Franken-suit

Eh gads I cannot believe how long it has been since the last post.  So much for my once a week plan.  I shall try to be better.

As some of you know, when I get interested in something, I get a bit obsessive.  Pianos, boots, tecras by the time I am finished I feel like I  know just about everything about them and my husband is sick of hearing about it.

I have now moved onto the playsuit.  I love the idea of having one item of clothing which covers the body all at once.  Thus my love for dresses and jumpers.  I am not so good at matchy matchy so these items allow me to be dressed quickly with the minimum of fuss.

As a result, recently I have been spending a lot of time on etsy looking for a 1950's or 1960's playsuit.  

For those who are unfamiliar, the girl on the right is wearing a playsuit.

I discovered this one (below) on etsy and fell in love.  I still want to buy it, but it is pretty expensive.  There is also the issue that the bust is 2" too big and I just cant get myself to pay that much for something I would have to alter myself anyway.  It is so super cute though!

The lovely suit of awesome

So, with price being an issue and I was unable to find one which had a nice patterned fabric and actually fit, I decided that sewing the playsuit myself  would be the best option. 

I did buy this pattern (left) a couple weeks ago,  but it has not arrived yet and as I am an impatient person so I decided to design my own.

There is also the issue that it is a tie waist rather than darted but at the time I figured it would be a good start

Thus began the Franken-suit

I used two patterns for sizing: 

A 1970's pant pattern and a summer top.  I drew out new pattern pieces with some changes.  I took out the button band at the front of the top and put in a seam instead.  I also added a seam to the back of the top where a zipper was to be installed.  Finally I moved the darts to try and match then when joining the top to the bottom.

After much sewing and testing I came up with a decently fitting muslin. 

Here is the final product.  I plan to make it strapless if possible but adding thin straps would not be too hard if I decided I did not feel comfortable.

I next want to mock this up in some of my thrift store fabric and see how it looks completely finished off. (I did not finish hemming the shorts and the whole thing needs to be lined in the end I think.

Overall I am pleased with how it came out.  It still needs some tweaking but I was able to take some of the problems with the muslin and fix them on the original pattern so hopefully the next version will be better.

The pattern design and creation of the muslin took about 9 hours total on Sunday.  Being unable to stop when I am in the middle of a project, I worked until 1am that night so I was pretty tired on Monday.  Lucky it was the BC day long weekend and I did not have to do much the next day.

So next weekend, the plan is to mock this up in a patterned fabric and see if I can line it as well.

And now for more Random Rupert

Hugh and I recently discovered Morse Creek Park.  It is a 10 minute walk from our apartment and made us both wonder how we had not known about this in the two and a half years we have been here.  It is essentially a walk around a large pond which was created when they built a dam at the exit of the creek.  I am not sure why they decided to do this, but it looks very pretty.

I worry sometimes about bears and wolves being in the area, but they mostly stay up the mountain and I figure with the amount of people walking their dogs as well, Hugh and I should be okay.