Made by Rae Jade Tee

One thing Me Made May has taught me is that I need more solid colored t-shirts and layering tops.

Plum Week: Made by Rae Beatrix

Plum week continues! Today I'm sharing a plum-colored double gauze version of the Made by Rae Beatrix blouse on Imagine Gnats, but I'm talking about my wearable muslin (which also reads plum) here!

Josephine for Mom

My mom loved the last Made by Rae Josephine blouse I made her a lot, so I made her another...

Buttonless Batik Beatrix

When my mom was visiting me in Indonesia a few years ago, we went a bit crazy buying batiks for her to make a quilt. (Hilarious) evidence of our shopping spree below:

Remix the Stitch!: Ravenna Remixed

Happy Anniversary to Straight Stitch Designs!

Josephine in Lawn

Here's a Made by Rae Josephine blouse I made for my Mom. I've made Josephine for myself several times in the past. I love the pleats (pintucks?) and the wide (but not too wide) neckline and thought my mom would like it, too.

Watercolor Floral Beatrix

Oooooh, I am in love with this top I just made with the new Made by Rae Beatrix pattern!

Floral Lawn Washi

My sister really liked the last Washi top I made her, so I whipped out another one for her in this 

pretty floral lawn.

Floral Washi

When Chuck was in Bangkok we went to Sampeng Lane to do some fabric shopping... she picked out some nice floral printed cotton from Belleboo and decided it should be a Washi top.

She chose the sleeveless version with the u-shaped cut-out neckline (the "fun" neckline, as she called it), so I did some things a little different than my last Washi top (which I love and wear on the regular!):

• Last time I used bias tape on the neckline rather than facings, but with the u-shaped cut-out, I decided that following the directions and using the facings was prudent... 
• I top-stitched the facings down and sewed them to the shoulder seams to make sure they don't flap out.
• I'm still having trouble with shirring on my machine, so I decided to make internal casings for 1/4" elastic using bias tape and the pattern's shirring lines as my guide.  
• I was able to get the stripes of flowers to match up in the center of the bodice and skirt, but the pleats threw off the matching a bit. Meh.

Japanese Josephine

Since I have already given you sneak preview of my latest project in my last post, I might as well tell the full story!

After my successful wearable muslin of Made by Rae's Josephine blouse, I quickly cut out and sewed up another one, switching out the sleeves for a slightly less poofy look.

I used some cool Japanese fabric I bought in Bangkok's Chinatown (that's a mouthful of international-ness, eh?).  The selvage is labeled "kimono chintz poplin. made in Japan" and it's deep red with a really light grey... the design is stylized mountains (or maybe clouds), but occasionally when I look at it too hard, I see a certain part of the male anatomy.  This is particularly funny because when I Googled "kimono chintz poplin" to see if I could find the name of the company that manufactured the fabric, the first hit was another sewist bemoaning the fact that she saw "hot steaming piles of crap" in her kimono chintz poplin and that she couldn't unsee them. Ha! I am trying my hardest not to see the man parts in my fabric because I love the shirt.

I switched out the sleeves that came with the pattern in favor of the narrower 3/4ths sleeves from the Painted Portrait pattern.  I think they work ok... still a good deal of poof at the shoulders, but less fabric around the lower part of the arms.  A better style for me as well as a fabric saver, so win-win.  I probably could have just shortened and narrowed the Josephine sleeves, but laziness set in.

I made the same construction changes I made for my first Josephine (besides the sleeves, of course), which is to say not many: skipped elastic and bound the neckline earlier in the process.

Here's me GIFed again, because one can never have enough GIFs of oneself floating around the interwebs:

Josephine Blouse: A Wearable Muslin

I didn't jump on Made by Rae's Josephine pattern when it first came out, but for some reason this past Sunday I couldn't get it out of my head. Later that afternoon: an impulse purchase, a download, some printing, cutting and taping, a quick sew and ta-da! 

A wearable muslin Josephine blouse by evening's end.

I used some polka dot mystery fabric that Martha gave me (you might remember it from this Maggie Mae top or the lining of the plaid patchwork dress I made Zoe).  I think it's vintage stuff from her stash.  It's quite sheer (hence the camisole in these pics), very soft, and if you turn the iron on too hot it melts a little.  As such, it doesn't press very well and my pleats are not as crisp as they could be, but the shirt is really comfy to wear. 

I am really digging this pattern... it's super simple and quick to put together, but the pleats make it look really polished and professional.  It would go well with a pencil skirt or cigarette pants for work, but it could also be worn with jeans.  I can imagine it in lots of fabrics... I've got a pretty piece of batik silk from Indonesia that has Josephine written all over it!  I think perhaps next time I might go with sleeves that are slightly less... um... pirate-y. Maybe the straight 3/4th length sleeves from the Painted Portrait tunic?  

My methodology consisted of following the directions for view B with the exception of a few areas:

• I staystitched and sewed the binding on the neckline immediately after sewing the pleats and attaching the shoulders together (before sewing on the sleeves) because I didn't want the neckline to get distorted.  Also, I sewed the binding on the inside like a facing rather than have it show since I was using store-bought bias binding.
•  I basted together the side seams and tried it on without the back elastic to see if I wanted to add that feature or not...  I wasn't sure it would look good with the sheer fabric and I didn't feel it needed more shaping, so I omitted it for this version. 

As an aside, the slightly pink hue in all my photos is due to this pretty sunset in the other direction:

Pantalones!

I went on a bit of a kiddo pants-making spree this week.  Here are the results:

Made by Rae's Big Butt Baby Pants (also made here, here, here and here) in batik (same batik as my Hammer pants) with a shirt-striped butt panel for Tim's soon-to-pop colleague:

Super cute shirt-striped Big Butt Baby Pants with up-cycled (from an old, ill-fitting dress of mine) chambray ruffles on the butt... pretty freaking adorable, these guys.  The photo does not really do them justice:

And another pair of Dana Made It's Kid Pants... this time made from chambray (also upcycled from my old dress, see above), sans pockets, but with contrasting top-stitching (pink!).  Some good basic pants to have in your wardrobe.  And no, I cannot explain why they are so wrinkly, given that I had just ironed them:

Washi Tunic in Nelly

I have had Made by Rae's Washi Dress/Tunic pattern  on my to-sew list since it came out last year.  Not quite sure why I didn't buy the pattern and just make the damn thing until now, but I was so happy with the result that I wore it out approximately an hour after finishing it!

 

I sewed up the tunic version of the pattern using this beautiful fabric, Sapphire Nelly from Sis Boom's Honey Child line.  The colors in the fabric are awesome.

I made a few changes to the pattern:

 

1. I lowered the neckline so that it was even with the bottom of the Washi's U-shaped cut out. 

2. I have a facings phobia, so I skipped them and used bias tape around the neckline as a facing.

3. After wrestling with the elastic thread and my machine for a while in a failed attempt to shir the back of the tunic, I gave up and sewed a strip of fabric across the back on the inside and made 4 rows of casing for thin (1/8") elastic.

4. After making 2 muslins of Washi bodice, I decided to go one size down from what my measurements called for.  

I can't wait to make the dress version of the Washi.  Maybe I'll line the bodice to eliminate the need for facings and make the elastic casing in one go.

Little Geranium Dresses

Here are two more versions of Made by Rae's lovely Little Geranium dress pattern for newborns that I whipped up for a couple friends who've found out that they've got little girls on the way.  Not the most practical of gifts (maybe a diaper genie or something like that would be more useful), but damn cute nonetheless!

One in hand stamped batik (same as I used for one of my Ella Raglan blouses) and one in some pretty blue flowered fabric from Joann's (also used for my Pleated Playsuit last week).  Cute!