A new finish

 Hello, everyone.

Today's post is a new finish, but it's also a stash item. And a rough-draft of a future garment.

This is a cardigan from a prior year's Burda Style (July 2019, number 103) with a shorter length--the design original length looked a lot like "commune clothes" when tried out--and with the sleeve enlarged to accommodate my non-stick-figure arms. 

I guess the way to keep a long, long cardigan from looking like that is to use the shown metallic knit in the magazine photos. Or to be 5'10 or over, weigh 107 pounds and combine it with skinny pants and high heels. The cardigan's more usable at this length because like most people I go places in cars while wearing sweaters or jackets. 😉 And at this length a person isn't constrained to wear spike heels and leggings with it.

Detail of the new sleeve. I tried to keep the wider lower sleeve from the design as much as possible, while opening up the upper arm. I kept the armhole seam length from changing by following the directions in one of my fitting/alterations books to open a cross shaped cut inside the seam line and pull it apart until the needed width was achieved. This was a first time for me!

The fabric is an ice-blue poly or rayon with spandex knit that has been lying around the place for a while. I am thrilled to have used up some of it.

For the seams I used the canned "stretch" slanted-zigzag on my sewing machine. It's a useful stitch, but it works a LOT better if it's sewn on a more stabilized knit--I interfaced the sewn bits all over the place with a knit type interfacing.

This was a test drive for using the beautiful piece of gray knit I got from EmmaOneSock to make a cardigan with. 

Thanks to DD2 for making phone photos for me!

The tee shirt is my spiffy Montana merino one from Duckworth. 

Test stitching on something new

Hello, everyone.

A little while back I encountered a free embroidery pattern on the internet. (And now I can't remember where it was.) It was a "primitive" style angel, and the photo showed an angel stuffed toy made with Minky-type fabric. There was the stitch file, right there, and a link to the maker's blog, which drew a blank. So, being in the mood to experiment, I downloaded the stitch file. 

Opened the file in the embroidery software that came with my Janome MC500 and printed out the alignment page. Also I put it into the thumb drive. 

Loaded the file into the embroidery machine. Dug around in the info provided there. It had 11 colors of thread. Each color had a color spot next to it and a nominated Janome thread color. I don't have that brand of thread in the house, so I went by the color chips and approximated the colors.

Having no instructions for the project, I used the instructions for the OESD Minkee Pals which are about the same size and look to have similar ground fabric.

This helped me to decide on stabilizer and topper. It also allowed me to try out the other pattern, which I had bought the package with the idea of making gifts, and see how I like the construction method.

A close-up of the little angel.

At the top right, part of my notes on which colors go to what. I think I misread the color that ended up on the little face, the chip looked like bright pink and probably should have been some shade of beige/tan/flesh tone. There was a pair of final colors that was a bit confusing: a speck of green that seems to have no purpose, and after adding the back fabric to the top of the sewn material in the hoop an outline stitch. This was spec'd as charcoal gray on my screen and probably should have been the same pale pink as the first outline stitch, as the charcoal shows at the interior corners of the shape. 

I don't think I like the "primitive" style. The dot eyes and the half-circle mouth just aren't my thing. The texture on the wings and hair is interesting...blue wings? whatever. It is a cheerful looking little thing, perhaps as a tree ornament or package decoration? All it needs is a little ribbon loop added at the top. Maybe that was why the tiny green line was placed? It's at the top of the halo.

The most key thing I have difficulty with is the method of construction of this stuffed angel--and by extension the stuffed animals in the Minkee Pals pattern set. (Remember, this was copied from the Minkee Pals instructions as an approximation.) The final outline stitches a seam *all the way around* connecting the front to the back. This produces an inside-out angel with no turning opening. The user is supposed to cut a slit into the back fabric and turn through the slit. "It's Minkee, you can just stitch the opening together and it doesn't ravel!" Right. But I was thinking of giving the Minkee Pals to children. 

I put a piece of the trimmed off stabilizer inside the slit after the stuffing was inserted and used it as an interior patch to stabilize baseball stitching and closed the slit that way. 

I'm not sure I'm excited about this. The minky-style fleece and the stabilizer and topping worked out well. (A mesh in the hoop below, the fleece on top and not actually hooped, and Sulky Solvy on top--spray temp glue and tape were involved in this.)  

Maybe it's time to make the first of the Minkee Pals and try a different way of attaching the back to the front. Like using my regular sewing machine to make an outline seam that has a turning opening. With a little flap to tuck in at the opening so it can be sewn shut by hand. 

This was basically the way the coasters went together, except that the instructions there said "hand stitch" and I tucked the flap (just make it while trimming the fabric, they don't say anything about such and idea) into the inside of the coaster, pinned it, and edge stitched all around the edge to close. I think the machine edge stitching won't work as well on the curves and corners of this type of project.

If the Minkee Pal works out, I'll probably do another post on this stuff.

A little repair project

Hello, everyone.

Things have been a little bit busy. One reason is the subject of this post: a repair on a knit dress.

I love my Icebreaker merino-blend knit dress. Unfortunately, one day I tried to pick it up with a snaggy, sharp fingernail. Oops. A collection of very obvious holes appeared in the front bodice area.

I looked around on the internet and tried the one knit-holes repair I saw listed. It might have been all right for the back hem or someplace out of the way like that. This was to seam the edges together with the best match in an all natural thread that is around. It made glaringly obvious linear lumps on the front bodice.

So I got the seam ripper out and took the stitches away as well as possible. This was going to need a back patch, I decided, and baseball stitch. Or some reasonable facsimile of baseball stitch.

The back side of the patch, showing some basting stitches as well.

Got an old pair of pantyhose (washed) and cut a chunk out of one leg. This is the thin part of the knit, not the thick part near the waist. Basted it, two layers thick, onto the back of the dress fabric with some random thread. Put the reinforced area gently into an embroidery hoop and used the same (not quite matching) charcoal colored DMC floss to stitch the edges of the holes down and to each other as well as possible.

The front side of the patch.

After the patching stitches, the dress came out of the hoop for a while. I got out some new embroidery stabilizer: Stick n Stitch. This is a stick-on and dissolvable stabilizer. They claim you can run it through your ink jet printer but I really wasn't looking to make something that complex and heavy with stitches.

The traced daisy. I used a temporary marker pen.

Traced a daisy from the Dover Publishing floral designs book in the cabinet onto the soft (not paper) side of the stabilizer, pulled the paper backing off, and stuck the stabilizer down onto the knit. Put the hoop back on  carefully.


Stitched the daisy and a couple of leaves onto the fabric, using wool thread. (It may be tapestry thread, but the weight looked right.) I used a tapestry needle to do this, on the theory that if one uses a ball point needle to sew the knits, one should probably try to use a ball point needle to embroider them.

The threads of the flower.

Progress on the front side.









Stitches used: leaf stitch (?) for the leaves, with one strand of the Floralia. Stem stitch for the petals. Cross stitches scattered for the center of the flower. These last both in the Felicity's Garden thread.



Ready to soak:































After soaking and drip drying, the finished repair.

 The double layer of pantyhose knit seems to have worked out well for the patch behind the fabric. It has similar stretching characteristics, which matters on this kind of thing, and the dress is a thin knit so a thin patch was needed.

The Stick n Stitch worked reasonably well for a stabilizer and pattern transfer, but probably does a bit better with either a smaller needle or a crewel (sharp) needle to pierce the fuzzy stuff. I was careful not to tighten the thread tensions too much. And this dress being now even more delicate, will get hand washed from now on I think. But I love my Icebreaker tank dress. It's so comfortable and packable.