I am wriiiiting!! In DA blog waahoo! After Summer months lazyness, when I thought I would still have some time to juggle work and pleasure, my plans got all mixed up. I didn´t think I would be so caught up on school agenda, but in the most positive way; going back to work really lifted my spirit and I´m back at a phrenetic rithm thinking and planning for my "adopted" kids for the year.

Still, I miss sewing at the level I was doing it oh so much, but for now I can only commit to smaller projects like testings I can´t say no to and others that I have time to plan and sew little by little.

Califaye Collection has my heart from day one and I can´t resist Sarah´s sense of style; I always know her patterns will fit me like a glove and turn to staples on my wardrobe.

The Rumi pullover is just an easy going pattern, one of those perfect for the 15 minute soul cleansing I allow myself everyday, ha! I used a very light and open wool knit, which is not the best recommendation for the pattern, but I made it work with a couple of changes; I added the neckband and skipped the side vents. Also I made it a little smaller by removing 1 inch on fold on both front and back pieces, and shortened it by 2 inches. You know the drill with me, my 5´2" and petite stature always require a bit of sizing down.

It has just gone to my TNT pile and I´ll definitely try it with a heavier wool knit and longer sleeves. You can drive back to Califaye´s blog to check the awesome tester versions and how the pattern looks with other knits (so different but so good!).

If I ever were to have a love affair with a piece of clothing, it had to be with a romper. Not being much of a dress girl on day to day wear, this fills that one-piece gap perfectly, put it on and you´re ready.

The Sanibel can either be a dress or a playsuit and, obviously, it has the Hey June seal, which means you´re bound to learn some new technique and end up with professional looking finishes. Seriously, I´ve done quite a few of her patterns by now and Adrianna always finds a way to simplify or twist the process a bit to make it easier on us. I call that a real commitment on making very very good patterns.

I used a very light rayon challis from my local shop and it just drapes beautifully, but with some interfacing as recommended it also makes a sharp placket and collar. There are quite a few details and steps, but I wouldn´t say it´s an advanced pattern, specially with the instructions that follow it.
I made the cap sleeve version, which includes some shoulder tabs, in size XS; it has plenty of ease around the waist and hips but you can just pull it together once you tie the drawstring (in an outside sewed casing) with no need for alterations.

The back features a yoke, which is lined, so I´m guessing hacking potential here if you lenghten up the bodice to make a full placket shirt; or add a waistband to enclose some elastic for a loose fitting pair of shorts (or skirt).

Now, this time I can really say that this piece was entirely sewing machine made: with my clever button foot I´m done with "i´ll-sew-the-buttons-later-meanwhile-a-month-goes-by". Even the pompons were basted to the drawstring ends first and then I just tied a knot to secure them better.

The Sanibel is finally available on Hey June´s shop and it´s another must have and a perfect Summer piece!

Well, January is long past, Spring is finally making its first appearances and this year I tried to run from bunny prints for Easter, but that doesn´t mean this January peplum won´t have lots of wear like it did so far.

The January peplum from Califaye Collection is a pattern for wovens, with cute shoulder insets and a hi-lo peplum. I did a size 5 for my almost 5 girl, in french terry from the Sweet Mercerie. This bunny print is sold out but they have amazing other ones and it´s worth to check.

Regarding the pattern, I did mostly no big alterations: I cut the back piece on fold (remember to remove SA) because I wasn´t adding the zipper, lowered the neckline 0,5cm all around and also used smaller pieces for the peplums (each shortened by 5cm) to have less bulk on the gathers.

For the neckline I used a neckband in the same off white french terry as the insets and I also added some sleeve cuffs. The bottom hem is serged and then folded and topstitched with a double needle right on top of the serger threads. The sleeve is designed simmetrically to be beginner friendly and no gathering is required.

This is a very beginner friendly pattern and also quite fast; although I haven´t made a woven version yet, this knit one came together in no time. I finished it and hang it in my girls bedroom and when she came home from school one day I just told her "There´s a surprise for you there". When she saw it her eyes literally grew and shaped as hearts, ha! Nothing like a girly pattern and an adorable print to get you some mummy points!

Once in a while you have special occasions that require a little more dressing up than just Linden´s and jeans. Wedding season has begun around here and oh the drama too. I had nothing to wear but most importantly, nothing to sew. I couldn´t find the patterns I had appropriate for formal wear and I wasn´t feeling what was on the market too. And then, stars alignement (I get that a lot, ha!), angels choir singing and along comes Adrianna announcing this vavavoom one week before the wedding, should I thank my lucky stars or what?

The Charleston is not just a dress, it´s a curvylicious thing you´ll wrap around your body and feel like a million bucks. Princess seams from top to bottom, front and behind, and a sexy negative ease at all the right places.

The pattern is designed for knits but this is a stretch woven (around 20%); it´s kind of a twill on the right side but I used the wrong one as main as it appeared to have a little sheer. I was planning to use a ponte with a lace overlay, but the lace didn´t have enough stretch to work.

Though this was my tester version, I made a couple of changes: the back is supposed to have an exposed zipper all the way down the back, which I replaced with a shorter invisible one. And once I wasn´t needing that skirt center back seam, I cut it on fold instead of two pieces. I also finished the neckline with a facing instead of binding: I just cut out directly on the pattern´s front and back at the width I wanted the facing to be, interfaced, stitched and understitched. The ends are enclosed, sandwiching the zipper with the main fabric.

For the hems, since I didn´t want any stitches at sight and I´m still not keen on my machine´s invisible foot and stitch, I used fusible hemtape. I also added a bit of that to the facing to keep it in place.

Because this was a tester´s version and a more fitted dress than what I usually do, I didn´t grade any seams in case I needed to let them out in some places. I ended up grading in the side seams of the skirt from the hips downwards about an inch, for a more fitted and pencil skirt look.

It´s really comfortable and was worth almost freezing to death. Naa, I had a little RTW jacket too, not very warm but looked good. I also stud up those heels all day in the name of poshness, so that´s why you now have to look at my ugly wall trim, ha! A few accessories composed the look

To celebrate the launch the entire store is 20% off with code "BLIZZARDSALE" until Monday 3/28 at 11:59pm MST.

This blog post contains affiliate links but all opinions are, as always, my own.

Remember my "ohh, no more pattern testing from other designers, I have to close the list, bla bla bla" mambo jambo. Yeah, I´m full of crap. When a beautiful pattern appears I just can´t help myself applying and I really must thank Heidi (and all the other designers too) for picking me.

I knew Elegance and Elephants for a long time now, the free pleated playsuit is a wonderful pattern and the Spin skirt is the.most.perfect skirt for toddlers. Really, it´s just two rectangles but they have the perfect measurements and provide a beautiful skirt for everyday wear. I don´t have good pictures of it, but you can see it on my Instagram here and here, in a Nani Iro double gauze from Maçãs d´Amor.

The Mori dress is true to the beautiful designs from EandE: flowiness, flounces and finishes.

The dress has no opening at the back but a neckline wide enough to pull thru head without issues. The bodice is fully lined as are the flounces; I only had 50cm of this double gauze from my local shop, Feira dos Tecidos, but it was enough for the exterior dress. My fabric was double sided I just double hemmed the flounces and used a plain coral from my stash for the lining.

This is a size 5, version top. Since my girl is not 5 yet, she´s below the chart height so the top version works as a short dress for her, in a lenght I actually love to see on girls while they´re little.

 

There´s an option for ties at the back as well which I choose not to include so she can dress herself and not be worried about the back knot. It runs true to size and I love how fast it is to make. It´s a great dress for a beginner who is wanting to learn some more techniques, like the full bodice lining; the instructions have pictures to guide you thru but Heidi also made a little video tutorial for the "burrito" lining method if you feel stuck at some point.

The Mori dress will be on sale at discount price ($8CAD/$5.90USD) using the code moriday. It will expire on Wednesday at 7am PST. Grab it because it´s totally worth it!

I think my absolute favorite sews are becoming hacks. Really, it´s getting in my system now and using great base patterns is making the hacking experience ultra gratifying. Not that the base patterns aren´t great as they are: it´s exactly because of that, because they fit wonderfully and are so well designed that they work so well also with some mods. A few weeks ago the new Eleena dress by Coffee and Thread was released (my tester version is here) and I couldn´t wait to give the pattern another go in a more relaxed and day to day look: meaning knit, right? I do love a good structured dress, but there´s no running away from the comfiness a knit dress gives.

The stripes + denim combo was something I´d seen on Boden a while ago and was dying to try. The stripes jersey was in my stash for a while now and the light denim was from some maternity trousers I had kept for upcycling. Now that I look at it more, it reminds me of "where´s Wally?", ha!
Let´s talk hacks: first I lowered the neckline by 1 cm all around, making the front curve more pronounced, so I could omit the back zipper. Another cm from the neckline was taken in account for the binding SA. The sleeves were also adjusted by slash and spread (or overlap in this case), removing about 2cm total ease from the sleeves head and adjusting the sleeve cap curve making it a little more straight. This made the sleeve fit perfectly regarding ease on the old armscye, but I should have adapted that as well, by rising it a bit, as it now sits beyond the shoulder point. No real harm done, she´ll grow and it will lay in place eventually.

To finish off the neckline I used binding that came with the fabric and was the worst finish I´ve ever done. It´s inconsistent in width all around but my serger hated it and when I went to my machine to try and correct it, it just made it worse, so I stopped fiddling with it and embraced imperfection. Ahh, liberating. Not really. I wanna rip that thing off and correct it asap. I also used the same binding for the cuffs; I kept the width of the sleeves and made the cuffs about 1,5cm shorter for the puffy look I love. Keep in mind that all these measurements I´m refering have to be adjusted depending on your fabric stretch, so always test first if it fits when it comes to bindings.

Of course, when you use stripes it´s mandatory you drive yourself crazy trying to match them at all seams. The flare line of the dress makes that chevron effect at the side seams where the stripes match. For the sleeves, well I tried. During cutting I realised they wouldn´t match perfectly because the stripes were to large and along the armscye curve they would go beyond their color match.  I also manipulated fabric a lot during the sewing itself, meaning I stretched it enough to make them match where I could but not too much that they wouldn´t match the essential notches to keep the fit right. Overall, I´m happy that the sleeves stripes follow along the dress main ones when the arms are down.

I prefered to keep the hem at the same stripe for visual purposes, so it´s not even but longer at the sides. Yep, people do crazy stuff for prettyness reasons, ha! If I had a large stripe at the bottom it could have worked with the original hem, but I prefered to match the stripes at top first. This way I ended up with my own unique hi-lo-hi-lo hem, ha!

Now, for some good stuff: the Eleena dress will be on sale for $7.00 (regular price $9.00) through March 7th, 11:59 EST. And there´s a giveaway too - two patterns of choice and one yard of Sara Jane fabric in the photo:

Thank you for having me Olga! Loved making this hack and, more importantly, my girl loves it too! And we had a blast shooting since she got me repeating silly jokes over and over again. For my portuguese girls, here´s her favourite:

"- Olá, como te chamas?

- Fu.

- Fu quê?

- Fumiga. E tu?

- Ota.

- Ota quê?

- Ota fumiga."