A Little Something

Finally I actually finished something. Two somethings but the second one will have to wait for photos. There may be a third something by then too, who knows?

Cassia In Blues

For:  Rosebud

Begun:  June 20, 2012
Completed:  August 17, 2012

Yarn:  Sandnes Garn Smart, 100% superwash wool, colour 1002, hand-dyepainted with acid dyes in shades of blue, 108 yds + 50 g (DK weight), 6 balls (about 1/2 ball left over).

Needles:  Addi Lace Cliks, 4mm. Addi Lace circ, 3.25mm. Aero aluminum dpns, 3.25mm.

Pattern:  Cassia by Georgie Hallam, purchased as a Ravelry download here.

Comments: This is a lovely pattern for a girly tunic or dress in multiple sizes, newborn to 12 years. Although it’s fully colour-coded, I took a highlighter pen to clarify where to go for the size 24 months and was still frequently confused by the many needle changes for the ruched yoke. I might have benefitted from re-writing the details for my size out again in a simpler form thus saving the time spent frogging!

However, this is a really cute dress! I found 3 buttons in the stash that go reasonably well. It blocked out quite large (good old stretchy superwash!) but should fit her for a long time.

I’ve also been sewing a little bit. Before we went to Manning Park I started a project inspired by Sigrid’s blog post here. Judging by her excellent photographs I decided I could copy the idea and combine the draped neckline with the Kirsten Kimono Tee pattern and come up with one of my infamous frankenpatterns. Yay! I had a little difficulty with figuring out how to split the neckline to get the shape correct.

First I took these instructions from Connie Crawford’s book:

And got this:

I didn’t like how it distorted the shoulder seam and didn’t seem to add enough volume. So I went this way instead:

After straightening out the neckline to allow a folded facing, I ended up with this:

The top layer is the original pattern and the (wobbly, sorry!) black line outlines the new front neckline. Then I added the matching facing to the top line. It ends a couple of inches below the armhole and curves gently up at the centre. The back neckline, shoulder and armhole is the same as the original Kirsten Kimono Tee. I lengthened the top to a tunic as well and was quite pleased with the results. I cut the garment out of some green novelty sport fabric that’s quite light and drapey and has tiny little holes in it. The usual 100% unknown fibre bargain basement find at Dressew. Total cost about $4. I figured if it didn’t work out, no loss really except my time.

Trouble came when I went to sew the tunic together. I thought I understood Sigrid’s brilliant sewing order but kept messing up and had to use my seam ripper more than I usually do. I ended up printing out her blog post for reference before I got the darn thing correctly put together. I hope to have photos for the next post. T-Man thinks it’s really sexy but I swear I can’t gain any weight or it will be too tight! This stuff isn’t very stretchy at all even though it’s a knit. Now you really want to see me in it, don’t you? Heh.