Still working on the skirt, sort of.

I haven't finished the skirt from the Nichola pants pattern yet. I altered the pattern pieces of the pants to make a skirt, and cut the skirt out, and basted it together to make sure it worked, and then I laid the skirt aside and started work on the two tee shirts.

There is a method to this madness. I have black thread in the serger now from the pants, and the skirt will need white thread, but both tees would be better with black than white. Rethreading the serger and getting the tension right is a pain, so I decided to get the shirts done now, while the black thread is on there.

I thought I'd post a blog about a technique I used to make the pocket pattern for the skirt, and to help me determine how to alter the pants pattern, though. It's called making a ruboff pattern, and you can use it to copy entire garments without unpicking the seams. I haven't been that ambitious, but I have found it useful in the limited ways I've used it.

It's similar to what you did as a kid, with paper and a crayon, to make rubbings of tombstones and stuff (Don't tell me I was the only kid wandering around making rubbings of tombstones. And less morbidly, the brass plaques on buildings.) It's also similar to how Indy made a tracing of the inscription on a tomb in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusades.

For the skirt, I wanted to add jeans-style hip pockets. My favorite khaki skirt has nice deep pockets that I wanted to copy. I turned the skirt inside out and laid it flat, then pinned an old flour-sack dish towel over the pocket and rubbed it with a black crayon over the pocket seams.

Then I cut out the rubbing and traced around it and added seam allowances to make a pattern piece. That's really all there is to it, although of course copying something that doesn't lay flat, like the crotch curve of a pair of jeans, is a little more finicky.

Adding Side Seam Pockets to a Garment Without a Waistband

I will try to explain as clearly as I can how I put the pockets into my McCall's 2016 shirt dress. I've included some quick illustrations I worked up in Paint. They are meant to be only rough approximations of the pattern shapes.

Adult pockets are pretty much one-size-fits-all. The easiest method of getting a pocket pattern piece for your pattern that does not have one is to take one from another pattern that incorporates side seam pockets. The pockets I added to one of my husband's jackets came from a woman's robe pattern. The pockets I put onto the shirt dress came from another dress.

The pattern piece should be shaped something like this :





















If it looks like the piece below, with the flattened top portion, it is meant to go into a garment with a waistband. I think you could just trace it and eliminate the top flattened portion (as the blue dotted line illustrates) with no harm done.





















To determine the correct placement of the pockets in my dress, I guestimated a little. I measured from the approximate point the underarm seam was going to hit on my body to where the a pocket would be comfortable for me. Then I folded in the bust dart in on the pattern piece and measured down the same distance, making a new notch to mark the pocket placement. To make a matching notch on the back pattern piece, I measured from the notch that the pattern company put under the armscye (for matching front and back when sewing the side seam) to the new notch I'd made, and made the new notch on the back pattern piece the same distance below the existing notch on the back pattern piece.

Cut FOUR pocket pieces. Pocket pieces are sewn to dress pieces BEFORE the side/underarm seams have been sewn.

Right sides together, match the top point of the pocket pieces with the notches you made for pocket placement. Sew at the seam line (represented by blue dots). You should end up with fabric pieces that have the general shape shown in the illustration below. Press the seams flat.





















When it is time to sew the side seams (which in the case of the McCall's 2016 dress is after the side seams of the raglan sleeves have been sewn), put right sides together, matching notches and seams as usual, and matching pockets pieces, and sew the side seam AROUND the pockets, illustrated by blue dots below. Backstitch for reinforcement at the top and bottom where you pivot to go around the pockets.





















Turn your dress inside out and press. You have pockets!

If you have a copy of the Vogue Sewing book, it also has instructions (a little more fiddly then mine), and a pocket pattern piece drawn on a grid that can be enlarged.

Patternless Fleece Hat Tutorial

Yesterday I went through several projects-worth of fleece scraps and used what I could to make winter hats. Through trial and error, I developed a nearly fool-proof way to make fleece hats using the head measurements of the person the hat is intended for. The hat is made from one rectangle of fleece. It is fairly simple, and so it is quite possible that I am not the only person who has discovered this style of hat. It would make a good gift, and can be very inexpensive depending on the fabric used. It would be a good donation to charities such as homeless shelters in the wintertime. The double layer of cloth over the ears makes it warmer and more wind-proof.

I estimate that one yard of inexpensive fleece ($3 to $10 at a discount store, or you could buy fleece blankets in good condition from a thrift store) would make up to 6 adult hats, and more than that if you were making hats for children. Once the basic style is mastered, it lends itself easily to variations such as color blocking and stripes.

If you are not confident marking the measurements directly onto your fleece and cutting, you can draw them onto newspaper and pin that paper pattern to your fabric, just as you would use a store-bought pattern.

Materials Needed: measuring tape, ruler, chalk, adequate amount of fleece for the project (a rectangle approx. 12" by 22" should be enough for most sizes), scissors, sewing machine, thread, and a hand sewing needle

Step 1: Measure around your head, or the head of the intended recipient of the hat. If you do not know their head measurement, I have found that a small adult's head is around 21 inches, and a large adult's head is around 23 inches. This measurement will henceforth be referred to as H.

Step 2: Subtract 1 from H and add 1/2 (H - 1 + 1/2). We will call this measurement W. This is the width of the fabric piece for the hat.

Step 3: Using chalk, mark out a rectangle on your fleece fabric, with a height of 12" (children's hats should have a height of 10", or the approximate distance from the center of the top of the head to the bottom of the ear, plus 2.75") and a width of W. Please ensure that W is laid across the stretchiest grain, whether crosswise or lengthwise, so that the most stretch goes around the head.

Step 4: Fold the rectangle in half right sides together. This should give you a rectangle measuring 12" by 1/2W". Using a 1/4" seam, sew along the open 12" side and one of the 1/2W sides with a straight stitch, leaving one side open. This is the head opening of the hat, the bottom hem.

Step 5: Fold up 2 and 3/4 inches along the bottom hem. Sew using a zig-zag or three-step zig-zag stitch.

Step 6: Turn the hat right side out. Now you have what is essentially a square hat. If nothing is done to shape it to the head, it will stick up like cat ears. Quit here if you like that look.

Step 7: Head shaping: Take each of the top corners and bring them together in the middle. Sew the corners together by hand with needle and thread.