Anna Maria Horner knit top

I should probably never go on the internet and look at things. Because then I get ideas and those ideas make me spend money and buy fabric.

Like these beautiful Anna Maria Horner interlock knits. I bought them from Fabric.com a few months ago after seeing something stunning AMH had made {no need to pick just one, it's like endless eye candy with her designs}. Her fabrics are so vibrant and unique, I seriously love them all. I've even bought some of her home dec fabrics so that I can frame them and hang them on the wall in the sewing room.

Which I will totally do, one of these days.

In the meantime, I stole a few hours these last few days and tried to make a shirt using my sweatshirt shoulder pieces but a t-shirt body.

I will totally wear this shirt all the time, but it's a little big around the shoulders and bust. Also, the fabric is a true interlock, so not necessarily the drapiest of fabrics. Warm and cozy and lovely, yes. Drapey, no.

I didn't have enough fabric for long sleeves, so I added a band at the bottom.

I'm really enjoying hemming with my coverstitch  machine.
It scared the crap out of me for a long time but now I think I have the hang of it.

I cut the neckband three inches shorter than the neck opening, but even that wasn't enough to avoid a little gaping. I've put some temporary tucks in place to keep it down, but I'll take it off and shorten it tonight after the kids go to bed. Speaking of kids, my son thought I should have "action" shots of me in my regular life. Enjoy.

Doing laundry.

I had to run up to my kids' school after this, and one of the moms complemented me on this shirt! I was stunned.

More laundry.

What are the odds that the grey and pink Tangle print would perfectly match my pink Frye cowboy boots? Love it. Another reason to wear these boots more often is a good thing. I've had them for at least five or six years and I never get tired of them.

Seriously, can we stop with the pictures of laundry?

Now, I must clean up the sewing room and take a work-induced break. My dog will be bummed.

I like it when my mom sews.

The envelope tunic - a tutorial

As you know now, after my husband died three years ago I took a big long break from sewing and blogging. So long, in fact, that I didn't realize people were still leaving comments on posts and asking questions!

The kind folks at Pattern Review emailed me during this time and asked if they could share my series of posts on how to construct a swimsuit? I said yes, but I wasn't sure I would be able to help much if anyone had questions as I had temporarily forgotten how to sew. They posted them anyway, and I hope they've been helpful to fellow sewers.

Anyway, one of the post comments I got in the midst of all that was a request to show how I made this envelope neckline in a tutorial. Better late than never!

The Envelope Tunic

After twisting my brain into knots to construct jeans without a pattern, I wanted to make something easy and wearable. I pulled out this striped sweater knit I think I bought on the Red Tag table at Joann's and decided a loose tunic was in order. I matched it up with a grey slub knit from Fabric.com for the neckband.

I recommend choosing two fabrics that match in their stretchiness, otherwise you may have to fight one or the other. Both of my fabrics are quite stretchy, as were the two I used in my first version lo those many years ago. I'm happy to report I finally sat back at my "new" Babylock coverstitch machine (purchased three years ago when the boys and I moved into this house and then promptly abandoned) to hem this top and it was so lovely I think I may start using it more. But I digress..

 

The Envelope Tunic - Supplies and Construction Instructions

• 2 yards of stripe knit (main body fabric). For my sample, I only had 1.75 yards, so I turned the sleeve sideways, hence the stripe running vertically instead of horizontally. I kind of like it.
• 6" of contrasting neckband fabric at least 32" wide
• 8 buttons, mine are quite large but you can play around with sizes and colors
• A serger. OK, maybe that's not exactly a must but with the fabric I used, I simply can't imagine keeping this thing together on a regular sewing machine unless I used wooly nylon, and my Bernina hates that stuff. If you've sewn stretchy jersey on your machine with no problems, then you could do this top on a regular machine.

Make your own pattern pieces with large crafting paper or freezer paper (or literally cut as you measure, like I did). The dimensions are shown in these photos for my sample, a size Large.



Front pattern piece. See my note below, you may want to cut the neckline 5-6" deep instead of 4".

Back pattern piece, total length is 27" unless you want the back a bit longer than the front, then cut it longer.

Sleeve pattern

After all your pieces are cut, fold the two neckband sections in half, wrong sides together and press with a warm iron.


Neckband sections

With right sides together, pin neckband to front section and then back section.

 

Serge or stitch the neckband to the front, then repeat this step again for the back. You will have two pieces that look like this:

*Now this is where I pinned the front and back together, pulled it on over my head and checked to see if the neckline fit in the right spot. After wearing it today, I'm convinced the neckline in front should be a least one inch lower than my pattern states, so you may want to cut the front curve deeper after trying on.*

Lay the back over the front so that the neckband overlaps completely but doesn't lap into the body of the shirt, baste to hold in place, leaving 12" opening for pulling on.

Baste the sections together, lapping the back neckband over the front neckband.

With right sides together, attach sleeves in the flat to each side. This step essentially "closes" the envelope for good.

Right sides together, sew side seams and sleeves together.

Sew buttons onto basted neckband. I placed mine 3" apart starting at the opening and working back towards the shoulder. I also considered using mismatched buttons from my grandmother's stash but I decided against it in the end.

Mismatched buttons?

I'm very lucky to have a sewing machine that has a button attachment presser foot, so sewing on 8 buttons takes no time at all.

Hem the bottom and sleeves and wear it!

You see this stash? This is why I should not step foot into a fabric store again.

Cargo skinnies - Cabi
Cowboy boots - Frye Carson

Let me know if you have any questions about the construction or want to share your own version, I would love to see them!

Freezing cold + super strong wind = not a good day for photo shoot.

Very hard to take a selfie of your shoulder!

This top only took a couple hours from start to finish, and I had a lot of fun sifting through my grandma's old buttons. She passed away twelve years ago, and I inherited her sewing supplies and machine (a Bernina). She and I both used to share a fondness for Molnlycke thread. They've since been discontinued, apparently Coats and Clark bought the company and then closed it! Can you believe that? Probably because they had a far superior product. I still use those threads today and after all this time they are still so much better than C+C, which I try never to buy unless I'm desperate.

Metrosene and Gutermann are nice, but I'll probably pine away for Molnlycke for a long time.




Molnlycke thread and my grandma's buttons

I make things I don't need

I don't know why I don't just change the name of this blog. Any number of titles would be more appropriate than Featherty Sews.

• I Make Things I Don't Need
• Sewing With Attention Deficit Disorder {I'm not sure I actually have that, but it feels like it when I step into the sewing room.}
• I Should be Cleaning {or substitute Cooking, Working, Exercising, Reading...}
• How to Make a Wadder

Case in point - I made jeans. Because I need more jeans like I need more pajama bottoms, that's what I decided to make the other day.

And did I follow a commercial pattern with easy to read instructions, you ask?

No. I decided to take a pair of pull-on skinny jeans I bought off the Home Shopping Network last year, cut them up, make changes to the fit and details, and sew a pair myself with no instructions. Because I have no time and a million other things I should be doing.

I believe this is a sickness.

Anyway, here's the story.  For my real job, I cover a vast territory - Missouri, Arkansas, Oklahoma and New Mexico. Last week I spent a few days in Oklahoma and found myself in the Joann's in Tulsa before I was due to be back at the airport. They had a lovely little piece of animal print stretch denim on the remnant table that somehow reminded me of these jeans made by Elke of Pulsinchen. I love foreign bloggers, even if I don't understand a word they're writing and Google Translate is only moderately helpful. My only wish is that they would share more info on where they buy their shoes. They all have fabulous boots.

Anyway, I got the denim for $8, stuffed it into my carry-on and flew home to hug my kids. After I washed it, a lot of the animal print was worn off - total bummer, but sometimes I think you can still see the hide?

A few days later, I pulled out the cut-up pieces of those skinny jeans I've had for a while now. The price was great ($20!) but the pockets were so small they made my butt look enormous. Plus, they were way too short, but that's something at my height I'm used to. And then while the fit was OK for the price, the crotch seam hung a little too low for my comfort and the calves were very tight.

The piece of denim was only 1 5/8 yards, which was a little short to make a pair of jeans, but I managed to make it work. The waistband is pieced together in sections, although with the elastic on the inside I can't feel it. I considered removing the denim waistband and replacing it with a knit yoga-style waistband but those remind me of maternity jeans so I opted to leave it alone for now.


You can see the pieced seams in this picture, and a little bit of the hide print, too.

I wanted them to be pull-on, with a faux-fly front but no actual zipper. Most of the tops I wear are long enough to cover the tops of my jeans (or longer) so I am not worried about my make-do waistband showing at all.

If my belly is showing, I have bigger problems.

Wow, look at all those lines! I am thinking of taking the inseam out a little to make them less tight, we'll see if that fixes the lines. To be fair, my RTW jeans do the same thing.

I used a pair of my own Hudson jeans to copy the pocket design and size, and made sure the placement wasn't too high. When pockets are high on me it makes my butt look like it's sagging way down. I found the jeans buttons at Joann's for another $2 and they were surprisingly easy to install. I only wish I could find rivets for the pocket corners.

I like the finished product, but I do wish the animal hide showed up more. Also, in hindsight I think I would have gone with a simpler pocket since the pattern of the denim is the focal point.

The fit changes I made, in no particular order -

• I cut the pieces with 1" seam allowances to make adjustments to the legs as needed. In the end, I sewed  1" SA up by the waist and tapered down to 5/8" at the knee break. 
• After the knee break my ready-to-wear jeans all tend to be a tad tight, so I kept the 5/8" SA on the outside seam but eased out to 1/2" SA on the inside seam. I also measured to be sure my knee break was in the correct spot, which I've had trouble with before.
• For the crotch curve, I raised the crotch stitching line higher in the SA from about midway down the pockets through to the front where the "zipper" would be. This creates a bit more "curviness" to the bum area and less of a flat-butt effect.
• The waistband is simply turned down and top-stitched, then elastic zig-zagged onto the inside to hold them up. They're already plenty tight, but it's for added security. I left off the belt loops on this version.

No belt loops, but so far they haven't fallen down.

At the very end, I pulled a classic Heather move and cut off a bit too much of the excess length before hemming. Yes, that's right friends, one of the reasons I decided to slash up my original pair was they were too short. And I carelessly cut these pants that I labored over for hours too short.  BIG SIGH.

Oh, well, live and learn. I already have a new piece of stretch velveteen ready to go for a different pair that will hopefully not get slashed to bits by my own hands.  Wish me luck.

Sweater - Evereve cashmere cardigan
Boots - Lucky Brand I found at TJMaxx a few weeks ago