This week the new Fibre Mood, issue 11, launched and I was allowed to sew one of the patterns. I picked the Ellis, a unisex sweater with fun details.
Somewhere, between the lockdown ending and before the start of the summer, our eldest, who is twelve, decided that she was in for a shopping trip and would actually try on clothes. I jumped on the occasion. If I buy something, I usually order it online and when we are on a rare shopping trip she always claimed that she needed nothing. She is the opposite of her two smallest siblings who always need EVERYTHING when we enter a clothing store.
On this mother-daughter trip (yes, I left the others at home) she bought trousers. I had to practically force them on her because she was sure they would be uncomfortable. She had a bad experience with second-hand jeans just from the washing machine a few years go. They were as uncomfortable to her as a straight jacket, so she swore off jeans for years. Until now. Now she only wants to wear these stretchy jeans that we bought (something about teenagers...).
Her new found love of jeans, of course, meant that she needed shirts and sweaters. Although I am not a fan of sewing jeans, I do love the simplicity of sewing sweaters. Enter the Ellis pattern from the new Fibre Mood. The asymmetric line on the front and fun details at the neckline and waistband immediately stole my heart. I wanted to color block the first sweater but the teen had her doubts a bit, so I went for safe and made the sweater in one color.
I made her a size 14 fand the fit is just PERFECT (even though she is just above the table chest wise). It is so perfect that besides sewing her one Ellis according to the pattern, complete with the little splits, I sewed her five plain versions. No splited front, no splited bands. Live is busy here and photo's of extra projects are easily forgotten. All of them are uni-colored French Terry with a screen print. I did manage to shoot one quick snap of this black version. On my Instagram you can also see the print on the red one, that she has to warm up to a bit though.
After making the uni-colored version, I of course, also had to make a color blocked one. Fortunately our son is still a fan of printed fabrics, so I made him the black penguin version. The splits are not that visible in black, but trust me they looks awesome. He likes his clothes to be a bit oversized, so I reused the size 14 that I used for the eldest. Kids in the same size must be a joy for any sewist.
The Ellis pattern is now available on the Fibre Mood website and this edition contains, as usual, many other great patterns. Check out the edition here.
