Meet Jalie clam diggers: the well dressed, hopeful, gardener?

...and another long-sleeved Jalie tee (this gardener colour-coordinates to her implement!)  But, brrrr, it's hopeful gardening only today:  it's cold here this afternoon!

This is my first, test jean.  Normally I can easily get a pair of slacks out of 1.5 meters, but this fabric was narrower than the normal 150 cm, so the legs had to overlap - thus the clam-digger length. No matter, it was the body fit I was checking, not the length, and I really did want (& need) a pair of short ones.

I made size U, but I'm wondering if I should've gone a size smaller. Jeans aren't trousers - they should hug! They FEEL loose.  And there seems a bit too much fabric over the front.

It's a bit of a toss-up as to which length I'll go with - I think short, hubby suggests long. What say you?

Backside, you ask?

I knew I'd have to make some back adjustments: I scooped the crotch into an L and downwards about 1.5 cm, and took in the waist 3 cm on each side of CB.  So I changed the order of construction a bit: the two waistband halves were added first, and then the back was fitted (like with men's trousers). Only after I was happy with the fit, I sewed on the pockets and inserted the loops into the waistband; I had to open little sections for the loops, but as the waistband was being topstitched afterwards, that was fine. Finally, after the waistband was topstitched all around twice, I bar-tacked the loops to the top.

Actually everything else is topstitched too, though you wouldn't know it, as I used matching thread this time - I didn't want to fiddle with contrast hassles while fitting etc.  All the topstitching is done using the triple stretch stitch, so the pants won't be likely to pop when I bend down to pet a plant ;) gardening is a serious sport around here!

I'd welcome constructive criticism on this pair before I cut into my next iteration - yes really, please!!! I've never made jeans before so I'm totally tickled how these came together - and all the credit goes to Jalie's drafting, of course!

In the Trenches

Even up here in the Great White North we're rapidly running out of winter.  My beloved shade garden has been snow-free for a week, the front is abloom with snowdrops, and irises, daffodils, tulips and daylilies are in a mad upward race.  I'm loving it.

During our mini-heatwave last week, many of my co-commuters traded their parkas for trench coats.  Some are hanging on to them still, despite the fact that the weather's cooled down again. I HAVE a trench coat - though it's pretty old it's still a very nice one, in a dark teal jewel tone techno fabric, fully lined, long against the rains, double breasted, and nice and loose - just how I like it. So I don't really NEED a new one - but I'd dearly love to HAVE one. A classic taupe. Shorter, more fitted, neutral-coloured . Yes yes yes, I have the fabric(s), the lining, the pattern(s).  I'm like the donkey who dies of starvation because he can't decide which carrot will be tastier. 

While I decide if/when to make one, I browse Burberry's Art of the Trench.  Go see it - every size, colour, and shape. Fun!

Möbius Made Marvellously Easy

A Möbius band is a topological wonder: a two-dimensional entity happily residing in a three dimensional world.  It has only one edge and one flat side.

What is it about a Möbius scarf that makes it look so attractive?  It's the half-twist.  Without it, the plain loop looks like what it is: a simple short & wide cylinder hanging on a vertical cylinder (your neck).  But that half-twist is a trompe l'oeil effect that turns the flat cylinder into a graceful bias; or, at least, makes it look that way. It gives you the lovely, fabric-greedy, expensive bias drape appearance on straight-grain cheap.  Best of all, it can be dead easy to make. But, as I'll show below, if you try a slightly different approach, the results can be hilarious!

Start with a rectangle of fabric twice as high and as long as you'd like it to be (plus two seam allowances in each direction; wine is optional).  If you want to wear a single loop, 30" (75cm) will suffice; if you want to double or even triple it around your neck, increase the long dimension appropriately.

Fold this in half along the long axis with right sides together, and sew the long seam, leaving a gap large enough for your hand near one end.  I like to backstitch and clip off only one thread, leaving the other one long enough to sew up the gap once the scarf's finished.

Turn the scarf right side out, and fold it so that both raw edges are at left. Give it one twist as you do that - now the seam crosses under from the top to the bottom of the piece.

Lay the two ends one on the other and pin the right sides together; notice the seams are on opposite sides of the two openings.

Now reach into the little gap in the long seam and pull the pinned sections completely out through it. It's just like bagging the lining on a sleeve hem through a gap in the side seam of a jacket's lining.  Match up the rest of the two ends (they're one inside the other now - AHA!), and sew them completely together.  Once that's done, pull the scarf right side out again.

Now use that long thread and sew up the little gap. Your Möbius scarf is done!

Ready now for the "don't do this at home" trick?  You might wish to be "clever" (ahem) and simplify matters. You might want to sew the short edges together from the wrong side - thinking that it's easier to do that, and just turn the completed loop inside out once finished.  Heck, why on earth not?!

So you do your half twist, place and then pin the raw ends right sides together....

Sew up that short edge, and - you might think - you're all done, except for turning the lovely little scarf right side out.   Right......? 

Right!!! But your results aren't quite what you expected, are they?  Instead of a low but wide loop, you made a tall and skinny one.  Surprised?!  I sure was. 

Perfect if you happen to be one of the lovely Karen ladies, who are famous for having the longest necks in the world. 

That's topology for you, kids!  Live and learn.

Joli Jalie weekend - part 2, aka: thinking out of the envelope

My 3rd Jalie tee was this fine little leopard (meow!). I had only 80 cm of it. Because it had a repeating vertical pattern, something had to be done to ensure the fabric wasn't all nilly-willy, so this is all I could do: barely below-elbows sleeves, and NO neck-warmer. Boo hoo. I did consider placing the sleeves so that they'd be dark along the outside (matching the body) but that would've placed bright spots in my armpits - nyeh. I chose "look-at-me" biceps instead.  Notice I rounded the Vee neck for a low-crew neck look.  And notice the matching front&back skunk-leopard stripes down the centre. And how nicely the neck binding is matched to what's below it. 

With all of the above well under control, I decided I have just the ticket to verify how the true crew actually plays, all the while ALSO trying out a child's version.  

This one is size P (31" chest) - in a nice beefy cotton knit, my FM freebie (thank you, FM!  yes some of you will recognize the shade for my rusty coral cashmere coat's interlining).  The kid's actually a size smaller, but he's a Real Boy - trust me, he'll never want to wear skintight clothing. The tee fits (though the sleeves are a tad too long) and the kid's cute, trust me.

[Mom-brag-alert:  I made the pants too - a washable wool-poly herringbone, yes they're dreadfully saggy now because the elastic's died & gone to heaven after too many cycles in the dryer, but he swears they're the warmest, comfiest pants he has. He wore them round the clock in winter - two winters, as a matter of fact, as he's already outgrown last year's version from the same fabric (that's why sewing for kids is such a THANKLESS chore) - END of Mom-brag]

My thinking out of the envelope moment came when I foolishly visited Fabricland to replace a double needle I broke (grrrr) on a pin yesterday afternoon, and came home with, um, a couple (three, actually) more knits for tees, plus.....

..... this crinkle rayon. I love its colour scheme - it's VERY ME, red and black, with a touch of gold, white, and brown thrown in.  Not a knit, but I applied it to the Jalie tee pattern nevertheless.  Because it's a woven, I widened all vertical seams (including the sleeves) about 0.5 cm.  I needn't have bothered: the sleeves are very loose, as is the hem. I rounded the neck again, but it gapped a bit, so I took two little tucks to make it rectangular instead - you can see it quite well on the right.  The left-over scrap became a cowl:

It's a Moebius band, ie, a single loop with a half-twist: I like it!

(((Gratuitous sexy hubby shot (I'm feeling first-day-of-spring-silly):  just look at those giant come-hither paws! Swoon!!!     Disclaimer: I made NOTHING that's he's wearing - not even his tee!)))

I have some more knits. The left one is a poly, in a deliberate experiment to see how poly knits actually wear. For example, do they breathe?

...but really, all of the above are but an exercise in advance of turning these two silk jerseys into something wearable:

I promise not to burden you with any more tees.  Unless they're silk, or make me look like a stick of dynamite in mid-kaboom, or something at least as interesting.

A trio of tees: les Jalies sont jolis!

Les très jolis patrons Jalies arrived last night, and I practically leapt on them. Was I surprised? you bet. LARGE format, printed on HEAVY white stock. Realizing I could easily use this pattern for tees for my very own pre-teen très joli garçon, I didn't cut, but instead TRACED my size (V, per my bounteous charms, though my waistline is 3 sizes smaller). The pattern offers four neckline versions: crew, turtleneck, vee, and "Klondike Gold Rush Underwear", ie. a curved Vee with a placket & buttons. Whatever.

After cutting out all the parts for the first version - intended to be the basic long-sleeve crew, by way of a muslin test of the to-spec draft - I nearly had a conniption. Dammit! Whoever arranges the icons on these patterns at Jalie should be summarily FIRED!!!! I mean, honestly - if you saw this:



and this:



and THIS:



you would, wouldn't you, expect that the garment icon refers to the pattern piece that surrounds it, right? Well, nyah-nyah, it does NOT. Idjits!!!

ETA. Example: the two icons on this pattern piece made me believe I was drafting a crew neck. But this piece is for the Vee neckline; the crew pattern piece (views A and B) has the Klondike neckline icon on it. This confusion makes it very easy to err, and err I did.  As a consequence, my tees are all V-neck. No biggie. I like v-necks, but I HATE being made a fool of by some flunkie who seems to think it's too much effort to make sewing a seamless ;) pleasure for the employer's customers.  If you want to get it right the first & every time, just follow the text designations (highlighted in green) and refer to the envelope for what views A, B, C, and D actually look like.

Moving right along. After laundering and drying on HOT, I have three sub-meter lengths of rayon knit from Fabricland, acquired last fall with the idea of eventual tank tops in mind. But you know me, I'm the stingy cutter, right?

First iteration:
I folded both selvedges towards centre, and PIECED (yes I was DETERMINED to make that full muslin out of what I had) one of the sleeves. The left sleeve is vertically bisected by a full length seam - not that you'd ever notice it, with that design!


That scrap of fabric in my hand, you ask? that's my Moebius scarf, out of the scraps. It plays two ways.

Cowl neck:



and, doubled up, "free turtleneck":



I have a long neck that gets easily c-c-c-c-c-cold, so I LOVE to wrap it. That's why I always try to arrange my pattern pieces so that the scraps can be folded into a scarf.

Second iteration:
I placed the vertical seam on centre back. Both sleeves are seamless this time. There's some misprinting weirdness going on near one of the selvedges which I obviously didn't notice 'till after the item was seamed and cut, but this is my spring gardening tee and my hostas won't care.



Front:



And the warm-up-me-neckie look again:



Hmmm, I did say three tees, didn't I? Buh-but, the two above give five looks! Oh OK, I have five, yes FIVE more lengths of knit, seven total, one for every day of the week, and two are already pre-washed & will be turned into some sort of tee by the end of the day but it'll be no-outdoor-photos-pitch-black by then and you're already bored, aren't you, and anyway, it's dinner time over here.