Easy clothes, t shirts with wrap around skirt

How mini can a mini-wardrobe be? 4 garments to make 3 outfits is possibly wardrobing failure.
I made 3 t- shirts and a wrap around skirt to wear in uber casual situations eg: at home, or, as it turned out, during our camping/driving trip.



These were easy to sew, easy to wear, and will be very useful. Bread and butter sewing, not even cake. Fortunately for my wardrobing mania, I have several other skirts that extend the wearing possiblities of these t shirts.

SleevelessT shirt 1, to the left is from OOP Vogue 2925, from brown cotton-lycra knit (Stretchtex). It is an exact replacement of 2 previous iterations of this pattern in this fabric that I have worn out. I find these dark sleeveless shirts that cover the tip of the shoulder most practical.
The central t shirt is based on Ottobre 02-2011-1.



I have made my usual square shoulder adjustment and raised the neckline to limit sun exposure. The fabric is a dull medium green cotton-lycra knit I bought at the sunday markets a year or so ago (I have never seen fabric there since, sigh) and the t shirt to the right is the same pattern, but widened at the front by 8cm, with the extra fabric pleated to the previous (and raised) neckline. The fabric colour is called military, and is sort of brown and sort of green.


  Inside view of pleats


I had thought that adding all the extra fabric to the front would release the folds lateral to the upper bust, but you can see that it did no such thing - back to the FBA at the sideseam.

The skirt, serendipitously containing all these lovely sludgy colours within the fabric embellishment,  is made from a sarong length of hand printed Indonesian batik (cotton). This was a present from my Mum (she knows me well) after a trip she took to Bali, where my aunt lives. I have been very lucky in my acquisition of particularly lovely batiks, and they never last long in the stash, as they are so beautifully cool to wear.
I am the wrong shape for a sarong, but find the versatility and rapid drying time of the garment irresistable.
My TNT not-quite-a-sarong is from Style 2642, OOP.



I have been making it every 2 years or so for over a decade now and am pretty sure there is nothing stylish about it.
I add an extra dart at the back, and extend the waistband to make ties, rather than using buttons per the pattern. I particularly like the width of the over/under lap - all the way to the side seams, keeping it unsually modest for a wrap around skirt even in windy situations. The A line shape is so practical that allows brisk walking and even gardening!
Here it is on location.

Threads"Elastic as a contour waist finish"

As I described in my previous post, this is my trial of the 'No-Nonsense Flexible Waist Finishes" from Connie Long's article in the September 2008 issue of threads magazine.
I continued with method 2, after applying the lining in my prefered method, described in my previous post, as I did not understand step 1 in Ms Long's article. Step 2, which is basting, then overlocking the waist of the lining and the garment together to leave a 3/8 seam allowance was not a problem. Step 3 and 4, where the elastic is pinned then sewn to the seam allowance using zig zag was only tricky in that the amount of elastic stretch to allow is trial and error. Ms Long suggests obtaining the correct amount of ease by practicing on fabric scraps, but this seems a little impractical to me, ease over a full waistband will be different to ease in short scraps, so I chose to guess, and then to wear the garment for a day at work to see if the ease was suitable. I did find that this application required great precision of stitching. The zig zag needed to just catch the outer edge of the elastic, or the turn over became very messy.(This means that I ripped out my first attempt and did it again more carefully)
Below is the inner view of the Vogue 2925 pants showing the differing waist finishes. The view on the top is of my worn out pair, finished with a strip of woven selvage as an alternative to the petersham ribbon called for in the pattern instructions. I have not experienced any waist expansion difficulties with this pair, but as I do not tend to wear my tops tucked in for work, I probably would not notice minor expansion. The lower pair has 1 inch non roll braided elastic applied according to the method 2 instructions in the article. I have trimmed this elastic down from 1 and 1/2 inches to meet the instructions.

 

I wore the pants to work, where I bent, crouched, stretched, knelt, twisted and climbed in my normal activities (work is hard on clothes). The waistband was fairly comfortable, but not noticeably more so than the previous pair.I did not like the uncovered elastic against my skin. This method of waist finishing requires a tucked in camisole in my opinion, and it is too hot where I live to wear several layers of clothing.
I do not think this waistband finish could be worn as I have made it with a tucked in blouse. I may have too much stretch in the elastic, but to me these pants look gathered at the waist, even though there are no obvious gathers in the elastic application. To me they appear more bulky at the waist than my previous pair. My daughters told me they look like clown pants. Fortunately this is not apparent with a blouse over the top. They allowed me to leave the house wearing the pants.

 

 

The other thing I dislike about this waist finish is shown in the photo below.

 

This is not immediately apparent in the previous photographs, but the elastic does not lie flat against the body, it is turned out by the pants fabric, and I can see it when I look down. Yuck! I will be removing this elastic, and applying a woven selvage waistband finish. Next I will make another pair of these pants using method 1 "elastic as a stabilizer".

Lining pants with an invisible zip

I am still keeping away from fitting, so have temporarily abandoned my plans to make a pair of work pants from the July BWOF, and returned to my only TNT pants pattern, Vogue 2925, from which I made 3 pairs of pants for the Timmel SWAP. I have destroyed one pair of these, and the remaining 2 are looking rather worn after 4-6 months of hard wear and wash, so I will not be looking too repetitive, despite using the same fabric!
To give myself some interest in making these, I decided to use the elastic waistband application described in the September 2008 Threads magazine. For the first pair, I thought I would try method 2, where the elastic acts as a contour waistband. Unfortunately I did not understand step 1, which first instructs you to attach the lining to the invisible zipper by placing right sides together.
I could not figure out how this would work, and the photograph did not make it any more clear, so I have already diverted from the instructions. My method for applying lining to pants which fasten with an invisible zipper has been worked out by trial and error, undoubtedly re-inventing the wheel, but for what it is worth, here it is.
First I construct the pants with the zipper, then construct the lining up to making the legs, without joining at the crotch seam. Then I put the right side of the lining against the inside of the zipper tape. To me, this is the wrong side of the pants. I then sew down the zipper tape, and turn the lining so that the wrong side of the lining is next to the wrong side of the pants. I do the same thing to the other lining leg and zipper tape.

 

Next I join the crotch seam of the lining. I sew this as close as possible to where the lining joins the zipper tape, and finish the stitching with a bar tack.

 

When the lining is turned in, this gives a neat finish to the inside of the zip, or it would do if I had pressed it before taking a photo - sorry, but I was running out of light.

 

I will post about the success or otherwise of the contour elastic waist after I wear it.

v2925 skirt part 3

The wonderful skirt from V2925 uses a lot of fabric.There is very little instant gratification involved in my acquisition of fabric. I order most of my fabric on-line, and then I have to wait for it to arrive. Most purchases are posted very quickly, but we are relying on rural postage here. When I have an urge to make a skirt on a Saturday afternoon, I need to visit my stash. This piece, an Indonesian cotton batik from Ewan Gardam fabrics (a visit to Brisbane = fabric shopping ), is around 2.3 m long, and not quite 112cm wide, but I squeezed a long version of the V2925 skirt (my third)from it. First I trimmed the side seam flare as suggested by Morzel in her review of the V2925 skirt. I took this to extremes, and removed nearly the entire flare at both the side seam and the front and back side seam of the side piece in order to fit the skirt on to the fabric. Naturally, this removed a lot of the fullness, so I added a godet (see above) to the side seams to replace some fullness. I needed to use the cross grain for this, but the print is small, and quite busy, so I do not feel that this detracts from the skirt, or is noticeable to anyone except seamstresses.
I wore this skirt with a top from V2925 to the farmer's markets on Sunday morning and found it very comfortable and light to wear. It was rather windy, so I have shown a photograph of the skirt on the hanger as well so that the shape and fullness is easier to see.

V2925 skirt part one

When Evaposted about her V2925 skirt made in wool crepe at target="_blank">Stitcher's Guild, I instantly wanted to make one, as hers looks fabulous. I have learned my lesson, however, and knew that I should first fit, and second make a trial version before cutting into any fabric that I would be sad about if I ruined.
I decided to use my second piece of stretch woven cotton lycra for the trial version. This was not cheap fabric, but I had a dismal failure making V8305 pants from a caramel coloured piece of fabric that I bought at the same time, from the same shop, and had just over 2 m of chocolate brown looking at me every time I rifle through my stash, reminding me of my horrible sewing experience, not a feeling I like!
I bought this for pants, so there was not nearly enough fabric for this skirt. First I trimmed around 15cm from the side piece flare, as suggested by Eva in herreview of this pattern (it is very nice of Eva to think all this through and post about it so that I don't have to come up with ideas myself). There was still not nearly enough fabric, so I took yet another tip from Eva, and looking at the picture she put up of V8461, saw that this envelope shows a knee length version of a very similar skirt. I do not usually wear this length skirt, as I truly love long and disguising skirts, but decided that I had nothing to lose (well, maybe a few kilos), and went ahead with a shorter version.
I started by tracing out a pattern with size 12 waist and size 16 hips, which is where I started with the pants. I found when tissue fitting, that this was too big at the waist and the hips, and scaled down to 10 and 14. When I constructed the skirt, I found that it was pouchy at the hips, so I took in the side front seam, and trimmed the pattern for next time (see photo above). I put in a single dart at both centre back pieces, then trimmed the tissue at the back side seams to match this for next time. My other changes were very minor. I put the centre back seam just inside the selvage, which I did not trim, for added stability. I interfaced the zipper area, again for stability (all fabrics and interfacing are pre washed, so I do not expect shrinkage), and I used an invisible zip. I did not line this skirt, as I want to wear it soon, in warm weather, and the fabric is thick.
Below is a photo of the skirt worn with the V2925 jacket, that I am still hoping to replace, and one of the V2925 tops. I love the skirt pattern. I am making more versions - see the next post.

SWAP progression

I have been sewing, not posting since the middle of February.The top picture is of the Jalie sweetheart top. This is the pattern I bought from Julie at Timmel fabrics as a possible qualifying purchase for the SWAP. This is my first attempt for me, and I used fabric from a hemp/cotton knit coat that I bought 5 years ago and have worn only 2 or 3 times. There is less stretch than asked for in the pattern, and allowing for this, I think the fit straight from the pattern is amazingly good. I did not think this style would be suitable for work, but my husband disagrees. I am taking his advice and have cut out a 3/4 sleeve version from a rayon jersey knit purchased from Julie to wear as a winter work top. The neckline works very well under the V2925 jacket, and I am very pleased with this top. I am wearing it with the olive linen/viscose pants from V2925. I made a shorts lining for these per the review by Morzel on pattern review, and they sit more nicely than the caramel pair, (thank you Eva), but are a little too warm to wear at the moment, they too will be for my winter work wardrobe.
The second picture is of one of the tops from V2925 worn with a self drafted generous A line skirt made in an embroidered cotton denim from Kerryn's Fabric world. I like this fabric, and am pleased with the skirt. This is definitely not a work outfit, but more the sort of clothes I wear for my real life. I am increasingly tempted to move the SWAP in this direction.

I worked for a long time on the cream blouse pictured at the bottom of the post. This is from New Look 6945. I originally wanted to make a blouse with a collar to wear under the V2925 jacket. I drafted a flat peter pan type collar to fit this neckline, but I was not able to make it work - it looked too fussy with the other embellishment, so after attempt number 2, I removed it all together. I had intended to pipe the neckline with satin bias binding, but as I had clipped the seam allowance, decided that unpicking again was a risky endeavour, and have left the neckline unembellished. The blouse has pintucks on the front, sleeves and back. I ended up with 51 pin tucks on the back, as the pattern was too wide for me across the shoulders. The pin tucks did not take up as much fabric as I expected, and I had to cut off the button placket so that the front would fit. I used elastic loop tape insterted in the front seam, and a very narrow left button space to fix this problem. I am quite happy with the fit. The blouse does have a very generous 6 inch ease, and my failure to read this before cutting out the pattern lead me to large fitting adjustments at the waist darts and side seam (and the 51 pin tucks). I am wearing the V2925 pants in an olive linen viscose with this blouse as well. I do not actually like this blouse for work. Although the neckline is not terribly low, it does display far too much of me when I lean forward, which I need to do constantly at work. I am considering a stay at the bust, but am not really keen on the fiddling around. I may keep it to wear on desk work only days.

construction issues v2925 jacket

Eventually I gave up on my toiles. I got to the point on my second toile where every time I tweaked in one direction, somewhere else looked a lot worse. Construction was fairly straightforward. Essentially I followed the pattern instructions. I was unable to convince my weft interfacing to fuse, so "quilted" this to the facing. I found the sleeve quite difficult to ease into the armhole, and I ended up cutting out both the armhole and sleeve exactly to the pattern, so was a bit surprised by this. I ran 3 rows of easing stitch to help with the sleeve cap, and was reasonably happy with the end result. However, the sleeve cap sagged, so I applied bias binding to the sleeve allowance in the top 1/3 of the armhole, following the instructions in Kathryn's jacket blog (fxdoc posting at artisiansquare.com). This made it sit much better. The photo is taken using my 10 year old daughter as a dress form, so does not give a great impression of the fit. My other construction variations were to use an aide for achieving equal curves on the jacket peplum and the lapels. The photo shows me using a sticker - this was much easier than drawing a curve from an eggcup, which is what I used for the lapels.

My overall impression when I finished the jacket was that I had chosen an inappropriate fabric. The photo of the jacket on the hanger is of the finished jacket, pressed to within an inch of its life. You can see that the fabric does not hold a crease, and that the jacket looks boofy and horrible. The fabric is a poly/viscose/linen, was $22 per m from a good fabric shop, and I was assured that it was suitable for this pattern. I was not very happy at this point.

My rescue techniques were first to topstitch the collar, lapels and edges of the peplum and sleeves. This helped a lot. I used a heavy weight topstitching thread in a dark camel colour, using an 80 needle. I then tacked the lapels to the jacket, so that they would sit properly, and this also improved the situation. I hand stitched the bottom of the lapels so that they turned outward properly. Overall the jacket progressed from wadder, to only moderately disappointing.
I have bought some lightweight melton wool for my next attempt.

v2925 jacket completed

I finished the jacket from my SWAP wardrobe pattern V2925 yesterday. I am moderately disappointed with the outcome, but hopefully will have forgotten all the bits I don't like by the time it is actually cool enough weather to wear it. In the picture I am wearing the jacket with the camel pants and the chocolate brown knit top from the same pattern. I am pleased to have finished the 3 pieces from one wardrobe pattern that are required for the SWAP, but I am not sure that the cream blouses I made earlier will suit the style of the jacket. The collars on the blouses may not look very good under the jacket, so I am planning on making some more collarless blouses .

FBA research, wrap top findings

Today was only a tiny sewing day. I marked all the seams on the V2925 jacket toile, unpicked a bit, then spent the evening reading old Australian Stitches articles, searching sewing sites and reading blogs to look for nice diagrams of a french dart full bust adjustment. I found several verbal descriptions but no nice pictures. I did, however, find out how to fix the FBA on the Butterick wrap top, at Sewing Divas, and also how to stabilize and press the french dart, also at the Sewing Divas (I was reading just a trifle off the topic, what a great blog)

http://thesewingdivas.wordpress.com/2007/03/09/adjusting-for-a-full-bust-on-a-wrap-top/.

I am reasonably pleased with my research. I think I may need to make the toile with a little more ease, particularly in the sleeves, so will adjust these as well as the french dart as my next step in the jacket. If this gets too much, I will make a trial of the mandarin collar top for my daughter's SWAP - it works quite well having 2 project streams.

Construction details

I'm behind myself with my pictures. These are pictures of Vogue 2925, tops and pants. I described the alterations to the pants a few days ago and have edited that post to add pictures of the alterations. My alterations to the top were very minimal - I scaled down to a size 10, curving out towards a 12 below the waist. I stabilized the shoulder seam with selvage, the dark brown with a lime green strip and the caramel with a green batik strip. I also used swimsuit elastic in the neck finish. I overlocked the edge, then folded it over the elastic once, stretching the elastic very slightly as I sewed. I finished the arm in the same way without the elastic, and finished the bottom hem with wide zig-zag stitch. I am very pleased with both the tops and pants. My little extra for the pants was using a brown/yellow and metallic gold quilting fabric selvage for the waist facing instead of grosgrain ribbon.

I will definitely use the pants and at least one V2925 for my SWAP. I probably wouldn't wear the top to work, unless it was under the jacket for giving a talk or going to a meeting as bare upper arms don't seem very business- like to me. I need the top to complete 3 pieces from the wardrobe pattern, should I use V2925 for the pattern, as I am not making any skirts for my SWAP - this is a self inflicted rule to make sure I use the SWAP to make work pants.

I have some red/brown fabric that I will use to make another of these tops, and that may end up being the inclusion, as I really like the colour.

Today I was in the local fabric shop again, buying the green invisible zip for pants V2925 #2, and also bought some probably not very good quality, but quite thick interlock in a neutral sandy colour. I will not use it for my SWAP, as it isn't a great match for the caramel pants, but it will look good with the green ones, or be a good top to wear with a denim skirt. I bought 1.7m, all there was, so that I can try making a top for my mother when she comes to stay with us for the Australia Day long weekend that is only 3 days away. This is a cunning plan to keep sewing whilst she is here. I will bring the machine into the living room, sew her top, which I really think will suit her, then keep working on my SWAP without her feeling in the least bit neglected. I may also work on my daughter's SWAP, as Mum will enjoy being consulted in the planning stages. I am so keen to sew at the moment that I think I would have withdrawal symptoms if I didn't sit down at my sewing machine for 3 days running.

Today I woke full of fortitude, and revisited my overstretchy cotton lyra woven stretch pants, V8305. I used all the tips from the sewers at artisianssquare, and there was a definite improvement. I will keep working on them. I also sewed and pressed the darts for pants V2925#2. I also went to work, washed the floor, ironed a bit (only because ironing a minimum of 3 items when I get the iron out for my sewing is another self inflicted rule), made a tiger striped vegemite sandwich like the one my son saw on playschool this morning, cleaned the kitchen, made the beds, did 2 loads of washing and 3 rows of knitting so that my sister might get her socks on time for her birthday..... I am not sure how much my SWAP will slow down once the children are back at school and I have all the after school activities transport to do-but the knitting rate will improve.

Another SWAP?

I had a very productive sewing day today, although the fan does tend to blow all my pattern pieces down the hall whenever I stop using my scissors as a paper weight - at least every 10 minutes. I played with knits. I had not used up 100% after all, there was a bit more under the bed, I so like my stash. I made several tops from my wardrobe pattern V2925 (pictured above), then moved on to Simplicity 3800 (pictured even further above), and while I was gleefully whipping up twist tops and making knickers with the scraps (inspired by lauralo's lingerie ( her blog is on her posts at artisianssquare) , but definitely not to the same standard) my older daughter came to sit with me in my sewing room, also known spuriously as her brother's bedroom (His bed,- yes, his room, - not quite yet.)
DD " You are making a lot of new things for yourself. I like all these new tops."
Me "I'm enjoying doing SWAP, it's great"
DD" I really like all the new clothes you made me before Christmas"
Me "I like them too."
DD " That twist top looks really nice, Mum, do you think I could have one?"
Me (thinking of Marji posting at artianssquare making a whole SWAP for her sister and feeling a bit guilty) "Sure" (thinking, that last top only took 30 minutes, this will be a snap). from further under the bed I pulled out some hot pink cotton knit with navy blue polka dots, courtesy of my mother's quilting group (i.e. the result of someone else clearing out their stash).

I made the short sleeved twist top from Simplicity 3800, scaled down to a size 4 and with a small bust adjustment for the 12 year old figure. It looked great, and I said so, as did her Dad, and her sister, who now wants one too. (Her brother was too busy playing with his truck to comment).

DD, reading the SWAP requirements ( in prime position behind my sewing machine) whilst I snipped off a few threads "You know Mum, if you put in my Christmas dress and the denim shorts you made me and this new top, it would be easy for you to do a SWAP for me too". Well you can't blame the girl, it is at least 3 weeks since I made her anything other than dinner.

This may be a good idea. We pulled out a lot of fabric, none in my colours, and mostly remnants that are much more likely to permit a garment for a slim 12 year old than they are to stretch around me. I truly want to reduce my stash, although mainly in order to make space for delicious new fabrics. At the moment we are thinking Simplicity Lizzie McGuire 5220 for the wardrobe pattern. I have just looked this up on the Simplicity website, but it is no longer in print, or available out of print, so I can't include a picture. This pattern has a Asian influence with a chongsang style top, a sleeveless top, capri pants, a skirt, a kimono style top/jacket and a handbag. The colours so far are denim and navy blue for the bottoms, and pink and white for the tops, possibly with a white knitted cardigan, for which I have the wool. I have already ordered some shirting fabric from Julie at Timmels Fabric that should fit in to the very preliminary plan, so I think this meets my qualifying purchase.

I have asked if doing two SWAPs is permissible, I have read that someone completed 2 in a previous year, so if the rules have not changed, I think it may be. I also am not sure if I can include a purchased item (I am thinking jeans, as DD fits nicely into RTW jeans) and a knitted item - a cardigan as a jacket. I will make up my mind when I get a reply. If I can enter the competition for DD, this means I have already completed 4 of 11 items for her, and there are still more than 2 months to go, so it is possible timewise.

I have completed 4 definite and 3 possible items for myself, without using a purchased or a knitted item, so my main problem for my own SWAP is finding pants fabric, and whether or not to attempt a jacket. I do have vague ideas of including a dress in my SWAP, even though I will not wear it to work, as I would love to copy a "smocked" linen Jag dress I bought in Melbourne. My version will have beautiful hand smocking and embroidery (at the moment, it is a vision in my head, and looks perfect, hence "beautiful"). I have the ideal fabric, but I will need at least a month to work on such a big project. I will see how I go. I have just looked at the Jag website to see if I could include a picture of my inspiration dress, but it is not there. I bought it in the January sales so it is probably very last season. Fortunately I am not at all fashionable.

I will look for the scanner programme disc tomorrow to see if I can get it working. I photographed my fabrics, but the camera has real trouble with the solid colours. My chocolate brown fabric looks a grey-white colour, and the camel fabric is almost green. I would like to make up digital storyboards for the plans.

Pants, Vogue 2925

Here are my alterations to the pants from V2925.

I have just managed to post my first attempt at a storyboard, which has been cancelled by the failure of the stretch woven pants from V8305 to remain even semi fitted after 3 hours wear. Today I did not work on rescuing the V8035 pants with refitting and stay tape, because they were in the wash. This was just as well, because I was not at all inspired to attempt this sure- to- be- difficult project. Instead, I revisited the woven pants from V2925. That's right, a different sure- to-be - difficult project, these being the pants I sewed the wrong way multiple times last night, thus eventually ensuring that they would not fit by sewing drastically inside the seam allowance in several places. Everything looks better in the morning. This morning I could not believe I'd experienced any difficulty in sewing these pants. There could not be an easier pair of trousers to construct (elastic waistbands are not found on trousers, just pants). It did take me until 10am to work up the fortitude to unpick the sewn and overlocked seams. The fabric is a very loose weave linen/viscose/silk that looks a bit like soft, finer hessian bag and frays incredibly, so the unpicking was not entirely stress free, and I ended up losing some precious seam allowance. However, the pants fit. In fact the pants fit pretty well, even though they are more snug than originally planned. I have started a review of the pants on patternreview.com, but have not pressed the pants or taken any pictures, so it is still in draft mode.I worked very hard on the fit of these pants. I made 2 toiles. My final alterations were :
1. Redraw side seam for size 12 waist, size 16 hip
2. Add another dart at the back and widen dart at the front to fit from hip to waist.
3. Lower waistline by 2.5cm, front and back.
4. Slash at back centre seam to add about 5 cm to this seam without altering side seam.
5. Redraw crotch curve at back to deepen, as shown in Morzel's review of this pattern.
6. Add 1.5cm to inner front leg seam at crotch.
7. Add 2 cm to inner back leg seam at crotch.
8. Taper outside leg seam ( The straight leg would have been fine for wearing fitted or tucked in tops, but I want to wear these pants with a semi fitted blouse outside the waistband, and the quite wide leg made me look big(ger) all over)
9. Shorten legs a little. (I have short legs, and these pants are to wear to work with flats.
10. I also used an invisible zip at the back, rather than a regular zip.
I have taken some pictures to show these changes, but they are still on the camera.
After this hard work on the pants, I had great fun making knit shirts. I had a few metres of chocolate cotton lycra knit that I bought on ebay from Fabric Warehouse Sydney. I played with this with great success. I made the camisole/almost t shirt from V2925. It went together in about 30 minutes including cutting out and drawing the pattern on to interfacing. It looks great and took hardly any fabric, definitely not the 80cm it calls for on the back of the pattern. I made the size 12, which should have been a good fit from the high bust measurement and ease, but was actually a bit big. I have redrawn it to size 10 to try tomorrow. I will use this t for my SWAP, even though I am unlikely to wear it by itself for work. It will look good under the jacket if I can achieve one. I bought small amounts of gorgeous camel brown and a deep red knit from Kerryn's fabric World last week for this item. They were very pricey, but have washed really well and are lovely colours.
After this I escaped from the SWAP for a while. Yesterday I went to my local fabric shop to buy an invisible zip, and check out woven fabric for pants now that I have scrapped the camel and the chocolate stretch woven pants. There was nothing unless I want Navy Blue drill (school uniform fabric). There were a few possibilities for shirts, but shirt fabric is a fruitful area of my stash and does not need attention. To cut a long story short there is a 50% off sale on Simplicity. I could not resist and bought Simplicity 3800 in order to try a twist top. This was fun and easy. Again, the 12 was too big, but I can wear it with a camisole underneath if it ever cools down enough. I will make this again tomorrow in a 10 if there is sufficient chocolate knit left. This is my only knit fabric other than some terrible, cheap looking white and blue interlock that my mother gave me because her quilt group couldn't use it. I must learn to throw out these fabrics as soon as she finishes her visit. Once it is in my cupboard I seem to be incapable putting fabric in the bin. At least I am using lots of rubbish fabric for all these toiles.

Vogue 8305