Another lonely night while my husband flies this way or that. I've been filling my time by peeping into your lives. I've been going through the comments you left about your blogs and the others you follow and one by one I am making my way through. It has been delightful. Really. You and google reader, which are slowly being one in the same, are my life line to the outside world. I never knew how hard it would be to live in isolation for 6 months, but so far Maaike has remained admission free, so definitely well worth it.

Funny story, or rather amazing really, while in Beijing I met two women who had been on Presserfoot. Seriously! They were both expats living in China, but when we got to talking and some how conversations turned to sewing I mentioned that my sister and I run a blog called Presserfoot.com and they were like, "oh, I've been on your blog before." What! I hate sounding like a high school girl, but that is like totally awesome! One woman was from Virginia and the other was from Kentucky. I have retained a close friendship with the one from Virginia and this is what I found on Stephanie's blog today:

You may remember this project from our anthropologies inspired tutorials, the catch and release scarf. I'm loving the striped one. Might be just the project to get me out of the February blues. Glad you are still following us Steph!

Inspiration Anthro : Catch and Release Scarf

So here is my tutorial for the Catch and Release Scarf from Anthro. Better late than never right?





Materials:

- 1 piece of fabric about 90 inches long
- elastic thread
- matching thread (all purpose)
- rit dye (optional)
- tailors chalk
- sewing needle


* Your fabric needs to be light weight, breezy, and somewhat see thru. I think a cotton voile, cotton lawn, or cotton gauze would work really well. I am not sure what mine is made of but I found it on clearance in the home decor section.
here is a closer look at my fabric:


1 - Cut your fabric so that you have one long piece that is about 90" x 17"

2 - To finish the two long edges fold in 1/4", press, fold another 1/4", and press again. Edge stitch both sides with normal all purpose thread.




3 - Leave the top thread of your machine with your normal all purpose thread. Hand wind the bobbin with your elastic thread.

4 - Using your tailors chalk, mark 3 vertical lines down the middle of your fabric - each 4 inches apart.

5 - With all purpose thread as your top thread, and elastic thread as your bottom thread, stitch all three vertical lines from top to bottom allowing it to gather as it goes. Do not back stitch at either end.
*test on scrap fabric first. i found that my machine used the elastic thread best at a longer stitch length (4) and the usual straight stitch.
here is a good link to learn a bit more about sewing with elastic thread.


6 - Using a sewing needle, pull the regular thread to the back and tie a knot with the elastic thread to secure ends. (the video suggests backstitching but everything else i read said you shouldn't backstitch with elastic thread as it wont hold.)


7- Try on scarf to make sure that the length is what you want (depending on how much your machine gathered your fabric it may be different - the goal is about 40" long)

8 - Finish off ends the same as the sides by folding at 1/4", fold again at 1/4", press, and stitch.




9 - If you want a different color as I did, use RIT dye to dye your scarf. I used teal.


Finished scarf:

Inspiration Anthro : Tutorial Tissue Three Roses Top

Here is the complete tutorial on how to make the Tissue Three Roses Top from J Crew.


1 - Using your tailors chalk roughly sketch on your tshirt the placement of your three roses and zigzigs.

2 - Cut about 8 - 16" x 1" strips of fabric out of your knit (I used an old black shirt).


3 - Starting in the center of one of your roses, tack one end of a strip in place in the middle of of the fabric. Continue to wrap the strip in a circular fashion and stitching it in place in the middle of the strip. (the strip will then fold in half giving more bulk to your rose.)


4 - When one strip is used up, simply add another where it stops and keep wrapping and sewing. This is not an exact science and will look a little messy - this is part of the shirt - it should look a little rough.
* I found it very helpful to keep my needle in the down position so that every time I stopped sewing I could just lift the presserfoot and pivot easily - which you will be doing a ton of.


5 - Once one rose is complete continue with the other two roses.



6 - To make the zigzazs on the lower portion of the top, cut a bunch of 1/2" strips in varying lengths.

7 - Take one strip and place it on the top where desired - folding and zigzagging it. Stitch around all edges roughly. Continue to cut more strips and sew down until desired result.




8 - Thread a hand sewing needle with coordinating thread. Hand sew small clusters of beads on the shirt in various places.



9 - Add a few more strips of fabric and a few clusters of beads to the right hip of your shirt.



Finished shirt:

Inspiration Anthro : change of plans + materials

So there has been a little change of plans. Originally I was going to do a demo on the winding road tank by Anthropologie. After trying to make it repeatedly and unpicking it 3 times I gave up. For some reason it just wasn't working for me. If you still want to make it , Adventures in Dressmaking made a great tutorial here.

Once giving up I realized that I still had a bunch of strips cut out of my fabric and so went out to find another top that I could make and use the strips already cut. Then I came upon the tissue three roses top at Jcrew and fell in love. So this is the top that I will be demonstrating instead.


Here are the materials you will need:

- 1 tank top or tshirt with a scoop neckline
- about 1/4 yard of matching fabric (I used an old shirt)
-1 package small matching beads
- chalk
- hand sewing needle
- rotary cutter or scissors

* i will be posting the entire tutorial tomorrow so go gather your materials and hurry back.

Inspiration Anthro : Vintage Lace Dress : Steps 31-36

Today we finish up the dress with the hem.

31 - Try your dress on and mark where you want your hem to hit. (I did mine at middle knee)

32- Take off dress and mark 1 1/2 " down from hem mark. Cut off excess fabric.



33- fold up the bottom edge of the skirt 1/2" and press.


34- fold up the edge another 1" all the way around and press.


35- On the right side of the fabric stitch all the way around the bottom edge of your skirt 3/4" from the edge. Backstitch at both ends.


36- Iron your dress. Try it on and enjoy!

front

back

Inspiration Anthro : Vintage Lace Dress : Steps 21-30

Now that we have the top and bottom ready, it's time to connect the dots with the belt portion of the dress.

21- Take your 1 1/2 inch wide black elastic and fit it around your high waist (wherever you want the two portions of your dress to intersect). Mark where it fits comfortably. Add 2 inches for overlap and cut. Pin with 2 inches of overlap.



22- With black thread securely stitch the overlap down so that it now forms a permanent circle. Stitch a box and then and x in the middle as shown below.



23- With pins or chalk mark center front, center back, and the two sides. Do the same on your skirt.


24- Match the markings up with those on your skirt, with the overlap being center back of your elastic. Pin at all points with the skirt tucked about 1 inch under the elastic. (There will be a lot of excess skirt fabric inbetween each marking as the skirt portion will be gathered.)



25- Put your machine on it's longest stitch -basting- and stitch around your skirt about 1/2" from bottom of elastic on the inside of your garment. Do not backstitch either end as this will later be taken out. While stitching, pull the elastic with your right hand so that the top fabric is not gathered (once your let go of the elastic it will gather the skirt fabric). This can be a bit tricky, but go slow and remember this is just a basting stitch so it doesnt matter what it looks like.


26- Press the skirt gathers.

27- Change your stitch length back to normal. On the top side of your elastic and dress, stitch 1/4" from the bottom edge of the elastic all the way around. While stitching, pull on the elastic so that the skirt fabric is no longer gathered like before. (this is important otherwise you will snap your threads the first time you try to put the dress on) Backstitch both ends. Trim any excess seam allowance on the inside of the skirt.




28- Now let's do the same thing to the top of the dress. First mark the CF, CB and sideseams, and match with the same on the elastic.


29- Basting stitch all the way around on the inside of the garment. Stretch both the elastic and tanktop while doing so.

30- Top stitch around the elastic 1/4" from the top edge on the top of the garment. Stretch both the elastic and tanktop while doing so. Remove all basting stitches from elastic.



*we are almost done. tomorrow we will hem the dress.