Here's one I made earlier

Monday, February 01, 2021

 

Hello everyone, we have reached February! Good news. It's an outfit post with a twist today because I just so happen to have made this skirt myself. 
Yes, I also gave myself a haircut, unrelated. Amazing how much faith you can put in a YouTube tutorial. I took more off than expected but I've had much worse and haven't cried. 


We all love watching the Sewing Bee and I have for a few years toyed with the idea of making clothes but the transition from being able to make something with the sewing machine to having a go with a full pattern (of which I'd never seen) or having a clue how to start did fill me with fear. Dressmaking seems to be a long lost skill which is so sad as I'm sure people, mostly women, would have needed to make clothes all the time in the past. Even just to make alterations or to mend. Now, women my age have no such skills unless they have sought them out on their own.

A while back I looked up courses but being in the middle of nowhere, I would rather avoid heading into the city at all costs. Besides, I don't recall there being anything that sounded suitable on offer. So it never got furthered and instead I just daydreamed about making clothes. Last year, C bought me a very thoughtful  birthday present; a book on demystifying dressmaking called Love at first stitch by Tilly Walnes which immediately and simultaneously made feel excited and alarmed. Along with the projects in the book, of which I think there are seven - proceeding in increasing level of skill, there are the patterns needed and breakdowns of how to tackle each new skill. 
I've always felt like it's a struggle to learn new skills, for example sewing, so reading, re-reading, reading alongside an attempt to put the instructions into action, reading again is my slow way of trying to get my head round what on earth is being talked about. The book has been a bible and I've tried to absorb all the knowledge contained in each piece, though some tricky operations have taken a fair bit of trial and error before reaching any success. But that's how learning and understanding happens.
This skirt was the third project, after a headscarf and a pair of pyjama bottoms. The book details the material and accessory, tool etc requirements for each project and fabric suggestions. I thought a cord skirt would be something I'd wear a lot so I chose this material. I did a bulk order on My Fabrics for the whole lot of material for each project as a leap of faith that I'll follow through on this journey. The cord actually turned out to be lighter weight than I expected and each cut edge lead to fluff falling off everywhere so as a first step, I hadn't made a good choice to ease myself in. Typical. Anyway, I set about carefully starting on the project. At the outset you have to take your own measurements which is just a nightmare really. I'm far from a traditional feminine shape and semi-permanently have a bloat so how do you figure that out? I had to choose something so in the end I went a little larger rather than smaller but didn't feel confident that it would fit, be fitted or would flatter. 

I bought a large roll of paper for tracing patterns on to. I found tracing patterns more of a challenge than expected and made errors missing of key points so had to keep referring back. 
Sewing wise, I went slowly and tried to keep everything neat. Somehow, despite best efforts, nothing quite lines up or matches, though judging by high street offerings it's just the norm. 


Inserting the invisible zip was a real headache and took a lot of tries and bungles before I got there. Even finding the correct feet and how they work was difficult. A lot of unpicking and frustration. Then I twigged about how to iron the zip backing. 


However, I have made the skirt and I have worn the skirt! It's actually a bit big and a little longer than I would normally go for but when I'm feeling extremely ambitious, haha, I'll trying taking it in and up. 

Have you ever tried making your own clothes?

Take care,
Sophie

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Sometimes I am sent items to feature as part of a post and these will be clearly mentioned as part of each post.Everything else is bought by myself. Any sponsored or collaboration posts will be clearly marked. Each post is my own content and all opinions are honest.