Competition Update and Plaid Talk

The results are in and I have made it through to the next challenge! Thanks again for your support and your votes!

I was very sorry to see Meg leave the competition. She was a fierce competitor, as well as being very sweet and gracious. She made some beautiful and creative garments. I look forward to meeting up with her in the flesh soon.

Grainline Archer. Click the picture to see my post.

My friend Elizabeth has been working on a project and has been asking me and another friend, Sherril, for some fitting advice. This morning she asked for some advice about sewing plaids.

I have been sewing a lot of plaid lately, and I thought my response to her might be of general interest, in case you aren't comfortable sewing plaid fabric.

<snip>

Plaids. I have sewn so many plaids lately. You have to do some matching, there's no way around that. But you can minimize the pain by putting some elements on the bias. Put the front band on the bias (then interface). Put the back yoke on the bias, or the collar. Put the sleeves on the bias. In a princess seamed piece, put the side front or center front on the bias. Put the pockets on the bias (then interface). Once you start playing with bias, it's addictive.

Also, because you have a bust dart in the side seam, matching the plaid across the side seam presents a conundrum. What I do is match the plaid at the hem, then it mostly matches, up until the dart. But that part is under your arm, so who cares.

And then, this morning, I saw that my friend Beth, sewist extraordinaire, has a timely post on matching plaid!

I haven't cut out my next challenge project, though I've done some prep work. I need to get busy!