Finished - un beignet vert

Hello there! Thanks everyone for the ace comments about my Morgat jumper (and for that matter all the comments about my makes!) - I do appreciate it! 

And to another Beignet. This really is one of my favourite patterns. I finished my second Beignet a couple of weeks ago, but only debuted it the other day - and I love it so!

An emerald green skirt was high on my summer sewing list - this one was made from a fairly unexciting but marvellously bargaino-licious slubby cotton from an op shop. I had planned to leave out the lining, mostly due to laziness, but the cotton was too lightweight, so I used another lighter cotton leftover from lining my bird Peony. No mods to the pattern apart from leaving out the pockets again. I know pockets are so useful, but I really didn't want them gaping open and adding bulk right over my hips in this skirt....

As you can see I do look rather smug with myself. I love this skirt, I loved wearing it with my stripes and pard shoes. It's such a happy green colour. I did make a matching fabric belt, but used some little D-rings rather than using it as a tie - but it's a bit long so I went with my tan belt (such a USEFUL belt - it goes with so many things!).

Of course I did have to add an extra, time consuming, possibly pointless step - covered buttons. I do love a self covered button, but for some reason I decided rather than buying the kits, I'd have a crack at covering normal buttons. I've got a RTW skirt that has self covered buttons that are sewn through, rather than with a shank, and I love the look. A sane and reasonable idea, if you have to do maybe 2 or 3. Insane if you have to do TWELVE!  Anyway I did a test run covering each side of the button, and my personal style consultant (husband) felt that the curved side looked nicer so off I went.

I cut circles and interfaced the lot but it was too bulky, so I just left the centre interfaced, and the edges uninterfaced. I sewed a gathering stitch to pull the fabric tight around the button and tied it off like a little plum pudding. I trimmed the excess fabric and added some fray stop (which I think did nothing useful) and then I ironed another tiny little circle of interfacing over the back of it all, to hide the gathering, and give my thread something to grab onto. It seems to have worked ok - I'm not sure of how long they will last in the wash - worst case scenario is I just have to replace them with regular buttons.....

 

My machine has quite a few decorative stitches, and after seeing Gail use a nice scallop stitch on one of her projects, I thought it would add cute nice detail to the hem of my otherwise rather dull lining. I ironed a little strip of interfacing along the edge, turned it up and stitched it down with the scallop - cute non?

I have found with both my Beignet's that the lining is a tiny bit long - maybe I traced the pattern off a bit too long, so reminder to future self - make lining maybe half an inch shorter! I do definitely see another Beignet in my future, but not until next Autumn - I'm thinking a nice heavy black twill.... maybe with bound button holes, crazy crazy lady that I am....

And I just had to put this photo in because it catches the EXACT moment that I noticed I had a ripe strawberry..... hilarious!

And thus ends my sewing of skirts for summer. I have one more summer skirt to post, a sad little fail, but that will have to wait for another day!