Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Weddings and Waistcoats

No turning back now! I've cut the lace. As there is no other way to mark this lace, I devotedly followed Susan Khalje's suggestion of thread tracing. So I traced...and I traced...and I traced
And I traced!
The tracing and cutting out (with no proper seam allowances, just huge amounts of lace on all sides) is as far as I've gotten. I had grand plans of at least getting all the beads removed from the seam allowances last night, but that was not to be. We drove to E-town last night instead to have dinner with Jim's family and drop off the flower girl's dress. It was great to get to visit with everyone (though the kids were bitterly disappointed that we didn't bring Riley) but it did cut into my sewing time, which is kind of critical right now. I'll just have to truck on through tonight before I go bowl for charity.
There just isn't much available sewing time this week. Tonight is bowling for Junior Achievement, tomorrow is a Louisville Bats game (I have a hard time passing up free tickets), Thursday is dancing at Porter's and Friday we're driving to Brown County (about an hour and 40 minutes away to pick up the newest addition to my sewing room. Today I confirmed my offer to buy an industrial straightstitch machine off of craigslist. I cannot wait to go pick it up! I'm so tired of having to fight with thick fabrics and not being able to stitch down the designs on a jackets that one of my customers brings me. No more trouble on that front though. This little baby will sew through just about anything...now where to put her?!
I'll have to be sure to get this new little number put well away before she gets here since I have a feeling she'll need some serious cleaning up done. Meet Charley's waistcoat. This is the first (nearly) completed piece to his Mr. Darcy suit. I've already gotten (and gotten out) lipstick on it, so machine grime is not really a welcome addition.
All this little guy needs now are buttons and buttonholes and he's ready to go home. The fabric is some kind of jacquard fabric (probably from the upholstry section) that my customers picked out before they hired me and I lined it with white linen from Hancock. It's fully lined with faux welt pockets and a lovely stand up collar.
I'm rather pleased with the result of my 2 days of work. Still have to tally up the hours spent, but all in all a breeze to put together and a fantastically drafted pattern from Rocking Horse Farms. Having been accustomed to working primarily with the Big 4, this was an absolute delight and I will be looking first to Rocking Horse Farms for all my historical pattern needs. Everything fit, there was no fussing or tucking or unnecessary easing and the directions were short, easy to follow and quite to the point. Love it!

1 comment:

  1. That's a handsome waistcoat if I ever saw one! Good luck on the dress. There's a lot of work to it.

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