Continuing the jacket prep work.
 I was wrong - my mother noticed the weave. It was a pleasure to have my parents here for the Mother's Day weekend, especially after all the health problems Mum had in the winter. Dad had something he had to do on Friday after they got here, so Mum came upstairs with me and sat in my sewing room, reading, while I cut the fabric out. She would find amusing passages from her book and read them aloud to me while I hunched over the cutting table. It was most companionable.
As I was cutting, I asked Mum about which side of the twill she thought was the "right" side and she thought the more visible weave with the diagonal markings was the right side and after we talked about it, I agreed.
After I had cut out all the green pieces, I sorted out which pieces I needed to cut the underside in blue and pinned them to the blue twill and cut them out, leaving a half inch seam allowance on the collar, cuffs and bottom bands. Then I cut out the corresponding pieces in interfacing and arranged them all so I could make sure I hadn't missed anything.
Finally, I sewed together the blue and green pieces, using an old leftover green thread for the bobbin and the blue thread for the top.
Another jean jacket and some other things.
 This is a jacket that I have had on my mind for quite some time now. I have also had the twill fabrics sitting in my stash boxes for a while. In fact, it has been so long that I thought the green twill was much more like a Kelly green than the brighter, more acid green that emerged when I went digging. I am glad it's not as Kelly green as I had imagined. I like the brighter green with a touch more yellow than blue in it. But it does go nicely with the mid blue twill I got at a separate time.
In this photo, I have also dug out of my boxes some rayon that I bought in three complimentary prints. I have already made a matching pants and big shirt in the large print and a dress with the medium print (using a little of the small print for contrast). I realized that it goes well with the plain blue twill so I unearthed it in anticipation for later.
In further anticipation of what is to come, I went to get matching thread (no photo - really!) and to see if there was some twill in a blue print. I found some! As far as the thread is concerned, I discovered only today that Fabricland is phasing OUT Mettler thread which was the only one that really matched the green. AND they only had one small spool of it. Argh. So I am going to have to be clever in my use of green thread. I say this because normally, a fully-flat-felled jean jacket uses up two 100m spools of thread. Anyway.
Again with the Vogue 7610 pattern - I love this pattern and it SO works for me. But this time (drum roll please) I am going to make the undersides of the bands, pocket flaps, collar and tabs in a contrasting fabric. The green jacket will have little touches of the blue twill. And the blue jacket will have touches of the blue print twill. Oh hold me back, I'm so excited. :) Now, you'll hardly see them because they are just the undersides of things, but I'm telling you, it's pretty exciting.
These are the pattern pieces that I will use in the contrast. However, the bands and the collar are both normally folded over to make the two sides so I am going to be adding a seam allowance so I can get the contrasting sides this time. I'm going to go ahead and cut two collar pieces too, because it is just easier than fiddling around trying to get only one layer for that piece. And what could I do with the other bit anyway, except save it to use for crafts? So I'll stash it away and one year, I'll make yet another jean jacket that will use the green as contrast. Or something.
Summer Dress Continued...
 Sometimes I out-smart myself and then, when I fix the problem, I figure it's good that I am smart enough to fix the problem but I wish I hadn't created it in the first place. Also, I should just accept the fact that I should cut the garment out in the 14 and give up on thinking I am a 12 in most places. sigh. But I really DO want to lose 10 pounds! wail.
What happened when I took up the bodice pattern pieces was that I raised the neckline a little but not enough and in the process, I made the armholes quite tight. I can fix the armholes but my bigger problem was that I cut out the pattern in the size 12 and the bodice barely fit around the bust on the dummy.
So I was glad I hadn't sewn in the darts in the back but I wasn't sure what to do about the fact that the front edges hardly met.
I may in fact end up taking a small tuck in the back of the bodice where the darts are because my waist is okay for the size 12. But it's not small enough for two full darts.
In the meanwhile, I pondered what to do about the front. I had to sew on an interfaced front band on each side of the front and I decided to take only a 3/8 seam instead of the usual 5/8 seam allowance. That might give me an extra whole inch to play with and I need every bit I can get. I also sewed the skirt to the bodice only at the front so I could play with the gathering and darts in the back later.
It worked like a charm and when I put the dress on the dummy, I could get the front bands to properly overlap! Now I can adjust the back gathers and that part will be done.
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Notebook Parts, , Computer Laptop Components.
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