I was catch-stitching the hem facing until almost 11pm last night, but I finished! Here are some hastily-taken pictures of me at the office this morning.
When I decided to sign up for the sew-along, I had no idea what to make this skirt out of, so I hastily ordered some charcoal 100% twill. It's a good, basic skirt that I will be able to wear with a lot of different things, but maybe wasn't the best choice. After working with it for a bit, I realized that the twill picks up every hair and fuzz it comes close to. I created the entire skirt out of the same fabric, so the hem facing is twill, too, and is a bit "grabby" with my cotton tights. I probably should've faced it with something a little more slippery to counter that.
In a lot of ways, this is the best garment I've ever made. From the really cool invisible-zipper-insertion trick following the book's instructions, to the faux overcast stitch I used to finish the side seams (instead of my usual pinking), to using my pressing ham (Merry Christmas to meeee!) to press the darts, to catch-stitching the hem facing by hand... Yep. I even traced the pattern from the tissue onto freezer paper first. This is probably the first time I've ever done things really right. And the result is a really well-made garment that fits incredibly well.
I made a few adjustments to the original pattern. Because I'm a little short, I removed 1" from the length as I was tracing the pattern, since you can't really take it off the hem at the end. I also lengthened the back darts by 1.5" for a better fit; for some reason, the tips just didn't look right. I'm not sure they do even now, but part of that could be the bulkiness of the fabric.
Overall, I'm quite pleased. The skirt fits perfectly just below the waist and hasn't done any shifting around, which is fantastic. For a beginner garment, there are enough challenges and interesting bits to keep it, well, interesting. Now it's onto the Pastille dress--which, I must confess, scares me the most of all the projects in the book. A well fitted dress with little embellishment?! No time to be scared, though--I just have to dive in!
ETA: My skirt was featured! Thanks, ladies!
ETA: My skirt was featured! Thanks, ladies!
3 comments:
Way to go! It looks great. I'm totally terrified of the pastille, too... I'm thinking of making it in a super-busy small print so that hopefully the mistakes disappear! :)
Well done on the meringue!
It looks great -- what a fun outfit! And I can't wait to see the dress.
I love that skirt! I picked up a handmade scalloped skirt at the thrift store last year and it is one of my favorite pieces now. Maybe since I can't sew a straight line, this is the pattern for me to start on! ;)
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