So much for October

In a nutshell, October has been dreadful. I shan't even bother to recap the reasons why it was so dreadful, just take my word for it: it was just grim and I am glad it is nearly over.

Due to the dreadfulness I have sewed very little since my last entry in this blog.  Right back at the beginning of the month I did continue my Almost But Not Quite Pyjama sewing and made one knit tunic/short dress in black and white:

The Tree Bark Twig Dress; or Ottobre 05-2015-01, in a print so busy that you can make out literally zero details

Ottobre 05-2015-01 Twig Dress

This is Ottobre 05-2015-01, which Ottobre call the "Twig" dress, a simple A-line knit dress. This name was baffling until I realized that the sample dress was made in a print reminiscent of twigs. It amused me far too much that the fabric I used was described by the vendor as a "bark" print. Can't escape the trees with this dress!

The fabric was a 1.75m remnant of a slightly woolly textured sweater knit in a poly/viscose/lycra blend. It was the perfect amount of fabric for this dress -- I had nothing more than some skinny strips and one small square left at the end. I made no attempt any kind of pattern matching, but it turns out the print is so busy and random that I think the seams, even the centre back seam, blend in pretty well anyway.

If you squint REALLY HARD you can probably just about make out the semi-circular pocket here. Maybe.

I made a size 44 straight off the pattern sheet with just my usual square shoulder adjustment. If I make it again, I'll shave just 0.5-1cm or so off the shoulder -- making it more like a 42 through the neckline -- because the shoulder point is just a tad too wide. Really, I should just use the size 42 neckline but I was being lazy about blending sizes when I traced this one.

On me, sorry for the camera phone shot.

One reason I like Ottobre patterns so much is that even though this is really an ultra-simple dress it just seems really well thought out. The pockets at the front are just a little bit different, with bound edges, there is a nicely shaped centre back seam, and overall it seems really well drafted. My version went together extremely smoothly and quickly. My only tiny sewing problem was that the fabric was quite bulky and the bindings at the neckline are therefore quite thick. You're meant to sew in a little dart at the centre front to create the v-neck, but that was just not going to work out. My dress is therefore a sort of pointy scoop rather than a V neck. That aside, in conclusion: A++, would sew again.

Since making that (and that first wear that I took a mirror selfie of was back on October 4th, so, a while ago now) I have also cut out a second tunic pattern to wear with black leggings. However, that's still languishing in pieces on my sewing table right now awaiting my return to sewing productivity. As the dreadfulness is receding I imagine I'll get started sewing again imminently, but as usual I have a backlog of more urgent but much less fun things (housework I cannot continue to neglect, etc) that I need to catch up on in my more productive hours before I can start using them for sewing purposes. I still have high hopes for November, in terms of making interesting things and getting stuff done!