maritime shorts | LLADYBIRD

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Completed: Ikat Maritime Shorts

Good morning, everyone! I hope y’all had a nice weekend – we spent the holiday driving back from the beach, which was AWESOME – well, the beach I mean, not the drive, ha – but I’m soo happy to be home! Apparently, my cat spent the entire time sulking downstairs and trying to attack my roommate when she would try to feed her. Great job, cat. And you wonder why no one wants to be your friend 😐

ANYWAY, now that the summer heat is in full swing round these parts, I’ve really started rolling with my warm-weather wardrobe. Beginning with shorts, obviously, because ain’t no way I’m trying to wear pants in this humidity.

The pattern I used is the Maritime Shorts from Grainline Studio. I have a long history with this pattern – having made shorts with crazy colors, home decor weight fabric, bicycles, and even some failed jorts. This is a good little workhorse of a pattern, and I love the modern, clean cut (which kind of reminds me of something you’d pull from a JCrew catalog, especially in a printed fabric like those bikes!). They’re also REALLY easy to whip up, Ikat fabric notwithstanding, and can be squeezed out of a fairly paltry yardage. All good things, in my book!

Since I’ve made these so many times before, there’s not too much to comment on construction or fit. I made my usual size, although it needed a bit of pulling in due to my fabric choice (more on that in a sec). I used stretch interfacing for the waistband and fly pieces and shortened the hem as much as I could before the pockets threatened to poke out. Most seams are serged, although there are a few flat-felled seams in where I could manage it. Oh! I also used both of my machines to make this – one threaded with white, one with navy. This meant that I didn’t have to change out the thread over and over, as I did with the skirt. Made sewing these shorts go a LOT faster!

When it came time to sew the fly zipper, I skipped over Jen’s instructions and followed the ones for the Thurlow pants (you can see my sewalong post for those steps here). I don’t know what it is, but the included fly instructions don’t make a lick of sense to me. This seems to be the case for about 50% of sewers who make these shorts – some people think the instructions are awesome, and some of us are just sitting there scratching our butts, confused as shit. Obviously I fall into the latter. Anyway, it’s easy to swap out the directions with something that makes a little more sense to you, so in my case, it’s Thurlow. All good!

If this fabric looks familiar, it’s because I’ve used it before – on another Grainline pattern, no less. This is a stretch cotton twill that I bought from Mood Fabrics aaaaages ago – and have been hanging onto ever since, mostly because I had to work up the courage before I attempted pattern matching again! As with the Moss Mini, pattern matching these shorts was a total and complete bitch. I cut everything on the single layer, but even then it was really really difficult. Matching plaids and stripes is pretty easy – I could do that shit in my sleep at this point – but I had it in my head that I needed to match the print like freaking wallpaper for this piece, so the Ikat pattern runs seamlessly all the way around. I actually did manage to do just that, but not without wasting a shit load of fabric – seriously, I think I started out without about 2 yards, and I just barely had enough to match the back pockets by the time I was done. I kept mis-cutting and it was extremely frustrating. Of course, I have more Ikat lurking in my stash and I’m just side-eyeing it with terror now. I don’t know if I can deal anymore. I just don’t know.

Anyway, I’m happy with how everything turned out – it was totally worth the effort. You’ll notice that my print-matching is not 100% – especially at the center back. This is because I used a twill with a heavy stretch, which rendered the shorts waaaay too big when I sewed them with the normal 1/2″ seam allowance included in the pattern. I tried them on before attaching the waistband, so it was easy to nip in the sides until I got a closer fit, but that meant I had to sacrifice some of my perfect print-matching. The Ikat still runs in a straight line, which is good – it’s just a little interrupted at the sides. The center back looks like a vortex leading straight to hell, but there’s really not much I can do about that, so whatever. At least the back pockets are good, ha.

All in all, I think I pinched out about 1″ off each side before the shorts were finally the right size. Again, this is due to the stretch in the fabric. I’d normally size down for this sort of thing, but I sewed the smallest size so that wasn’t really an option.

I don’t have much else to say about this project, so here are some pictures.

(I totally sewed the hook & eye on with pink thread – I am pretending like it’s a design feature, but in all honesty it’s because I already had a needle threaded with pink thread and I didn’t feel like changing out to white. Ha!)

Notice that the bottom of the fly shield is unfinished – I sewed it in upside-down on accident. This seems to be a running theme for fly shields+me, as it certainly isn’t the first time I’ve made this mistake. Oh well.

Ok, I guess that’s it! So happy to finally bite the bullet and put that Ikat to good use. These shorts turned out really awesome, and they’re much more wearable than the mini skirt was (it’s hard for me to justify wearing something if I can’t comfortably sit on the floor with it on). And they look great with my new coral button-up, so bonus!

In other news, I recently decided to quit drinking coffee for the next couple of weeks – I felt like my caffeine dependency was getting out of hand, so I wanted to try to 0 out and start new. Omg you guys, it is REALLY hard! I am fortunate not to have any withdrawal headaches, but instead I’m just tired and listless and feel a little depressed, which is weird. I’ve also taken way too many naps over the weekend. I’m hoping things will balance out soon and I’ll feel back to my normal self but – ugh. So pardon me if I seem irritable – I’m just under-caffeinated! In the meantime, if you have any tips to help me ease out of this ~trying time~ in my life, I’m open to suggestions! I mostly just miss the taste of coffee. It was like getting a warm hug in the morning.

Tags: completed, Grainline Studio, grumpy LT, ikat, maritime shorts, short, shorts

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Categories completed projects - new

Completed: Bikey Maritime Shorts

31 Jul

I love it when a single piece of clothing incorporates a bunch of my favorite things at once.

Bicycles? Check.
Maritime shorts? Check.
Roisin? FUCK YEA.

I know they look like polka dots from a distance, but seriously there are teeny-tiny little bicycles all over these shorts and OMG SO CUTE.

I’m a sucker for bicycle printed fabric – this is a true fact, and I don’t think I even need to say it, because most of y’all are probably nodding your heads (and/or rolling your eyes) from how often I mention it. That’s ok, I’ll say it again – bicycle fabric rules! This stuff is extra special, though, because it came as a gift from my homegirl, Roisin. Recently on her honeymoon in Paris, Roisin posted this shit on Instagram after a fabric shopping bender (seriously… she went home with some really beautiful stuff) and I nearly had a heart attack over the BICYCLE PRINTED DENIM. Because she’s an amazing sport, Roisin offered to go back to the fabric store and pick me up my own 3m length. On her freaking honeymoon! Do you see why this lady is amazing? Because she’s amazing.

And because of her, I now am the proud owner of these cute little bike shorts! Yay!

I’ve made this pattern – the Maritime shorts – a million times, so there’s not a lot left to say about them. I cut my usual size, and sewed these up as normal. I knew I wanted to stick with a good tried-n-true to be absolutely positive that we would have no fitting issues here, especially after all that trauma I had trying to make jorts. Speaking of which, I think I figured out the issue with the zipper – after inspecting the zipper of my jeans (the ones I bought, not me-mades), I noticed that the fly extension is tacked down right at the base of the zipper, which takes a lot of the strain when you’re pulling them off and on. It’s amazing that something as simple as reinforcing the extension with a bartack really makes such difference but it does. After realizing this, I checked the pattern and it does instruct you to tack the extension down. I guess I skipped over it in my jeans haste? I dunno. But hey, now you can learn from my mistake! 😀

Sorry ’bout all the wrinkles. I took these photos after wearing the shorts all day, so most of them are from sitting and moving around. While this fabric is a denim, it’s pretty lightweight for shorts, so it tends to wrinkle. The fabric softened up quite a bit after prewashing, and also set a few wrinkles in permanently (such as the one you see by the side seam).

Some additional notes:
– I debated on topstitching with a contrasting thread – either white or gold – but ultimately decided to let the bikes take center stage and kept the topstitching navy. I love how it’s subdued and classy – well, as classy as a pair of short shorts covered in bicycles can be 😛
– My pocket lining is Liberty fabric, left over from my recently Liberty make! I know it doesn’t exactly match the denim, but I couldn’t resist pairing these two special fabrics together – after all, they’re both from some of my favorite bloggers, so it seemed only natural 🙂
– You may have noticed that I didn’t finish the edge of that fly extension. Actually, I did. It’s just up under the waistband because I’m fucking stupid haha. Oh well!

I tucked my chambray button-down in so you could really see the way the shorts look, and I surprised myself because I actually kind of dig the way it looks (even if it does scream ~Fashion Blogger on Pinterest~, which we all know I most certainly am NOT haha!). For the most part, though, I wear the shirt untucked, as in the above photo.

The best part – those lil’ shorts use barely any fabric at all, which means I still have about 2m left to play with! I’m debating what to do with the remaining yardage. It’s too heavy to be any sort of top (well, any sort of top that I would wear) and I’m not keen on making a matching pair of pants… but a dress, perhaps? What pattern would you suggest?

Thanks again, Roisin, for being such a star and making these cute shorts a reality! When I finally get my butt to London, I owe ya a drink 🙂 Or two 🙂

Tags: bicycle, bikey, completed, denim, grainline studios, hot damn this is my jam, maritime shorts, Roisin, shorts, sunni

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Categories completed projects - new

Completed: Jorts Fail

28 May

Jean shorts (or jorts, as I like to call them – because it’s ridiculous and hipster and sounds completely stupid) are something that have been on my to-sew list for a looong time. Super long. In fact, my jort supply has long run dry – I used to get those the old-fashioned way, by waiting until summer to hack the legs off my jeans so they’d be warm weather appropriate (and later realizing my huge mistake come fall – argh! Whyyyy!!). Jean shorts are an American thing – and I haven’t worn a proper pair in years. No wonder I always see pictures of bald eagles crying:

Anyway. Back to jorts. I knew I wasn’t going to get them by way of cut-offs (I love my jeans too much to do that to them!), so I figured I’d make a pair from scratch and call it a day.

My denim is a bit special – I actually bought it during Imogene + Willie‘s big yard sale. I went because I knew they’d have markdowns on jeans (although, when I finally got there, they’d put all the pants away due to threat of rain, wah), but I didn’t realize they’d also have leftover yardage of fabric! For cheap! I got 4 yards of this ridiculously amazing denim for $5 – yes, it’s super narrow (it is selvedge denim, after all), but still. That’s cheap as shit.

The denim was really nice to work with. I always complain that good-quality denim is really difficult to find for the home sewer – either it’s too lightweight, it has too much stretch, it has awful stretch recovery, it feels cheap, the color is awful, etc etc. And while I have found some really great denims that make fabulous skirts and dresses, I’m not so convinced when it comes to pants. This fabric, though, is really good. It’s very sturdy and luxurious, with absolutely no stretch.

Honestly, I think the lack of stretch is what did me in. These jorts are, unfortunately, a fail for me. Wah!

They look WAY better in these pictures than they look in real life – so much, I’m almost second-guessing my fail label. But, no, they’re pretty bad.

I had a somewhat traumatizing experience while making these. Things were going along great – I’d unearthed my Featherweight to do the topstitching (which is BEAUTIFUL, btw! Well. Beautiful where it’s not crooked lolz), I was having a lovely time stitching that denim, I was confident in my TNT shorts pattern, Grainline Maritime shorts. I love my Thurlows, but these are a fab casual shorts pattern if you don’t want all the fuss of the lining and welt pockets! I’ve made them a couple of times before, and while I’m not going to discuss the sizing and construction in detail on this post, you can read all my thoughts on the pattern here and here.

Anyway, I decided to try them on before attaching the waistband, and the zipper immediately popped in half.

“Well, that was probably a shitty zipper. It looked kind of old, probably just gave up on life right as I was pulling them on. I’ll put in another zipper, should be fine.”

So I unpicked the zipper, inserted a new one (have you tried to insert a zipper into a front fly that’s already been assembled? It’s… weird. Not a fan.), attached the waistband, and was getting ready to stitch down the waistband facing when I decided to try the shorts on again.

Oh, right. I popped that fucking zipper too. DAMMIT!

This is when I took an emergency trip to the fabric store (guys, I never do this – but desperate times call for desperate measures and I am DESPERATE for some jorts ok) and bought the strongest denim zipper I could find. I figured the shorts were probably straining against the bottom of the zipper because there was no give in the fabric, so I decided to let out as many seams as I could. I gave myself as much extra room as I could squeeze out, and then reinserted the (third!!!) zipper and finished the waistband.

Then I tried them on. Meh.

The fit is just… weird. I’m guessing my emergency unpick didn’t work as well as I had anticipated, so now I’ve got some weird lumps in seams that shouldn’t have weird lumps. They also just feel vaguely uncomfortable – I get that selvedge denim is pretty tough, and needs to be worn in a bit before it’s actually comfortable, but I don’t like it. Not in shorts, anyway. I know it looks like they are painted on, but they are honestly not that tight (except I guess somewhere around the base of the zipper, where it strains when I pull them on). Then there’s that whole issue with me being terrified that I’m going to snap this zipper every time I pull them off.

Here’s a closer photo of the shorts and the way they fit. You can see they’re kind of off – it’s not horrible, but it’s enough to bother me. Actually, I think the thing that bothers me the most is the fact that the damn waistband isn’t lined up. I have NO idea how that happened – it matched up perfectly the first time I attached it (right before I popped the second zipper), but it looks terrible. Oh well.

Aside from the fit – and the laughingly terrible waistband assembly, seam pucker and all (fyi, that’s where I gave up) – the construction is something I’m moderately proud of. While I didn’t go as far as doing flat-felled seams (and thank GOD for that, since I ended up unpicking them. Well, it didn’t help in the end. But, you know), I did topstitch them with proper denim thread. It looks so good!

Well, I guess it would look better if the topstitching were straight, haha! Oh well! Like I said, I used my Featherweight to do all the topstitching – I figured it would be better than unthreading my Bernina every couple of seams. I’m really glad I did, because being able to switch machines made things go a lot faster. Plus, the Featherweight just produces some of the prettiest topstitching! Now I understand why people flip their shits over these machines. They’re pretty fun!

Of course, that machine handles entirely differently than the Bernina I’m so used to, so I definitely went through a bit of a curve with this project. My topstitching isn’t straight, but that’s ok. It was a good practice and I’m over these shorts anyway 🙂

I’m totally ashamed to admit that I’ve barely used that Featherweight since I bought it, btw. I used it to make a failed Amy Butler bag right after purchase, and after that it just sat on my cabinet as decoration… until I pulled it out to make these failed shorts. And now I’m wondering if this is a jinxed machine ohgod.

Anyway, here’s that damn fly that gave me so much trouble. At least I have lots of practice sewing flys now! Haha!!

Sorry for all the unclipped threads and general messy inside. I think I just mentally gave up on this project after the first zipper broke.

So, overall – these jorts are definitely a fail for me. Not entirely happy with the fit, I think the topstitching looks sloppy, the back pockets are weirdly in the wrong place, they’re uncomfortable, the stupid waistband looks stupid, but most importantly… I will always always be afraid I’m going to break that zip when I’m taking the shorts off. Not worth the stress. Also, as a side note, that’s my Briar I’m wearing and I’m thinking it looks too big and droopy on me now 😦 Sad.

I’m not entirely bummed with this project, because I had a good time making them (despite the multiple zipper incidents) and I definitely learned a lot during the process. This probably makes me look bad now, considering I just announced my pants making extravaganza, but you know what? Mistakes happen. None of us are immune to the occasional sewing fail, and even if I don’t get a completed outfit out of it, I at least come away with the knowledge to improve on future makes and not repeat those mistakes. I’m also really happy that I reunited with my Featherweight! Maybe I’ll get around to actually fulfilling my sewlution of using that machine to make an entire garment. Sure, it was set for 2013, but… better late than never, right? 🙂

Tags: completed, denim, FAIL FAIL FAIL, Imogene+Willie, jean shorts, jorts, maritime shorts, shorts

Comments 71 Comments
Categories completed projects - new, sewing fails

Waverize It! Maritime Shorts

3 Sep

Ok, this is a liiiittle bit different than a normal post, but there’s still a totally rad finished product being shared, so I hope y’all can get excited about this with me 🙂 A couple of months ago, I was asked if I wanted to participate in the Waverize It! campaign, courtesy of Waverly Fabrics and Joann. I was given a piece of fabric, my only guideline being: Waverize It!

I should tell you right now, that fabric they sent me was a total surprise. Upon receiving the package, this was me:

Haha! Just kidding – I actually really like the fabric, although it’s definitely not a color that I wear or decorate with AT ALL. Coupled with the fact that it’s home decor weight, well, that narrowed my options even more. That being said, I am not one to admit defeat, so I racked my brain for a few days. I realized a couple of things:
1. Home decor weight means ~*~BOTTOM WEIGHT~*~
2. Any color can be improved by adding ~*~MORE COLOR~*~

And that was how I ended up with this amazing pair of shorts.

I used the Maritime pattern to make these shorts. I have already discussed making this pattern, so I’m not going to repeat myself – but this pattern is a pretty freaking perfect backdrop for jazz up some otherwise basic shorts.

Oh lord, did I actually use “jazzed” to describe these?

I know they look pretty plain from the front, but then you turn to the side and…

Piping! 🙂

PIPING ON BOTH SIDES, Y’ALL!

To be honest, I didn’t have much of a plan in mind when I started these up. I knew the base fabric, and I knew the pattern I would be using, and that was about it. I decided to pair the green with a solid navy (the same solid navy sateen I used in my lace trench coat) for the pocket lining, and upon realizing just how freakin’good those two fabrics look together, I thought I would add some navy love on the outside as well. I had a lot of ideas floating around while working on these shorts – piping around the pocket edging? Piping at the top of the back pockets? Piping at the waistline? Adding a navy sateen cuff? In the end, I chose to keep things simple with a single line of piping down the side seams, and a little bit of navy top stitching.

I could not be more pleased with the finished piece!
(ps do me a favor and don’t look at my legs in these pictures… I was in the midst of a mosquito attack, hence the furious scratch marks everywhere. I know they look disgusting. Ain’t nothin’ I can do about it now!)

In case you were wondering – I did make my navy shirt, too! Unfortunately, it’s kind of a Monet, though it looks fine in these photos. I will go more into that whole saga later this week with a proper post, but right now I’m still a little bit traumatized.

It’s difficult to see all the topstitching in the pictures, thanks to the lighting, but I used navy around the front and back pocket edges, the front fly, the top of the waistband, along the piping at the side seams, and around the bottom hem.

While figuring out exactly what I would do with my fabric was a little challenging, actually working with it was a total breeze! Waverly makes a nice substantial cotton that sews up like a mid-weight denim – which means it presses well, it doesn’t crazy unravel, and it doesn’t require any special handling to get it to do what you want. I didn’t even have to beef up my machine needle – a universal works fine here.

The fabric selvedge suggested that I dry clean my piece, but honestly? I don’t dry clean anything, like, ever. I can see how dry cleaning may be beneficial if you’re making curtains or whatever, but I wear my clothes hard and I don’t have time to schlep to the dry cleaner every time I inevitably spill something on myself (which is a daily occurrence, ok). Nor do I hand-wash, well, anything. Sooo needless to say, I tossed this bad boy in the washer AND the dryer, pre-cut, and I’m totally thrilled with how it softened up.

I even had a lime green zipper lurking in my stash, how perfect is that?!

The topstitching on the back pockets is my favorite part, too bad you can’t really see it in the photos! Oh well!

If you made it through this post, yay! Now here’s the fun part – to celebrate National Sewing Month and Waverly’s 90th anniversary, Waverly and Jo-Ann Fabrics are hosting a Waverize It! Facebook contest through 9/22. You definitely will want to enter this one – winner takes home a $250 Jo-Ann Fabrics gift card and $1000 in Waverly Fabrics! For more info, you can check it out here (or click below, do what you want!). Good luck, my friends!

I really enjoyed the challenge of making something with a fabric I would not have otherwise chosen – and I’m super happy with how the shorts turned out. I still have a bit left over, so tell me – what would you have done with this Waverly fabric?

~~Disclaimer: I was not financially compensated for this post. I did receive 2 yards of Waverly Fabric to review and keep. All opinions are my own.

Tags: completed, contest, Jo-Ann, maritime shorts, shorts, Waverly

Comments 49 Comments
Categories completed projects - new

Completed: The Victoria Blazer

15 Jul

Remember when I made those Maritime Shorts and I swore I’d make a matching blazer to satisfy my inner Tina Turner?

Welllll that happened.

AWWHHH YEAH!!

Don’t get mad at me, but it actually happened last week. I just got around to shooting pictures of this guy, hence the delay. Sorry!

You can also see my camera remote in these pictures, haha! I just figured out how to use it for this ~photo sesh~, so there ya go. I must say, taking pictures is a HELL of a lot easier when you’re not reliant on the self-timer. I just stood in one place and snapped away, it was pretty awesome!

Anyway, so this here pattern is the Victoria Blazer from By Hand London. This shit is extra special because 1. The pattern was PERSONALLY HAND DELIVERED to me via the beautiful and charming Elisalex while she was in Nashville at the end of May; 2. The fabric is yet another chunk of the endless yardage gifted to me by Sonja during last year’s swap; and 3. IT’S PART OF A MATCHING BLAZER AND SHORTS SET, HOW FUCKIN AWESOME IS THAT.

Oh, and the inside is purple.

So, this was a pretty easy pattern. I don’t understand why people have such an aversion to sewing lined jackets – it’s essentially the same process as sewing a lined dress. Were this jacket fully tailored, with all the padstitching and a back stay and fancy welt pockets or whatever, I could understand the hesitation. But, guys, all of you are capable of sewing this. It’s a jacket – an easy jacket, at that – with another jacket inside it, inception-style.
(oh god I just realized I inadvertently gave myself a weenie in this picture… ignore that, ok.)

I cut the veeeeery smallest size – the 2/6 – and made the cropped version. The pattern calls for a partial lining (the sleeves are left unlined), but since the cotton voile I used the line the inside is srsly the most buttery smooth fabric IN THE WORLD, I thought it was a shame to not have it against my skin and thus chose to also line the sleeves. This is super easy – I just set them into the lining, same as the shell, and then finished the bottom with a french seam as instructed.

I know, this looks super ridiculous with the matching shorts (hahaha y’all shoulda SEEN Landon’s face when I stepped out of the sewing room in this get-up!), but I think it will look really nice with my dark jeans.

It’s such a departure from my normal, everything-fitted style, but I like it!

The sleeves did give me a bit of trouble at first, but it turns out that I accidentally set them in backwards. Oops! Make sure you pay attention to those notches!

OH MY GOD, I took way too many pictures and I’m just going to dump them all right here.

I love these tags from Sweet Little Chickadee! I should also point out the running stitch along the top – that goes all the way around the jacket, through both the lining and the shell (you can’t see it from the outside since the lapels cover it). The lining didn’t want to behave and stay inside the jacket where it belonged, so I used embroidery floss and handstitched around the edge of the lining. It keeps everything in place, and I think it looks pretty as well!

Another thing I really love about this jacket is how good it looks draped over your shoulder, fashion-model-style.

Want to make your own Victoria Blazer? The girls at By Hand London are currently running a Sewalong for this pattern, so you have no excuse now!

Would you ever make a matching blazer and shorts combo like this? Am I off my rocker here?

Tags: blazer, By Hand London, completed, I am fabulous, jacket, maritime shorts, Victoria Blazer

Comments 53 Comments
Categories completed projects - new

Completed: Maritime Shorts, Straight Outta the 80s

28 Jun

As I mentioned at the end of Me Made May, I really have been wanting to try my hand at a different shorts pattern. Not because there is anything wrong with my beloved Thurlow pattern – but I want to change it up! Try something new! So here’s my first stab at trying something new.

So, check these babies out~

This is the Maritime Shorts pattern from Grainline Studio. I only just recently discovered these and immediately decided that I wanted to try them. I like that they are similar to the Thurlows but a little more casual – patch pockets instead of welts, no cuffs, and the detailing is a little less fussy. While I was summoning up the courage to buy these (only because I didn’t want to have to assemble the PDF, ha!), Carla contacted me and asked if I would like the pattern as a gift. Yep, same Carla who also gifted me the pattern for those glorious culottes. So not only is she a sewing saint of gifted patterns, but she can also read my mind. AMAZING.

Also, just for the record – taping this pattern together was not difficult. I was surprised at how smoothly it went, actually!

Putting this pattern together was interesting. I’ve slapped the Thurlows together more times than I even want to count right now, so much that I really think I could assemble a pair in my sleep. Jen’s instructions for these is totally different though! Not in a bad way, however, I did have to pry myself away from what I thought was ~the right way~ and let myself at the mercy of the instructions. Turned out ok in the end, though, as you can see!

The only thing I didn’t like about the instructions was inserting the front fly. I don’t know, maybe I’m just stuck way too much up my own Thurlow ass, but I found them a bit confusing. Fortunately, Jen has a whole tutorial on assembling these shorts, from beginning to end, and that includes inserting the zipper! So that helped. I do think that in the future, however, I’ll probably go with the Thurlow instructions just because they make more sense to me.

I wasn’t sure what size to make, since I usually base mine off the finished measurements. In the end, I decided to go with my actual measurements and cut the size 2. The shorts were a little big at the sides, but I was able to pinch those in nbd. However, the back gaped a LOT at the waist. This was super easy to fix – I just pinched out the excess and stitched a new CB line before putting on my waistband. Easy!

But hey, it’s fixed! And I managed to avoid mount crackatoa in the process! TAKE THAT.

Oh, so, now let’s talk about the fabric I used!

It is awesome, yeah? I’ve actually been hoarding this for over a year… it was a gift from Sonja during the 2012 Summer Sewing Swap. I could never figure out what exactly to make with it, but I knew a good fabric when I saw it, so I hoarded and waited patiently. I’m happy to say, it totally paid off! This fabric looks perfect as shorts.

I’m tempted to use the rest (assuming I have enough – I haven’t measured my remaining yardage) to make a matching Victoria Blazer, like the most amazing summer power suit you ever did see.

The only change I made to the pattern was to swap out the hook & eye closure for a button. I did originally sew on the hook & eye, but it was pulling the waistband really weird, so I decided to do the button instead. I think the pulling is actually because all the stress is on that ONE closure, so next time I will extend the back of the waistband to be long enough where there can be a second button the inside, as with my Thurlows. Just a personal preference!

I’m also a little bummed about my topstitching choice. Wish I’d gone with a darker thread. Oh well!

The pockets are lined with a super soft purple voile I had in my stash. With such a loud outside fabric, I wanted to keep the inside plain!

And because you guys love inside shots as much as I do, here are some pretty serged seams for ya.

Finally, this is what happens when I get bored with taking pictures of myself:

If you’ve been hesitant to buy the Thurlow pattern because you’re not as curvy as the pattern is drafted for, this is a GREAT alternative. You could even follow the Thurlow Sew-Along for extra hand-holding, since the construction is mostly the same.

Psst! That’s one of my white tshirts I made with fabric from Organic Cotton Plus. I just wanted y’all to know that I am wearing a BLACK bra underneath it in these pictures. Pretty cool, huh?

Also, I have a few updates that need to be mentioned:
– I don’t know if I have any local readers on this blog (well – I know there’s at least one because I met you the other day! 🙂 Hi, Beth! haha!), but I am going to be teaching sewing classes with a local dressmaker 😀 We are still nailing down details, but it will be a small, open-workshop class where people bring in what they want to sew (so you don’t get stuck sewing something you have no interest in ever wearing) where we will be on hand to demonstrate techniques and answer any and all questions. Classes will be on Tuesdays, last 2 hours, and will start in August. If you are interested in attending the class, please email me at lladybirdlauren at gmail dot com. If the days don’t work for you, we may be able to offer a different class day. Right now I’m just trying to figure out if there is an interest 🙂 So, please, let me know! Teaching sewing has been a longtime goal of mine and I’d love to see it actually happen this year 🙂
– Theodore has now gone to his new home, and I MISS HIM, but I’m also very pleased that he is in such wonderful hands! Thanks everyone for your support and comments. He’s a little stinker (literally – he stepped in his shit every single morning, and got an emergency bath every single morning as well), but he’s a CUTE little stinker! He is now with my brother and sister-in-law, which means I should still see him from time to time 🙂
– My other little brother, Matt, won’t be going to England this summer! So sorry to everyone who offered to show him around 😦 He actually made it across the ocean, but when they asked him for his work visa and he didn’t have one (he told customs he was there for an internship, even though “internship” really meant he was fixing this place’s website in exchange for a free place to stay), they put him in a holding cell for 22 hours and then shipped him home. I’d say poor Matt, except he’s now planning a road trip around the US and some parts of Canada, so I’m actually quite jealous. Ha!
– I finally stepped up and got my own domain! You can now find my site at WWW.LLADYBIRD.COM. No need to update all your readers and whatnot – the wordpress.com site should redirect to the main domain. If it doesn’t, do let me know! GOD, THIS IS ALL SO EXCITING.
– As most of you should be aware by now, Google Reader is dying a tragic death come Monday, 7/1. If you haven’t already started moving your blogs to a different reader, better hurry up! You can follow me here on Bloglovin.

WHEW that was a big ol’ wall of text! If you managed to read through all that – yay! Your consolation prize is another kitten picture: