carrotflowers

Made: JJ blouse from burdastyle.com

This blouse took me a couple weeks to finish. Whew! Longest I’ve ever spent on a piece! Now, the delay was in part due to timing: it was March Madness, after all, and my boys went all the way to the Final 4. But back to the topic at hand: the JJ blouse from burdstyle.com. This pattern was actually the winning design of their first contest. The moment I saw it I knew I wanted to make it. The moment I received my little flock of birds fabric from reprodepot, I knew what I wanted to use it for.

As mentioned in a previous post, I had to start by reading the first step several times. I still don’t think I did it quite right. Overall, however, it was easier than I thought it be and I love it! It fits so nicely. This pattern is a total keeper and would be easy to modify by dropping the ruffles and/or changing the collar. Yay!

Project Source: JJ pattern from burdastyle.com.

Project Notes: I did a lot of basting this time. I basted the ruffles on before machine sewing, and I am sooper glad I did! I also basted the cuff part of the sleeve on, and I basted the collar, natch. For many of the seams, I also followed a fellow burdastyle member’s recommendation and used a mock french seam to enclose seams. I misunderstood the how to though, and sewed my mock seam down, so you saw the second row of stitching from the right side. Still, I loved the look of it! Except for the first step, I didn’t have too much trouble, except I could not figure out the slit on the sleeves. I consulted my trusty co-worker, and she enlightened me fully. Despite this I still messed up a little - see mistakes.

Mistakes/Complications: The sleeves started a little more off my shoulder than I would have liked. So after I basted the sleeves on, I sewed the SA much wider at the shoulder area and tapered it as I advanced toward the pit. I did this by feel, so I guess I’m just lucky the sleeves did not turn out uneven.

Also, I was not careful and therefore had to do some fiddling to get my ruffle tops to be parallel as well as starting at the same point. Oh and the slits on the sleeves - I had the buttons closing 2 different ways, so from the front it isn’t the same. also I did not trim the cuff part enough, so when I went to sew the buttonholes, drama city - AGAIN.

Finally, I put the buttonholes WAY too close to the edges, and too much space between the buttons, so that the fabric between gapes open a little. Boo.

Notes for Next Time: Ruffles, Sleeves and Cuffs - Carefully line up the ruffles - mark the darn pattern and fabric next time! Also, maybe experiment with cutting the sleeve pattern pieces smaller. Finally trim down the cuffs better so less buttonhole drama!!