Because I'm an Over-Achiever

I can't remember when my daughter started asking for a school uniform for her Journey Girl but I always intend to make one.  This is my daughter's school dress:

My previously mention problems with patterns for the dolls meant I'd been putting this off. I had a blue check cotton in my stash which I'd intended to use even though it wasn't really similar, but then I was op-shopping and found a cotton that was almost exactly the right check pattern!!

Left is fabric from my stash I'd planned to use, right is my excellent op-shop find!

After watching the How to Make Dolls Clothes Class on Craftsy, I decided to attack the school dress project, with the help if this book that I bought ages ago:

In the Craftsy class, Joan teaches you how to make a sloper for your doll.  With this as a base, I used the A-line dress pattern included in the book, merging sizes to get the best fit. To work out the pleats and yoke etc, I traced off a copy if the front and back and then worked on measurements based on  the same ratio as the real uniform.  I just worked rough ratios such as 1/3 full length measurement etc.  I drafted mock cuffs on the sleeves, and a collar.  A quick google search showed me how to make the front placket (I used the 2 piece placket instructions). The sleeve pattern ended up a little smaller than the armscye, so I just made it a bit bigger and gathered rather trying to make it fit perfectly.

This is the basic A-line dress front piece with markings for front placket size and front pleat location and size

To make the black trim on the collar, I cut bias binding in half and top stitched it along the folded edge, with the raw edge against the raw edge of the white. This was then enclosed when I attached the collar facing and bagged out.  For the cuffs I attached it the same, but then folded over and top stitched to the sleeve.

Black trim attached to the (ill-fitting) collar piece

After that effort, my collar piece didn't fit the dress!! So I grabbed the collar from the lab coat I was making at the same time (blog post coming here!), and it seemed to fit better, so I cut new collar and off we went again.

I decided on snaps with decorative buttons, rather than buttons and buttonholes, basically because I got lazy.  I also made her "school knickers" to match the ones I made my daughter.

Unfortunately once I'd got it together, I hadn't made the front opening quite big enough and it's very snug getting on and off, but my daughter got it off without help so it can't be too bad.

This is one of these projects where I even impressed myself with how awesome it came out. Of course when she took her doll to school the next day, I noticed the error I had made by not cutting the front placket and back belt on the bias. Oh well, "next time"....

I guess now I have to knit her a school cardigan in the right colour.  Here, she's wearing a cardigan my Nanna knitted for my Cabbage Patch Kid in my school uniform colour (over 30 years ago).

Pants Maketh the Man

Heading into autumn, my little man needed some cotton pants. It's starting to be cool in the morning but warms up later, so still to soon for trackies or jeans.

I made lots of cotton shorts for summer. They are cute and functional, but a little plain. I wanted to make it a bit more interesting with pants. Plus as he gets a little older, he can make use of pockets!

I went to Pinterest for inspiration and found these

Left is a free pattern from ikat bag. I'd made this once before as a test run, but it doesn't fit my chubba bubba that well becausae there isn't a lot of crotch curve.  So I traced out the crotch from the shorts pattern I'd been using, because I knew it fitted well.  Other than this, I made it as per the pattern, but I didn't have enough of the print to make the waistband so used plain black.  They are meant to be 3/4 length when rolled on up, but on my little shorty, they're almost full length, so they wont be rolled down until he grows some more!

The centre pair was a free pattern from Compagnie M. but it's no longer offered so I just worked out something myself.  I started with Kwiksew 4080 because he's currently wearing a pair of pants I made from this and they fit well.  Which is actually surprising because he's 1" taller and several kg heavier than the 'measurements' for the largest size.  Oh, well, you  make what fits, regardless of the number on it.

I'm not sure what the original version was inside, but my version is a false opening at the front.  It's is a real flap, but underneath the left and right front are joined together, so I just sewed the decorative buttons on through all layers.  This does mean that the pockets are technically one big pocket across the front but my boy is only just working out pockets so I'm not sure he'll realise any time soon.  I used the flat from from the original pattern as my guide for the pockets, but I probably could have put them closer to the centre.

He hasn't worn these yet so I don't have an 'action' shot

The pair on the right appears on the  Made by Rae blog, and inspired me to do the same.  I used the same Kwiksew pattern above and just made it up as a full elastic waist rather than with a flat front.  Then added the side panel, including pockets.  So simple!  And after wearing both these and the black ones, this seems to be the best pocket style for his age.  He had great fun putting "lego" (actually lego style blocks that are erasers) in them.

I think I need to work on my 'action shot' photography skills..... but it's so hard to get an almost 3 year old to stand still and/or do what you want for photography purposes.

With what he already has in his drawers, this should see him through the in-between weather, so now I need to start thinking about warm pants for the cold weather, and apparently winter PJs too because these kids just keep growing...

A journey in Journey Girls

My daughter got a Journey Girl doll for Christmas a year ago. I was very excited at the prospect of making lots of dolls clothes for her.  Years ago I'd bought my niece a doll and made it some clothes, but hadn't realised at the time that the doll was 16" and the patterns were 18". So now all these patterns that had been useless were finally useful!!

Sadly life is never that simple.

Commercial patterns, and most indie PDFs I've come across, draft for an American Girl doll, which is a different shape to Journey Girls. There are several websites/blogs comparing measurements so I wont go into details but essentially the American Girl dolls are wider through the body so all the clothes end up too big.

Before I realised this, I downloaded this free pattern for an Elsa inspired dress and made it up without fitting. I thought a mock-up wouldn't be necessary for a commercially available doll. I've learnt that lesson the hard way!  Luckily my then 6 year old thought it was amazing.

Following this, an internet search for patterns specifically designed for Journey Girls brought me to Pixie Faire, who offer (among other things) a free t-shirt pattern by Liberty Jane Clothing.  I also got a leggings pattern from Artsy Fartsy Mama; then found a glove pattern from Diane Morello on Pinterest; and boots from Peek-a-Boo Pattern Shop (which should fit but I used the wrong seam allowance so they are a little big)
Which gave me Batgirl!!

DC Super Hero High inspired Batgirl

For the mask I just googled 'bat mask template' and printed one in a smaller scale to fit, then cut it out of felt.

That t-shirt pattern from Pixie Faire came in handy again recently.  After Christmas just gone, my daughter "needed" an Emma Wiggle skirt and I decided to make a matching outfit for the doll from left overs.  The skirt is just a circle skirt with 'waist' measurement being about 1" larger than her hips and then sewn onto elastic.

(Yes that is a different doll, that is MY doll that I got last year so I can make costumes for it!)

Over the year, I haven't done as much doll sewing as I'd hoped for, because of the effort in trying to mock up a pattern and make it fit, especially when sleeves were involved.

Then, the other week, Craftsy had their free weekend and I watched this How to Make Dolls Clothes video/class by Joan Hinds.  In the video she shows you how to quickly and easily make a sloper for your doll, and then compare it to existing patterns to see where/if you need adjustments.  This has given me a new lease of life on my doll sewing and I have recently sewn up two more garments, which I will blog about shortly.  Stay tuned!

Playing with Miss Ruby Tuesday

I'd seen several people who have made Miss Ruby Tuesday by 1 Puddle Lane and I loved it. Then Ann had a fundraising sale to help pay for her daughter's cancer treatment so who could resist a message like that telling me to buy the pattern. Plus one of my online sewing groups had a sew-along to help promote the sale.

Headed to the fabric shop hoping the Clearance Table Gods would favour me so I could a make wearable muslin without risking good fabric. They did indeed favour me and everything seemed to fall into place.

I decided on the extended shoulder/cap sleeve bodice option with the half circle peplum.  After printing, I did a FBA because I know that's standard for me now and added a few inches to the bodice length. I'm pretty particular about where I like my waist seams hitting because the wrong spot can really accentuate my belly.

It still felt and looked too tight in the bust but the length seemed good. I just took some off the back length to fit into the curve of my spine better (it's folded up in the pic to where I wanted it to be).

I added more to my FBA but this made it look worse!!

It sat in the "I don't know" pile for a day or two.

I decided to return to my first bodice with the smaller FBA and press on. I attached the peplum and bindings.  It wasn't love.

Attaching the skirt did pull the bodice down a bit so it became too long and the bindings have pulled the neck/armhole too tight. I'm guessing my fabric didn't have enough stretch in that direction.

I tossed it aside and there it sat for a month, until I decided it deserved a re-look.

I realised that when I had done the FBA, I had used the extended shoulder point rather than the actual shoulder point, so this may have affected my results.  Will have to remember that for next time, but before then, it was time to look at the waist seam! That is one of the major factors of the silhouette of this dress. I decided to do some comparisons.

Note, these photos were deliberately taken with the light behind me to show the silhouette rather than the details. And the different waist heights are just roughly pinned up so don't give a smooth line but you get the idea.

Left is my finished product (above) that came out too long after attaching the skirt.  Not a good photo, but you can see the shape.

Centre is when pinned up to my natural waist, and where I believe the pattern is designed to sit. 

Lastly, I let some of the pinned section out, so it's about halfway in between the previous two.  This actually hits me at the largest part of my belly, which is about 1/2" above my belly button. You can see this point in the first photos of this post.

Left looks nice enough, nothing wrong with it as such.

Centre looks quite cute I think, giving nice waist definition and shape.  The 'skirt' is now a bit short and hits in a really bad spot, but could easily be fixed in future versions.  

Right also gives me nice waist shape, the skirt sits a bit flatter/smoother over hips.

Now for side view, which is always what I dread:

Left: doesn't look bad, but it just feels a bit 'meh' to me.
Centre: The higher waist seam really pops the skirt out, giving a more 'maternal' look.
Right: It looks very similar to the centre one, but it's just a subtle difference of where the skirt pops out and how it hangs.  I can still see I have a belly, it doesn't just go away, but it becomes less of a "feature"

Personally I think the last one is the best option, and was probably the length I was going for before the skirt weighed it down.  It doesn't make the belly disappear in side view, but it does give a fairly smooth look. And from front view, there is still some really nice waist shaping.

Of course all these variations make the overall length different, so some skirt length might need to be added to maintain my ideal length for a peplum/top, but that's a separate problem.  And so is the neck/shoulder puckering.  I guess this one is still assigned to the "needs work" pile, but I've got the waist height sorted out!  Next time I'll try a different fabric too.

Stash Tally Update

So, let's see where I'm at!

Total Fabric (incl fabrics on order but not delivered)

1st Jan            441 metres
28th Jan          443 metres
2nd Mar           441 metres

Between 1st Jan and 2nd March, I've added 10 metres bought locally, added another 2.5 metres to my UK pre-order (which has now filled the box so won't be buying any more), and decided that I just HAD to have 1 yard of something else I saw for pre-order (can't show you a picture until it arrives though because the pictures all get taken down once the pre-order closes).

Given how much fabric I've added, I'm impressed that my total is not more, so I'm still happy with my progress, even though I haven't actually reduced my stash.
Although I don't feel like I've done enough sewing to justify it, so I can't shake the feeling that I've missed something somewhere....


Clothes to be upcycled

1st Jan           126
2nd Mar         126

I have used up some of the clothes, but I've obviously added a few, or updated things that were in the box but not on the list.


Unused Patterns

1st Jan           201
2nd Mar         197

Since 1st Jan, I've bought 2 new patterns (Miss Ruby Tuesday, and Slash Tunic), and picked up a couple of free ones, so am glad to see the number drop a little.


Whilst I'm moving in the right direction (or at least not moving in the wrong direction), I think I need to lift my game a little if I want to make significant progress by the end of the year.