Summer sewing

It's been a bit quiet around here lately, but I have been sewing a few things. And yesterday I bought new fabric. So I'm still (sort of) productive but just nog blogging. Free time is limited and I'd rather spend the small amount of time I have behind my sewing-machine than behind my computer.
But last week I finished a summerblouse and I just want to show it to you. So here you have it.

Linedrawing:

There's a lot I like about this blouse:

- The feminine style
- The fabric, a lovely creme/purple mille fleurs cotton (one of the three swatches I bought for € 5 in total)
- The little purple buttons
- The slightly curved neckline with the tie-bands
- The fit (sleeves that don't cut off my blood-circulation, yay!)
- It's summer-appropriate breeziness. Quite thin fabric but actually not very see-through.

Alas, there are also a few things I don't like:

- The tie-bands are way too short to tie them like the pretty bow in the linedrawing. In the meantime I've come to  accept that fact and even like the way I tied it in the picture. I'll wear it like that.
- The neckline is mucho low. I must wear something underneath.

So that's 6 yay's against 2 no's. I guess that makes it a winner.

There were some challenges along the way. The bands are mostly cut on the bias and curved. The facing of the bands is interfaced. So when I had to put those two together I was working with a stretchy fabric and a stable fabric. The first part went great. The second one however.....

at the bottom you see the finished one.

I'm glad it didn't happen with the first one or else I probably would have panicked a bit, but now I knew I was able to do it right and repair it. After unpicking the stitching and trying a next time, it looked much better.

Tie- and fabric detail:

In one of the next posts I'll show you a picture of the other project I finished, the knit-dress. And I have the above-mentioned fabric to show you.

But right now I'm busy organising all my Knipmode's and Burda's. I want to copy all the linedrawing-overviews in each magazine. That way I don't have to go through all the magazines when I'm looking for a pattern. I expect this to be a great time-saver!

I've always made a point about hanging on to all the magazines, so I have been checking their completeness. And guess what? I still have all of them.

What you see are all the Knipmodes from 1993 (starting april - bottom/left) until now (top/right). In 2006 I stopped my subscription (the patterns were just no longer interesting for me at that time) and started again in 2008. I bought some loose copies in those years.

That's it for now folks. Hope you are all enjoying a great weekend with lots of sun! It certainly is (early) summer over here!
Gr.
Lilian