A Quick Look Back at 2023

I thought I’d do a quick review to wrap up 2023. So, I’ll make it short and sweet. The year started out with Josey, but then I tried Freja and love it! There’s also the Brenda Brief pictured here, and it’s a really lovely panty pattern.

  My Frejas included a silk bra, and all of these lovelies as well. One of them turned out to be a surprise favorite of mine.

A few more gorgeous Freja bras. Another favorite or two in this grouping.

  Here’s one last bra that didn’t fit into the collages. So pretty!

Bras weren’t all I made this year though. I had to make panties to go with all these lovely bras.Lastly, there were the tops I made when I took the TomKat Stitchery fitting course. I’m still working on the pants part of the course.

Lastly, one final project from 2023. My silk tap pants.

It was a great sewing year!

Happy Creating & Happy New Year!    

Copper with Black Roses

This week I’m showing you my third beige-ish bra and panty set. This one is the least of the not so basics. It’s actually copper duoplex with a gorgeous sheer lace with black roses. As soon as I saw this lace, I put the copper finding kit aside. I knew this bra needed black findings! And I love it. And you know I made a matching set, don’t you?

Here again, I had to use that not so perfect cotton Lycra. Still. I think it’s a great looking set. It’s interesting that the golden lace seemed to lighten the look of this CL. In the same way, the black lace seems to darken it as well.

What do you think? Is it just a trick of the eye? Or the lace? Does the one pair appear a bit lighter? Here is the set together. Lastly, here’s a collage of my three ‘beige’ bras and panties. It was fun to sew them all together and complete my bra wardrobe for 2023.

What plans do you have for 2024? I’m sure I’ll be making more bras, trying new patterns, and working on some pants fitting.

Happy holidays & happy creating! See you next year.

A Copper Rose Set

Last week I showed you my new not so basic beige set. This week I’m sharing my new copper rose bra and panties.  Oh, this lace! Love!!

I think it pairs really well with the copper duoplex too. And I really love the copper duoplex color, but… I’ll get to that a little later in the post.

More of this pretty bra first. I’ve decided I’m going to make a bra ham to put into my bra cups so they fit on the display form better. I don’t love the gaping and the peeking of the bean-a-boobs behind the cups.

A pretty new bra needs some pretty new matchy-matchy, don’t you think? I thought so.

And that little teaser above? The one thing I don’t love about copper duoplex is I haven’t found that perfect color match in cotton Lycra. I’ve tried a few colors, but I’m just going to have to accept it’s not perfect.

So here are my new (not absolutely perfect) matching panties. That lace trim is a really pretty golden color. The trim on the leg is actually the same lace trim that is at the waist – I just followed the curved design in the lace and made my own scalloped narrower lace for the leg openings.

Above you can see where I followed the design lines.

Here’s the full set. Although, not a perfectly matched color set, I’m still happy with it.      What do you think? Do you think the golden lace trim helps pull it all together?

I have one more set to show you before the holidays. See you next week. 

Happy creating!

Not So Basic Beige

I’ve been having fun sewing some garments, but I still need some work on sewing and fitting pants – mostly fitting them. So, back to my sewing love: bras and panties.

I’ve sewn some gorgeous new bras this year. Black bras, a purple one, a pink one, and an ivory one. Oh, I can’t forget the lovely platinum bra either. But there wasn’t a beige bra in the lot. Or at least not yet.

It was time to sew a lovely beige bra. However, I decided to sew not just one beige bra, but three! I’m rounding out the year with a full bra wardrobe. I can always work on fitting pants next year!

Here’s my beige Freja bra with golden lace. I love this lace. It’s so pretty. So delicate. I think it’s lovely with beige duoplex too. A lovely new bra isn’t enough though, is it? I need some panties to match, am I right? 

So I pulled out some beige cotton Lycra and some lace, and made a matching bra and panty set. Again, I’m using the House Morrighan Clover Boy Brief pattern. Here is my new beige set together. Next week I’ll share my next set.

Happy creating!

Perfect Pistachio

A while back I bought a lovely Black Beauty (Emerald Erin’s) bra kit. I saw it and loved it. What can I say?

So the very pretty kit was sitting patiently on a shelf in my sewing room waiting for just the right sew-jo to inspire me.

Then B,Wear brought out Pistachio finding kits! Oh my!

Findingskit -Pistachio green - 3   I knew right away they’d match perfectly with that kit. The green is the perfect pop of color.

Here’s my lovely Pistachio Bra. I chose to only use the Pistachio on the upper part of the bra. My frame is sheer cup lining and power net, so I wanted to keep it looking black. If I’d been using duoplex or nylplex the pistachio wouldn’t have shown through, but it really did show through the sheer cup lining.

What I wanted though was just a little peek of color with the upper band elastic, and then the straps with that pop of color. And I think I got it. This bra has such lovely rich fall colors. I’m very happy with my new make, and I’m still loving the Freja pattern.

I was asked last week if the frame I’m using for my pattern is the one that comes with the pattern. No. Most definitely not. My frame is highly adjusted for my Omega shape. I’ve narrowed the upper bridge, widened the lower bridge, used a smaller cradle size – so it’s definitely not the same frame as comes with the pattern.

Lastly, here’s the back of the bra. I really love this Pistachio color! I was looking through my lace to see what else I had that would go well with it. 

Do you remember this bra I made?  I still have some of this lace.     I think this will match perfectly with the pistachio color too. But not with the burn orange this time. Basic black always works.

Happy creating!

Lavender Clover Boy Briefs

I was looking at the blog posts I had coming up, and realized I missed one of my makes. I’m not sure how I missed them as they’re a favorite of mine, but I did miss them.

I made some lovely lavender Clover Boy Briefs to go with my new bright bra. And I have decided my favorite panty pattern is the Clover, so I naturally pulled out my favorite pattern. Oh, I think these are cute!

Here’s the side view. And of course the back view.     I had thought these would go really well with my bright bra, but it just so happens they also go well with my platinum bra! These coordinate very well, but just for fun look at these panties with the platinum bra. That little bit of purple in the lace makes this matching more fun, and a bit less matchy-matchy.

Happy creating!

Concord Tee Take Two

For my knit top in the TomKat Stitchery fitting class, I now had a few new alterations to add to my Concord Tee.

If you haven’t seen the Concord Tee, here it is.

Concord T-Shirt 12-32 PDF pattern

It’s a basic tee with a few options. What I love most about it is it goes up to a G cup in sizing – and I don’t have to do a FBA!

So, I learned I need a narrow shoulder adjustment from making the woven top. Then once I made my knit top, I learned I also need a gaping neckline adjustment, and a sway back adjustment.

Where was all this information when I was learning to sew in school? I don’t remember having to making any adjustments then. I also don’t remember wearing anything I made, so that might be why.

I didn’t want to break out new material to test these adjustments, so thankfully I had just enough fabric left over from my first tee shirt.

This sleeveless tee has all my adjustments. And it fits quite well. If I want to improve it even more I’ll add 1/4″ to the gaping neckline adjustment, and 1/2″ to the sway back one.

However, a big part of this course is to not overfit. This is wearable and fits quite well. I’m learning to be happy without everything having to be perfect. Along with the side view I captured some ghosting in the lighting. The pretty pink bra peeking out is my favorite Prima Donna Milady that I bought and is too small. Still it’s getting use on my display form and is inspiring me.

And the back.     I noticed putting it on the display form that my back and its back are different! The alterations I made caused it to fit just a little more awkwardly. Ah, it’s for me not the display.

Next in the course are knit pants and woven pants. It will be interesting!

Happy creating!

Cashmerette Concord Tee

After I finished my Cashmerette Concord Tee, I sent a photo to Whitney, the instructor at TomKat Stitchery. I really wasn’t happy with all the bunching in front of my arms. What was this?

I did mention this alteration in my post about the Montrose woven top. I need a gaping neck alteration. It was actually this make that helped us figure out I needed this adjustment.

I would NEVER had figured this out by the name. What does this area have to do with the neckline? If you want to see how this alteration is done, you can see it here.

  So although there is gaping, this is still a perfectly wearable top. Or a wearable muslin as it’s called in the class.

Here’s the full top.

I do love this fabric. This was from B,Wear a few years ago. I had saved it for the perfect project and this was it.

Here’s the side view. The top has a nice scoop neckline, with 3/4 sleeves.

And the back.   So, although there is some gaping/bunching up of material, I’ve worn this a few times already.  I love it.

Happy creating!

The Bra Making Academy

If you’ve followed my blog for any amount of time, you’ve probably heard me mention Jeanette. I took all my professional classes with Jeanette, and I have the honor of still working with her on occasion.

Well, Jeanette has just opened The Bra Making Academy online.

purple girl sew uplifitng bramaking academy

Now you can take classes with Jeanette too. 

I loved taking courses with Jeanette. Her classes are full of little tips that are wonderful to learn – and honestly I already knew how to sew a bra, so those tips meant even more to me. I still use many of them now.

You keep your classes forever, Once you sign up, you have instant access too. You can also subscribe to receive updates for new classes if you don’t see what you’re looking for right now.

Follow for more on Facebook

Happy creating & learning!

Black Freja Bra

I’m still loving the Freja pattern. I decided I had some pretty colors, it was time for a nice basic black bra. Well, not too basic.Isn’t this pretty? I really love the lace. It has a barely there look to it with delicate floral outlines and just a hint of color on the petals.

I also love how delicate the lace edge is.Oh, I like that. Who knew lace addiction was a real thing?

Here’s the side view.   And lastly, here’s the back view.  As I said, it is basic, but it’s a very pretty basic black.

I had cut out a second black bra from a kit I bought from Emerald Erin. The lace is the loveliest lace. I had everything cut and ready to sew on my cutting board when I saw an announcement from B,Wear.

They have brought in a new color of elastics. Pistachio. I ordered a couple of kits. It’s too pretty to resist. I think it will go perfectly with my second black bra, so it’s current waiting for the mail to arrive.

I’ll share it as soon as it’s finished.

Happy creating!