Previous efforts

Poked two additional holes in the Ikea thimble I was using as I tried to topstitch the seams yesterday.  Ow!!!  Are those thimbles made of aluminum foil?  I think they are.  Am going to try and stop by a shop to get a thimble today.

Hole #1:

My first two attempts at Alabama Chanin-style garments involved simple trapeze-style tunics for my two daughters, made with 4 large shirts we got at a charity shop in England.  If I recall, it was a blustery day, we were off to a birthday party, and I had the whole family in tow - I had about 5 minutes to run in, grab shirts, and get out!  Turned out that two of the shirts were the recommended all cotton (navy/purple), but the others were some form of rayon (purple/light purple one).

The rayon one is actually fabulous!  As you can see, my elder daughter grabs it every weekend when she doesn't have to wear a uniform, and loves the drape.  Inside, it's actually not fully lined- I didn't have enough of the light purple to go all the way down to the hem.  Another nice thing about the rayon is that it doesn't curl at the bottom.  But it was kind of a bear to stitch through - much tighter weave than your standard cotton knit.

The younger daughter got the heavier cotton (bottom right), which was also a bit too small of a piece to give it a good amount of "swing".  So, I took the sleeves of the t-shirt and made pieced, triangular panels that start at the armpit.  Little bit clearer here (sorry, hard to get a 3-year-old to stand still!)

She does like to spin.


After I'd finished the girls tunics, and had made my first muslin of the corset top, I traced out, cut and constructed a single-layer swing top.  Had to go with a pretty short length since that's all that would fit on my fabric.

I really like this, right off the page.  The armholes are a good fit (I hate gapping), and the V is just the right depth for me.  It verges on maternity-top - to be honest, it probably swings way into that category.  If it were heavier, it'd drape a bit better, and the edges do curl outwards a bit.  I'm now trying to help that by stitching dark green glass matte beads along the bottom hem.  Initial experiment with a patch on the back seems to be encouraging, so I'll show more of that as it progresses.  Despite all this, I wore this with a brick red skirt on a blustery day and it felt fantastic.  Might be a bit more frumpy if paired with trousers than with a skirt.  Still - I think I'll make more, perhaps a bit longer, and perhaps eventually as an embellished, double-layer top.