Remake of the non-stretchy T

You know how you have an idea of what you want in your head and it just doesn't work out the way that you want to?  That is how my remake went.  Remember the T shirt that I made for the bear cub that didn't have enough stretch and irritated me?

Well, for a while I've been trying to decide what to do about it.  My first thought was to throw it in the donation box so that maybe someone with an infant could use it.  That is what I should have done, but instead I decided to remake it into this.

It looks okay, but it's nothing like what was in my head and while there is a lot more stretch to the pink insert and that helps with getting it on and off of the girls, in my head it was going to turn out much cuter.  I still sort of like the idea in my head, and I'll probably use this again with other t-shirts that the girls have outgrown and I was thinking I could even add a ruffle or peplum to the bottom if the shirt is also short.  The nerdlet likes it so I guess it is sort of a success.

On the other hand, Q proved once again that he is the best daddy and husband by distracting the girls while I did this.

I made sure to get him signing 'I love you' so that no one would worry that I was going to be a victim of domestic abuse later for posting this on the internet.

Fringe Festival Knit Top

When Stacie posted in December about making her Fringe Festival Knit Top, I immediately downloaded and printed it out.  It's a free pattern from Hot Patterns that you can download from fabric.com here.  It has been sitting next to my printer ever since.  When I was looking to bring something to occupy myself while the bear cub was in surgery, I couldn't find my Kindle and I decided that I would tape the pattern together and trace it with my adjustments while I was waiting.  I actually brought more than one pattern to the hospital to trace, but I had more problems concentrating that I thought I would during the surgery and I pretty much spent the whole time in the hospital after the surgery in the hospital bed with the bear cub.

For the last few weeks I haven't gotten much sleep, mostly worrying about the bear cub and that is one of the reasons that I have been so prolific with my sewing lately.  Now that I'm a little more relaxed, I'm still having issues getting to sleep, almost like I've forgotten how to fall asleep.  So last night, I decided to sew this pattern.  It's listed as a pattern for beginners and it really made me feel like one.  The instructions for the scarf made zero sense to me until I realized that it was meant to be left with unfinished seams, which doesn't really make me happy normally and really didn't work for my one-sided fabric choice.

I ended up changing the scarf piece quite a bit and I also cut off six inches in length.  I was planning on only making my FBA of 2 1/2 inches and a sway back adjustment of 1 inch, but after sewing it together, my darts were two inches under my breasts, so I just serged off 2 inches from the shoulders since it looked like I would still have room for my arms in the sleeves if I did so.  This brought the darts to the right place, but the shirt was still really long, so I cut off four more inches off the bottom.  The other thing I did differently was to finish the sleeves with FOE.  I was planning on using the coverstitch machine to finish them, but even though the coverstitch did the bottom hem and one sleeve fine, for some reason it refused to sew on the other sleeve.  I finally was so frustrated that I took out the seam ripper and removed the stitching from the first sleeve and used bias tape on both sleeves.  I also ripped a small amount of the one sleeve while removing the  coverstitching so one sleeve is about 1/4 inch shorter than the other.  It's sort of underneath the sleeve and I really have to search for it to even see where it was so it doesn't bother me at all.

Despite the fact that making this shirt made me feel pretty incompetent, my final result makes me pretty happy.  If I make it again, I think I will move the dart and only take off 1 inch at the shoulders.  I will widen the scarf so that I can seam it like I did here and have a slightly wider scarf.  I will also add a second sway back adjustment about two inches lower from the first one and cut the front on the fold.  I might actually cut it a little wider if I use a more stable knit than this rayon jersey.

In case you are interested, I thought I would tell you how I made the scarf here.  First, I did as the pattern states and sewed one side of the scarf to the neck opening.  Then, I sewed the ends that were not a part of the neckline right sides together.  I turned them right side out and then zigzagged under the scarf the raw edge of the scarf, the seam of the sewn edge of the scarf to the neckline on the inside.

The Bear Cub's T&A

My bear cub had her tonsils and adenoids removed on Wednesday.  I knew it was coming as the need for it was mentioned a number of times by her pediatrician and also her pulmonologist, but it would be mentioned and then they would tell me we could wait a little bit longer.  The next appointment after she turned four, all of a sudden it seemed more urgent, and both doctors were encouraging me to schedule it right away.  We saw the pediatric ENT that handles most of the kids that I know with special needs in the area.  He also suggested that likely she needed ear tubes and we scheduled it then.  We had a little scare with the pre-surgery blood work being off, but it turned out to be a minor thing and the surgery went as planned.

The surgery went well and this is my bear cub right after the surgery.  We tried to distract her from the pain by showing her youtube videos of the Fresh Beat Band as she loves them and has a crush on Twist, but she wasn't really interested.

Because she weighs so little the doctor didn't feel it was worth the risk of any pain relievers stronger than Tylenol.  Despite that, she is doing amazingly well.  She is a super trooper and by the next morning she was already willing to give us smiles and try to eat and drink.

Friday morning, she was even better and was wanting to play and run and started really fighting us giving her any medications.  I am supposed to keep her indoors and from playing too hard for two to three weeks and they told me not to send her back to school or take her to church for at least a week.  I'm not sure how I'm supposed to keep her from being too active when this is what she was doing Friday morning.

Even when I tried to distract her by coloring with her on the floor, she decided that it would be more fun to run in circles around me than sit down and join me.

This doesn't surprise me too much considering that after her heart surgery (at 8 months) she was rolling around the living room floor two days afterward even though they said to expect to be in the hospital for 7 to 14 days.  The nerdlet actually seemed more traumatized by Q and I being gone for 2 days than the bear cub did by the surgery.

Even with the swelling from her surgery, she is already breathing better and snoring less.  She is actually eating better than she ever has.  I'm beginning to think that part of the reason that she always ate so little was because it was too difficult and painful to eat or drink much with the huge tonsils and adenoids.  I also sort of wonder with how little she is reacting to the pain if maybe she has been in almost constant pain before this.

She is so amazing to me and I've always called her my superhero baby and now I just have another reason.

Jalie 2796 Skort

I finished my skort.  It was pretty easy to put together.  Since I already posted about how I make the change to eliminate the fold around the crotch, I'm not reposting it now, but if anyone is interested in see the pattern change let me know.  I didn't change the skirt part at all.  The whole thing is slightly shorter than the pattern because I sewed the waistband on to the skirt inside out and instead of unpicking the whole thing, I just cut it off.

It's kind of amazing to me what a difference fabric choice and a second layer of fabric can make.  It's not just the color (though the black helps), it really doesn't make me look as lumpy and gross, even without the skirt part.  This is so comfortable and I'll definitely be making some more.  I used nylon/spandex and the shirt is the same (though I didn't make the shirt).

My mom called me and wanted me to get my pictures up so I had her on the phone while I took the pictures.

When I make these again, I think I'll draft a back skirt piece that is assymetrical and comes down about an inch more on my back right side.  My higher hip is pulling the skirt up so much that the shorts show underneath on that side.

I did do one thing that I wonder if it will come back to haunt me.  I used my coverstitch machine to make the bottom pocket seam.  I've never used the coverstitch for any sort of weight bearing before so I don't know if it's a sturdy enough stitch for that.  I'll let you know if it is a fail.

On another note, the nerdlet saw the stripe shorts from my last post and immediately demanded to wear them, so that was kind of nice.

Remakes into Jalie 2796

I went to put away laundry and found a couple of dresses that were damaged and since I had the pattern for the Jalie shorts on my kitchen counter I took some time to turn them into shorts for the girls.

The dresses.  You can see the damage letting your daughters play with permanent markers does.

And the final shorts. I just cut the neckline from the dress front and back and just used that for the shorts band.  I wanted to use the flower, but it was too big to fit anywhere.  For the striped dress, I placed the bottom of the shorts just above the ruffle.  I know the nerdlet will like the purple version.  I'm not sure about the bottom version, but I figure no one will see them under dresses and they are sort of cute in a bizarre kind of way so one of the girls might take to them.

 

And just because I think it's interesting, the size 2 pattern piece on top of the size 14 (before alteration).

Jalie 2796 - Adult Version

I finished the first pair last night and it isn't pretty.  Okay, there isn't anything wrong with the pattern, but really no one needs to see these shorts with me in them.  It seems I carry all my gross fat between my belly button and my upper thighs.  And for some reason, while these shorts are probably a size too big, somehow they still manage to cling enough to show what being serially pregnant and having three babies in three years does to your abdomen.  I think they will be fine for working out, but I'll also be wearing one of my t-shirts over them and since all my t-shirts are x-large or bigger to get over my chest, this means that they are all long enough to come down to my thighs.

I'm posting the pattern again so that no one has my image appear on their screen.  This is your opportunity to stop reading and close this post.

There is no resistance/support in the fabric that I used (the same cotton Jersey that I used for the nerdlet) and they are pretty comfortable.  You can see the fold right above my crotch.  It's actually two inches of folded fabric  I already have a fix for this as I did this with my favorite shorts here, and I'm going to adjust the shorts and make it into the skort before I traumatize any readers with another version.  I didn't bother to hem the bottom edge as I won't be wearing these.

Now that I'm looking at this picture, I think I should have left my legs in the picture and maybe that would have taken away from the horror a bit.  I could play with the filter and make it sort of artistic.

Then I could pretend people are just looking at my pretty legs.

Jalie 2796

I bought my first Jalie pattern.  I actually ended up buying 4.  I ended up buying 2796, 3135, 2805, and 2920.  I decided that I wanted the first two and they were having a buy three get one free so I found two more to add to my order.

Katie of Kadiddlehopper  and another blogger are hosting a swim suit sew-a-long.  I'm not really participating, but I am reading the posts.  She recently posted about SCUBA chic and posted a picture of Jalie 3135, which upon seeing it, I knew that I had to have it for my bear cub.  Children with Down syndrome often have a hard time regulating their body temperature, and my bear cub is very thin. Because of these two things working against her, she turns purple very fast.  I've bought neoprene tops for her and the nerdlet but the smallest size (size 2) is pretty loose and doesn't seem to help much.  I'm hoping that a suit that covers more might help more.  I haven't bought any fabric to make this yet, so it is currently just sitting by my machine.

Jalie 3135

I did, however, trace 2796 for myself (in size AA - American 14) and size F in width and H in length for the nerdet (size 2 length and 4 width).  The fabric I had for making this with only stretch 70% in one direction so I decided to make the nerdlet's version first, since the size 2 is actually 2 inches wider than her waist and if it didn't have enough stretch, she could likely still wear it.

Jalie 2796

I just made the shorts for the nerdlet (though I did trace off all the pieces in her size since they are really a good size for all three of my girls.  Though for me, after making sure the shorts work, I'll likely make myself a few of the skorts.  I'm a huge skort fan, even though I only have one in a size 12 that I used to wear before I ever had any babies and still squeeze myself into occasionally. These will be great because I can slip my phone and gym locker keys in the pocket.  Currently I have one pair of real workout shorts and more often than not I end up going in my regular shorts (Burda 06-11-111) and while they work, they aren't exactly ideal.

The nerdlet wasn't exactly cooperative and Darth Baby was more than willing to help make sure I couldn't get good pictures.  They started playing some version of swing tug-of-war with that blanket and I did the best I could with the pictures.

 

 

The nerdlet really likes them and she decided to go to sleep with them.  There is enough room in them that I think I'm going to try my size as is even though there is no vertical stretch.  I'm short waisted so I'm hoping that the lack of vertical stretch works out okay.  I can sometimes buy the low waisted jeans and get them all the way over my hips so I think it should.

I actually think the draft fits the nerdlet so well, that I may replace the pattern I'm currently using (a cross between two Ottobre patterns) for leggings and replace it with this one.  The nerdlet prefers to wear dresses most of the time and as she starts Kinder this fall, I think it's a good idea for me to make her some knee length leggings in a bunch of colors to wear under the dresses.

Since I have the pattern traced and the fabric washed, ironed, and ready, I should have my version sewn fairly quickly.