KCWC-Day Two: Easy Knit Shrug + TUTORIAL

Tuesday, day two of the KCWC, I made a little knit shrug to go along with the Tiered Ruffle Dresses I just finished for the girls. These dresses were unique enough in color and style, they needed their own shrug; nothing the girls already had seemed to go with them.

This shrug was made with a few alterations of my TNT T-shirt pattern, Jalie 2805. Click below to see the details and how to take any t-shirt pattern and turn it into a shrug of your own!

My Perfect New Cowl–The Renfrew Top

If you are a follower of Tasia over at Sewaholic, then you heard about her latest pattern release this week, The Renfrew Top.

A little more than a month ago, I was able to test out this pattern for Tasia. It’s so much fun to be a pattern tester. It was really fun to test a pattern for myself rather than my kids this time too!

This is a great basic tee-shirt design with neckline options and three sleeve length options. It also features banded hems, so no worries about hemming knits with this pattern.

I opted for view C, the Cowl neckline with long sleeves. It is winter here after all. I used a ponte roma knit print from Hancock, I had my eye on it for a while, but when I went to pick it up for this top, it had gone on clearance for $5/yd! Yeah!!

I cut a strait size 8 and followed the instructions almost completely. They are very well written with great illustrations too. The only change I made was to construct it on my serger; the instructions are for sewing on a regular machine. Then, after sewing it up, I did end up narrowing my sleeves just a bit from the elbow down – I have kind of tiny wrists… it runs in the family.

Here’s a close up of the cowl, which I’m totally in love with. It is, in my opinion, the perfect cowl. I have big plans for this cowl. Hopefully coming soon. We’ll see, I have so much I want to sew, so little time…

And just for kicks, here’s a “great” shot of me adjusting my camera…

And one of my little man, who thought taking pictures with a remote was very, very cool.

So, if you’re looking for a really nice basic tee or a super cool new cowl, I highly recommend the Renfrew top – head over here to get your own!!

Friday Night Out Cardigan

I haven’t spent too much time lately sewing for myself. It’s been all about the kids. But my hubby and I had a night out that we’ve been planning for months and I wanted something new to wear.

I’ve had this piece of grey/silver/black sweater knit for more than a year (another awesome remnant bin find at SR Harris) and I had been thinking I wanted it to become a long cascading cardigan, and I had two patterns to choose from.

McCalls 6408 or

McCalls 6084

After looking over reviews on both patterns, I chose the second, M6084. Mostly because there were fewer pieces so it would sew up faster. I was, after all, just deciding to do this the day before our night out. =)

And it did sew up quickly, I constructed it mostly on my serger, with the exception of the shoulder dart. I sewed the sleeves in flat and it was finished in about 20 minutes. And it was enormous!! I cut out the XS and I was swimming in it.

The biggest problem was the shoulder fit. Or lack of fit. The shoulder seam fell off the edge of my shoulders by a good inch (it actually looks better in this picture than it did in real life). And the sleeve had an outrageous amount of ease.

So I cut off the sleeves, and scooped out an inch of the armscye from the shoulder seam to about halfway to the underarm seam, tapering to nothing. Then I sewed the sleeves back on (this time not in the flat as the underarm and side seams were already finished) and it was MUCH better!

This is after the first shoulder/sleeve was corrected, comparing it to the non-corrected side. See how much shorter I needed to make that shoulder seam. And I have broad shoulders! (and this was an XS!!)

Then, the second fit issue was just a matter of it was too big all around. I ended up taking it it 1 inch (so 4 inches total) at the side seams and I narrowed the sleeves by two inches each. Ah, much better again. Looking back at the pattern envelope, I realize it was intended to be loosely fitting, but it didn’t translate well in real life. It still is loosely fitting, just in better proportions for me.

Now the only downside: the sleeves came out too short! I added 1” in length when cutting, but I think the sleeves were on the short side to begin with (should have measured!!) and shortened even more after the shoulder correction. So I ended up wearing it pulled up to a 3/4” length for the evening. I think I’m going to go back and add cuffs to make them truly long sleeves.

This is how I wore it out last night. It was very comfortable and warm! I left the hem unfinished for now, since it’s a knit and it doesn’t ravel. I do want to finish it with a rolled hem in my serger, but I didn’t have the right shade grey/silver of thread on hand.

Over all, I’m really happy with it! Now that I know what changes to make, I do already have another sweater knit that I will use for this pattern.

Pattern Review can be found here.

FO: M6203 - A Nice Tunic

Wow, was this a quick sew. Instant gratification! I had this tunic cut and sewn completely in about 45 minutes.




It's a very simple pattern. Per the design, the neck bands are left unfinished. The instruction would have you turn down the neckline and do a narrow hem, then attach the two neckbands. Hum, no. I just layered all three RST and serged. Much faster, and in all likelihood, a much neater neckline. I left the hem unfinished as well, it seemed appropriate considering the unfinished neckline. The cut-on sleeves do have bands that finish them off. The sleeves are also a little long. Partially my fault, since most patterns require added sleeve length for me. I added 3/4", but it looks like I have too-short long sleeves instead of 3/4 length sleeves (if I don't have them pushed up as I did in the photos).

I cut a small and constructed the whole thing on my serger with 1/4" seams. This worked out perfectly.

Overall, I'm happy with it. It's not that fancy, but I like it with grey leggins or my favorite blue jeans. It will be great for taking my daughter back and forth from school this fall/winter.

And as I mentioned before, now that I've made this up and I know the fit, I'm going to use this pattern as a base to make a cute fall dress. And when I do, I'll try to get that up here in a tutorial. I'm excited, I just need a good piece of sweater knit in a dark orange or a rusty red.