Top 5 Hits and Misses and a 2014 Summary

Continuing in the Top 5 series, as hosted by the lovely Gillian of Crafting a Rainbow, I am writing my final entry in the series on my Hits and Misses of 2014 in this entry with a bonus summary of my 2014 sewing. If you missed my other entries, here are highlights and reflections/goals.

I’m going to start off with the Misses, because I like ending my entries on a high note.

Misses

1. Espresso Leggings. By far the most frustrating miss of the year. I make three muslins and just had horrible fitting issues with all three. It was a combo of the pattern and fabric choices, but I was not pleased with the result. The hunt for a better pattern continues!

2. Lekala Pencil skirt:

Sour look says it all.

3. Parisian Nights pajamas.

I think it was partially poor fabric choices for these and the fact that I graded them up and really did not need to. I wear them, but I am very grateful they are pjs and no one sees them. They are far too loose on the waist and can make for unfortunate pants-dropping incidents. Ha!

4. Parisian Top cardigan hack.

Initially, this one was a fail, but ended up being a lot more wearable as a cropped cardigan. I don’t wear it that often, though. It isn’t my go-to cardigan, but I love the style of the Parisian top and am glad I made the top again as it was drafted, because I love it. Cardigan, though, not so much.

5. Cat paw buttons for my Kitty Chronicle Shirt Dress.

Several of these buttons broke after being thrown in the wash the first time. They seemed more like decorative scrapbook cabochons when I received them in the mail even though they were listed as garment grade, but I wanted to have them on for the final pictures. I received a bunch of basic black buttons in the mail have sewn them on the dress to replace the pink paws. I will use the paws for something else in the future, but not garment sewing.

Hits

1. Colette Moneta Times Four.

 

My shiny gold Moneta is my go-to party dress to thrown on for a night on the town. It’s so comfortable, but looks super fancy. I love the compliments I get in it. While the rose print Moneta isn’t worn as much due to low-quality fabric, I still love it and bring it out about once every two weeks. I also frequently wear my colourblocked Moneta. The only reason my orange Fall Moneta didn’t emerge was because I have procrastinated for so long with installing that stupid elastic at the waist…derp…

2. Many many many skirts aplenty.

This time last year I would have scoffed at making skirts (dresses gal all the way). Where skirts hit me before, I was not happy: talk about lump city. The smallest part of me is my underbust and I prefer to emphasize that while still giving my girls the highlight. I wear a lot of dresses with waists in the underbust and flared skirts and find that style the most flattering on me. I’m glad to have quite a few more separates in my wardrobe now and find that I grab those in my sleepy morning grumbling search for clothes more than a woven dress now.

I am very much a skirt fan now, because twirls:

4. M6696, the Kitty Chronicle dress

God damn, I love this pattern and this specific dress. I’m so happy to have the replacement buttons and be super cute in it again! I suspect that this pattern will make an appearance several more times. Since the Autumn of 1000 Shirtdresses ends on Saturday, I am going to try to whip up another one before then. I think it’s doable…

5. My first coat! Vogue 8346

I haven’t blogged about it yet. Honestly, it’s taking me forever to write the entry, because there is so much to say about what happened in the process. I might break it into two parts, actually. Construction and then final product, along with what I liked and what I would change. That would make it into much easier to read and to write. I thought I would show you a teasing image, though. 😛

The success is huge, though, and I’ve been wearing it a lot. It’s incredibly warm. Example: today is -22 Celcius with the wind chill and I feel toasty warm in my coat. I know I did a great job! 🙂

A Year in Review

The incredible Tanya over at Mrs. Hughes wrote a lovely entry that included pie charts on her sewing for 2014. She borrowed the idea from amazing Kelly at Flowercat Designs and I had to borrow it, too, because I am a sucker for pie charts. Mmm….pie….

2014 was really my year of falling in love with sewing and starting a long-term relationship with it. Before we were complicated….I’d return to it for costumes and maybe a dress here and there, but I wasn’t in love with it and sometimes used and abused it. Poor sewing. It cried many a night. Now, I’ve officially declared my love and put a ring on it and decided to spend the rest of my life with it. I am Mrs. Sewing now, everyone!

You can sort of see the increase in love reflected in how much I sewed over the year:

For comparison, in 2013, I made a total of 11 things; 2014: I made a whopping 33 things! By far, my most successful month this year was December with 12 garments sewn for me and other people. Phew, that was a lot! I suspect I won’t have as much in January, but I do have a few things planned out for the month to go along with several of the themes in the sewing blogverse.

So, what did I sew?

Knit dresses won overall, but I almost kicked them out with skirts and cardigans came in a close third. I surprisingly made more PJs than I expected for a person that, full disclosure, doesn’t actually wear PJs….. I didn’t count all the PJ pants I made for my kids and my nieces and nephew here. This chart is all selfish sewing.

Unsurprisingly, Colette patterns wins as the most sewn. I sewed four Monetas and one Myrtle during the year. Muse Patterns is a close second and, I suspect, will take over in 2015, because I love Kat’s designs. If my Natalie dress hadn’t been a disaster in the fabric department, Muse Patterns would have been tied with Colette. Technically, I did sew a Natalie dress…it just was betrayed by horrible fabric.

2014 was a great year! I’m super excited to see how my sewing grows in 2015 and what my wedding dress looks like! Eeeee, I can’t wait!

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