Mimi Blouse |

How did you find Me Made May this year, if you took part?

This was my second time taking part and I definitely felt the difference in the amount of garments I had to choose from! I didn’t even get a chance to wear everything I have made. I decided to wear me-mades on 5 days of each week, basically at work as I am still working towards having a good casual wardrobe for weekends and I am still yet to try sewing with jersey! Maybe I should sign up to Tilly’s new online class?

Sorry if you follow me on instagram – you’ll have seen these all before, but in case you haven’t…..(sorry for the crappy, blurry selfies – I hate taking selfies!)

Day 1: Tilly and the Buttons Mimi Blouse + Black By Hand London Victoria Blazer.

Day 4: Refashioned High-Necked top and Refashioned Coat to BHL Victoria Blazer

Day 5: Grainline Scout Tee with self-drafted collar.

Day 6: Blue and White Striped Colette Laurel Dress.

Day 7: Colette Violet Blouse.

Day 8: Pink Stripey Banksia + Blue Simplicity 2451 Skirt.

Day 11: Refashioned Shirt Dress.

Day 12: Refashioned Peter Pan Collar Dress.

Day 13: Refashioned High-Necked top + Black Simplicity 2451 Skirt.

Day 14: Refashioned Parrot Shirt.

Day 15: Flowery Grainline Scout Tee.
Day 16: Refashioned Ugly Skirt into Grainline Scout Tee.

Day 19: GBSB Boyfriend Shirt.

Day 20: Tilly and the Buttons Francoise Dress.

Day 22: Pink Spotty Grainline Scout Tee + Black Victoria Blazer

Day 26: Emery Dress by Christine Haynes.

Day 27: Refashioned Mustard Corduroy Shorts.

Day 29: Refashioned Ugly Skirt into Grainline Scout Tee + Bright Yellow Butterick Skirt (worn to a ceilidh!)

I think I must have forgotten to take pictures on some days because I’m sure I wore my other Banksia top and there don’t seem to be enough pictures, but I definitely wore me-mades on 5 days of each week! I definitely forgot to take a picture on the last day, when I wore my Orla Kiely-esque Laurel and my black Victoria Blazer (again).

The things I learnt from Me Made May were:

1. I hate taking selfies – I took about 20 each time, just to get one I liked! Documenting the month is definitely the least fun part for me!

2. There are still some me-mades that I have never worn/ don’t like wearing, but wear because I made them (my 2 Elisalex Dresses [1 + 2], my Miette cardigan, Gertie Bow Tied Blouse and my first dress, New Look 6000). These tend to be the things I made earlier on in my sewing, so hopefully this means I’m getting more of a handle on my style and what I like wearing and not being seduced by patterns which look great on other people but aren’t really me.

3. I definitely need to make some skinny jeans/ trousers, probably from the Ginger Jeans pattern.

4. I definitely need to conquer knits, so I have more comfortable, casual clothes for weekends and days when I don’t fancy dressing up.

5. It felt like a lot of effort to wear a dress as I cycle to work now. But when I actually put on the dresses, it was fine, so I think I can afford to wear them more often, especially as the weather warms up!

I did enjoy taking part in Me Made May as it does force me to look at what I have in my wardrobe and to not just put on shop-bought skinny trousers and tee shirts. Did you enjoy taking part? What did you learn?

I was lucky enough to get a copy of Tilly and the Buttons‘ book Love At First Stitch for free from a publisher at my old job. I also was lucky enough to go to the launch at Drink, Make, Do waaaay back in May I think. I like quite a lot of the patterns in the book, as I mentioned in my review, and I decided quite a while ago that the first pattern I would be the Mimi Blouse.

I did make my blouse quite soon after getting the book, but have only just got around to writing up the make!

I made the size 1 and accidentally traced the wrong size of the yoke, so couldn’t get the pattern to go together and tried for ages to work out why it didn’t work, until I finally figured out I’d cut out the wrong size! Duh! Rookie error.

The fabric is yet another ‘remnant’ that I got some Rolls and Rems in Holloway Road. I’m not sure what the fabric is, but it’s got a quite nice drape but is quite thin. It also marks super easily, and any pin marks seemed to be pretty permanent, so I made sure all my pins were inside the seam allowance. I love, love, love this fabric – it reminds me of Orla Kiely, who I love! Also, this was quite a big length, so this is not the last time you’ll see this on my blog!

I made one or two little changes. One was to use calico instead of interfacing, as I didn’t have any interfacing in my stash. I thought this would be fine – and it may have been if i had already pre-washed the calico, which I didn’t bother to do as I generally use the calico for muslins or other makes which aren’t going to be washed. As soon as I washed the blouse, the calico shrunk and make the front of the blouse a bit puckered and wrinkled, which is a shame. But I’ve learned my lesson – I won’t substitute interfacing again in the future! You can see in the below photo the front doesn’t sit flat and the collar is a bit odd. I might try to unpick some of the seams and take out the calico. Any tips on how to do this without having to completely unpick and re-make the blouse?

The buttons were in my stash and came off my parrot shirt refashion. I think they go a lot better here than they did on the shirt!

The other change I made involved the sleeves. As I mentioned with my stripey Colette Laurel dress, I seem to have bigger arms that the rest of me would dictate in sewing pattern sizing. I made the size 1 sleeves, with the pleats and cuffs/facing…….and couldn’t get them on. So I traced off the size 2 and made the sleeves again…….and still couldn’t get them on! Not sure what is up with my arms – maybe they are really freakishly fat?! I don’t care if that is the case, it’s just mildly irritating to have to redraft sleeves. I decided to leave it as the size 2 and leave off the pleat and cuff/facing, so I just have plain sleeves, which I hemmed with a small hem.

I also took 4cm off the length and then did a hem of 2cm folded up twice. I’m not really sure why I took it up so much – it did end up quite short. If I make this again, I would just do a normal hem and leave it with a bit more length.

I do still like this pattern and the fabric, in spite of all the errors on my part and changing the sleeves, I really like the collar and the gathers on the shoulders – there are some unique design elements, which make this pattern interesting.