BWOF 8-2009-121 - Brown twill skirt w/ front pockets - Wardrobe contest garment #8

(pattern used for skirt only)

This is the last of the bottoms for the wardrobe contest! Originally I was going to do some crop pants with this fabric, but I'm a little out of time to try to fit another pair of pants. Also, the other brown skirt I made is a bit dressier, so I thought a casual skirt to go with all the tops would make a great addition. I'm wearing this top with the skirt.

I can't resist designs with interesting construction lines, and this one has them in spades. The fabric is a stretch heavy-weight twill. If I had it to do over again, I would use a thinner fabric. The side panels extend into the inside pockets, and with another layer of fabric at the CF, the pockets bunch a bit when I'm walking around. It's not unbearable and I'll definitely wear it. Just FYI if you are planning to make it.

I love a skirt with a back yoke. If you click on the picture, you can see two darts taken on either side of the CB not present on the blackline drawing. Without them, that yoke was terribly poochy when the waistband was attached. I had more fabric; I could have cut another yoke. But I couldn't figure out how to fix the problem without adding the darts. In the end I think they look fine and don't distract at all from the design lines. The back waistband fit onto the back skirt much better with the darts in place, so perhaps that was an oversight on Burda's part.

Here's a close-up of the front. I had to fiddle around with my machine to figure out the pocket thread bars.

I love that the zipper extends up into the waistband. I think I'll do this on other skirts with side zippers. It's much less bulky then a tab closure and you don't have to fiddle with hooks and eyes.

Back close-up:

I used two whole packages of bias tape for this project because of the many vertical seams. This skirt was to be casual and I didn't want to line it.

Here you can see the small back darts made to the back yoke. The bottom inside waistband was folded up and slip-stitched in place.

8 Down, 2 to go!!! I am currently working on the "topper": 5-2009-102B. It's going really well and I'm very excited about it. I should be finished with that by next weekend, and then I have only a very easy sheer top to finish things off. Whew!

Something was missing...

Look closely. Notice anything different?

After I finished this blouse and hung it in my closet, I found myself looking at it and thinking something wasn't quite right. It looked sad, if that makes any sense to you. Like it was missing something. I remembered one of the reasons I originally liked the design was for the sleeve tabs. (They had been left off because at 1 1/4" wide with a squared-off top, the small buttons I used didn't compliment the scale. They looked funny to me.) And then I got to thinking what a shame it was that the sleeve tabs didn't work out. Hmmm... What if I made them 7/8" wide instead? Perhaps with an angled top?

And with just the smallest of additions, I now love this blouse.

Amanda's Not-So-Shrunken Cardigan - in eggplant

Another knit is finished! I'm getting closer and closer to my 2009 goal of 6 knits for the year. This pattern is Wendy Bernard's "Marilyn's Not-So-Shrunken Cardigan". In all honesty it wasn't even on my radar to make. But then I saw Lynn's awesome pink cardigan made this past summer, and I had to have one. I already had this yarn in my extremely small stash from last year and the printed gauge was the same, so I went for it. By the way, I made this fun white blouse in January. Isn't it the perfect top for wearing under this sweater? I love the look!

The yarn is Knit Pick's Merino style 100% wool and it is super warm. I feel like I have discovered a new thing in wool sweaters. They just don't seem to sell them much in Texas, or perhaps they've been out of my price range. Anyway, I hate to be cold, even with our light southern winters, so wool sweaters are great to have on hand.

This pattern is suppose to be looser - hence the name - but I wanted something more form-fitting. I separated the sleeves from the body at 9" diagonally from the CO edge, instead of the called for 10". I just knew this would be a perfect fit. When I finally tried it on after I had done the bottom ribbing, I thought it was a bit snug. Hmmm. I guess I'll check my gauge now. Instead of getting 22 stitches per 4 inches per the pattern, I was getting 24 stitches! Duh! Totally a rookie mistake. I ended up knitting a wider button band and putting the ruffle directly on it. It was still snug, but not too bad.

And then do you know what happened?! I washed it and blocked it and the thing grew to the perfect size!!! Huh? Is this normal behavior for wool fibers? Do you knitters out there expect your wool to grow and knit sweaters smaller because of it? I'd really like to know, because while I know a lot about the behavior of fabrics, I know nothing about yarns.

Aren't these ruffles cute? Thanks, Lynn, for sharing your great modifications. I found the perfect buttons at JoAnn's. After I made both button band and buttonhole band and tried to close it, the buttons kept popping out. I had to go back with needle and thread and whip-stitch around the buttonholes for reinforcement. I'm just learning new knitting techniques left and right with this one!

I chose this purple yarn because I love the color but don't have anything like it in my closet. I also have some wonderful matching fabrics built up to make coordinating garments with, if I ever get finished with the wardrobe contest.