Pajamapalooza!

This is a four for the price of one post. A month back Sydney did its usual mid-Autumn thing and switched to cold nights. All my old winter pajamas were well and truly falling apart, so I really had to hurry up and make some new long-sleeve PJs. And so here is most of what I've done in the last month. Three pairs of pajamas and one dressing gown, all the sleepwear I need to get me through the cold months and the spring. As with my Sari Pajamas I've used Closet Case Files' Carolyn Pajamas pattern.

So I'll write about the PJs in the order I made them. First up were the long sleeve sari pajamas. I loved the luxurious look and feel of my short sleeve version, and had an enormous amount of fabric left over so had already decided to make these before even finishing the short version. The weight of the fabric also means they're trans-seasonal, so I thought making them first would mean I had a bit more time before I needed to make warm ones, but the weather had different ideas about that. Anyway. The only real difference, and I did this for all three pairs, was I left out the collar interfacing. The collar maybe doesn't look as nice, but I prefer the softer feel. Other than that, this pair again has french seams, and again I used the fancy embroidered selvedge in place of added cuffs on the sleeves and pants - it gives the exact same effect, and also means no need to hem!

When I was looking for flannelette for winter pajamas I decided to try and look for more muted, classic prints. So obviously I bought rainbow striped fabric with polka dots. It's very grown up fabric. Anyway, this pair I had a lot of dramas with. Starting with being an idiot and not checking how much fabric I needed and buying too little. The stripes being horizontal for the top's front and back and vertical for the sleeves and pants was not part of the original plan, but it was the only way I could get the pattern pieces to fit. And even then I couldn't get the pants pieces on properly so they have wide cuffs. You can see that the print doesn't match up for the bottom 6 inches. And I had to use a contrast fabric in black cotton for the waistband, pockets, collar, and facings. And I managed to screw up sewing these, putting the first pocket in incorrectly THREE TIMES! My brain obviously needed a break from sewing pajamas, so I made the spotted shift dress before embarking on my final pajamas.

For this last pair I managed to buy a less garish fabric and get the right amount of it! So it was doing better than the previous ones right off. I decided this time to leave off the collar, and just have a rounded neckline. So I made a back facing to go in place of the collar, and slightly reshaped the neckline to be a curved v neck. I did make one error, accidentally putting the buttonholes on the wrong side, but that's a minor problem. I also squared off the top for the two flannelette pairs, because it was easier than doing a curvet hem on the thicker fabric.

And last but not least, the dressing gown. I made this after the long sleeve sari pajamas and before the flannelette pairs, because we had some big storms come through and it was horribly cold and this was the quickest thing to make. The whole thing was made in a few hours, and then I could be cosy inside while it rained for three days straight. I didn't use a pattern for this, instead I based it off a summer weight cotton kimono I bought in Japan a few years back. It's very simple, two rectangles for sleeves, trapeziums for the back and two fronts, and giant pockets. I then used some of the leftover for a shawl-ish edge/collar (I'm sure there's a proper name for that bit) to give it a finished look and also to be nice and warm around the neck.

So I think I'm done with sewing pajamas for the time being. I do love the Carolyn pattern because it is easy to make and looks great, but I'm looking forward to doing some different projects now!

The Carolyn Sari Pajamas

Almost all of my pajamas have either fallen apart or are on their very last legs, so when Heather Lou of Closet Case Files released her Carolyn Pajamas pattern recently it was perfect timing. And when she decided to have a pajama party in early March it was a good motivator to actually get them made quickly!

The pattern is very much a classic style of pajamas, and are very timeless and well designed. They also have pockets in the shorts! The pattern had a breast pocket, too, but I decided to leave that off this time, and I only put four buttons on the top instead of five because I only had four of the buttons I used. The fit is relatively slim for pajamas, so they look quite elegant, although if you're a person who prefers loose fitting PJs you'd probably be best to go up a size, especially on the shorts.

The fabric I used is actually a sari, which was given to me by a friend who knows how much I love to sew. She sews a bit too, and had been given the sari. but couldn't work out what to do with it. I didn't have any ideas either, because while it's a beautiful teal colour the fabric is a little thin so might not be the best for clothing. But when I saw the Carolyn pattern, I thought this would be perfect for it.


I made use of the embroidered edges of the sari for the cuffs of the shorts and sleeves. This meant adjusting the pattern slightly, by extending the length of both the shorts and sleeves so that the embroidered section formed the main part of both. I cut the sleeve just slightly too short, though, and ended up sewing some of the embroidery into the armscye rather than having it start just below, but that's a minor detail.

Because the sari fabric frays like crazy, I used french seams throughout. I found they helped the sleeves to set in better, which was great because I normally hate setting in sleeves (if a genie gave me three wishes setting in sleeves perfectly first time every time would be one of my wishes). I also hand finished the facings so that there wouldn't be visible stitching lines.


I had one hitch when making these - I discovered I had no elastic for the waistband! I also didn't have time to go searching for some, so I looked at what I could find when I had to go to the supermarket. Because it was a small supermarket they only had 6mm elastic.But Heather Lou had posted about different waistband finishes, including multi-channel elastic and waistband frills, so I decided to try out both with my narrow elastic. The picture on the right shows my double channel elastic waistband with top frill (as well as a close-up of the embroidery detail), which I actually really like and will probably do again. It's great when an error turns into a feature.

Overall, I really liked both the pattern and the final result. The instructions were nice and clear, the construction very smooth. Even with doing french seams, the pattern was very quick to make. This time I only made the shortsleeve and shorts version, but there's also long sleeve and long pants, which I plan to make as well with more of my sari fabric. But it's still very warm weather here even though Autumn has started, so I've probably got a bit of time before I need long-sleeve PJs.