Jacket Update

First muslin of my jacket and I was ready to trash it and look for something else.  Claire Kennedy  to the rescue.  She made some suggestions and I altered the pattern to eliminate both the welt pocket and the fact that the lower side is not attached and stands away from the body and is just not flattering or practical.  I altered the jacket to one, enable me to attach the curves to the jacket side and only leave an opening for a small pocket in the front curved seam.  Good for a lipstick or tissue or just interest.  I have actually never made a pocket like this in a seam so I have to look for some instructions, though I think I know what to do. I loved how the front fit, so it made it worth doing more alterations to the jacket and I am ready to make another muslin.

I love the fabric I bought and I am waiting for some 4 ply silk crepe samples for the pants.  Not making the pattern pants, but I am going to take my tnt pattern and widen the legs a lot to give a full pant.  For those of you who have forgotten what I am sewing, after all it's been awhile, here it is again.  I like the width of these pants, but not the pleated front.  Maybe I'll make them a little narrower because I cannot wear much of a heel.

I found this really nice silk and metallic fabric from Marcy Tilton for the jacket.  I like the face of the fabric on the left, though either is probably ok.  The picture on the right has some silk charmeuse of the color I am looking for in 4 ply silk crepe.  In real life both fabrics are cooler. 

By the way, I ordered my samples from Mood's online site and guess what?  They have finally fixed it and it no longer acts like you are using dial up instead of the very nice fast dsl line that I use.   I can now recommend their site; especially for dyed to match silks in all types and lots of
colors.  They should be here today.  or tomorrow.

Living With Pain

Lots of people live with pain for a variety of reasons.  When your doctors can't figure out why you are in pain it's even worse.  Right before my plantar fasciatis got bad I went to my doctor complaining about lower abdominal pain severe enough to finally come in.  This was last June.  She sent me to a gastroenterologist who proceeded to perform numerous tests and found nothing.  He sent me to my gynecologist who looked at all my tests and she said,  you're post menopausal so it's not gynecological.  Lose weight.  Well, yeah I want to lose weight  but I was more interested finding out why I was in pain, by then it had been months.  Good news, you don't have cancer, but we don't know what's wrong with you.  I left depressed and  angry with her attitude.  At this point I decided to go back to my primary care physician and asked her to look globally at my pain and  lack of other  symptoms and see if she could look beyond what the specialists had looked at.  My pain is very close to the surface when palpated.  She thought about it and decided to send me to a woman who specializes in woman's urology  at Stony Brook Hospital.  It took several months to get an appointment with her but it turned out that she actually had a diagnosis and a treatment. She sees lots of women with this problem.  That was in December.  She was wonderful, one of those doctors who actually listen and pay attention to what you are saying.  I don't know that there is a medical name but she said that I have what's known as pelvic pain and  mine is muscular.  There are several other causes.

But, getting treatment turned out not to be so easy.  The two very specialized physical therapists she refers  did not take my insurance.  I could only find someone who could do external pt and the low dose valium I was taking  which was  working turned out to turn me into a zombie.  I couldn't focus and couldn't stay awake in the evening and had trouble waking up.  I didn't feel safe driving so I stopped taking it and called the office.  She prescribed  a larger dose to be taken internally once a day.  I won't go into details, but the generic form wouldn't dissolve.  The insurance company wouldn't pay for the brand name which does dissolve.  $100 for a drug that's been around for how long?  I am still waiting for their decision on whether they will  cover it.  Oh, and by the way during this we changed insurance companies and the recommended therapist takes the new insurance.   So for the last 2 weeks I've been finally doing the therapy my doctor recommended.  It's painful and exhausting and time consuming especially since the office is 30 minutes away.  Hopefully it will also work.

I decided to write about this because there must be other women who have the same problem and haven't found a diagnosis either.   My physical therapist said that her boss is working with a doctor doing research on this.  It's not rare, but the doctors I went to weren't aware of it.  There are medical centers where all your doctors are in one place and actually talk to each other.  If that had been my experience I doubt it would have taken 6 months to get a diagnosis. 

The Moulage a la Kenneth King

Yesterday was the third and last session of my moulage class with Kenneth King.   It was a success; I now have a moulage and a set of slopers to work with to fit garments for myself.  Beyond that it was a pleasure to take a class with him.  He is a wonderful teacher and generous with his knowledge and a great raconteur.  Those extra little details on sewing and fit that I got from him were invaluable to my future sewing.  I wish that Alex was around so that I could make a moulage for her.

We were 10 women and we paired up for taking measurements. Both my partner and I must have done a good job measuring because her muslin needed no adjustments and mine needed adjustment for my low shoulder, we had measured my high side,  and a little taking in at my high hip which has been a challenge to fit over the years.  He was very hands on in this class, going around to each of us with infinite patience so that we got it right and answering any questions we had.  He took our muslins and marked the changes and transferred  them to  our moulage patterns.  Some women needed their side seams straightened out as they were pulling to the back or front  Very much like Claire Kennedy did for me when I was fitting my pants.  That side seam needs to be straight and perpendicular to the floor, not just for fit, but for a flattering fit.  I was thrilled and sort of amazed at how close the fit really was for me; my body is certainly no where near that perfect fitting model size.  It was also  interesting to see all the variations in our patterns.  No wonder it's so hard to get rtw to fit!

Today I sewed the right shoulder lower, and adjusted the high hip on my muslin so that I could put it on my dress form and adjust it to the moulage. I have one of those duct tape dress forms. I needed to pad out the shoulders a bit and I have to do some surgery on the arms.  They are causing some wrinkling on the back, but other wise it fits pretty well.  My next project is to draft sleeves for my moulage from KK's basic sleeve book.  We took the necessary measurements to draft sleeves to fit our moulage's in class.  Pattern review has all his cd's and if you are a member you get a 10% discount. They also have Linda Maynard's Demystifying Fit cd that he recommends for using with  your slopers to fit commercial patterns.  I ordered it this morning. 

 You can see the wrinkles on the back right shoulder where I need to do some surgery on my form.  Other than that I might  actually be able to  drape garments and pin fit to my shape with less time and   trouble. You can also see that my dress form narrows at the bottom.  My moulage also looked like that , but Kenneth suggested I straighten it out for a more flattering fit, which is why the muslin looks big at the bottom.   Trust your common sense and your instincts when it comes to fitting.
KK says that he can measure and draft a moulage and set of slopers in about an hour!

If you have the opportunity to  take a class with Kenneth, by all means do so.  It was worth every penny and while it was hard work, it was also fun and rewarding.

I haven't been doing any sewing since I finished my coat.  Lots of things going on.  But taking Kenneth's class has certainly inspired me to get back to the sewing room so I look forward to some good clothing coming out of that room!  Now that I've taken the class I will be making a muslin of the Miyake jacket and then, if I like it I'll be taking a trip into the city to look for fabric.
Happy sewing.

My Image Magazine

 Update:  I got an email this morning from Sew Baby that they finally received their shipment of My Image. If you are interested in buying a copy click on the link above.

I have been hearing about this magazine since it first came out.  I wasn't impressed enough with the first issue to buy it, but Melissa at Fehrtrade reviewed the spring summer issues and put up links to their website and where to buy it, and I was hooked.  You can even buy it in the US for a reasonable amount of money. She also has links to buying it in Australia and from the magazine site.
There are at least 4 things I want to make in this issue, so again at $8,95 plus reasonable shipping it was worth the price.  A lot of prints but the styles themselves look very wearable.   I like the fact that most of them have good design lines for fitting that make them very appropriate for curvy women, aka moi.   I have too many knits in my stash but there's a great dress that I could make and live in this summer.  More than once.
I cannot figure out how to get images of the pages I like show up here, but here's a link to the  My Image website which is better than any of the other pattern magazines out there.  Go take a look.

I Am a Food Snob

I have pretty high standards for the food I am willing to eat.  I am not picky per se as I like almost all food, though it has to be lactose free these days. But it has to be worth eating.  Before we had dietary issues we always ate a wide variety of foods and fast food was not on the menu except for the occasional  pizza and some take out Chinese.  The only time either child ate fast food like Mc Donald's it had to do with some team sports activity.  Certainly it didn't come into our home.  I cook from scratch and was a really good baker in the pre gluten free days.  Like many families, birthday meals were chosen by the one whose birthday it was.  That included desert of course made by me.  Josh and Seth generally chose chocolate pecan pie and Alex's favorite was cheese cake.  Before lactose intolerance of course. Josh, my older child is an excellent cook.

It amuses me no end, that Alex who while she knew how to cook was not willing to cook for herself.  She'd occasionally have friends to dinner her senior year and she'd cook, but knowing that she wouldn't feed herself we insisted she take the meal plan at least during the week even though she had a kitchen.  In Korea she ate out or had take out most nights.  Food was cheap so why cook?  Now that she's engaged and living in Austin where eating out costs much more than it did in Korea she is cooking.  Her cousin Simon sent her two cookbooks and after consulting her older brother she asked for The Joy of Cooking which we sent  her.  She also calls her food consultant, namely her mother.  Having grown up with food being cooked from scratch and of a pretty high order, she finds that she has much higher standards for food than her fiance.  It was his birthday this week and what did he want for desert?  Cherry pie.  So Alex made him a cherry pie.  He said oh just buy ready made crust. Alex said, of course not I'll make it.  Of course the ready made stuff is probably not lactose free. She used canned cherries in juice, fine it's not cherry season after all.  He said you mean you didn't just buy canned filling?  Incredulous, she said of course not! That's the easy part of a pie after all. He was impressed.  She only made a few phone calls to her food consultant.  She sent me a picture of the finished pie and it looked lovely.  Hopefully it tasted just as good.  For a child who liked to eat but never wanted to cook she has  embraced cooking  good  food as worth the effort.  Eating well is healthy and affordable and even fun.

Sewing By the Book

 I wrote this post awhile ago, but never got around to posting it.  I combined it with the post on my finished coat.

Sometimes you can break the rules and other times, not such a good idea.  Necklines need staying,  A garment is  taken on and off a lot during fitting and has lots of opportunity to stretch and stretching creates problems.  I did not stay the neckline right away. I don't usually think that stay stitching works all that well, but stay tape does and it should be done before you take it off the cutting table so that it has no chance to stretch.  The collar on this coat has a right angle that's sewn into an inside corner.  If the neckline is too long a bubble will form when you try and pivot around the base of the collar which is what happened on my coat. On the top side of course, because that's the one that's shows.  I ripped the collar off and took off the tape, that I applied after I'd already tried it on a few times.  Way too late by that time.  I had to ease the collar back to the correct length   so that I didn't get the bubble in the corner. If I'd followed the rules I would have saved myself a lot of work and aggravation. 

What else did I do wrong on this coat?  Too many things.  I always, always have to narrow my shoulder seams by 3/4" on Burda.  Why did I think that this one didn't need to be shorter?  Fortunately it worked removing it after the fact, when I like to do it in the pattern of course.  Fortunately I won't have short sleeves because I made them longish on purpose because I always seem to have coat sleeves that are too short when I drive. I guess I need longer gloves.  My lack of organization on this coat has made it take twice as long as it necessary. Note to self.  Make a damn list of construction order! (Or, sew with a good book next to you.)  This is really the best way to sew well and efficiently without instructions.  And readers?  These are are some of the most obtuse Burda instructions I've seen and I've seen plenty.  They rival the instruction booklet for our new Blu ray player for obtuseness. No, you are not stupid. The instructions are truly bad.

Now for the coat itself, which is finally finished.

The coat is finished  finally.  I like it, I don't love it, though it grows on me as time goes on.  If you'll recall I used Claire Kennedy's re design of this Burda coat to eliminate the hip band.  I left in side seams, she didn't .
Coat  Burda 120 9/10

 The original  coat is made of boiled wool or the equivalent and the construction is lapped. I used conventional sewing techniques with a wool coating that was in my stash and bought at one of Micheal's Fabrics half price sale.  The lining is silk charmeuse from one of Fabric Marts big sales.  I think it was Anna Sui and probably no more than $5 a yard.  It really loses something from the tall, broad shouldered model to my narrow shouldered body.

Other changes I made:
I eliminated the hip band, the hidden front zipper and I eliminated the back darts which wouldn't have worked for me. 
The collar is annoying, but easy to leave open when I am driving.  It was also much too high in the back for my short neck, so I took it off and made it narrower by about a 1/2".  Actually, I cut another one.  I had interfaced both sides and it was too stiff and annoying.  The issue of the shoulders are  problematic.  While they are the proper width for me, they totally  change the triangle shape of this coat as seen on the model.  Because I narrowed the shoulders after the fact, I would have loved the sleeves to be a bit longer, which wasn't possible because the hems are all curved and faced so I couldn't just turn up less.

I left in the zippers on the sleeves because I liked them and I had a pair in the house. Always good to use anything from stash!  I didn't put in the hidden zipper for the closing because it would have made this  difficult to sit and drive in and after all, I live in the suburbs.  I put in 3 large snaps below the top button which work well.  It was also easier to install and it's easy to undo.
The pattern called for a decorative  snap at the top.  I put in a leather bound button hole which I like.  It's a rather plain coat, with the seams that attracted me to the coat not all that evident in the finished coat.  Adding a nice scarf to the neck hides the nicest part of the coat, the button and buttonhole a the top.
The only other detail I'm going to mention about the construction of this coat is that I used lambswool interlining to interline the lining.  Never again.  It stretches.  I hand basted it onto the lining and trimmed it out of all the sas after the seams were finished. but it is really pita.  If I want a warm coat in future I'll use a warmer outer layer and interline with cotton flannel.  I cut the fabric on the cross grain so that the border ran along the bottom.

I honestly don't want to go into a real review of this coat. This was so not a labor of love and I just want to move on.

What's up next?  Cleaning my sewing room, which is bad.  That and putting away the mountain of fabrics that seem to have accumulated on my bookshelf.  How the hell did that happen?  I have a very nicely organized fabric closet.  It's just that most of the contents  seems to be on this shelf!
I will say that I am done with winter sewing.  For once I want to be ahead of the calender.  Spring is my busiest season and I really need some spring pants and things, so that's what I'll sew.  Specifically?  Not so sure yet.
Have a great weekend.

Bad Blogger

Mea culpa.  I have been a negligent blogger.  My coat has been a trial, and while it is almost finished I have not felt like blogging about it or much of anything else.   I will post it as soon as it's finished.

I got invited to a wedding with only 4 weeks to the date and I was in a panic over what to wear.  Weight gain has made my lovely brocade suit a bit on the snug side so that's out.  It's an afternoon wedding, and after consultation with my cousin who is also invited, it's not a particularly dressy affair and with 380 people invited it will run the gamut I am sure.  It's also an Orthodox Jewish wedding and calls for something conservative.  I made a list of possible patterns that I could make with fabric I had in my stash.  I wrote all this to Sigrid and sent her the list.  She wrote back with what about that black jersey Knipmode dress you made last year?  Duh.  I ran to try it on with my Spanx and I still love it.  It fits and it's perfect.  I have shoes and purse so all I need is an extra pair of Spanx (its one of those with the tights attached) in case of disaster and I am all set except for the gift.   To refresh your memory and to have a picture to add, here it is.

It looks good with my current hair as well.