Rebecca Shift Dress Pocket Variation – Sis Boom PDF Pattern

Posted June 18th, 2013 by darcie & filed under Sewing, Tutorials.

I posted my Sis Boom Rebecca Shift Dress I entered in the Summer of No Pants recently and mentioned I’d added pockets. Here’s a really quick, iPhone quality outline of how I did that!

1. Take the dress front pattern piece and draw the outline for a pocket. My pocket is cut at about 1/3 the half waist measurement, the pocket lining cutting line is at about the next 1/3rd. The side mark is at about the hip. My line is at just sharper than a 45° angle, as I think a steeper line is more flattering across the hips. Don’t forget seam allowances.

2. Make a new pocket pattern piece for the pocket back and pocket facing. You’ll cut two with the hip corner and two without.

3. Cut the skirt with the hip corner cut out.
4. Lay pocket facing, right sides together, on skirt and stitch along new diagonal line.

5. Flip and top stitch. Repeat for other side of skirt.

6. Keeping skirt free, lay pocket back right sides together on pocket facing. Stitch two straight sides. I suggest serging or zigzagging to prevent raw pocket edges from unravelling.

7. Baste top and sides of pocket to skirt if desired, and continue assembling dress as per the pattern!

Ta Da!

Another SONP entry!

Posted June 15th, 2013 by darcie & filed under Currently Working On.

More dresses! More skirts! I made another entry for the Summer of No Pants. SONP 2013 has another week to go. Another week before Summer officially starts. Time to stock up on skirts to keep cool and fashionable during the hot weather.

This dress started with surfing the fabric porn on Spandex World. It spoke to me. I had to have it. It would be a perfect mod racerback dress. I made my order finally, it came, and it was not exactly what I’d envisioned. A bit thinner. Ah well, I’d also ordered a nude knit lining for having for some other projects.

This was a self-drafted pattern. Basically, I took my measurements and drafted a basic bodice block. I read a lot of websites to decide that I wanted a bust dart and what angle to cut the back straps. I compared to an existing racerback tank that I own. The skirt I simply extended the line from the waist-hip line. I don’t have a ton of knit experience, but I’m trying to fix that. This was also the first experiment I made with fold-over elastic (FOE). I think I’d like the FOE to be thinner, but this works and I’m happy with it.

I bike A LOT so leggings, although not necessary, can be handy. My knee length leggings are a super quick, super comfy pattern by Jocole. Jodi’s patterns are just about perfect. I’ve made a short pair of these before, and they turned out awesome. I cut these to 16 1/2, a line not on the pattern, and gave them a 1″ hem so they fell right under my knee cap. I made these also with a fold-over yoga waist to smooth out the belly under the dress. I’ll probably wear each piece separately as well.

OK, so a week to go, I’m going to try to squeeze in two more entries before the deadline! Maybe skirts. Maybe some upcycling. If you like my design, please vote for me by repinning it! And see more of the entries for SONP2013 at the board here!

Ah Summer! Dress

Posted June 7th, 2013 by darcie & filed under Currently Working On.

Ah Summer is definitely here! I don’t go by the calendar when it is already reaching upper 90s. It counts. So I made myself a new summer dress.

I inherited this fabric and kept it stashed for a few years. I think it came from my husband’s acting teacher’s neighbor? Who knows. People give me fabric. That’s totally fine with me, I’ll accept fabric. So it sat around until I realized that the perfect pattern for it would be the Rebecca Shift from Sis Boom. Totally perfect.

So I whipped this dress out in a couple days. Hardest part was matching patterns! Note to self: Start laying out pieces at the top front when aiming to match patterns, not with the biggest piece, the skirt bottom, like usual. I did use some tips from Historical Sewing when it came to laying out the bodice that really helped.

I also added pockets to my dress. The reason I don’t wear as many dresses is lack of pockets. And this has nice, deep ones. I have pics and can do a really simple tutorial on it. I also added side vents for ease of movement when biking around town. The pattern is written with a back zipper, and I intended to adjust for a side zip instead. I cut all the back pieces on the fold. But when I did a preliminary side seam to test fit, I noticed I could wear it without even bothering to add a zipper! Score! I did fit this like a loose shift, and some might prefer a closer fit. I also am small on top, so getting into the dress without a zipper works for me. It might not for someone with a different shape.

Wow, I’m even impressed with my pattern matching.

Pictures of me were taken just before 1am this morning after getting dressed at 7am Thursday! Biked to school, did the last day of school, sat through Kindergarten Graduation, cleaned up ice cream, biked home, took a nap, made dinner, sat through Les Mis… And I still look good! I have a feeling I’m going to be wearing this dress a lot this summer.

I am also entering this in Hideous! Dreadful! Stinky!’s Summer of No Pants. I can’t guarantee this will be a no-pants summer, but here’s another reason to try.

It is Kids Clothes Week!!

Posted April 22nd, 2013 by darcie & filed under Currently Working On, Kids.

I am writing a blog post again (I know, shame on me for still being bad at this!) because I am committing RIGHT NOW to participate in Kid’s Clothes Week! (Kid’s, not Kids Clothes Week? We’re only sewing for one kid? Hmm. Oh well.) Yay! Sewing!

So I pretty much came to this conclusion a very short time ago. “Very short” being relative of course, and including the morning I spent catching up on internetting and the early afternoon time I spent writing this post. But anyway, I said I was in on the main blog post and on another blogger’s Facebook page, so I’m in. Accountability. Bam.

Kid’s Clothes Week is all about dedicating at least an hour a day for the week to sewing for kids. Or prep for sewing. Or something. It’s about doing something. And I totally need that! It starts TODAY and runs through next Monday, the 29th. And because I like to cheat, I’m including the thing I finally assembled on Saturday in my pile of KCW accomplishments. So there.

Gluten Free Scones – Two Ways

Posted February 5th, 2013 by darcie & filed under Recipes.

Yeah, more baking. Gluten free scones again. I seriously love scones. They’re easy to mix up quickly, and they bake in less time than a muffin. I’m sharing two different new recipes that worked for me recently. Why two in the same post? Because I didn’t take a picture of the first kind- they went too fast!

I was having trouble with crumbly texture of scones, but then I revisited a Top 8 Free Chocolate Scone recipe online. This one used a banana and a lower oven temp. But I’d just had chocolate scones recently, and we are out of chocolate chips. So I went with frozen blueberries instead. Success! Kids ate them all up, no crumbly, sandy mess, and they didn’t really even notice the banana flavor. Try #2 this morning was adapting a favorite maple-oat recipe. Got to skip the 1/3 sugar in the scones by using some applesauce instead. And my usual jittery feeling after eating that kind totally gone. Another winner!

So here are my recipes for Gluten Free Blueberry Scones and Gluten Free Maple Oat Nut Scones. Mostly so I have them saved somewhere, but hopefully someone else will like them too. And if you have any other great scone recipes or gluten free baking tips, I’d love to hear them!

Gluten Free Scones - Two Ways! Maple Oat Nut and Blueberry

Gluten-free chocolate scones

Posted January 20th, 2013 by darcie & filed under Recipes.

So although I mainly mean this to be a sewing blog, I crafted something else today and wanted to share it. We love chocolate scones around here, but I’ve been feeling not so happy after eating them lately. I tried a version of these a couple weeks ago and they were moist but still crumbly, so I wanted to tweak it a little more first. I added a second egg and some flax meal, which definitely helped. This still isn’t perfect, but it’s passable. And it’s corn/nut/gluten free and can be dairy-free.

I only have a known issue with corn, but I’m feeling lately like I’m having issues with gluten as well. I think it’s leaky gut so all connected, but anyway. Trying to figure out if the gluten or the sugar (or both) is making me feel yucky and jittery. Can’t hurt to cut some out! They’re not sugar free, but they don’t have as much as they could. One and a half teaspoons per scone. My kids liked these too, well except the small one that had her heart set on blueberry like we had yesterday.

These still have a bit of a crumb issue, but I just don’t know how to manage that any more than already. If you change or edit this to improve it, please let me know! For the rice and oat flours, I grind my own in a little electric coffee grinder. Please, as always, use safe for you ingredients.

Sewing Again

Posted January 20th, 2013 by darcie & filed under Currently Working On.

I’m doing some sewing again! Yay! Although I’d started moving my sewing studio to the garage, I found I just didn’t want to be out there when it is 38° outside. Brr! But I had to get some work done, so my regular machine and a handful of needed things came in last night.

In the interest of laziness but still attempting to blog, I’m trying to post from the WordPress app. We’ll see how this goes.

So, last minute birthday present was the primary reason. Mimi requested a bag. I think this one turned out well!

Silhouette Contest

Posted December 6th, 2012 by darcie & filed under Uncategorized.

So, how much do I want to win a Silhouette CAMEO? A LOT. Here’s a silly contest entry I made yesterday about it.

I pinned it as per their directions, but Pinterest ate the image! So here’s a link to it that I’m adding to the pin. This would enable me to do so many more awesome things! Here’s some awesome fabric projects they have pinned right now-

I have sooooo many great ideas too. Crossing my fingers! Eek!

Fall Quinoa Salad Recipe

Posted November 4th, 2012 by darcie & filed under Recipes, Uncategorized.

Today I did a little recipe post for a Corn Free Community site that I totally didn’t know existed. It’s part of a larger network of Corn Free sites. We have a Facebook group and a Blogspot site all run by the talented, dedicated Von Young.

Being corn allergic or intolerant is rather stinky. Not only do some doctors NOT BELIEVE that it is even possible to have, some prescribe medication that has corn in it to deal with it. And yeah, corn is in EVERYTHING. So the community aspect of dealing with corn allergies is really important. We work together to find out which products are safe, when companies change their packaging or formulas, what works and what doesn’t. And of course, interesting recipes are key.

So I threw this together last month and hadn’t gotten around to sharing it anywhere yet. Today it is posted on the Community site, plus the story behind it. Enjoy!

Fall Quinoa Salad

A costume that wasn’t for Halloween

Posted October 28th, 2012 by darcie & filed under Costuming.

Here’s my semi-recap on the costume I made in October that had nothing to do with Halloween! I did start doing a spookyish costume for me that I could potentially use this 31st if I get it done. But all the kids’ costumes were purchased this year. Bad designer! Oh well.

So as I mentioned, my friend Linda Bair of The Linda Bair Dance Company was asked to dance in Barbados. What a dream come true! And she asked me to make her costume. Another dream come true! A semi-odd request- a Regency gown for a young woman in mourning, and she can dance in it. Challenge accepted!

I chose to use Simplicity’s #4055 Regency pattern. A good jumping off point. Easy pattern, fits well, and fairly close to accurate. The style I went with was the A view on the left of the envelope. A bit more youthful looking. I altered the sleeve design to use a lace with a scalloped edge, fitting a little less puffy than the original. Rather than use a lace overlay, I used a cotton underskirt to line the dress under the silky fashion fabric. I wanted a lightweight feel for the islands of the story’s setting, but didn’t want the fabric to cling to her legs when she danced. Some lace trim at the neckline to tie in the sleeves and braid sewn along the neckline finished it off. Hemmed to ankle length for being able to dance barefoot, with enough turned up to let it out to dance in heels at a later occasion.

My challenge making this was with the buttonholes! I haven’t done enough on my current machine and doing them manually without the included “one-step” buttonhole attachment was giving me grief. I’d misplaced the attachment, but luckily have found it now. The day after I finished the dress. Oh well, I took the opportunity to learn how clothing construction of the day would have made buttonholes- by hand! It was a pretty fun experience, and something I would do again if needed.

And here’s the dress completed! In my hurry to get it done and over to Linda before her plane flight, I only got cell phone pics. I’m really hoping for event photos! Or at least I’ll get out my camera and take a picture of it on her at some point.