Yeah, it's the Tie Top Tank from the belle epoque tutorial. Very easy, very cute, but also very... billowy. I can't really pull off billowy since I'm not exactly... willowy. However, it will make a lovely pj top (I keep on thinking it would make a great nightie if done a little bit longer or if I wore a nightie and by that I mean that I wear pajamas and not nothing and I should stop this line of typing). It would also be a nice maternity top- pregnant ladies can pull off billowy (NOT that there are any beaglets in the making around here).
There were two cool-ish discoveries during the making of the tank. The first was that bias binding is not all that bad to make. In fact, it's pretty easy, if a little fiddly. Between the example tank and this month's Martha Stewart Living, I was inspired to try and make my own. Now I want to put it on everything. I imagine using it to avoid having to actually hem after shortening jeans. Wouldn't a pair of Levi's look cute with that cherry print around the ankles?
The second discovery was my new magnet trick. I am way to cheap to pay over $10 for a magnetic pin catcher, but I got tired of crawling around on the ground looking for all the pins that I dropped. So, I chucked a magnet on to the lid of my oh-so-stylish pin tin (I'm all about rhyming today) and I had my very own magnetic pin catcher.
But- that is not marvelous innovation (and forgive me if someone has already innovated (?) this before- it's new to me). No, that was just a little background and an explanation of why I have magnets in with my sewing stuff. The pet peeve at hand concerns cutting out patterns. I am very, very bad at cutting out patterns. In addition to my base badness, I'm always annoyed at having to pin the pattern to the fabric thus creating little wrinkles and jogs and compounding the badness of my pattern cutting.
As I was about to start cutting out the tank, I briefly considered just tracing the pattern when I realized that i could pin the pattern absolutely smoothly to the fabric with my neat-o uberstrong magnets. One magnet on each side in a couple of key places and snip, snip, snip. I did my best cutting out ever.
The only downside I found was that the magnets looooooove my pretty fabric scissors, so they have to be set in an inch or so from the cutting edge.
I think I'll be trying the magnets with patterns from now on.
3 comments:
That cherry fabric would definitely look sweet on some Levi's. Or just about anything else in need of embellishment!
I'm about to try making that tie top tank. I'm a bit worried, since I'm not exactly the willowy type either, but it will be good stitching practice for me regardless!
I love your magnet idea, I've got to get some uber-strong magnets and give this a try!
Make something new and unique with your creativity and using all kinds of fabric.
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