“Fan” tastic Dress and Purse…Lekala Style!

Four the last contest on “The Monthly Stitch“, I made a polka-dot cotton dress with  red decorative stitching and a box purse from a piece of heavy weight plaid cotton canvas and  blue brocade satin lining. I’m very happy with both pieces and had a blast modeling them on the new trail currently being built by my house. It is so pretty! You can get right next to nature without getting into the poison oak! The workers actually stopped for awhile, while we took our pics, that was so nice of them. They are volunteering their time to make this awesome trail. I can’t wait until its done!

These are the two patterns I tried out for the first time.

Lekala 4345

Small Bag Lekala 3001

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I made the purse so I could figure out the directions and hopefully make them easier to follow. I love the square shape. I used fabrics from my stash,  rectangular metal rings, and a thrifted metal zipper.

Everything went together easily, except for sewing the square fronts on the straight piece. It’s a little tricky going around the corners. It’s kind of like putting a square peg in a round hole. But if you clip into the corners, you can make it work. It’s just a bit fiddly. It wasn’t quite sturdy enough for me, so I ended up putting pieces of flexible plastic between the fabric and the lining. Next time, I’ll use heavy interfacing to help it hold its shape.

The dress was super fun and easy to put together. Especially since I saved so much time by having it printed in large PDF. I weighted down the pattern pieces and zipped around the edges with my special left-handed rotary cutter.

I am really liking this flat sewing technique. It makes it so easy for final adjustments. First you make the entire front, then the entire back. Then you sew the shoulder seams. Now you can pin or baste the sides to fit you perfectly!

I reinforced the waist inset with satin lining. Next time I will add interfacing to give it more stability. Here is what it looks like on the inside.

This is what the baseball stitch looks like, and the fabric is navy blue with tiny white polka-dots. For some reason, the computer makes the print do a crazy digital pattern on the dress in all the outdoor pictures.

I have to laugh, I think I put the little sleeves in backwards! After taking a closer look at the cap-like sleeve in the picture, I’m sure I goofed it up. Too late now, and it’s fine. I did double each sleeve so that the underside looked as nice as the outer. I skipped all the serging of the seams, because I sewed a decorative baseball stitch on the inset, sleeves, and the skirt seams.  I could have taken a nap while the machine slowly did its magic. The red stitching goes nicely with the red and white plaid purse.

The new trail follows  a creek that runs through our housing subdivision and the new hospital that is being built.  I’ve been walking it through the different stages of development and today it was graveled and pressed.  It will certainly be part of my daily exercise, but not in heels and a dress!

It’s almost a full circle skirt, so I had to give it a twill!

Happy Sewing!