WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN??? Summer Denim Jumpsuit a mashup of NL6493, M6930, and Imagination

What's good sew fam?  I know, I know, I haven't posted anything in like 5 months, but believe me, your sis needed a break.  Here's what I've been up to:

In late February, I spent a week in Guadeloupe for my birthday.  What an amazing place!  I had never been before but definitely have plans to go back!

Anywho, as soon as I got back, LITERALLY... I raced home, dumped my luggage, packed my pre-arranged clothing for 23 days in Paris.  This was a work trip that was scheduled 3 weeks before I went to Guadeloupe.  

Now here's were the problem comes in..... 23 days of the most glorious food, work dinners, all day work sessions with pastries, all the wine.... ALL THE WINE!!!!

Again, beautiful place, I even took one of the weekends to go to Venice.  

But YALL.................I legit gained 15 lbs while there AND blew a sewing machine (yes I shipped mines there).  When I returned it really took me those same 30 days I spent from home to get my life together.  I began my workout regimen and slowly worked the lbs off.   

In that time though, I really lost my desire to sew.  I didn't go into my space for weeks.  I did client work, and that was about it.  I was uninspired, and flat out tired of what was available in both the form of patterns, and textiles.  So I decided to take a break.  

Fast forward to today, I finally put the pieces together to start blogging again.  I in better shape physically and mentally, but still uninspired most of the time.  I'm going to work through it though!

So about this jumpsuit.  I started on it in June as a solicited ideas from my FB group (Needles and Fashion).  I opted to alter patterns as opposed to draping so that others can be able to make the same. 

Inspiration: 

It wasn't easy finding a pattern to work with this top.  Thanks to my sew sis Shari Belle, I was about to get NL6493.  The fabric came from Fabric Mart Fabrics, but is no longer available.  Try these alternatives (HERE) & (HERE)

First thing you will realize with this pattern is 1) The bust seam is not centered, 2) this is pattern has an overlap at the center front, and 3) The top of the bodice was a lot taller than I wanted for this jumpsuit. 

UGH, If it was easy, it wouldn't be right!

The first thing I did was cut 2 inches from the top of the center front piece. 

Next up, from the top right corner, I cut a diagonal piece off of the pattern that is a total of 8 inches long (this is important).  

Next you want to true up this piece with the side front pattern piece.  To do this, you want to connect to top corners with seam allowance and pin.  Repeat this down to attach the pattern pieces.  

This will leave you with excess paper in your seam which you will need to cut off.  

After that is done, you want to line your back piece.  This is so you can draft the slope of the back.

As you can see, I started my draft line on the front piece and progressed to the back in order to have a seamless line. from front to back rather than doing it at the side seam.  Once you have your draft line figured out, you can cut the pattern pattern along the line. 

As last, you will need to cut off the overlap portion of the pattern piece along the vertical dashed line. 

You then want to take your pattern pieces for the front and back and create facing.  I created 2 inch facing.  and a 60 x 4 inch piece for the belt. (the pockets are also pictured here).

I then created (2) 1 x 30 inch ties made from folding the fabric in on both sides and then enclosed it using a straight stitch.  

Next up, we draft the pants.  I used M6930 which I have used many times in the past and opted for this fit rather than the pattern shorts.  You can do the same with either to extend them into pants.  You can check my YT for tuts that include drafting this shorts into pants, but the gist is below. 

Form a slight diagonal line from the top of the crotch down 10 inches and mark.  From there, you draft a straight line stopping at the your desired length.  

Once all of these pieces were drafted, I created the top attaching the facing and the neck ties.  

The pants were simple pockets, front and back.  Once put together, I attached the top to the bottom. 

THAT'S IT!!!!

It would have been easier to drape this on my dress form, but hopefully this works for some of you that haven't progressed to that yet.  Pattern hacking ain't no punk tho!  Be sure to tag me if you make this!  

Until Next time... SMOOCHES!

EDIT:  For those that wanted to know, I am putting a post together next week to give you the deets on my work out routine and new diet!

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Silk Crepe de Chine Soft Pleated Maxi Dress, a tale of last minute struggles

So before I get into this garment, I need you to know I spent 10 (yes 10) days home with this fabric.  I took a mental staycation from work and just did a bunch of nothing with kid time sprinkled here and there.  I woke up Superbowl Sunday morning to a phone call.  It was my best friend that asked what I was doing for the day to which I responded "I need to sew something, anything today".  She responded, "what did you end up doing with the green silk"?  Yup.... I forgot this dress was due this week.

The fabric used 4.5 yards of  kelly green silk crepe de shine from fabricmart which I snagged during the sale a couple weeks back.  It is no longer available, but check out these alternatives (HERE), (HERE), & (HERE). My plans were to make some sort of maxi with pleats, so I had a good starting point.  This dress will be one of many garments I am making for my upcoming birthday trip to Guadeloupe.  I didn't have much time to play around, so I flipped through my pinterest for some bodice ideas.

I came across a simple yet effective top with spaghetti straps and thought.... hmmmm I can do that!  I draped the bodice on my dress form, cut my fabric and began to assemble to pieces.

Somewhere between all this and the final construction, it all fell apart.  Too many adjustments were needed, my patience was short, and I didn't have time to go back to the drawing board, so I trashed it.  Fail #1

While I pondered what bodice I would make with the remaining yard of fabric, I began to work on the skirt.  I cut 2 panels that were 45" (the fabric width) x 50".  

There a several techniques that you can find on pleating.  You can make a pleat board, or something as simple as measurement marking.  Because I was working with silk, I had to get creative.  The difficulty involved was keeping silk stable. 

I laid out my measuring mat on my cutting table which is the ONLY surface that could accommodate 50 inches of fabric in length.  Next I had to determine the method of pleating I would use keeping in mind, I could not put anything on this fabric (i.e. starch,).  I used my drafting ruler to measure out my pleats.  While this method would have proved to be beneficial for sturdier woven knits, I quickly realized this was not going to work.  So in the spirit of time, I decided to freehand pleat from top to bottom.  I used my pattern weights (thank God) to hold the pleats in place until I was ready to press each one down.  

After these 7 pleats, I knew it would be a long day..... 

This is one panel completed.  I measured 15 inches exactly #winning.  Looks like I heading in the right direction right?  I put masking tape along the ends of the top and the bottom to keep the pleats in place.  A little tip I learned (HERE).

In the end, I had 30 inches for my 29 inch waist.  With freehand pleats, this worked out better than I could have imagined as I did not have to cut off any extra fabric or re-adjust any of the pleats #wonthedoit. 

Now back to the bodice.....  

I scrambled through my patterns which I recently reduced from over 200 down to less than 20 and found V1524.

Using silk for this pattern bodice is NOT recommended for this pattern, so I knew there was a potential for fit challenges.  I omitted the stand up collar, self lined the bodice with silk, and added Pellon fusible knit interfacing & underlining to the pattern pieces that served as the lining.  This was my first time using this type of interfacing, and I happen to have JUST enough for this project in my stash.  This interfacing was very soft and a great option for this type of fabric as it does not take away from the natural drape. 

I constructed the bodice, attached it to the skirt, added an elastic band to the seam to also serve as a facing for the back, and hemmed the skirt.  

The last thing I did was adding the hardware.  In this case, it was the invisible zipper on the skirt, the one inch metal release buckle I ordered months ago for this pattern found (HERE), and the metal zipper used for the upper back.  I shortened a zipper I already had for the upper back which was the first time I actually took to the time to do so.  I pulled out my tools searching for the right pliers to removed and replace the stopper.   I found out I had a leak under my basement sink while looking for tools and got rusted tool water ALL over my bodice top while discovering the tool kit I was pulling out was full of water.... WHY LAWD?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?  Fail #2.  I quickly removed the bodice from the skirt, hand rinsed the bodice and threw it in the dryer on delicate.  At this time, I just sat down in time to watch the halftime show.  By the end of the halftime show, the bodice was dry.  I reattached, finished the zipper, and had hand sewn the metal buckle on.  Finish at last and I was beat!

Moral of the story... plan better!

I hope you enjoyed my last minute struggle, until next time, Happy Sewing!

Jenese 

Needles and Fashion

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