Pants!!!

On goodness guys, I SEWED PANTS!

These are seriously my kryptonite.  I was traumatized early in my sewing career by pants sewing, and despite a few tentative attempts, have never been able to sew a pair that fits.  But then Gillian made a pair of (polka dot!) Style Arc's Elle Pants which looked awesome, and she encouraged me to brave this pattern since it's real simple.


So yesterday, I finally did.  Sadly, the above picture is all your getting today.  I had everything set up to take some photos today, when the camera said "please charge battery".  Ugh.

Well, at least it said please.

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And uh, sorry for the long delay with posting.  I had a great Cuba post all written up, but then blogger ate it and that ended any motivation I had to blog.  Whatever, I'll try rewriting it another time!  For now, here's a picture of some kite surfers we watched while drinking rum from a coconut on the beach.  OH YEAH.

Espresso Leggings: The Test Version

I bought Cake's Espresso Leggings ages ago, when they were first released.  I didn't even wear leggings back then, and am only a recent convert on their comfy wonderfulness.  (With a long top to cover my arse, of course.)  I knew they had potential though, and had plans to sew a few pairs for underground clothing and warm winter layers.

And then never got around to sewing them.  As usual.

Uh, but I'm having a heck of a time finding decently fitted leggings, especially in colours other than black (and sometimes charcoal), and I sort of want to sew some fun exercise leggings too.  So of course I made a black pair of Espresso.

These are my trial run, and I'm glad I did it.  I had a few issues, mostly in measuring the front and back rise.  I seemed to get really weird numbers - much shorter than I expected and the same for the front and back.  Everything I've read in my attempt to understand crotch curves says that latter bit was wrong, especially considering my *ahem* ample bum.  Obviously I did something wrong.  So I sort of made stuff up based on my total crotch curve and figured I'd fix it.

Heh.  I wound up with some really high waisted leggings!  And a really awful crotch (there's that buzz word again!  Not worried though, there is nothing nice about the crotches in this post!), but that's my own fault.  I don't know why, but I thought the crotch curve looked too narrow, so I added some width to the thigh measurement.  I'm 99.6% sure that's why things went so wrong here.


I don't care, these are super cozy house pants that I'm not embarrassed to be seen in, and with a long enough top, you won't even notice!

I didn't have any 3/4" elastic, so I (finally) used some 2" elastic I've had pretty much since I started sewing.  Glad to get that piece out of my stash!  (Although it's a pretty cozy finish, I'll probably try it again.)

As suggested in the pattern, I added a tag to the back, because you really can't easily tell the front from the back here until you put that sucker on and it simultaneously covers your boobs and exposes your crack.  Oops.

I'm going to try these again, possibly tomorrow later today, and follow the instructions properly this time.  Except for the front and back crotch curves, because obviously I'm doing something wrong there - I'll just measure off a RTW pair I have that seems pretty good. And add some length, because those suckers aren't hemmed at all.

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Oh hey, anyone interested in a tour of my gardens and back yard?  I have some great flowers, trees, and bushes growing in my yard, and some fun veggies growing in my canoe!