The Lake Shirts

So here we all are in our trashy lake shirts (S2666), as I like to refer to them. Not necessarily a ho-shirt, but the only one I would wear out in public is Elizabeth's view (my SIL in pink) - much more coverage. I'm on a mobile device in Texas, so sorry for the out of order pics. Obviously this is the back view.



Here we are embracing our muffin tops.



And I did bring the machine to the lake so I could make a top for my niece - thank goodness Jalie (2794) has kid sizes too. Aren't they cute in their matching shirts? The fit was spot on and it went together really quick, so I didn't miss any water time.



Oh good, the nicest picture for last!

Fourth Simplicity 2666 - Done

I sat down to get Elizabeth's shirt done for the lake, and look at the disorganization I'm battling on my cutting table! The far left is the pile of swimsuit stuff - 3 fabrics and 2 patterns all mixed up. Plus wax paper for tracing - yes, I actually traced a pattern instead of cutting it up! The red bear was purchased by Lucas at a flea market ("Mom, can we go to the flea market today? Huh? Can we?") and began life looking over his left shoulder. Lucas prefers facing life head-on, so I had to decapitate the thing and sew it back on, but it's coming undone.



Next to the bear are the 2 madras fabrics for the shorts I hope to wear this summer (yeah, right), followed by leftovers from a Jalie blouse that I hope to make a T-shirt for Lucas with, and lastly another pair of shorts for Lucas waiting to be.



Now I love this pattern's easiness, but this is view B which I haven't done before. It has ties at the shoulder seam and an overlapped bodice (is that what you call that?). Well, did I read ahead to find out that the shoulder seam allowance is actually the casing for the ties? No, I noted on the pattern piece that 3/8" seam is allowed, so I very nicely zigzagged a narrow shoulder seam. DOH! So on the other shoulder I sew a straight seam in 5/8" and try to use it for the casing, seen below.



Pure suckiness - can you see the hand-stitching I had to do at the bottom of the pic to hold the seam closed over the ties? Awful, although from the outside you can't tell.



Well the little zigzagged shoulder isn't going to work like that, so I decide to fashion a casing and enclose that seam. First I spent 30 minutes trying to put the ties in place with the casing over them and sew it nicely from the right side, but that was ridiculous, so I just gave in and did it the easy way.



It came out looking better than the other one for sure. Note to other sewists doing this shirt - leave a LARGE seam allowance at the shoulder seam, despite what the pattern piece says.



Everything else went together nicely, till I was overly aggressive with the gathering at the left bustline and gathered the fabric right off the thread. Gotta go back and do that again - it' amazing what gathering can do for you. I tried this on and thought, "Holy crap, my right boob is twice the size of my left!" I actually checked to make sure something wasn't going on that I missed in the shower! (Sorry for the crappy picture, but it was midnight.)



So I'm leaving it basted at this point so we can fit it at the lake. I don't know how you women sew for clients when they're not with you to try it on - I'm nervous about the fit, and don't even get me started on the seam finishes!



I did line the front bodice, Elizabeth, because it was sheer, so you won't be selling raisins at the lake! (Heard that from a fellow PR reviewer of this shirt.)

Pity Party's Over; Moving On...

Sorry, sorry, sorry for the pity party last night. I normally handle stuff better than that, but it all piled up at the time of the month when I'm prone to cry anyway, and I just couldn't suck it up. Thanks for all the encouraging comments. To quote that girl from The Sixth Sense, "I'm feeling much better now."

So I got my sister's lake shirt finished the other night, but I may need to go back and tighten up the side seams after trying it on.



She used to be MUCH better endowed than me, but I think having children evened us out (and down) so we wear the same size now.



So now to my SIL's shirt - it's view B of the same pattern - ooh, mixing it up! This one may need a little more fitting, plus my niece doesn't want to be left out of the girls' lake-shirt club, so I'm thinking of taking my machine to the lake. (As long as it doesn't interfere with the Rook games, we'll be okay.)

Swimsuit Funk

Well, I worked on those danged boyshorts ripping out elastic at seams so I could tighten them up, and it worked pretty well till I sewed the elastic back together twisted. That was apparently the last straw, because I just got very funky (emotionally speaking, not odiferously...if that's a word). I put them on and it looked a little better, but Dean walked by and said, "Aren't those supposed to be tight?" Right you are, Sir! They're not, and even if I succeed in tightening up the legs, they still don't make it past the cheeks far enough. I do believe I've made my first wadder. (I'll wear something awful if I can possibly get away with it because I hate wasting time and fabric.) So I sadly folded up all the swimsuit paraphernalia and stacked it in a corner of the cutting table to tackle another day.

I decided to do something for instant gratification, so I started on my mother's lake shirt. The whole family goes to the lake every year, and my sister wanted a Simplicity 2666 shirt, so I had the bright idea to make all the women (4 total) this shirt. It was going pretty well but I was still feeling like a failure, when the doorbell rings out of the blue. Well it's the nice postman and look what he's brought me!



Wow! God is smiling at me (or telling me I don't know what the hell I'm doing), because this wasn't supposed to arrive until next week! When is the post office ever EARLY with a package?! So now I can start reading about swimsuits and come back to mine better prepared.

Well, I whipped out my mom's shirt in record time - about 2 hours from cutting to trying on - the fastest ever. I'll finish the straps when she's here to try it on, but it should fit perfect since it's a tad loose on me. And my funkiness is all gone - hooray!



Now you go have a good weekend too, and if you get funky I hope God sends you a postman!

Back Home...

What a lovely week at the beach, besides a couple of days of chilliness and overcast-ness. Here are some of the photos (sorry the first one is dark, and the others show more detail if you click on them...not that you want any more detail since we're not wearing makeup):

My sweatshop - how nice to sew in a room with a view of water where you can throw the door open to catch a breeze!

But my poor baby skipped stitches and didn't want to zigzag too well on my sister's shirt.

It still turned out okay, though she didn't want to pose without makeup...

Okay, I talked her into wearing sunglasses and posing...

Hey, Tracey, I missed the fact that your right shoulder is higher than your left (unless you were posing that way). Perceptive seamstress I am, huh!

See, my hips aren't really that wide - I was just posing that way. (It's my favorite pose.) This is the pink too-young-for-a-42-year-old shirt I made. The fabric was WAAAYYYYY too stretchy and I had to take about 3 inches off the side seams. Wish I could've taken some out of the center front, but that was cut on the fold, so things were not as snug as I'd like there. (But just small things that don't cause a lot of commotion when they're dangling freely, so no biggie.)

I actually kind of like the back - the top part is made of two ties that you knot and the bottom has a little keyhole where the ties are. Kind of cute. I even remembered to sunscreen that place!

And it wasn't ALL sewing - we did have some fun, as evidenced by the hole to China dug by Lucas and Parker, and the 3 tiny boys on the tube far in the distance screaming for their lives under what appear to be very stormy skies (they weren't, Mother, relax; though that brings back the memory of you running down the pier at Lake Martin last year screaming "GET OUT OF THAT WATER!!!!" when it was lightning. Good times, good times.).

Toes and Tops

Well, it was a yucky rainy day yesterday, so we spent most of the morning in Target. (Sometimes an unfamiliar Target can be as interesting as the beach.) I picked up some nail polish on the way to check out, and painted the tootsies when we got home. Later the weather cleared up and we all sat on the dock while Dean fished. I commented that I didn't mean to get such an obnoxious nail color (Hot Magenta - rrrrrrow!), whereupon Drew declared that painting one's toenails "is like painting garbage cans - you can try to make them look pretty but they're still garbage cans." Don't my kids say the sweetest things?!

In sewing news, I'm thinking of using that pink knit from Hancock pictured on a previous post (didn't have enough for my sister's tshirt) for Simplicity 2666 view A (alas, I can italicize with effort on the iPhone, but I can't link). Suffice it to say that it's a tank top with ruched bodice, spaghetti straps, and lower half that drapes to extended points past the hips. I was worried this was not appropriate for a 42 year old, but I justified it with my usual argument: "I'll wear it over a bathing suit at the beach." I just don't know if I want to get my hopes up for my broken machine by cutting something out that may not get sewn for weeks....