SUMMER SEWING PART3: WINTER NIGHTGOWN

Yes, yes, I know I am hardly likely to wear this during the summer! Seems a bit of an oxymoron…… It was summer sewing even if it was almost torture trying it on for fitting. However, our friends in the Southern Hemisphere might appreciate this at this point in time? Actually my brother told me on Skype recently that Table Mountain in Cape Town (where he lives) had more snow than they had ever had in recorded history. Hard to believe as I only recall it snowing on Table Mountain very lightly & melting real soon afterwards while I lived in SA. Needless to say, without central heating in their homes, they have been whining a lot. Here in Canada, we just smile but that is another story for another day.

The cow nightie!

But back to the nightgown…….I bought this fabric earlier this year and then wondered later just what  had I been thinking at the time……must have been a heck of a deal? A closer inspection really made me think of cows & not animal print for a long sleeve top which is what I had at first thought I would use it for.  So I decided it would need to be made into a nightgown which will have a very limited audience!  I took one of my tried &  tested as successful knit top patterns and simply extended the hem length by a good 20 or so inches. I used my Simplicity pattern #3790 (which may not still be available as I have had it quite a while). I used view E which I lengthened and added the sleeves from View D. These sleeves are much too wide so I narrowed them but the cuffs were still a bit wide hence adding elastic (see below).

I decided it needed something to break the cow pattern going on there so I made a scallop trim using black t-shirt fabric.  Search in the box to the upper right of this post for previous posts about making your own scallop trim – basically just use the blind hem stitch but check out the post(s) for more information.

BTW: have you entered our BOOK GIVE AWAY? see blog post on 1st August. Deadline for entering is Sunday 31st August.

Everything was sewed on my Elna 5 thread serger using the 4 thread knit program and my Janome MC8900 for the sewing of the scallop trim  & top stitching etc.

There it is – inserted into my bodice seam and top stitched afterwards which made it lie nice & flat. Knit fabric can have a tendency to curl so top stitching is a good way to tame it. I also trimmed the cuffs & added a little elastic around the wrist as the sleeve was a bit wide for me. Lastly I added the same black scallop trim around the hemline – don’t think I would do that again as it made it a bit stiff and I might find it irritating when I get around to using the nightie come October & November in Canada!  see pic below: