October Fashion Sewing Club

Cooler weather is here-a beautiful fall as I look out at my orange/brown yard thick with wet leaves. And that’s where sewing went-to long sleeves, corduroy, boucle, deep purple, dark blue and a bit of cleaning out the stash. The pictures and Club sheets have been posted for October (click on the bar above). We hope they are useful to you.

Sewing and Quilting Expo is right around the corner. We have decided to have Club meetings as usual. We’ll carpool up to the Expo on Thursday after Club at Make It Sew and be back in time for the 6:30 Club meeting. Let us know if you’d be willing to drive or want a ride. Saturday meeting will be held as usual. The Cute Kids Clothes Trunk Show has been postponed till spring. Tuesday’s Club meeting is unaffected by the Expo so we’ll see some of you there.

Babies, showers, wedding are all coming quickly so the sewing machines aren’t getting much rest. Hope you are inspired by what is going on in your lives.

Happy Sewing!

Lucia returned from New Zealand with a wool hat and coat

September Club Sheets

Photos and Club sheets have been posted under “Garment Photos and Club Sheets” above. It was another great month for show and tell and new people. The change in weather seems to be motivating us to sew.

At the Make It Sew meeting, Julia Olson wore a necklace she’d made and we were so impressed that Julia will be teaching us how to make them following the October meeting. If you would like to come and attend the class, please see the class description under “Classes-Make It Sew”. It isn’t on the Make It Sew website. There is some advance preparation-stringing beads so you can start crocheting in class-so please plan ahead. If you attend more than one Club meeting in a month-you only pay once.

A few cute items that showed up at Club:

Happy Sewing!!

Shrug Pattern and More

Yesterday at the Treadle Tuesday meeting of Fashion Sewing Club everyone got their money’s worth-well, that is judging by the buzz created by Cathy’s shrug. Evidently some of you have seen it before way back at Stretch and Sew but the popularity demands that we remind you or show you for the first time.

The shrug shown here is in a wispy wool knit from Treadle. Cathy’s bag of goodies, however, showed many other possibilities for the shrug-double faced knits, silks, single knits, the options are endless. Cathy likes to keep at least one of hers wadded up in the car so that she always has something to throw on as needed. Debbie and I were so inspired that we splurged and bought the paisley Liberty of London wool to split down the middle and we’ll each have one.
Directions: Cut a rectangle of fabric 2 yds. by 20″. Fold in half so it measures 1 yd. by 20″. Beginning at folded end, leave a 15″ opening and then stitch together to the end. Hem edges or not as you see fit.

We also saw a great version of Kwiksew 3718. I went looking on the website and this is it-

Kwiksew 3718

Not a good picture, in my humble opinion. But this is the version that Barb made-
Whew!

And Barb’s interpretation in a microfiber corduroy-

Great dress for fall, teaching, shopping, etc. Nice work, Barb.

Su Tucker had her first trunk show run at Make It Sew last week. She had made more great dresses for little girls. The appliqued faces and legs (so cute) that we saw at Treadle last month are available in pattern form now. I can put you in touch with her if you are interested in purchasing them.

One of four patterns

You have one more chance to see Su and her trunk show, Saturday, Oct. 13, at 2 pm. Registration required-don’t miss it!

And one last item-if you are tired of seeing teenagers modeling the latest fashions, try these blogs for a refreshing perspective-Advanced Style (Sartorialist for the mature woman), The Women’s Room (“on line community created for 35 plus freethinking, intelligent, stylish women”) and That’s Not My Age.

Tomorrow is Fashion Sewing Club at Make It Sew at 10:30 and 6:30. Basic Sergery at 2. Catch us if you can 🙂

Post Peggy Sagers Fit Workshop

From our California Material Girl, Carrie, after the whirling in her head slowed down 🙂
(To see the first two entries, see The Art of Fitting-Before and The Art of Fitting-In the Thick of It.

So, how does one feel after being enmeshed in fitting muslins for almost 4 days? Tired!
My head feels full of information that I didn’t even have time to get into notes. And I’m excited by all that I learned about how to fit patterns.
I still need to find time to take the adjustments from my muslins and adapt my tissue patterns according to the changes.
I brought 10 muslins with me to the training and all 10 came home fitted to me – first by another student, then reviewed, adjusted, and modified by Peggy.
I’m very happy with what I learned and am also happy to have 10 patterns fitted to me that I can use as a baseline going forward.

The training schedule is 80% hands on fitting. The other 20% is direct explanation and training from Peggy. There is no magic formula for fitting. Each wrinkle is unique to each individual, but Peggy has tried to create a common sense approach that breaks down the most common sources or reasons for wrinkles. I like that Peggy is all about taking a simple approach to fitting – what’s the fastest, easiest way to eliminate the wrinkles? Let’s not create a new arm hole shape that would require a new sleeve. Let’s not make several modifications to one garment – maybe we have the wrong size to start with etc.

After Day Two I think most people in the class felt frustrated with the learning process. Most of what we were doing to fit the muslins was still “wrong.” We were able to identify the wrinkles, but not always what was causing the wrinkle, so therefore, not fixing the wrinkle in the correct way. Day Three Peggy came in with a new class format and, in general, I could tell that by the end of the class we were starting to “get it.” Day Four, the last day, Peggy offered to start early and most people showed up early, already jumping in with a partner before Peggy even arrived. Each fitting was reviewed and corrected as needed by Peggy. She would often ask what the fitter saw before making an adjustment, then review what should be changed and why.

Overall, learning the fundamentals of fitting and the hands on experience is totally worth the cost of the class. Leaving the class with at least 9 fitted muslins- more if you have time to make more – is totally worth the cost of the class. If you want to become a fitting trainer and offer sewing classes – you won’t walk away with a packaged program or curriculum to do that. In my class about half of the ladies were interested in teaching fit classes. Peggy does share experiences and what works or doesn’t work from her personal experience and the experience of previous students.

So, am I a fitting expert now? No, but I have a really good set of tools in my tool box. From what I’ve heard and now experienced, it takes practice, practice, practice and I’m ready to jump in!

Thanks, Carrie. To find out more about Peggy’s class fitting class, click this link.

Reporting from Down Under

Lucia (some of you may know her from Treadle and others as the serger teacher at Make It Sew) nabbed a great gig for house sitting in New Zealand and misses Fashion Sewing Club so here’s her Show and Tell and a bit more…

Hi,Kristin, Debbie, Laurel and all of the Treadle Material Girls group!

The first week of every month since I arrived I’ve been determined to write. Yeah; well, finally I’m getting to it. Miss my garden terribly (hope there is some shred of life left after the inferno), and, the Material Girls meetings – other than that I’d be happy to stay here. I’m 10 minutes walk from the ferry into downtown Auckland. Lots of walking opportunities – up very steep hills – the only kind of hills they have in N.Z. Just saw the tax value for the apt. I’m in and it’s unbelievably $1 Million. It’s nice but not that nice! Property here is very expensive. Greater Auckland has about 2 million people – a big place. $500,000 buys you a very, very small, 40-50 yr. old place.

Here are some pictures off my balcony –



My favorite view out the kitchen window

Devastation in the dining room

I’ve been sewing up a storm with a Brother machine – no Serger – boo-boo. Tackled the chevron striped pattern from the cover of Threads – July issue. Made the sleeveless top below to test out the pattern and my stripe matching ability. Yikes, what a job. I am going to try the dress this week. Made a couple Quincy tops (Sewing Workshop). I like the window pane knit fabric – probably not the best pattern for a check but it turned out okay. Am disappointed with the wool selections here – lots of mixes like 40% wool and 60% acrylic. Found a discount fabric store where I paid $3/ meter for the dotted knit top fabric but it’s hard to get to. I’ll have to wrangle a ride back there some weekend.

The knit top is a Marcy Titon t-shirt with a Katherine Tilton double collar. Loved making the collar – so much fun.



Just joined a website from U.K. – Wardrobe unlock’d – ever heard of it?

Summer sounds like it’s been so much fun in Minnesota. I just got up to turn the heat on! When the sun is out it warms up nicely by 1 or 2 p.m. to around 58. Otherwise it’s pretty much heavy sweater weather – but I am not complaining at all. If I get too cold I just throw on my Eddie Bauer “can-take-anything” raincoat and go splash around in the rain.

Lucia

P.S. Am open to any introductions you may want to make on my behalf to single, millionaires who are interested in spending 1/2 of each year in New Zealand, the land of Frodo, Peter Jackson and the occasional earthquake.

Great to hear from you, Lucia. Thanks for sharing!

August Fashion Sewing Club Sheets Online

Thanks for coming to Club this month. Each meeting/location has taken on a personality of its own and because of that Debbie and I have our tanks filled by the end of the week. We hope you were inspired too!
Here are a few highlights-(Club sheets can be found under Club Sheets/Garment Photos above)

Roberta has been sewing! This is a wonderful Japanese double weave cotton that is as beautiful on the wrong (!?) side as the right side.

Su got creative using only what was in her stash. She’ll be doing a trunk show at Make It Sew on Sept. 6, 6 pm and again at Treadle in October. Can’t wait!!
A very proud grandma brought her pupil/granddaughter to model her latest project.

And finally, just wanted to show you the final version of the striped Anthropologie Dress-

Inspiration

Execution

Perfection (or another version, thanks to a belt from Target 🙂

(Directions for the dress can be found in the Club Sheets.)

First Sewing For Babies/Gorgeous Fabric/Three Thread Overlock

I know, the title is too long but depending on where your interests lie…

And yes, the babies are boys but this was my best photo…

Treadle has two soft Japanese double layer pique knits, one pink, one blue. A bit spendy and only 32″ wide but in my mind that said, “Baby Layette Blanket”. All I had to do was finish the edges and since we have had quite a few serger classes lately and we often got the question, “What do you use the 3 thread overlock for?” I thought I might share what I did.

Blue is 3 thread, pink is 4 thread

For the blue three thread I used off white Jeans Stitch cotton thread in the upper looper along with a heavier poly/cotton Gutermann denim thread that I had picked up at the Expo in the lower looper.

For the four thread I used Pearl Crown Rayon in the upper looper and Heavy XP Coats and Clark in the lower looper-serger thread in needles.

Square up the fabric-selvedge says “peaceful cooing” so I left it on

Serge around all four sides leaving a tail

Using a blunt tipped needle, go back under stitches

Pull through and clip

I didn’t prewash the fabric as I didn’t want the layers to separate before sewing. The fabric did shrink 4 inches both ways but it also got thicker and the pique showed more.

I tried to take photos of turning corners without cutting threads but my camera didn’t have high enough resolution. We teach this method in our Beyond Basic Sergery (Treadle) or Advanced Serger (Make It Sew) classes. Practice makes perfect.

Here is the written version from the Babylock website, check out a serger book and you will find it too.
“Outside Corners: Stitch to the end of the corner edge, but not beyond. Stop with the needles up and raise the presser foot. With tweezers pull approximately 1/4″ of slack thread above the needles. The slack will allow the fabric to be pulled slightly to the back, clearing stitches from the stitch fingers. Turn the fabric, aligning the new edge with the edge of the needle plate. Remove any slack from the needle threads. Lower the foot and continue sewing.”

I was only trimming the tiniest edge off the fabric but if you trim more you will need to trim by hand for about 2″ at the beginning of each corner. You’ll see what I mean if you try it-the blade won’t get a chance to cut right at the very beginning and that will make everything gum up.

Can’t wait to wrap up babies in these blankets!

The Art of Fitting-In the Thick of It

Carrie writes from Peggy Sagers’ Fit Training Workshop-
(Read “The Art of Fitting-Before” blogpost first to get the full scoop.)

Here are my thoughts from day 2 of training.

Learning fit is not for the faint of heart!

The last two days of fitting classes have been exhausting. By the time we wrap for the day my brain hurts – it’s so full of information it feels like it might start oozing out!
Thursday we started off with an easy lesson, fitting tee shirts. Today, Friday, we took the full day fitting blouses, which was really a lesson on darts and armhole adjustments. The basic format of each session is to start with Q&A from the previous day or session, then we jump into fitting muslins on a partner. We have a large class of twenty ladies. That does affect the flow of the class and the information covered each day, but Peggy is dedicated to ensure each muslin is reviewed by her. However, the practice fitting other ladies is invaluable! Each evening I’ve worked on transferring the adjustments which have been pinned into my garment on to the pattern.

At times I question if I’m really “getting it”, but I’m beginning to understand fit is learned by repetition. The first time you make the right adjustment it almost feels like an accident- did I really know what I was doing? But after seeing it, hearing it, and doing it all day it does begin to imprint itself in your brain.
The class is a mix of ladies who want to teach fitting, those who just want to have muslins fit for them, and a few ladies who just enjoy classes with Peggy ; )

For now I’m signing off, it’s been a long, busy day!

The Jacket Pattern Has Been Discontinued, However…

It has come to my attention (thank you diligent readers) that KwikSew 2896 has been discontinued. This is the pattern for the jacket class starting on Monday and mentioned in the previous post. Last week, Treadle still had 5 copies of the pattern and I have 1 that is unopened so we should be good for the class. If you are curious about the line drawings of the pattern, here they are:


At the time of the newsletter the pattern was still in print so we hope this doesn’t cause any problems.

One Jacket Five Ways and August Classes

We’d like to promote the idea that you can get one basic pattern to fit well and then branch out and make the same pattern but no woman on the street would guess that it came from the same envelope. Our jacket class uses KwikSew 2896-here are 3 versions. Debbie has a linen version that I forgot to get a picture of-it’s at Treadle right now- and the fifth jacket will be revealed at the class. Reserve your spot today by calling 651-698-9690 (Treadle Yard Goods). Class starts Monday, Aug. 13 from 6-8 and continues the 20th and 27th, same time. More info is available under the “Classes” heading above or call Material Girls (952-201-3863).


More August classes:
PS-It’s a great month to brush up on serger skills-Treadle or Make It Sew!

Advanced Serger, Thursday, August 9, 2:00-4:30 @ Make It Sew
Beyond Basic Sergery, Saturday, August 11, 2:00-4:30 @ Treadle Yard Goods
One Jacket-Five Ways, Monday, August 13, 20, 27, 6:00-8:00 @ Treadle Yard Goods
Basic Sergery, Tuesday, August 14, 6:00-8:30 @ Treadle Yard Goods
Focus On Fit – Basic Tee, Wednesday, August 15, 1:00-5:00,@ Treadle Yard Goods
Serger Club-Flatlock Skirt, Thursday, August 16, 10:00-12:00 or 6:00-8:00 @ Make It Sew
Cover/Chain Stitch, Tuesday, August 21, 6:00-8:00 @ Make It Sew
Basic Serger, Thursday, August 23, 10:00-12:00 @ Make It Sew
Guided Sewing, Thursday, August 23, 1:00-5:00 @ Make It Sew
Eternal Sergery-Zipper Bag, Monday, August 27, 1:00-4:00, @ Treadle Yard Goods