so different from anything I normally wear, I don't know how much of my "meh" feeling about the dress is maybe just because it is so very different from anything I normally wear.

Making a long-sleeved dress did make me want to get started on some fall sewing, though. To that end, I cut out a trench coat for fall:


I am always a complete disaster when it comes to coats, so for the shell I got a dark grey cotton/poly twill. If the poly doesn't keep me from making a mess out of it the next time I manage to say, spill a coffee down the front of me, hopefully the fact that I bought it in the same color as most of the stains I get on myself will help hide my clumsiness.

I also bought some chocolate brown small-wale corduroy to make another version of the Hot Patterns coat dress:


I have never sewn with corduroy before, so we'll see how much of a bumble I make of this!

I hope everyone else had a productive weekend! I will probably be slowing down a bit on my productivity now that the semester has started. I am teaching TWO undergraduate classes this semester...not the most fantastic idea I have ever had, but I'll muddle through!

Butterick 5522 for Fall

Edited 8/16/10 to add: Here are some photos of me in the dress....


Also, isn't it funny how sometimes photos will show you things that looking in the mirror does not? For example....this photo shows me that I need to topstitch that center back seam down, because the seam allowance is rolling around under the dress and making my butt look lumpy:


Ok, Ok, lumpi-ER. Thank god for Spanx!!

Posted 8/15/10:

This weekend I worked on Butterick 5522, a shift dress by Muse that was released for this fall:

I don't know if you recognize the dress or not, but if you are a reality TV junkie like me, you know that Tabatha Coffey wore one on her show, "Salon Take-over."


Now granted, Tabatha is about half my size, but Muse did offer the dress in plus-sizes as well:


Wow, that's really short, huh? When the pattern was drafted for Butterick, they did lengthen it slightly...thank goodness.

While the dress itself is pretty simple, the sleeves are a lot of work:


The pattern pieces for the sleeve parts only have notches on the "sides" of the U-shaped pieces. However, I also marked the center bottoms, otherwise it made it really difficult to distribute the ease through the curves of the U.


I also suspect that my fabric has more stretch than what was intended for the pattern, so I stretched the neck binding a bit as I was applying it. I ended up taking up about 5 inches of length that way:


I also eliminated the zipper at the back of the neck. I don't like an exposed zipper, and the neckline is large enough that there is no need to have the zipper to get it over my head. So, I just sewed the back right up. I also sewed the sleeves in flat rather than in the round, which made construction a lot simpler.

Now, for the alterations. I started with a size 20, and graded out to a 22 at the hips since that is what coincided with my measurements. What I ended up with was a potato sack with fancy sleeves. Also, a very, very A-line potato sack. So, I took in the waist at both the side seams and the center back seam, and then tapered the bottom a touch. Here are the changes that I made to the pattern pieces:


The changes to the back pattern piece were even more significant:


Fortunately, the back is not cut on the fold, so the center back seam can be contoured. And here is the final product:


And the sleeve:


And here you can see the contour that I added to the back:


In the end, what looked like a very simple pattern ended up being quite a bit of work. Because of that...I feel like I need to make it again, now that I have the fit fine tuned! Fortunately, I have another knit in the stash:


I was thinking about using this for the main part of the dress, and using what I have left of the black knit from the dress today for the insets in the sleeves. Or....I could use this fabric to make a dress from the plus section of the most recent Burda:


I love this dress!! But, would it be too "va-va-va-voom" for work? So, I will think about it. In the meantime, I bought some brown fine-wale corduroy to make another version of the Hot Patterns coat dress since fall is just around the corner.

Lots to Report!

My time away really made me miss the sewing room, so I have been fantastically productive the past week (not always in positive ways....fantastically productive, with plenty of mistakes!!). Yesterday I completed the third item that I worked on over the break and I finished Simplicity 2403, a shirtwaist dress with fitted skirt:


Initially, I was going to use the striped shirting in the photo, but decided instead to do the two-tone version...I blame Eugenia, she made a gorgeous version just before I started mine that most DEFINITELY influenced my decision:


I used a stretch pinstripe suiting for the skirt, and a stretch sateen for the top. I made a couple of mistakes, but don't tell anyone...For one, I reversed the pleats in one of the sleeve, ner:


Ooops! I'll just ignore it and wear it anyway. Some nice touches include gathers below the back yoke:


An invisible zipper (does anyone besides me agonize over what color to make the zipper when you are using two fabrics? I finally settled on white):


Puffed sleeves:



And front pleats and pockets:


Normally I find Simplicity patterns to have an excess of ease...often cutting 2 or even 3 sizes smaller than my measurements would indicate. However, I found the fit on this one to be excellent. Based on my measurements, I cut a size 20. I then did flat pattern measurements and made some minor alterations based on that, including NOT cutting the back skirt piece on a fold, and giving it more of a contour at the waist using that center back seam that I added. Surprisingly, even the sleeves fit my chubby baby arms with no alterations (this NEVER happens). Here is the final product:


BTW, that pocket is TINY. And I have small hands. If you want them to be usable, you should enlarge them. Also, for someone with a bottom-heavy shape like mine you would think that front pleats AND pockets would be a terrible idea, but with the raised waist it looks quite nice:


Here is a view from the back, that I altered so that it was not cut on the fold. My bottom is bigger than what was anticipated for the pattern, so I added some more shape to the top. However, if I make this again, I will add more room to the back at hip level, as the side seams pull slightly to the back yet. However, the fit is otherwise good and I will certainly wear the dress regardless. Plus, if I am going to do a center back seam, I'll give it a kick-pleat:


The first item that I made last weekend was something simple, Vogue 8647. I was initially going to use a pink t-shirt knit from the stash:


Unfortunately, when I laid it out to cut, there was a hole in it that I couldn't work around. I'll have to use it with something with a number of smaller pieces, rather than just the two huge pieces in this pattern. I ended up using a grey ITY that I had instead:


The pleats at the shoulder are a nice touch, and the construction is incredibly simple since the armholes and neck are just folded over and stitched. No facings. The neck is very broad, though, and I had problems hemming the "point" of the vee neck. It ended up more of a scoop neck, thanks to my fiddling:


The dress is incredibly simple, although makes a good base to dress up for work:


It is essentially completely shapeless though...so I wore it with a belt. Except....I was wearing it Monday, sans belt, while I got my breakfast ready. My husband walked through the kitchen and says "Oohhh...sexy." Seriously, J? It's a grey sack. Either J needs his eyes checked, or perhaps my grey sack has some fantastic trait that I am unaware of.

The second project I finished was a gift for my niece's birthday. When my last batch of Hot Patterns arrived, she fell in love with the Classix Nouveaux Pyramid Bag.


I agreed to make her one, and her birthday is August 19th, so I needed to finish it up. She decided she wanted it made from white "leather" (vinyl, a complete PITA to sew. Never, never, never again) and I used a leopard print for the lining:


I also managed to put the zipper in sideways, so it goes across the top of the bag rather than from handle to handle. I guess some days it actually pays to read the instructions:


Regardless of the sideways zipper, Sadie will love it. It is huge, has animal print, is a little shiny, and kinda tacky. Therefore, it meets all her requirements for fashion.

Finally, I made a cat bed. It didn't require any sewing though. I have a cat who loves to lie in the laundry basket. His most favorite thing in the world is to "re-hair" all the clean clothes. So...I tricked him. I filled a laundry basket with fabric scraps:


He has been sleeping in it for days! And has completely left the clean laundry alone. Sucker!

I'm Baaaack!

Seriously, it was like the surface of the sun in Austin! Yes, that is the dashboard of my car....in front of my friend Michelle's house! I nearly vaporized the first day. But, we had a fantastic time, it was wonderful to see my friends....AND....I got to catch up with a friend that I had excavated with in Syria and hadn't seen for WELL over 10 years.

One of the great things about catching up with my friend Sharon is that it reminded me what an amazing experience spending so much time overseas was. But also reminded me of everything that I left when I walked away from teaching full-time. We even compared notes on being "bitter adjuncts."

I talk every now and then about archaeology and my "past life," but thought that I would explain more fully. In 2003, I earned my PhD in Anthropology, specializing in zooarchaeology in the Near East. I worked for over a decade conducting research in Syria, Turkey, Morocco, and Egypt. In 2004, I ended my search for a tenure-track position and permanently became a university administrator.

Why, you might ask?

While I was searching for a permanent teaching position, I became very disappointed. I was invited to give a few job talks, search committees were requesting my references, but I was getting no offers. A close friend of mine that had contacts at one of the universities where I had interviewed made a few calls...asking if they would be willing to provide feedback, that if I was doing something that was turning these search committees in another direction, what was it, so that I could rectify it.

The answer was both unexpected and also completely reasonable. The friend reported back that the committee had liked my experience, were impressed by my publication record, and felt that my teaching experience was extensive, but....I had no active research. The expectation was that if someone I were hired as a professor, that I should be able to take students with me into the field...and because all my experience, all my contacts, all my sites were in the Near East, that meant that I had no active research. So, the committee moved on to the next candidate.

I was devastated. The reason that I had no active research was because our country had gone to war with Iraq...therefore, all my excavation sites were closed to me. I couldn't understand how I had spent so many years working towards this, and just at the time that I was ready to take my PhD to work...an administration that I did not support instigated a war that I opposed (I don't often talk about politics here, as I have blog friends that fall all over the political spectrum, but my politics played heavily into my feelings about my predicament...although please do not take this as a condemnation of anyone's political leanings. It is just that my politics were key in my view of the situation).

Out of desperation (and a need to pay the bills), I went to work as a university administrator. I have worked in MBA admissions, grants and contracts, operations, and now I direct graduate advising at a large university here in St. Louis.

I have carved out a comfortable place for myself...I still teach at least one course per term, and as an adjunct, I only have to teach those things that interest me. I also put my academic background to work every day in the application of university policy and helping my students prepare themselves for graduate school.

I had always thought that I would only do this temporarily. That it was just a way of buying time until I was able to develop new research. I excavated one season in Macedonia...and just as I was ready to "get serious" about moving to a new research area....I found out that I had Hidradenitis Suppurativa, a fairly icky auto-immune disorder that causes large cysts to form in my armpits that can only be removed through surgery.

And while I am positive that doctors in other countries are just as capable of treating it as my doctors here....having a skin graft while overseas is not exactly on my "bucket list."

So...

Here I am. Here I remain. An adjunct and an administrator, making peace with my exit from traditional academics.

While seeing Sharon again made me miss excavating and researching so incredibly badly...it also made me understand that I really have made peace with my life. That I really like what I do. And that I enjoy being an adjunct, and most days I am happy that I am not running the "publish or perish" race but enjoy just being able to write what I want to write, and research what I want to research. Or not research anything at all.

But, enough of all this!! I promise the next post will be about sewing something!

Don't Miss Me Too Much!

I'm heading out today for Austin, so nothing very interesting has been going on in the sewing room.

Although, along with cleaning up the basement, we have also been cleaning and rearranging in other areas of the house. One of the places that is being worked on is the sewing room. A difficulty with the sewing room is that it is also one of the two guest rooms in the house, and because of that we had a queen sized bed in it. The room is only 11x14, though, so with the big bed, a rolling garment rack, the containers of fabric, three sewing machine cabinets, and a cutting table it was getting pretty tight in there.

The first step in cleaning up the sewing room was to trade my brother the queen size bed for a twin bed. Next, we will buy a daybed with a trundle, so we will still be able to house just as many people when the room is used for guests. Finally, I want to install a long countertop along one wall and inset all the machines into it and put the cabinets (don't tell my husband this plan, he'll have a stroke) in the basement. I would need workstations for the 401, the 503, the 603, and the serger. Those are the main machines I use. The 66 treadle will stay where it is, and the 99 and 301 will stay in their travel cases (as will the featherweight...once acquired!).

After the beds were changed, I decided to go through my fabrics and see if there was anything that wanted to be sewn up. I took some time to lay out my next projects.

First, I want to make another version of the Hot Patterns Sunshine top:


I will make it in grey knit that was left over from the cardi-wrap I made last winter. It is very lightweight, so I think I will make the belted tunic version.

Second, I have a black and white knit print that I want to make a cowl neck top with:


I have so many patterns that I am loathe to purchase any more, but I think it would also be a great fabric for McCalls 6069:


Or, pehaps I just think that because the one in the illustration is black and white. I have also considered morphing the skirt from the Hot Patterns Uptown Downtown Dress:


Onto the top for the Sunshine top:


Next, I have a length of really soft pink knit that I would like to make a simple pullover dress with:


It will definitely need to be belted, but there is a pattern for a wrap around obi belt in an old Burda that I plan on making using black denim. I am considering making it reversible, and doing one side with zebra print and one side with the black denim....we'll see.

One of my final projects for summer is this purple and green plaid:


I would like to make the shirt with the cuffed half sleeves. And because even though it is poly, I can never pass that shelf by in the fabric store:



I figured after that, I really should start thinking about projects for fall. I have love this dress from the January Burda ever since it came out:


But, I have finally come to accept that gathered or pleated skirts are NOT my friend. But, I still wanted a dress with that menswear styling. So....


Here is a better image of the pattern:


Finally, I have a couple of jackets planned. First, I have a red embroidered stretch twill that was going to be a dress, but I didn't have enough fabric. Therefore, it will become a jacket instead:


And finally, I have a grey twill and a great charmeuse animal print for lining to make a trench coat for fall:


And for today's "Interesting Basement Find," apparently at one time I was teaching myself to tat. When I was little, my grandfather tried to teach me, but I could never handle the shuttle properly. Apparently I had better luck needle tatting:


Seriously, I only VAGUELY remember even doing this. I REALLY need to just pick a craft and stick with it!

Anyway, have a fantastic weekend everyone! Be safe, stay cool, and I'll catch up with everyone's blogs when I get back!