September 22, 2014

Coating with Cashmerette: Patience is a virtue (that I have limited amounts of)


And so the coat making commences!
Well, sort of. I rough cut out my pieces from the cashmere (more on that shortly), and cut out the interfacing. Then I stopped and looked at my sewing room table. On one side were all the pieces of the baby duffle coats I’m making, all interfaced with gorgeous weft interfacing. On the other side were my cashmere pieces about to interfaced… with rubbish interfacing. I struggle at the best of times with being patient, but I had to admit that it was a bit silly to make less effort with my own coat than those for little girls (lovely as they are).
So I calmed down, and ordered myself some more good interfacing, and decided to start instead with the lining. Double bonus: sewing the lining is usually very boring and frustrating at the end of a project, so getting it done first actually sort of makes sense.
I’m using this crazily excellent flamingo poly crepe de chine, which is gorge. However, it does fray like a maniac, so despite the fact the inside of the lining will never be visible, I decided to serge everything. I started off by serging the piece edges, and then doing the seams with my sewing machine so that I could press the seams totally flat (if you serge the pieces together they’re more bulky).

Here’s as far as I was able to take it, sans fabric pieces.

It is entirely apparent at this point that I didn’t make any attempt at seam matching. I dunno… maybe I should have, given all the time and cost in making a coat. And yet I have to admit that it didn’t even occur to me. The upside is that now I have excellent mutant flamingos going on:
What fabric animal have you decapitated and re-capitated, readers?

17 thoughts on “Coating with Cashmerette: Patience is a virtue (that I have limited amounts of)

  1. i made a baby quilt for a couple expecting their first. it was a woodland animals i-spy theme, & i used scraps from the animal fabrics to piece big penny stacks on the back. but i accidentally decapitated a horse in one of the pieces on the back, & sewed the severed head on elsewhere. & the really awkward part is that the new father is actually an ex, & the relationship didn’t end well (though that was a very long time ago). i was so (irrationally) anxious that i was trying to send him some menacing “godfather”-y message. (but he loved it, as did his partner. whew!)

    1. Jenny says:

      That is hilarious!!

  2. ack! that should say that i was irrationally anxious that he would think i was trying to send a message…not that i actually was!

  3. I’ve yet to experience animal decapitations. Except for those involving culinary activities.

    Jenny, where did you get that sweet flamingo fabric?

    1. Jenny says:

      I got it at EmmaOneSock (surprise surprise!) But I believe it’s also in lots of stores now, and some of them may (probably will be) cheaper than EOS.

  4. Love the flamingoes. I hemmed right through the foreheads of a row of cats on my Crazy Cat Lady top. It defintely made them look angrier.

    1. Jenny says:

      Ha ha ha 🙂 Makes it more crazy!

  5. tanyamaile says:

    I rather like the mutant flamingos!! I often spend more time and am more careful when making things for others and I shouldn’t be!!

    1. Jenny says:

      Well, I guess it’s all a balance of time and quality, right? Sometimes I just want to get things done, and/or I remind myself that no-one – not even myself! – will notice tiny things

  6. Kay says:

    I haven’t decapitated an animal yet, but made reindeers do upside down yoga for the back piece of my daughters pajamas just so I could fit all pieces in the small yardage I had.

    1. Jenny says:

      Reindeer upside down yoga is TOTALLY going to be a new trend, I can just tell…

  7. I don’t really sew animal prints. I did once make bias tape that went perfectly across Spiderman’s naughty bits. Thankfully little boys don’t notice such things.

    1. Jenny says:

      Modesty bias binding! I like it.

  8. Michelle says:

    I sewed a pair of PJ pants for my husband out of novelty John Deere flannel where one of the front legs had the wrong side of the fabric facing out (due to a cutting error and not having enough fabric to re-cut).

  9. I still have these pj bottoms where one leg is right side up and the other is upside down. The seams have some interesting combos of pink elephants without heads… http://griffinfoodandsewing.wordpress.com/2014/05/10/do-pjs-count/

  10. I’ve been working on a cat-themed outfit (for the Crazy Cat Lady Sewing Challenge) and have many disembodied cat bits all over my crop top. And that top was cannibalized from the original skirt, wherein I sewed the left half with the cats facing up, and the right half with the cats upside down! Maybe I should stick to abstract prints, huh? =)

  11. wethesewing says:

    Love this fabric combo!

Let me know what you think!