Cosy Wool Poncho Jumper

This is a very cosy lazy top. It's from the December 2016 issue of Burdastyle magazine and is described as an oversized pullover. The pattern is somewhere between a poncho and a jumper or even a snuggie, but with an elasticated waist.

the fanric is a $12 a metre bright cream hacci knit (I believe that's what it's called, it looks like a knitted jumper) from My Hung in Hurstville and is suprisingly warm for its weight. It's 70% wool and 30% poly, and is warm but soft to the touch and not itchy like wool can sometimes be. It drapes well, but still has a bit of body.

This pattern uses a lot of fabric. There are only three pieces - two front and one back - but each piece is wide, with a very long funnel neck. The pieces are too wide to be able to lay side by side on folded fabric, so I had to buy 2 metres of fabric to fit the pieces on. Unfortunately that means there is a reasonable amount of fabric wastage, with so big but awkwardly shaped scraps.

In the magazine there were two different versions of this pattern: this short elastic waist version, and a longer tunic-style version which has a curved high-low hem. I decided to cut out the longer version out, figuring I could always shorten it if it didn't lookright long. While it was very cosy longer, it didn't look right in this fabric, especially with the large neck.  So I folded the top flat along the centre front seam and cut the hem level.

The pattern sews together very easily. It is pretty straightforward, with the centre, shoulder and side seams all just straight lines. The neck is folded under and then stitched which I  initially tried to do with a machine zigzag stitch, but it got caught into the bobbin thread. So instead it is hand stitched in place which took longer, but isn't visible. For the waistband I decided to sew the elastic in directly to the waistband rather than inserting it into the already sewn hem. It requires a bit more care, but ends up cleaner and neater. I made the sleeve openings about 15cm wide, so the top rises slightly if I lift my arms up, but the volume of the top means it largely stays in place.

This top is wonderfully comfortable, and is definitely going to get a lot of wear for many years. It's simple and a lazy wear but still looks put together, and although light, it's also warm. I think it's going to be a great addition to my winter wardrobe.

Merino Jersey Dress

The pattern is from the burdastyle magazine of June last year. It is pattern 101 C, jersey mini dress. Being a northern hemisphere magazine the dress is meant to be a summer dress, but it's winter down here so my version is a cool weather version.

The fabric is a midweight merino from The Fabric Store. The fabric store has an amazing range of New Zealand merino, but I've been quite daunted about using merino because it's high quality and pretty expensive so I didn't want to ruin it. But the colours of this fabric were just too much to resist. The various blues are very vibrant and stood out from the rest in the store, so it came home with me.

In the end, the merino was extremely easy to sew with. It was very easy to cut and glided through my machine. There are only four pieces to it, two of the bodice/sleeves and two of the skirt/body. I lengthened both the sleeves and the skirt to make it a bit more cold weather appropriate. I also cut the front neckline just slightly more scooped so that I can identify the front from the back. I didn't want to make it too long because that might be too heavy and frumpy, but I think the length I chose works about right.

The dress is very comfortable to wear. It's a bit secret pyjamas, feeling much lazier and cosier than it looks. It's very easy to just throw on and wear at home, but a nice enough fabric and good enough cut that it's more than appropriate to wear out and about.

 I'm very happy with this dress. And I don't think I'll be so scared of using merino again, it really was a pleasure to use and it's such a nice fabric to wear.

Slashed Sleeve Top and Casual Pants

Sometimes I decide I need to make more 'normal' clothes, without over-the-top colours. It is useful to have some basic casual clothes in your wardrobe, and what's more simple and casual than dark grey pants and a fairly neutral colour top? So these two items are an attempt at simple and casual.

Observe the lovely weeds I chose to stand next to

 The pants are Burda young 7050, which have a fitted waist and thigh and then flared lower leg. I always find Burda patterns pretty easy to follow, except for the instructions on how to sew the fly, I avoid making pants because the instructions for the fly are always confusing.  Does anyone have and good tutorials on how to do them? Please leave me any recommendations if you do, then I might not be so scared of making pants. 


Having short legs I had to cut off about two inches of fabric from the pattern's original length. The original pattern was long enough that I could have stood right on my toes and the hem would still scrape the ground, so just a little bit
too long!

The fabric is just a simple dark grey cotton drill I bought from a small fabric, rug, and slippers shop (strange mix!) in Benalla in rural Victoria. I was doing fieldwork for uni in the town, and found the shop during a free afternoon at the end of my week. Even luckier, the owner had decided to stop selling fabric in the future because it wasn't making him enough money, so to get rid of what he had left, he was selling it all for $5 a metre. I probably bought more than was sensible.


Unfortunately I forgot to photograph the blue and white striped with strawberries fabric I used for the pockets. 

For the top, I used a fabric I bought on sale at Tessuti. It's a soft apricot and mauve striped-ish cotton elastane jersey, so it has some colour and a nice but not overwhelming print.

I wanted the top to be a bit loose but not big, and long enough that it covered my waistband, ending pretty much on the top of the hip bone. I made this without any pattern, and really without all that much of a plan, just a picture in my head of how it was meant to look. The basics of it are very simple, just two big rectangles for the main part of the top and two smaller rectangles for the sleeves. The sleeves themselves, though, were a bit fiddly.


I've seen slashed backs and sleeves on tops and dresses for a while, and decided to try it out on the sleeves of this. I probably should have planned what I wanted better, but I just grabbed my scissors and cut. Trying to sew the edges of seven bands on each sleeve was tedious, and dealing with all the thread ends even worse! I also stitched the middle of each band together so that they'd stay sleeves and not all fall off my shoulders completely.

So while both of these were meant to be more normal, they weren't completely simple to make. Some day I'll learn how to do a fly properly, and some day I won't do overly fiddly things like these sleeves.

Technicolour Sheath Dress

I'm a big fan of colour, so when I saw this fabric at Spotlight I had to buy it. The rainbow tesselated triangles were just too much fun to pass up. Of course, given how bright the fabric is I had to find the right pattern so it wouldn't be completely overwhelming - something fitted, something simple. I've been using Burda Style for years, so when they had a pattern sale late last year I had a look to see whether there were any good patterns and found this, the Scuba Dress. 

Normally I'm not a big fan of print at home patterns because they're a bit annoying to use, taking so much paper (I think this pattern was more than 40 pages) but the pattern was just what I'd been looking for to use this fabric. I think I used half a roll of sticky tape just putting the pattern pieces together! 

The pattern has curved seams on the front inset piece, and curved darts in the back. I cut the two side front pieces the opposite direction to the front insert and back pieces, to subtly accentuate the seams. Because the pattern isn't solid stripes but coloured triangles mixed together, the differing lines/colours complement, rather than clash each other.

The pattern is a petite size, and the length was just perfect, finishing just above the knee. But I have a long torso and short legs, so had to do some adjustments to the bodice. It fit well to just above the waist, but then expanded out for the hips almost two inches above my actual hips, with a lot of loose fabric at the lower back. So after some trial and error with the back darts I managed to fix it up.

To match the bright fabric, I used a neon lemon-lime Mettler poly-sheen thread, seen on the left in the stitching for the neck and arm facings, and also a few millimetres from the seam of the front panel, as well as on the hem and the zipper. I'm not a big fan of visible stitching unless it's going to work as an accent to the piece, but hiding thread was always going to be too hard with this fabric. Given the fabric is so bright, I thought the brightest thread possible was the best choice for any visible stitching. 

This close-up photo also gives a better view of the actual fabric print, and how multicoloured it actually is, with different colours of triangles contained within each row. You can also see how the front inset and side front pieces work, and how the fabric is reversed on the side front pieces compared to the inset.

It's probably not surprising that this dress is fairly tight, given how fitted it is. But it's not only due to the cut being fitted, it's also because the fabric I chose to use isn't really the right fabric for the pattern. The pattern specified it was only for stretch fabrics, but I like to ignore those sorts of instructions. This fabric isn't completely stiff, but it's definitely not stretch! Still, it worked out in the end, although I can't move my legs too far apart or bend down all that easily in this! But that's ok, I'm happy with how it turned out.