3 years ago
Well, I keep dreaming of spring, but here on the prairies the weather has other ideas. The last week has been so blustery, snowy and downright cold for so much of it. I have had more “white-knuckled” drives to work this week I think that I’ve had for the rest of the winter combined. But that’s not stopping me. I am manifesting spring with my new jumpsuit.
This is the Lush Garden print in Minerva’s exclusive line of viscose challis and it is such a gorgeous spring/summer print. I knew as soon as I requested it for my Brand Ambassador project that I wanted it to be a jumpsuit, so I also requested Butterick #6756 as well. We were allowed to pick a Butterick pattern for the #sewnwithButterick challenge that I’m sadly about two and a half weeks late on.
I was excited to go back to my roots so to speak and try out a Butterick pattern. I’m sure it’s been at least a dozen or more years since I’ve used one. But I grew up on the Big Four so I was curious to give it a go once again. I also thought that this pattern would be a great one because I’m currently trying to decide on a Mother of the Groom dress for Jacques (my eldest) wedding this coming June and the pattern has both the jumpsuit and a dress view. I ordered some gorgeous crepe recently for my dress and thought that the Lush Garden viscose would be a good comparable weight and drape to the crepe and I could get an idea if I liked the pattern by “auditioning” the jumpsuit.
I really enjoy sewing the viscose challis from the exclusive line. I made my swishy Marcel dress last summer and in fact just requested another length in a different print for another upcoming Brand Ambassador project! I love the colours of this Lush Garden print because while obviously it’s a floral, which I always gravitate towards, it’s sort of muted and rather than being crisp floral edges it sort of all blends together to give an abstract print vibe. Does that make any sense to anyone but me?
I do love wearing viscose challis in the heat of the summer! It’s so light and floaty, not too mention breathable and cool. (Rest assured we go all in for the extremes in weather here on the prairies. It may be freezing now, but in a few short months we’ll all be sweltering in blistering heat. LOL) There’s nothing quite like the swish of a loose viscose garment in that heat to make a person feel so much better!
Now for a few words about my re-entry into the world of the Big Four patterns… I scoured the Internet to see if I could find some reviews about this particular pattern. I like to know ahead of time what others think especially if I’m embarking on a pattern I’m unsure on. Unfortunately there were only two I could find. One here for the dress on Minerva and another for the jumpsuit on another site. So I just had to dive in and go for it. Talk about nerve wracking! I wasn’t about to ruin my beautiful fabric so I did do a muslin of the bodice first. According to the size chart I would need to sew a size 22, but given the amount of ease and the finished garment measurements I decided to size down to an 18. I am so glad I did! If I’d gone smaller I’d not have been able to easily get out of the jumpsuit, but if I’d gone bigger I think I’d be swimming in it. I was glad I’d tested it out first too because it turned out I needed a whole three inches of length added to the bodice. Sewing it together was fairly simple and straight forward so no complaints there other than those darn ties for the shoulders. Those were an unmitigated nightmare. OH MY WORD. Turning those tiny tubes of fabric just about did me in. To make it worse my kitten thought they were his personal playthings so he kept trying to steal them while I was fighting to turn them. Crazy times, my friends. Crazy times.
In the end I persevered and won the battle against both Pippen the Kitten and the ties of doom. I really do love how my jumpsuit turned out and am still considering the dress version as my Mother of the Groom dress, but would make a few changes. I think I’d gather the shoulders instead of use the ties, and I’d use bias binding in place of the narrow hem along the bodice neckline/fronts. I would also have to work a bit on tidying up the angle of the bodice that got a bit out of hand when I added so much length. I need to do a quick revisit of that so it doesn’t cross quite as high up and extend as far to the sides maybe. We’ll see!
In the meantime I’ll just be over here staring out the window willing the snow to melt and spring to come!
#minervabrandambassador #minervamakers #minervamakes #sewnwithbutterick #sewover50 #sewingforspring #jumpsuit #shortsleeves #viscosechallis #butterickpatterns #B6756 #handmadewardrobe #Imakemyownclothes #B6756seated #sewnshownseated
This is the Lush Garden print in Minerva’s exclusive line of viscose challis and it is such a gorgeous spring/summer print. I knew as soon as I requested it for my Brand Ambassador project that I wanted it to be a jumpsuit, so I also requested Butterick #6756 as well. We were allowed to pick a Butterick pattern for the #sewnwithButterick challenge that I’m sadly about two and a half weeks late on.
I was excited to go back to my roots so to speak and try out a Butterick pattern. I’m sure it’s been at least a dozen or more years since I’ve used one. But I grew up on the Big Four so I was curious to give it a go once again. I also thought that this pattern would be a great one because I’m currently trying to decide on a Mother of the Groom dress for Jacques (my eldest) wedding this coming June and the pattern has both the jumpsuit and a dress view. I ordered some gorgeous crepe recently for my dress and thought that the Lush Garden viscose would be a good comparable weight and drape to the crepe and I could get an idea if I liked the pattern by “auditioning” the jumpsuit.
I really enjoy sewing the viscose challis from the exclusive line. I made my swishy Marcel dress last summer and in fact just requested another length in a different print for another upcoming Brand Ambassador project! I love the colours of this Lush Garden print because while obviously it’s a floral, which I always gravitate towards, it’s sort of muted and rather than being crisp floral edges it sort of all blends together to give an abstract print vibe. Does that make any sense to anyone but me?
I do love wearing viscose challis in the heat of the summer! It’s so light and floaty, not too mention breathable and cool. (Rest assured we go all in for the extremes in weather here on the prairies. It may be freezing now, but in a few short months we’ll all be sweltering in blistering heat. LOL) There’s nothing quite like the swish of a loose viscose garment in that heat to make a person feel so much better!
Now for a few words about my re-entry into the world of the Big Four patterns… I scoured the Internet to see if I could find some reviews about this particular pattern. I like to know ahead of time what others think especially if I’m embarking on a pattern I’m unsure on. Unfortunately there were only two I could find. One here for the dress on Minerva and another for the jumpsuit on another site. So I just had to dive in and go for it. Talk about nerve wracking! I wasn’t about to ruin my beautiful fabric so I did do a muslin of the bodice first. According to the size chart I would need to sew a size 22, but given the amount of ease and the finished garment measurements I decided to size down to an 18. I am so glad I did! If I’d gone smaller I’d not have been able to easily get out of the jumpsuit, but if I’d gone bigger I think I’d be swimming in it. I was glad I’d tested it out first too because it turned out I needed a whole three inches of length added to the bodice. Sewing it together was fairly simple and straight forward so no complaints there other than those darn ties for the shoulders. Those were an unmitigated nightmare. OH MY WORD. Turning those tiny tubes of fabric just about did me in. To make it worse my kitten thought they were his personal playthings so he kept trying to steal them while I was fighting to turn them. Crazy times, my friends. Crazy times.
In the end I persevered and won the battle against both Pippen the Kitten and the ties of doom. I really do love how my jumpsuit turned out and am still considering the dress version as my Mother of the Groom dress, but would make a few changes. I think I’d gather the shoulders instead of use the ties, and I’d use bias binding in place of the narrow hem along the bodice neckline/fronts. I would also have to work a bit on tidying up the angle of the bodice that got a bit out of hand when I added so much length. I need to do a quick revisit of that so it doesn’t cross quite as high up and extend as far to the sides maybe. We’ll see!
In the meantime I’ll just be over here staring out the window willing the snow to melt and spring to come!
#minervabrandambassador #minervamakers #minervamakes #sewnwithbutterick #sewover50 #sewingforspring #jumpsuit #shortsleeves #viscosechallis #butterickpatterns #B6756 #handmadewardrobe #Imakemyownclothes #B6756seated #sewnshownseated
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