Repairs, blouses, and hair flowers..Oh my

This weekend I was very productive sewing wise.
I really wanted to finish my Sorbetto top and I wasn't going to let the fact that I was having issues with my vintage sewing machine stop me.
So, I decided to bring my modern sewing machine into play.

It is a brother and I got it for Christmas a few years ago from my parents. I am not certain that I have ever used it until this weekend (though my mom did borrow it and use it once).

Verdict: Okay i really like it. Of course I want to like my husband's grandmother's machine the best, but it simply isn't the case.

I love the button press to reverse and the different zigzag widths. I also like that you can move the needle position. It is also pretty easy to thread (both top and bottom).

This doesn't mean that I have completely given up on the other machine.

Anyway,

I did set up my modern machine. As a test run, I repaired a pair of my daughter's leggings (crotch seam came apart) and panties (the elastic on a brand new pair came loose). Once I got my feet wet, I felt confident to go ahead and finish my Sorbetto.

I unfortunately don't have any pictures of it though. I realize that I can not take pictures of me wearing a shirt, my bathroom mirror is the only mirror that I have and it isn't floor length. Pictures from it look terrible I guess due to lighting (which you will see later in this blog post).

The shirt itself looks pretty good, apart from the cat prints (my cat got dirty paw prints on it). I will attempt to take pictures of it once it gets through the wash. Though I watched Grimm on TV and the weird bat lady is wearing a shirt (under a sweater) that looks a lot like my Sorbetto.

You can't see if it has sleeves, but the pleat and bias tape make it look like that. It is white on white like mine (actually now that I see the pictures it looks polka dotted), though hers is much more see through then mine (and my hubby mentioned how MINE was so so through! hehe).

There is a problem with it though. It doesn't fit great. The whole purpose of this project of mine is to feel good in the clothes I wear. I tried on the shirt when I wrote the last blog post and it fit. The fact that it doesn't fit great (it is wearable, just tight in the bust - no I was not wearing a padded bra LOL) means that I must have gotten larger. Ugh.

The solution: I am going to have to start working out again. I have lots of plans to get into shape and I really want to do that for myself and my family. I am going to make it happen.

But that is not the only thing that I accomplished this weekend. I also tried to follow this tutorial to make a blouse out of two scarves. It did not turn out that well.

See I told you the bathroom mirror resulted in terrible pictures. And the freaky blue lights that look like eyes. I have no clue where that came from. It is pretty creepy LOL.

I am thinking that the problem is that the scarf I used is too big. The back scarf is smaller, so if I pick two the same smaller size, it might fit better. I ripped the seams and the back scarf you can't tell at all. the front scarf however, it a little worn for the wear. Only a little damage, but I can tell.

I wasn't done with the weekend yet though. I tried to do another scarf shirt (ring halter) from this tutorial. I used the same really large square scarf pictured above and this experiment as also a FAIL. After threading two sides through the ring and tying behind my neck, there was not enough scarf left to tie all the way around my back. Actually it went only halfway around my back. It makes me feel a little um.. large. I didn't try any of the rectangular scarves, so that might work better.

But even after those set backs, I still wasn't ready to give up.
This isn't very vintage, but I followed this tutorial, in order to make a pair of sweat shorts. Okay, now I know what you are thinking... sweat shorts, really?!? But here is my reasoning. I made these shorts as cleaning shorts. I know that some of you dress in 50s housewife with only a little apron to protect your clothing. However, I make a huge mess of my clothes when cleaning (especially deep cleaning). So in order to save those, I will wear something comfortable, useful, and that I don't feel bad about ruining. So I made these.

No pictures, because the sweatshirt I wore was pretty gross to start with and I did make a pretty bad mistake, I sewed the waistband on with the wrong sides together (instead of right sides). I decided that I should try on the pants before taking apart the waistband and restitching. I tried them on and they were very very tight. If you wanted to follow this tutorial, I would suggest using a sweatshirt that is at least one size too big. I also tried on the pants with the fuzzy side out, and they fit much better. So, weird inside out sweat pants it is LOL.

But, did I want to leave the weekend with all those failures? No. So I did another project (this time not sewing though!). I made some hair flowers!! And I think they turned out great. I didn't have a chance to do my hair and try them out, but I think they rock. LOL.

Here are the pictures (nice to end on a good note:)