April Make a Garment a Month Challenge photos

I was glad that I took the time to almost finish (I still had to add buttons and buttonholes, but fastened it together with snaps) my Barb Callahan Damask Jacket for the class I took with her at the Worcester Expo earlier this month since at one point during the class she was talking about the way she usually sets in sleeves (flat) and I was able to stand up and show the class what her sleeves look like when they are set in that way. I also showed them the back of that garment since I think that's the best thing about it and I think many of them did, too, esp. the neat way that striped fabric curves at the ends of the peplum.

I ended up hand sewing some buttons on the front of that top once I got home, going through all the layers since I can take it on and off by pulling it over my head, but then decided that since the white flowers didn't match across the front, those buttons just drew people's attention to the wrong part of that garment so took them off and sewed a white band down the front in hopes that that would hide my mistakes. Since I was using a white band, I also had to go through my button stash to find black buttons to replace the white ones I'd originally used, but finally found enough that matched to make it work.

I was very pleased by the reception my top got at the meeting of my sewing guild the other night, in fact, one woman thought it was a store bought top, and since a lot of that design was my idea, not something Barb included in her pattern, I'm esp. proud of my results which you can hopefully see in the two photos below.

Rayon One Seam Pants

I thought my Ponte Roma Louise Cutting One Seam Pants turned out OK until I made a pair of rayon pants from the same pattern, without taking 1" off the pattern width and I am much happier with the results, although I still have to learn how to make the bottom of the pant legs less tapered than they appear in these photos, but then this is a very old pattern, one that has since been updated. Since Louise Cutting is going to be teaching classes in our area this weekend, though, I'm hoping she can help me with the fit since I can definitely see making lots more of these pants in the  future.

This garment is also my entry in the March Make a Garment a Month challenge, rather than the Barb Callahan Damask Jacket that I originally planned to make, since I realized that my classes with Louise were before my class at the Worcester Expo with Barb, but since I have over a week to go until the Expo, and already cut and basted the Damask Jacket together, I should be done in plenty of time and have my April MAGAM entry done well ahead of time for a change!

Ponte Roma One Seam Pants success!

I'm afraid Louise Cutting wouldn't be impressed by the One Seam Pants that I made from her pattern using my JoAnn's Ponte Roma knit fabric, but since she is going to be doing some classes for our Albany ASG group this coming weekend, I decided to make a pair of these pants for my March Garment a Month Challenge because my original Barb Callahan Damask Jacket doesn't need to be finished until I take a class with her at the Worcester Expo next week, so that jacket is going to be my April challenge garment.

When I first made this pair of pants, they were so big that I almost could put two legs in one pants leg, but I am quite happy with the my pants fit after I went back and made some changes to the pattern yesterday (lowered the waistline, shortened the hem, and took 1" out of the center of the pants leg since there's no side seam) because they are now much more like the fairly straight legged pants that I like to wear rather than the looser pajama type pants that I think that pattern was originally supposed to produce. Louise later provided a pdf file with instructions on how to change that on her website, though, so I guess I'm not the only one who doesn't like wide legged pants.

I also want to try making these pants in rayon and will have to reduce the amount I took out of the width in order to do that since that fabric doesn't stretch and I'd also like to make pants that look more like her original design, but think first I am going to use some of my Arlene's tracing paper to make a copy of this pattern the way it is since I can see myself making lots of straight legged one seam knit pants, esp from JoAnn's Ponte Roma, since it worked so well this time. Based on my experience with the pieces of Ponte Roma I have bought at JoAnn's, though, there's no telling if the other pieces in my stash will work the same.

I was pleased to discover a box full of rayon fabric in my stash this morning along with quite a few other pieces of rayon that were kind of "hidden" on my shelves since I've long avoided working with this kind of fabric as I have working with knits since both are far more difficult than the much more stable fabrics that I usually use for my clothes, but since I do like WEARING clothes made from rayon and knits, I'm just going to have to learn how to sew them, and thanks to my wonderful Pfaff's dual feed foot, I feel like I have a much better chance of doing that than I did when trying to sew Ponte Roma on my Bernina, even with the walking foot attached.

March MAGAM project

My pattern for March is one from my stash designed by Barb Callahan called Damask Jacket and it has what she calls a swing back and what I call a back peplum. This is yet again a muslin since I've never made this pattern before so I used a piece of cheap fabric from my stash. Not sure what it is but it doesn't seem to stretch even though I thought it might be a knit however I thought the black and white design might be good for spring.

I cut and basted my jacket together yesterday morning after comparing it to my Sure Fit dress kit pattern and am not unhappy with the way it fits although the striped fabric does strange things in the back peplum. I like it enough to keep going through and perhaps wear to the Sew and Quilt Expo in Worcester MA next month so the designer, the teacher of my first class, can see what I did with her in pattern.