Striped Plantain Tee Dresses

I've been eyeing up the uber-popular McCalls 6886 pattern lately.  If we lived in the States, I would have picked it up at a Joann's sale by now. As I've been too spoiled by the $1 sales to pay mail-order prices for Big 4 patterns, I decided to use my Plantain t-shirt pattern to make the dress.

Pink Crepe Drop-Sleeve Top

I'm not sure how I feel about this top.

The altered wardrobe

So I have been whining here and there about how nothing from my handmade wardrobe fits anymore, and how alterations haven't worked out the way I want them to.  I think maybe I was indulging in some bad-attitude moments, because lately I've been very motivated to alter existing pieces to fit, with a good deal of success.

I did, at first, think I would just start sewing new clothes. But then I realized that I was going to have to redraft and/or refit every single pattern just as if I were starting over.  That knocked the sewjo right out of me.  I had built up such a reassuring repertoire of TNT patterns before I lost weight, that I had many options to choose from when I was hit with the urge to sew something fast and well-fitting.

Not anymore.

So I've been hitting the sewing machine with a few old makes that I wanted to salvage.  Today I want to share my newly altered Josephine tops. These were made in 2017 from a Made By Rae pattern that I modified a bit. They've gotten a lot of use in the summers.  But with my changing shape, the tops had not only become too wide, but the armholes were too low and they now seemed much too long.

This top was made from a long-hoarded Kaffe Fasset rayon challis.  It was actually my second go at this pattern in the fabric; the first one suffered a horrible washing-machine death. Here's a photo of the second version when I sewed it about two years ago:

Before (original blog post).

April 2019 and my Me-Made May Pledge

I don't have a focused Me-Made May Pledge this year.  I've gone from nearly everything in my closet being made by me, to not having much that fits, and even less that is me-made. I'm hoping to continue losing weight, so trying to sew a new wardrobe quickly doesn't make too much sense either.  So I will document my outfits on the days that I wear me-made, try to repeat outfits as rarely as possible, see if I can alter anything else to fit, and sew a few new things that I really need - like a pair of jeans and long-sleeved tops.

Pink and Flowery All-Day Shirt

For J's birthday this year, I did some secret sewing and made him two new shirts.  This one was made from the Liesl & Co. All-Day Shirt pattern.

Yasmin Yoke Skirt

Back in January, I decided to try the keto diet. Although I hadn't been happy with my inability to take off the baby weight since Niko was born in 2015, I had begun to accept my shape, and had sewn enough clothes to wear 100% me-made every day.  Sewing really helped me accept the shape I was then, and I had put thoughts of weight loss on the back burner.

March 2019

I made some good progress on my Make Nine goals this month.  I don't know that I'll make it all the way through my Make Nine, as my priorities are already starting to shift, but I'm happy with the things I've made so far.

I'm not sure I will get to that Yuzu Coat after all, and I'm less interested in the Cynthia Rowley dress than I was when I made this list.  I do still definitely want to make the Extra-Sharp Pencil Skirt and the Classic Shirt, as well as a new Traveler shirt dress.