Sometimes winging it is not the way forward

The downside to an attitude of haphazard optimism is that sometimes your mouth writes cheques that your skills can't cash. I lost a little bit of confidence recently from diving headlong into a couple of projects that didn't pay off the way I wanted or in some cases at all.

Look at those wonky ass buttons that I had to place sooo far out to reduce the sack factor.

Look at the bonus detail. Look at it!

First is the birthday shirt for the fella. I picked the Negroni shirt pattern by colette patterns to make him a linen shirt as he bought one last summer and wore the living daylights out of it. Got some linen-ette (it was in a basket, I can't really vouch for the true nature of its fibers) material from Abakhan with a discolouration to one of the selvage that I wanted to use to make a trim along the bottom of the sleeves. Was quite proud of that little bit of material manipulation let me tell you.

Like the collar. Would prob leave off the loop next time.

Obviously it doesn't pull like that on him as he, unlike my stunt double Olive, doesn't have a cracking pair of sweater bunnies

The fella is tall and slim but I'm doing my best to feed him up so I added extra to accommodate according to his measurements. The construction all went to plan but then I came to putting it on him and well I may as well have just cut armholes in a sack with potatoes written on it. The problem I have is I honestly don't know where I went wrong. I measured him and compared it to pattern measurements, maybe the next step would be to measure the pattern pieces but I guess I trusted them not to fib to me.

I had to save her. She has wool on her!

The second confidence blaster was again an issue with fitting the bodice on a By Hand London Flora dress. This one I know exactly where I went wrong and it comes back to my tendency towards reckless abandon. I had my first go at a full bust adjustment or a FBA if you will. Now as most patterns are graded for a B cup and I'm.... well I'm really not you'd be surprised I hadn't done one before. That's because I'd generally whack a couple of inches to the side seams and call it good. This is how I end up with a waist that I could get another person in there with me. I need to sort out how to do a FBA as I've also bought the pattern for a By Hand Anna dress that I want to make for a wedding.

I will get my head round the FBA! 

I even did two muslins (test go on a cheap fabric) and despite this not fitting correctly still thought 'meh it'll come good in my precious pretty fabric.

         *Spoiler alert* 

       It didn't.

When you can't fit the bodice, make a waistband and call it a skirt.

Making leftovers right. 

Imagine instead that Madonna in her cone bra days had created one with telescopic properties and that she pressed a button which caused said cones to eject about a foot out from her body. This is the look my adjustments left me to rock.

Quite proud of this little shabby chic fix for accidentally
cutting through the main skirt

Despite the fact I know it was poor planning and hasty adjustments with no basis in any real world geometric shape that caused the problem I still felt my confidence knocked. I hate wasting fabric, I just can't subscribe to the mentality that every mistake is new lesson learnt and therefore nothing is wasted. I wish I could but then I would also probably have the tidy mindset that believes that there is such a thing as left over wine to use in cooking and I'm not sure I can live in that world.

From there I had to improvise. I kept the skirt panels and popped on a waistband. Even after I accidentally cut through the main body of the skirt when trimming the seams I knew I'd come too far to let her go.

So from there I turn to Tilly and the Buttons. Her patterns are simple and I know they look nice. I need to get my sewjo back. I've already turned out one coco top that I'm pleased with so that's helping. A ruffle skirt in My little pony fabric also helps...so does the left over wine.

p.s the less said about inserting a zip into a fray-tastic african wax print fabric the better.