Colette Sorbetto Top

I am a bit late getting on this band wagon, but we are hitting SPRING tomorrow and this top will be perfect for the hot Perth summer. The Colette Sorbetto top has been made heaps of times by other sewers and has had great comments. There are some amazing versions with lots of embellishments in the flickr pool of photos .

This is great to download and easy to  tape together and even though it is a very basic pattern my adjustments are NEVER easy! My alterations are endless but fairly consistent .

• I started with a size 14 at the shoulders and went out to an 18 at the hips.
• I did a 2cm petite adjustment at the waist but added that back on and more at the hem.
• My FBA is very substantial for my E cup bust. I did a 3" FBA which actually adds 6" around my bust. I know this is huge but it is what it is!!!
• OK now I have a humungus dart and what am I going to do? I rotated half out to the side seam and left the other half as the side seam dart.
• I still had some gaping at the armhole so I darted it out on the pattern.
• I have shoulders that hyper extend to the back due to a connective tissue disorder so my shoulder are very weird indeed. On the front piece I extended the shoulder up to the 18 size and then added another 1.5cm to that. I then need to take some of the back shoulder. I think this is the opposite to a forward shoulder adjustment.
• One thing I will say is that the bust dart on the pattern is REALLY long. On lots of the photos in the flickr pool ladies have darts going right up to their bust point.

On the whole I am fairly pleased with the fit so far. The only thing I will change next time is to dart more out on the pattern at the armhole as it is still gaping too much. I was hoping the binding might have brought it in a bit but it hasn't.

The fabric is just a cotton I got an textile traders and whilst I loved the look of the print it really isn't my colour at all. I will probably just where it about the house as it will be very cool in the summer.

This is the first time I have used binding and the instructions on the pattern are great. I will definately be using it a lot more in the future. I was lucky enough to find some the same colour as the little aqua birds on the fabric.

I hope to finish this off in the next few days but as usual sewing time is scarce between teaching and work.

New Look 6735

I had sewn up this New Look t-shirt a while back and it had sat in my sewing room for a while not quite finished. I looked very boring and so I thought I would try embellishing it with some fabric flowers.

There are numerous tutorials on line on different way to make fabric flowers. The way I did mine was to cut three differnt size circles, place one on top of the other, fold into quarters and then do a few stitches at the point. When you open the flower back up it looks like petals. I sewed a bead into the centre and attached to the shirt.

I need to add a few more more smaller flowers to finish it off and fill in the gaps. These seem a little floppy to me and next time I will try some of the other ways of making the flowers like using a gathering stitch to make them a little "fuller" and hold their shape better.

I have made this t-shirt several times now and it has become a TNT pattern, I also love the skirt on this pattern and made it up a few times over the past few months.

I really need to make a cover for Millie my duck tape dummy as all her stuffing is popping out the poor thing!!