50s Pink Lady

Halloween is upon us and my friends are having a party at their house this weekend.  i was told to bring myself and a costume.  at first i said i probably wouldn't have a costume because i had already used up my other costume ideas: 2 yrs ago i was a hippie and last year i wore my poodle skirt.  so i got to thinkin'.  i love the 50s and 60s, so what can i do?  then it came to me!  i can be one of the Pink Ladies, from Grease.  i figured: i have the saddle shoes, i have the black skinny jeans, and i have the hair scarf.  it was a no brainer!

so i went out and bought some light pink satin when it was on sale at Jo-Ann and some black ribbing for the collar and waistband and black knit cuffs.  for the jacket, i used them same pattern from the footed pajamas, but took the kid's size large and just shortened it.  i added the knit cuffs and made a waistband and collar from the knit ribbing, which i ordered from Jo-Ann, and voila i had my jacket.

to finish up the costume i did a simple appliqué on the back of the jacket.  since it was just me being a Pink Lady i decided to do Pink Lady instead of Pink Ladies.  now if you were going out with a group of friends it would be fun to have them all say Pink Ladies.  for my appliqué i simply printed the words from a word doc, traced it onto the fusible Pellon interfacing, ironed it onto my cotton fabric, cut them out, and ironed them onto my jacket.

i must say I'm pretty excited about how it turned out...especially since i made it up as i was going along!

Time To Represent!

so now that i'm back in college, i felt it was necessary to start wearing clothing representing O'More College of Design.  i have plenty of sweatshirts from MTSU and have to end up wearing those instead of an O'More one.

here's a few fun facts about O'More:
>it's only a design college so there are only 3 majors: fashion design, interior design, and graphic design
>it was the original house of Mrs. Eloise Pitts O'More
>there are no more than abt 300 students

so with the campus being as small as it is, there is no big bookstore that sells tons of college apparel.  so, i've decided to start customizing my own pieces.  my first piece, a sweatshirt of course!

 i bought this basic sweatshirt at Kohl's, since it's on sale, to spruce up.

 and here is the final result! love it!

to make my letters i typed it into a word doc, blew up the letters, and printed them out in reverse.  i then took some pellon fusible interfacing, the kind that has paper on one side so it is fusible on both sides, and placed my letters under it to trace them.  once my letters were traced i ironed the interfacing to my fabric scrap.  then you can cut your letters out of your fabric.  once you have the letters find the placement you want on your garment, take the paper backing off each letter and iron them down.  after that i did a simple zig-zag stitch to make it more decorative and prevent fraying.  and voila!  this was actually very easy to do and i can't wait to appliqué more pieces.

i also used the tutorial from Sew Sara to figure out how to appliqué correctly and get around those corners and curves.

Pajama Party!

so this past weekend my mom and i went up to my aunt's house in KY for the annual girls' weekend the ladies on my mom's side of the family has started.  as part of the weekend there was a pajama party planned.  this got me excited because, well being the sewer i am, i already knew i was going to make mine.  my mom even suggested at one point that i make hers too...well that didn't end up happening.

so any who, i started thinking up what i wanted to do for my pajamas.  i first bought a pattern to make some shorts, or pants, and a top.  well that was just too boring for me.  so what did i do?  i went out a bought a pattern for a fleece jumpsuit when it was on sale for $.99 at Hobby Lobby!

i had always wanted some footed pajamas and this was my chance to get some!!  i wanted footed pajamas, and as you can see these don't have feet.  so i figured out a way to add some feet.  the way i did my feet was complicated, but i'll show ya how i did them, and hopefully i can come up with a more simplified process.

to start, i measured the top length of my foot and bottom length of my foot to see how long the pieces needed to be.

then i placed the pattern pieces for the front and back of the pajamas along the edge of my fleece.  i did this so the foot pieces would be the same width as the leg opening.  i drew the shape i wanted the foot piece to be and cut it out.  repeat for the bottom foot pieces, but for the bottom pieces i cut them longer so it would curve up behind my foot.

once the pieces were cut i sewed them together, wrong sides together.  but since the bottom piece is longer i sewed 5/8" down from the top on both sides, then bunched the fabric on both sides and sew the rest of the foot together around to the other point.  when it's finished i ended up with point like in the picture below.  that is where the fabric will curve around my foot.

next is attaching the foot to the leg.  to do this i turned the foot piece right side out, while the leg was turned inside out.  sew all the way around.

now, you need to make the casing for the elastic...and this is where it got complicated.  basically i had to shove the arm of my sewing machine into the leg to sew the seam allowance down to the leg pieces, but this made the fabric gather up on my machine and it was hard to keep turning it.  but i managed and made the casing, leaving an opening at one point for the elastic to go in.

once i had the casing i inserted the elastic, but that was complicated too b/c my casing wasn't wide enough.  so it took me FOREVER to get the elastic in!  but eventually i got it. and ta-da!  my feet were finished!

to prevent me from slipping when walking on smooth floors i took some paint and drew peace signs on the bottoms of the feet for grippers.

now my footed pajamas were complete!  and i love how they turned out.  next time i need to come up with a more simplified way to make and attach the feet...anytime i see footed pajamas i look at the feet to see how they are done so i will know how to do them.

a couple other changes i made were placing the pockets on the front instead of the sides of the legs and making them a split kangaroo pocket.  i also changed the shape of the hood slightly so i didn't look like a gnome.

The Basic Skirt

hello all my wonderful readers!  i know, it's been a while since i last visited with y'all...but of course y'all know that's because I'm staying busy with school.  i'm taking four classes this semester: Design Fundamentals 1 and Basic Drawing (which are basically just art classes, b/c all we do is draw), Intro to Fashion, and Clothing Construction 1.  i have to say that Clothing Construction is my favorite!...but of course, right! in the class we have three projects to do: a skirt, a pair of pants, and a jacket.  we've turned in one project so far, the skirt...and it was easy peasy.

McCall's 3341

the only requirements for the skirt were that it had no waistband, had darts, and then we did an invisible zipper and blind hem.  this was my first time ever doing a blind hem!  i never attempted a blind hem b/c it always looked too complicated...boy was i wrong!  it's so stinkin' easy...especially when your machine does all the work for you!  now that the skirt is finished, it's on to pants!  which, by the way, i'm going to make some red stretch denim jeans!

the finished product

blind hem