First Serger Project

Christmas day, I was too tired to even think about messing with my serger, knowing that it was going to require intensive concentration and use of the manual. So I put it off, and didn't actually mess with the thinkg until Wednesday night. And I wasn't very sucessful then, either, but Brandon figured out the problem, and so yesterday, I was rarin' to go and MAKE SOMETHING with it. (You will have to excuse my photo. My lovely assistant is driving the truck today and so wasn't handy to take pictures)

A month or so ago I bought a size medium men's long sleeved polo shirt at a thrift store with the intention of cutting it up to use the fabric for a long-sleeved tee from the New Look 6160 pattern, with some adjustments, since I didn't like the fit of the first one. I hadn't gotten around to it, though, and figured it was a nice, low-risk first project for the serger, since it was a simple pattern and I wouldn't cry if I messed up the fabric. It's a strange houndstoothy sort of plaid, which I like, yet think is ugly. Kind of like troll dolls. Anyway, there are some challenges inherent in cutting out a pattern from fabric that you have an extremely limited amount of, which is why the sleeves are 3/4 length. I guess I should have bought a size large or extra-large. It is also why the neckband is black fleece leftover from Brandon's shirt jacket. But I actually like the effect.

The changes I made besides sleeve length were to add about an inch to the circumference of the garment, since the original was too narrow for me in the shoulders. Then I changed the neckline and made it lower and wider since the first one I made barely fits over my head. Because I wasn't sure what length to make the neckband for the new neckline, first I made one too short, and then one too long, which I didn't realize until after it was applied, and that's why the neckline has a slight cowl effect.

I serged all the major seams, and only used the sewing machine to top stitch the neckline and hem and baste in the sleeves (Another pitfall of creating from existing garments with no extra fabric, I cut two left sleeves out, and there was no fabric left to fix the mistake. Luckily, you can barely tell. The right and left sleeve of the pattern aren't that different.)

Overall I think it went pretty well, although I think this shirt will mostly be worn around the house. I like the looser fit, since I added about an inch to the circumference, and the serger makes narrower seam allowances, so that added a little room, as well.

Sewing with Knits, Part 3 - Trials, Tribulations, and Triumph

I sewed the sleeve seams and hemmed them, no problems. Then I went to put the sleeves on, and in the instructions, either they don't expect that you will need to sew gathering stitches across the top of the sleeve cap, or they just left that part out. So I tried it without gathering stitches, and just stretched the knit to fit. It worked okay, but the sleeves are a little funky. I'm not sure if it was sewing them up that way, or the fact that the material is not cut on the grain.

When I went to try the shirt on, the neck hole is very small. I can barely get it over my head.

As I was sewing the hem, over halfway through with it, I ran over one of the pins. I've done this before, and bent pins and broke needles, but never quite so spectacularly. The pin was jammed way down in the plate of the machine. When I pulled it out, it left a big hole in the fabric. Well, big is a relative term. I could probably fit my pinky through it. I put a little patch over it and called it good, though. If it had been on a project that had gone perfectly up until that point, I would have been more upset, but this shirt has so many other issues that it is low on my scale of concern.

Basically, as the shirt turned out, I will wear it, but if I am going to make the pattern again there will have to be some major changes. For one, the neck hole is too small and needs enlarged. For two, although I cut the pattern to my size given my measurements according to the chart on the back, the shoulders are about a half inch too narrow on each side, making the shirt pull and stretch oddly around the shoulders and neck. And people, my shoulders are not that broad. This is not a normal problem for me. I have had fit issues with New Look patterns in the past, only in the other direction - the pattern was way too huge for me, even on the smallest size.

I like the idea of making my own tee shirts. Tee shirts are truly a wardrobe staple for me, and I love this sort of long sleeved close fitting tee in the winter for layering. So I'm disappointed that this pattern will take so much tweaking to work (since I cut on the smallest size and can't now cut out the next size up, which might fit better). I know, I could just go out and buy a pattern from a more reliable pattern company, and eventually I might, but I will probably first try to tweak this one to work, since I'm (A) cheap and (B) get a perverse enjoyment out of making patterns work that originally did not work for me.

In case anyone is wondering, I am going along quite well with my writing, keeping up my daily page counts. :)

Sewing With Knits, Part 2

The second day of progress on this shirt (which was actually two days ago because I am lazy about blogging these things) went fairly smoothly, thanks in part to my dear husband, who oiled my sewing machine and tinkered with it so that it ran a lot smoother than before. I don't have a real "knit stitch" on my machine, so I used a narrow zig-zag and then trimmed the seam to 1/4" and overcast the raw edges together. I like the nice finished seams it made. I really want a serger for Christmas, though. Does anyone have serger recommendations?

The Shirt - Cutting Out

I started on a long sleeve tee from the teacup fabric. When I prewashed the fabric I found out why it was $1 a yard. The washing and drying made obvious the fact that the printed teacups are not on the grain. It was such a pain to cut out, since I wanted the teacup "stripes" to look sort of straight. I pinned the fabric to the carpet and laid the pieces out all weird and slanted. I couldn't for the life of me get the stripes to go evenly across a fold for the front piece, which is supposed to be cut on the fold, so I had to make a second half out of leftover tissue paper and cobble the halves together.

The pattern is a New Look pattern I've had for three or four years. My mom bought it for me while I was in Ecuador and I had just bought a sewing machine. They don't have patterns in Ecuador. All of the women who sew clothing have learned pattern drafting, which is commonly taught in what we would call vocational high schools. I didn't use the pattern, though, because I didn't want to sew with knits. Instead, I carried it back home with me after Peace Corps and it sat in a drawer. I tried to sell it on Ebay (with two other patterns) and got no takers. But finally it is coming in handy. I did lengthen the torso of the shirt by two inches, as I am not fond of lifting my arms and having my tummy on display.

It took forever, and made me really really wish I had gotten some NORMAL fabric for my first try at sewing with knits. I think this pattern would have been a snap to cut out, otherwise. Not a lot of pieces, and not a lot of notches and circles to mark. The print still turned out a little wonky, not straight across all the pieces as I had hoped. But I think it will all work out now. It's just a sort of wearable muslin, an experiment, anyway, to see how I like both the pattern and sewing with knits in general.

The best tip for cutting out knits that I got out of my Vogue Sewing book was to pin the pieces to the wrong side of the fabric and cut them out. That way they curl less. And it's true. I cut the neck piece out on the right side, and it curled like crazy. I'm not sure why that is, exactly.