Ottobre 03/2011-18

Wow, it's been a while since I've posted! Life has been crazy, but good. Starting with the reason for this dress! My sister was married at the end of November, in Scotland! And we got to be there! Naturally, some new dresses needed sewn...

All my photos were taken in front of the Leith Registry House in Edinburgh, where my sister was married. It was a lovely venue!

Obviously, November in Scotland demands a certain level of cold protection. Not something this Southern girl generally has to deal with, but thanks to my Ottobre subscription, I had plenty of pattern options for Myra! Those Finns know how to deal with the cold.

We settled on Ottobre 03/2011-18, which is a simple dress with long sleeves and a turtleneck collar. Very cozy.

The skirt is lightly gathered into a high-low waistline, which has a pretty effect on. The skirt is nice and long, and kept her warm over tights.

The sleeves are long and slim, with plain hems at the wrist. The sleeve caps are gathered into a full puff, which Myra really likes.

The fabric is a cozy ribbed sweater knit. I'm not sure where I got it, but it's at least four years old, so yay for a nice deep stashbust. It really was perfect for this dress. It's a little on the unstable side, so I did stabilize the shoulder seams and waistline with clear elastic, but otherwise it sewed up without much trouble.

We've had a surprisingly cold winter here in Tennessee so far, so Myra has gotten quite a lot of wear out of this dress. I'm pleased that she likes it so much.

Avengers Assemble! Phase 1

A few months ago I came across some Marvel Avengers themed jersey at fabric.com. Although we are generally a DC family, we'll admit that the Avengers can be pretty awesome as well. Shirts were needed.

I started with Logan. His shirt is from the 03/2010 issue of Ottobre. It's a short sleeved raglan tee with a neckband and sleeve cuffs. I elected to do the sleeves only in the Avengers print. The remainder of the shirt is Laguna knit from fabric.com.

I could pretend I mixed the fabrics to make my Avengers print stretch farther, but the truth is, I wanted to add an HTV decal with my Cricut. I love that thing. Black makes a nice dramatic background for red!

When I was selecting patterns, I almost passed this one by. I wasn't sold on the sleeve cuffs. I'm really glad I went ahead and did them though. I like the ringer effect of the band.

The fit of the tee is long and slim, which has a nice modern look, despite the fact that the pattern was published 6 years ago. Ottobre is always ahead of the game! Duncan's tee is from the same 03/2010 issue, but his is number 18. It's the same style, but in a different size range.

The two fabrics are well matched in weight and both are nice quality, which means the boys are happy and comfortable in their new shirts.

In order to keep things extra comfortable for my sensitive guys, I made size tags out of scraps of HTV to iron onto the inside of the shirts. I had been using woven tags to keep track of sizes, but I like this so much better! No more itchy tags!

Duncan approves. And there's lots more Avengers fabric left to use! Stay tuned for more Super Sewing!

Mermaids and Whales! And the latest Ottobre

Whenever I get a new issue of Ottobre, Myra is the first to peruse it and make requests. Usually, I make a mental note of which styles she likes and either promptly forget, or get to it much later, when she actually has a wardrobe need.

This time, my happy, twirly girl got the dress she asked for. And bonus leggings! Because snow.

The dress is #18 from the 01/2016 issue of Ottobre. It's a fairly basic style. It features has a slightly raised waistline, long raglan sleeves and a gathered skirt. Not super full, so it's economical of fabric. The neckline is bound, which I did with my coverstitch machine.

Despite being fairly sparing of fabric, the skirt is slightly flared, so it twirls nicely. The leggings pattern is from the same issue of Ottobre (view #15), and is a simple one-piece leggings pattern. No bells or whistles, but a useful basic. Myra declares that the outfit is so comfy that she could wear it as PJs. But she won't because it's too cute.

The fabric is by Lillestoff, and I bought it at Kitschy Coo. It's very soft, but also sturdy and warm, so it's perfect for a winter outfit.

Lately I've been feeling the need to embellish everything I make for Myra. She likes bling. So the mermaid at the center front of her bodice got some sparkle on her shells and at her waistline. Those 2mm rhinestuds are made for doll clothing, so they're tiny but I think they're the perfect little adornment for Myra. She loves the sparkly mermaid.

My sassy little girl is growing up way too fast, but I'm glad she still loves a twirly dress with mermaids.

Pajamapalooza 2015

I took over 100 pictures. And that was the best one...

It seems like every year my kids all need PJs at once. You'd think I could manage to plan for this better, but every year it seems like I am making 12 or so sets of PJs. At least this year it was just the boys.

Sort of. Myra has a collection of nightgowns that I made her several months ago. They all still fit and she loves them, but a friend of hers gave her these fleece pants, and she needed a top to go with them.

It turns out to be sort of fortuitous actually. I've been wanting to make this pattern (Ottobre 06/2010-18) for her since the magazine came out. In 2010. I even bought this fabric with this very pattern in mind. In 2010. I was so on the ball about it in fact, that this is the largest size the pattern is drafted in. And when I got the magazine she was too small for the smallest size. Seriously, how does that even happen?!

Since I had waited until the last possible moment to make this, I decided to go all out with the topstitching. I did a line of stitching on either side of each seam, with the thread color contrasting the fabric. Myra loves it. And it wasn't as hard to do as it looks. I just threaded my coverstitch with the two colors in either needle. This pic also show the cool fabric. It is a knit double cloth. The pink layer is an athletic mesh which is bonded to the green jersey layer. The green shows through the holes in the mesh, and the pink bonding stitches show on the green side. It's a very neat effect.

Duncan's PJs are extremely basic. The pants are one piece pants adapted from Sewing for Boys. The shirt is long sleeve, cuffed sleeve from Ottobre. I honestly can't remember which one it is, but there is one in nearly every issue.

He likes them, and I made 3 sets, so I busted a ton of stashed flannel and knit scraps on these. Total win.

And last but not least we have Logan. Logan decided recently that he wanted to change PJ styles. His past pajamas have been long sleeve and long pants, both made of flannel. He told me a few weeks ago that these were too hot (note: It was snowing at the time.) and that he wanted short sleeve tee shirts and shorts for sleeping. So, here we go. This is set #1, made with Ottobre 03/2013-23/39 and 06/2011-37. 

I've made him two sets so far, and he's very happy with both. You can see the second set in the top picture. Those two sets were random stashbusted fabrics, but I find that the stash is very low on older boy friendly knits, so I ordered a few, and then I'll make more. You can never have too many comfy PJs.

Ottobre 06/2008-13 & 01/2010-18

Tired of PJs yet? I promise I'll make something else next. I'm getting tired of them, too.

Here is Myra in her latest set of PJs. Both pieces are from Ottobre, and both are intended to be daywear, but I think the combo of fleece and leopard puts this ensemble squarely in the nighttime only category.

The top is from the 06/2008 issue of Ottobre. Since the print of the fleece has that white area, I wanted a raglan top so as not to break it up over the shoulder.

Here is the line drawing of the original. It's called the "Sweet 'n' Cosy" tunic. I really like the shirred sleeves, but the fleece was just too bulky to shirr well. I'll definitely have to make this again for her with that detail though. It's so cute. I also left off the elastic in the sleeve hems. I tried, but the narrow elastic and the bulky fleece just didn't want to play. Fortunately, the bell sleeves are pretty darn cute without the elastic. I also lengthened the top 1 inch. Those pattern pieces just looked short. I'm glad I did. It's the perfect length. I used my binder to attach the neckline binding, which is black rib knit.

You can see it stretched out just a little bit. It isn't actually this bad - she's holding it up with her arms. The neckline is already a little more of a scoop neck than a crew, which I like. I am also so impressed with how perfectly the binding turned out otherwise. I am so in love with that binder!

I bound the neckline flat, and then seamed the left back raglan seam. Look at how perfectly the binding aligned! Even the stitching is perfectly matched up. I've never, ever managed to do that with binding applied by hand. Something is always slightly off.

The pants are made from design 18 (the Ruusunnuppu leggings) from the 01/2010 issue that you've seen so much lately. I traced these and cut them out before the movers brought our stuff. I really like the cascading pleats on the legs, but fleece was not the ideal medium to showcase them.

Here is how they turned out. As you can see, the loft of the fleece made it difficult to pleat and sew accurately, so some of them don't line up. as PJ bottoms though, they're fine and the scrunch effect at the ankle keeps her nice and warm and keeps them from riding up as she sleeps.

She likes them! She called them "kitty jammies" and spent the evening meowing.

I may be off the radar now for just a little while. I've a few aprons to sew for a church service project and then a baby gift to make, which of course, I can't reveal until it has been gifted. You'll die of the cuteness though. I promise!