Nina test and tutorial for a contrasting frontal zipper Nina

This post contains a tutorial at the end, scroll all the way down for the zipper Nina tutorial.

Compagnie M  has released a new pattern: the Nina culottes for girls and I was allowed to test it! Last month Marte released the Nina for women, but now you can fill your girl's closet with this staple item. The pattern contains instructions for an A-line skirt and culottes, so two different garments for one price. I really wanted to make the culottes because here I always see my girls' underwear. Legs seem to be made to stay up. With the culottes, this isn't a problem anymore.

Compagnie M is known for her pocket options and I love pockets. During the testing we were encouraged to experiment with the pattern as long as we didn't change the fit. I love getting permission to hack and I changed the front pockets to faux welt pockets. This were the first faux welt pockets I sewed. The pockets always gape a bit, because I didn't stabilize them and due to their position, this is my own fault and not because of the pattern, welt pockets like this are not even part of the pattern.

The fit of the culottes is simply perfect, just look at this picture where she crunches down with her legs open. Culottes give here freedom of movement, no visible underwear and still are a very girly garment.

There are so many option in the pattern that hacking really isn't necessary (but I always have this need somehow). There are several closure options, and as mentioned earlier, several pocket options. Whatever your style, you will find an option in the manual that will fit it.

Before I made the culottes, I first made an A-line skirt, to test the size (not that it was necessary the size was spot on). The skirt was just for size testing and I allowed myself some more freedom with the pattern and I added a visible contrasting zipper on the front.

Both fabrics are from Cloud 9, and I bought them at Modes4U. The zipper I bought in a big batch at Aliexpress once. With the code NINA10 you can buy this pattern with a 10% discount. When you buy both Nina patterns (girls & women), you’ll get a 20% discount with the code NINADUO. Both codes will be valid till the end of the month.

I like the result a lot and so did Marte. Therefore I wrote a tutorial (scroll down) on how to make your own zipper Nina. The tutorial is heavy on pictures, I am still experimenting when it comes to writing tutorials, so feel free to tell me how I can make a better tutorial next time. Marte's instructions are great, so I really tried to be extra thorough myself, but I might have overshot it a bit.

 
For the tutorial I made my eldest a zipper Nina. The main fabric is again one that I won in the facebook competition last month. This one is from Michael Miller and I got it from Koning Uil. I wasn't in top shape when I determined the size and actually took one too small at the waist, totally my mistake, so the skirt is a bit higher than it should be but still wearable.

 Zipper Nina Tutorial

Extra materials needed: an open-ended zipper (deelbare rits). You can make the zipper Nina with a normal zipper, but in that case the bottom will always stay closed, my girl loves the fact that the skirt can be totally open. 
 

For this version you will need pattern pieces 1 and 3 for the front. You need to add seam allowance to the side that you normally cut on the fold. The visible zipper will add to the width of the front. In my case the zipper coil plus the width of my zipper foot (on both sides) is one centimeter extra. You can adjust your seam allowance for this difference. In my case I only had to add half a centimeter allowance instead of 1 centimeter (half a centimeter less on either side makes up the difference). If this sound very complex just add one centimer allowence on either side, you can adjust the final fit due to the elastic in the waistband.

To avoid my daughter's skin getting caught in the zipper I added a zipper guard. The length of the guard is the total of your front. In my case I took 38 centimeter.

The width of the guard piece is the width of your zipper plus seam allowance times two. So in my case 3.5 centimeter plus 1 centimeter times two is 9 centimeter.

Use the manual to sew the pockets, sew the sides of the skirt, the sides of the waistband and sew the waistband to the skirt. Do not hem and do not yet sew the waistband to the inside (every other step should be done). Now lay your zipper upside down on the skirt, align the side of the zipper with the side of the skirt panel. Your zipper's good side should face the good side of your fabric (the zipper coil might not differ depending on the side, so focus on the position of your runner). The skirt has a two centimeter hem allowance so place the bottom of your zipper just above those two centimeter and pin in place.

Make sure you fold the seam of the waistband (the seam between the front of the waistband and the skirt panel) totally up.This seam will have to end up under the waistband and should be folded in that direction.

Pin the other side as well, turn you fabric with the pins in it to see if you did it correctly (avoid having to use your seam ripper).

Use your zipper foot to sew as close as possible to the coil (if possible also adjust your needle position). Sew both sides and start/end your sewing 3 millimeter after/before the waistband seam (the seam between the front of the waistband and the waistband's facing). You shouldn't sew to close to that seam to be able to turn it over later.

Fold your zipper guard piece and sew the long side and one of the short ones closed. Cut the corners and turn it.

Pin the zipper guard on the side of the skirt with the zipper runner. Put the guard slightly higher (1 mm)  than the end of the zipper. This step I didn't do myself, but I learned from that. So in this step the bottom of the zipper should show a bit under the zipper guard. 

Again, turn with the pins in it, and check if everything looks okay. In your case, the zipper bottom should be a bit lower than the zipper guard (in my case the guard is slightly lower).

Take your normal sewing foot and sew the guard to the zipper (and the skirt).

I never use zippers that have the perfect length, so for this tutorial I assume you didn't either. Cut the zipper about three centimeter from seam (seam between front waistband and waistband facing).

Remove the extra teeth with pliers (only the teeth not the entire fabric). Remove all the teeth above the seam and probably one more. Start with a conservative removal and you will see in the next step if more have to be removed.

Fold over the waistband facing (to the back) and pin the facing to the zipper. In this step you fold the zipper top between the waistband front and the waistband facing. If you can not fold the facing over, and make zipper disappear neatly you might have to remove another teeth (or two).

Fold the bottom of the waistband facing under (itself), to be able to finish your waistband as explained in the manual.

Turn and your waistband should look like this.

Fold the guard in on itself and sew closed invisibly (by hand). Invisibly close the waistband (by hand).

Now the bottom hem. Hem as explained in the manual, or like I did, blindly by hand.

 Your zipper guard should be slightly higher than mine.

Done.

I love to hear what you think of my creations. Feel free to leave a comment in the language you prefer (although Google translate might have to assist me if you choose something different than English, German, Dutch or Hungarian).

Onesie dress tutorial

I often read it on blogs, new baby equals handmade gift. New born clothes are almost as cute as the actual new born. A few weeks ago I sewed my third onesie dress gift and I decided to make pictures during the process. The garment is inspired by a onesie dress I received when our youngest was born. I tweaked the sewing process with every new one I sewed and I think I now found a good method.Several tutorials for onesie dresses exist on the web, this one is (slightly) different because it involves a two layered skirt, no extra inside seams and a rolled seam waist detail.

Let's first show you how my latest version looked like. Here you can find a picture of the first, the second one doesn't have a picture but the fabrics were identical to the first.

I was very satisfied with the inside of the bias, the zigzag from the twin needle is simply perfect and almost invisible!

I ofcourse used the flower snaps again.

I simply copied the fabric combination from her. The flowers (from Lillestoff) were "growing" in my closet for a while, but I didn't feel like sewing them, seeing them combined with the green inspired me.

So, now the tutorial. I also sew the onesie, but you could do the same trick with a store bought onesie because you attach the skirt after the onesie is totally done. I use the Ottobre 1/2012 onesie pattern, but any pattern will do.
 
In the picture below you see my pattern pieces (without seam allowances), if you work from a pre-sewn onesie you just measure the onesie on the outside. First you determine the position of the horizontal line, the line where the skirt will come. In my case this is 17 cm from the bottom of the entire onesie (so imagine the arrow going down to the folded piece). This time, I wanted the skirt to totally cover the buttom of the onesie. In previous versions the skirt was a bit shorter. If the onesie is on a real life baby, the crotch will not lay flat making the garment shorter. A shorter skirt can still cover the bum. The onesie dress that you make with this tutorial will be one cm shorter than the bottom of the onesie when the garment lays flat on the table. Like I said earlier, all these were gifts, so I have no modelled pictures.

Take the length, in my case 17 cm and divide it by two which gave me 8.5 cm. Add seam allowance once (in my case 0.5 due to working with a serger) so I get 9 cm. I only take one seam allowance because the skirt will be finished with a rolled seam (no fabric loss).

For this onesie dress I took three times the width of the bodice to determine the skirt's width. The weight of the  skirt became a bit too heavy for the onesie. In the past, I used between 2 and 2.5 times the bodice width and I feel the 2.5 was the best version. Cut four rectangles of 9 cm times the width of the skirt. If I would redo this onesie I would take a width of around 65 cm (26*2.5).

Cut two rectangles with the same width as the bodice, in this case 26 cm and a length 1 cm shorter than that of the four others, so 8 cm (this will be the under skirt layer and should be a bit shorter than the top skirt). Here you have a visual overview of what to cut.

Sew three circles, by sewing the shorter sides together of two times two skirt pieces and the hidden under layer. I finished the two bottom hems with a rolled seam and a lattice effect (differential feed of serger on lowest number). For one of the skirt circles you also finish the upper seam with a rolled hem, I advice doing the top of the skirt without a lattice effect.

Sew a gathering stitch on the top of the skirt circles (for one of the skirt parts this is the non-rolled hem side and for the other the non-lattice side).
 

Gather the non-rolled hem border and sew it to the bottom of the underskirt (the smaller circle).

Gather the non-lattice side and use a baste stitch to fixate it to the upper part of the underskirt (the smaller circle). Try not to cross stitches (like I did unfortunatly) and try to not go closer than 6mm from the top.

Sew the skirt with a stretch stitch to the onesie. The upper line of the skirt (the rolled hem) should be on the line you drew in the beginning. Use a zipper foot to sew approximately half a centimeter under the top of your rolled hem (in the picture the distance is a bit more but I feel half a centimeter would have been better). Try to not sew on any of the earlier gathering of basting stitches because they will be hard to unpick later.

Cut the upper seam of the under skirt close to the seam. The cut hem will be hidden by the ruffle. Remove all basting stitches.

I love to hear what you think of my creations. Feel free to leave a comment in the language you prefer (although Google translate might have to assist me if you choose something different than English, German, Dutch or Hungarian).

Another adjusted martini

Around a year ago, I sewed myself the Martini dress from La Maison Victor in a teal flower fabric from Lillestoff. The dress was such a success with my husband that I quickly sewed another in black an white. The Martini has a beautiful but distinctive neckline, I didn't want others to immediately see that I used the same pattern, so I made a normal round neckline. I have been planning to sew myself more dresses but didn't really come around to it until I won fabric from Lillestoff. Now my creative self sewing juices are flowing again.

When Joyfits showed this fabric on her Facebook page it immediately went into my digital cart and I figuratively raced to check out (usually I load my cart and surf away from the page at least a few times before I buy) because I knew this would be sold out quickly.

source photo: joyfits

When it arrived, my middle daughter looked at it lovingly but I stayed strong and turned the one meter into another adjusted Martini dress. I love it, it is very bold and very colorful.The fit is perfect.

I didn't pay attention to the fabrics print when cutting my pieces, now I actually ended up with a not-ideal cutting at the back side. On the left, the same pattern repeats a few centimeter from each other. On the pictures it might look that the neckline is a bit wobbly. That is an illusion because of the print there, I managed to position a horizontal horizon line at the top of my chest. The fabric actually curves perfectly around my chest.

Next time I will lower the neckline and might choose a different neckline shape.

I love to hear what you think of my creations. Feel free to leave a comment in the language you prefer (although Google translate might have to assist me if you choose something different than English, German, Dutch or Hungarian).  

Testing the Block Party dress

When I saw a call for testers for the Block Party dress from Mandy K designs I immediately loved the color blocking design (very appropriately named dress). I applied and was one of the lucky ones to test. I was assigned a size 4, my middle daughter's chest is a centimeter smaller than the size table prescribes for a size 4, as suggested in the excellent instructions, I took of a centimeter from the bodice pattern. The dress is for woven fabrics and my daughter still has some movement freedom around her chest. She can grown a bit more width wise (therefore I also left some extra length). When you put on the closure you can overlap a bit more so that you have exactly the fit you want.

Although the design is already very nice, I did make some small adjustments (of course). The things I did, that were not in the instructions, were adding piping to the front (I didn't have enough to also do the bottom but more on fabric later), I added pockets, went for a velcro closing and I redrew the sides of the dress to not have side seams (easily done in a size 4 when you kid doesn't have a waist, for sizes 6 and up you will have to angle your pattern pieces which makes it only suitable for some fabrics)

The fabric is from Kokette Katinka, I won it (among a lot of others prizes) last month in one of my (Dutch speaking) Facebook groups with my Lion attack shirt. I received both these fabrics (one meter from the green and half a meter from the light blue circles) and two meter of bias tape. I presume Astrid, the owner of the shop, thought they would match together because I decided they were the perfect combination for this dress. The salvage of the fabrics learned me that they are from the brand Little Darling.

I put a cord in the bias to turn it into piping. I just hadn't enough to also do piping on the entire bottom part. I did use the remaining bias to finish bottom hem (no picture but here I did the same) and I used 30 centimeter from the circle fabric to reach the full length. One of the other testers used velcro for closing and I thought this would be great for kids that are still growing. With velcro you can adjust the size better to your needs and the velcro is also easily removed and sewn back a little to the right, with snaps that isn't possible. Buttons with buttonholes are also great for readjusting of course, but the velcro really keeps the entire line of fabric in its place.

The pockets are from the Hide and Seek dress. Sewing on the piping was a bit of a challenge on the curves. The seams therefore do not match, but I was not in the mood to redo them, only in close up it shows, and usually she is moving anyway.

The dress released yesterday evening and is on sale until Monday June 8. This dress is also perfect for making every day princess dresses. The other testers made some amazing Rapunzel and Allice in Wonderland inspired dresses!

You might be wondering what my daughter has on her head. I tried to make a head band. I took some wire and turned fabric around it. It worked quite well but it would have been better if I measured my daughter's head, now it was a bit short, and if I also should have fixated the beginning (I only did the end) as you can see on the pictures it came loose a bit.

Especially my Dutch readers seemed to like my bloopers last week (my husband, who is Hungarian, usually jokes about the fact that the Dutch speaking population loves self irony). So, I am happy to show you three more outtakes. Since a few months I am really trying to shoot in M. One of the perks is that you can choose you focus point. When I started this shoot, my daughter was very cooperative but my focus was off, see her nice blurry smile and the sharp grass?

When I realized my focus was off and adjusted, my daughters patience was gone, see how sharp her disapproving features are when she realized she was cold?

 What is happening there...? Lets take a look and just take off in the middle of the shoot!

I love to hear what you think of my creations. Feel free to leave a comment in the language you prefer (although Google translate might have to assist me if you choose something different than English, German, Dutch or Hungarian).