Made By A Fabricista: Feeling Festive in Red

Happy Holidays! I’m so excited to bring you this all red holiday look that would be a hit at any holiday gathering this season. Whether you’re headed to your company holiday party or just going to sit in your living room, you’ll fabulous doing so.

For this month’s post I knew exactly what I wanted to make. I have been a Sew It Academy student since Mimi G opened it back in 2016. Sew It Academy is her online sewing academy that shows you what to do once you open your sewing machine and different lessons come out every month showing you different techniques and how to sew different things. Sew It Academy now offers PDF patterns and sewalongs that come with them. I made the Boxy Pullover Top and the Bubble & Wide Hem Skirt which are both Sew It Academy patterns.

The Boxy Pullover Top is the first garment class offered in Sew It Academy, so it’s super easy to make. I’ve seen several YouTube videos for the same top and they are all pretty much contructed the same way. I cut a size 18 and I graded at the waist to a size 26. The way that I did that was by making a line from the size 18 until I met the size 26 line.

I also added 5” to the hem. I’ve made this top before and wanted to make it longer this time around. Below is the first one I made with left over fabric from my last Fabric Mart make.

There are only a few pieces to this pattern. The front and back bodice, the front and back facing and the sleeves. First, staystitch the neck line of the front and back bodice and then sew them at the shoulder seams using the seam allowance the pattern requires. Then you want to sew the front and back facing pieces and then you want to pin the facing to the neckline.

Once you sew down the neck facing, you need to under stitch and then turn the facing to the inside of your top and press everything nicely.

Next the sleeves will be sewn in using the flat method where you open out your top flat, place the sleeve on top of the sleeve opening, right sides together and then you sew them in.

I also like to baste in the hemline to make it easier to sew later. I press the hem in at the hemline and it makes it so much easier to sew later. Once you’ve sown in your sleeves, right sides together, pin down each side up to the sleeves and sew it down.

Once you’ve sewn your top closed, all you have to do is sew your sleeve and top hem and you have yourself a boxy top!

I then moved on to the Bubble & Wide Hem Skirt. With this pattern you can make the bubble skirt or you can make a wide hem skirt. As you can see, I made the bubble skirt for this make. I made a size 24. This is another simple pattern with few pieces. You have the front and back of the skirt, the lining, pockets and waist band. I never really thought about how a bubble skirt is contructed and I thought it was so clever. Basically, the lining is shorter than the outer skirt. The outer skirt is gathered at the hem and then attached to the lining hem! I really think this is so cool. I’m easily impressed. lol

Since I already had an idea in mind of what I wanted to make, I set out to look for the perfect fabric to bring my vision to life. I came across this Fruit Punch Pink Polyester Mikado Twill Suiting fabric. I love how it had the right amount of shine and was very easy to sew. The fabric is sold out, but you can find other Twill Suiting fabric on the Fabric Mart site.

This is the perfect holiday party set. I also love that they are separates and I can wear each piece with something else. My holidays will be low key so I may not wear the skirt, but I’ll be wearing this top with some cute jeans and some heels. Maybe I’ll make the other view for the skirt which is the wide hem skirt. If you are interested in these patterns, you can sign up to Sew It Academy using my affiliate link.

Well, this is my last blog post for 2024 and it’s been an amazing year of sharing my makes with you all in the beautiful Fabric Mart fabrics. I try to share a tutorial or something that I learned while I made my Fabric Mart makes and I hope you all enjoy that style. I’m hoping that I can share something new with you or a different way of doing something and I hope you find it beneficial.

Hoping you all have a joyous holiday season and I’ll see you all in 2025! Below are a few more photos of my boxy top and bubble skirt. Until next time!

JOHANNA | @soveryjo

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Hi everyone! It’s finally warming up here in southeastern Pennsylvania and I wanted to make a light, flowy dress for springtime. I snagged a vintage Laura Ashley pattern from Joanns on one of my last trips there. I somehow didn’t have anything in my pattern stash with a sweetheart neckline, so I thought it would be a good addition. The pattern calls for a giant gathered skirt, so I knew I would need something lightweight and drapey for it. Something like a pink striped cotton fine seersucker. The fabric is light and has a really nice drape, almost like a challis . I knew it would gather beautifully. I got to work cutting everything out, with help from my assistant. When I say the skirt is massive I mean it. I ran into an issue right away where my fabric isn't wide enough to cut the back panel without opening the fabric out. And my three yards of fabric wasn’t enough to cut two back panels. I ran into this issue last year when making my pinafore dress . In ...

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