In a rare burst of motivation I came up with some ideas for regular posts. The first one will be a pattern hack, variation or mashup on patterns that I currently own. I"m hoping to post bi-weekly (I say hoping, because I'm horrible at keeping schedules set by myself). These posts will feature patterns of various indie designers, and tutorials on how to change up their look.
The second monthly post will be an up-cycle post using patterns that I own. I'll be digging through my closet, my husbands closet, and thrift stores, to find items that have unique features or fabric to up-cycle into something wearable for either my daughters or myself.
I"m really hoping to revamp my blog this year, and take it more seriously. Other posts that will be posted in between will include pattern reviews of any new patterns I've purchased, and posts on fitting a petite, short waist-long torso (meaning high hips), spoon body shape. I've noticed there isn't many bloggers with that body shape, but there seem to be a lot of sewists that identify with it.
If there's something specific that you'd like to see, and haven't found it elsewhere (or it hasn't been satisfactory elsewhere) just let me know, and I'll see if I can address it.
Now that I've babbled for awhile, onto the post of this week! I've had the Layer Me Up from Patterns for Pirates for a while, and I really like it, but I had an idea of dressing it up a bit by making the sleeve with more drape, and making it in a poly-lycra. I had a meter of black and white polka dot poly-lycra that I felt was a perfect fit. If you don't have this pattern, but have one similar it should work, although the sleeve might look slightly different. When in doubt, MUSLIN!
I began first with making prepping my sleeve pattern. I already had the shirt printed, and taped. I also had already made my fit modifications to it, shortening the armscye and sleeve cap to fit my petite upper body.
I traced around the sleeve pattern onto some heavy duty freezer paper, and shortened the sleeve to one inch long along the seam. To make it a flutter sleeve, instead of fitted, I needed to add some fullness. I did this using the slash and spread method. I drew the cut lines one inch apart, beginning from the center fold. I cut along each line, starting at the bottom of the sleeve, but only cutting up to the seam allowance, which I had measured and marked.
Then I got a fresh piece of freezer paper, and lined up edge sleeve with the edge of the paper, shifting the sleeve so that the top corner touched the edge of the freezer paper, and the bottom corner is half an inch away. Then just shift each piece so that there is a half inch gap at between bottom corners.
Your final sleeve piece should look like this.
I measured the the length of the sleeve cap along the curved edge from the center to the bottom of the curve, and my modified sleeve was 1/4 inch longer, so I just shaved that off from the center. If you want more fullness, just spread the pieces further apart, and remember to take off any extra length on the sleeve cap from the center.
That's all there is too it. Now just sew up as per pattern. I choose not to hem my sleeves, mostly because my serger wouldn't cooperate on a rolled hem, but you can hem them however you prefer to hem curved edges.
I'm really happy with how it turned out, and I can't wait to come up with more hacks for this pattern and other patterns that I own.
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