**Hermes Chat**

[pasdedeux1]

I admit I am a little nontraditional. Once I learned to thread trace and use tailors tacks I don’t pin much. When you thread trace you can sew along the seam line by feel and you just need the pressure of your fingers to keep the layers organized.
Knits are a different story of course but if I’m sewing a wool or a good woven it’s so much faster to sew with the thread trace or baste quickly and then run it through.

when I muslin I will always thread trace the pattern pieces when I have the fitting done and thread trace the darts etc so I can reuse the muslin pieces forever as they’re so much more durable than any tissue or pattern material. Sometimes I will only use a commercial pattern if I need to see how a specific detail like a collar is patterned.

it takes time but learning to draft so I could make up whatever my little heart desired felt pretty good. I’m useless with menswear though unless I havea very specific drafting guideline. I just don’t know all the tricks to make mens clothes fit.

 

[eagle1002us]

I admit I am a little nontraditional. Once I learned to thread trace and use tailors tacks I don’t pin much. When you thread trace you can sew along the seam line by feel and you just need the pressure of your fingers to keep the layers organized.
Knits are a different story of course but if I’m sewing a wool or a good woven it’s so much faster to sew with the thread trace or baste quickly and then run it through.

when I muslin I will always thread trace the pattern pieces when I have the fitting done and thread trace the darts etc so I can reuse the muslin pieces forever as they’re so much more durable than any tissue or pattern material. Sometimes I will only use a commercial pattern if I need to see how a specific detail like a collar is patterned.

it takes time but learning to draft so I could make up whatever my little heart desired felt pretty good. I’m useless with menswear though unless I havea very specific drafting guideline. I just don’t know all the tricks to make mens clothes fit.

The tailor's tacks are a special kind of basting, right? I typically baste by machine then check the fit (yet again). I have books that demo them but I am not fond of hand sewing. How did you learn to sew like this, with the tailoring techniques?

That's the whole idea behind home sewing, you can have whatever you want. I like vests. I get these "embossed silks" -- is that another word for brocades? --- and make them into short vests with the blouse or shirt hanging out from the bottom. I typically unbutton the vest and put a HS plus some long necklaces down the front of the outfit. I also like really long vests, as long as the dress is which is typically just above the ankle. Such vests are made of lightweight fabric with tribal designs, the dress is made of linen. I have made many lined jackets but dressing is more casual for me now so the vests do the trick.

 

[eagle1002us]

 

[pasdedeux1]

View attachment 5410724

Precious! That one on the bottom is me today. It’s hot and I’m tired!

 

[CoastalCouture]

@pasdedeux1 and @eagle1002us
I use a mix of methods but, for good or special things, I will thread trace and hand baste. Fitting takes quite a bit of time and once I've got the fit worked out on a pattern, I will use it many times over. I've taken classes whenever and wherever I can. After a while, the skills all come together. My work has definitely improved with the effort.

 

[pasdedeux1]

The tailor's tacks are a special kind of basting, right? I typically baste by machine then check the fit (yet again). I have books that demo them but I am not fond of hand sewing. How did you learn to sew like this, with the tailoring techniques?

That's the whole idea behind home sewing, you can have whatever you want. I like vests. I get these "embossed silks" -- is that another word for brocades? --- and make them into short vests with the blouse or shirt hanging out from the bottom. I typically unbutton the vest and put a HS plus some long necklaces down the front of the outfit. I also like really long vests, as long as the dress is which is typically just above the ankle. Such vests are made of lightweight fabric with tribal designs, the dress is made of linen. I have made many lined jackets but dressing is more casual for me now so the vests do the trick.

Tailors tacks are more like markings - you use little snips of thread to mark seam lines, darts, etc instead of chalk or ink.

I was totally unfamiliar with it until I watched a video on YouTube showing the making of a mens suit without a pattern. Watching how the tailor transferred his design to seam lines and other marks like notches was a lightbulb for me. It takes more time except if you’re making a muslin then you’ve already basically done the work.

you can baste and thread trace at the same time if you’d like, but I find that it allows me to leave larger seam allowances for fitting since you only really care about the piece itself and the excess doesn’t have to be exactly 1/4” of seam allowance or whatever the pattern specifies. Since you have to match seam lines anyway, I found that using patterns with seam allowance sucked me into the habit of trying to match the edges and not the seam line, which leads to a lot more difficulty setting in things like sleeves.

Susan’s French jacket course taught me a lot about couture techniques and I keep meaning to take her couture skirt and pants course.

 

[eagle1002us]

@pasdedeux1 and @eagle1002us
I use a mix of methods but, for good or special things, I will thread trace and hand baste. Fitting takes quite a bit of time and once I've got the fit worked out on a pattern, I will use it many times over. I've taken classes whenever and wherever I can. After a while, the skills all come together. My work has definitely improved with the effort.

It all jelled for you, nice!!
I attended a few classes a while back, sewing sheers was one of them. Nowadays I have a ton of fitting and pattern development books. I peruse them now and then but I haven't watched U-tube sewing instruction. Good suggestion, gotta try that.

I do miss the fashion spreads in magazines these days. I like to look at European mags like the UK Vogue and Harper's Bazaar (the latter always has nice accessory ideas irrespective of country). And the French counterparts. Since the pandemic US fashion mags have become anorexic, there's very little to see. Hopefully that will change. The UK Vogue is a special issue honoring the Queen's Jubilee, a nice fat magazine with tons of pictures for inspiration. Very happy to see that!

 

[eagle1002us]

Precious! That one on the bottom is me today. It’s hot and I’m tired!

Glad you like it. Koalas sleep something like 18 to 20 hours a day. They sleep in spurts, eat, then back to sleep. The eucalyptus leaves they eat (that's all they eat) are toxic but the mother passes on her gut biome to the koala joey. The extended sleeping prolongs digestion and helps neutralize the toxins. The eucalyptus may be toxic but the koalas don't have to fight other animals for leaf.

Koalas really know how to relax and sprawl out. The tree branches offer a lot of possibilities. Koalas know how to take advantage of their environment.

 

[pasdedeux1]

Glad you like it. Koalas sleep something like 18 to 20 hours a day. They sleep in spurts, eat, then back to sleep. The eucalyptus leaves they eat (that's all they eat) are toxic but the mother passes on her gut biome to the koala joey. The extended sleeping prolongs digestion and helps neutralize the toxins. The eucalyptus may be toxic but the koalas don't have to fight other animals for leaf.

Koalas really know how to relax and sprawl out. The tree branches offer a lot of possibilities. Koalas know how to take advantage of their environment.

I think I need to get on the Koala program.
After going to the gym and painting my parent’s living room today, I’m toast. Eating and sleeping for 20 hours sounds like a dream.

 

[eagle1002us]

I think I need to get on the Koala program.
After going to the gym and painting my parent’s living room today, I’m toast. Eating and sleeping for 20 hours sounds like a dream.

You are a very active person, pasdedeux1. Sewing, painting, regular exercise, yeesh. I feel very sleepy right now. Where do you get the energy to do all that?

 

[eagle1002us]

A tree-hugger in action (a model for us all):

 

[pasdedeux1]

You are a very active person, pasdedeux1. Sewing, painting, regular exercise, yeesh. I feel very sleepy right now. Where do you get the energy to do all that?

Well, it helps that I’m only in my late 30s and I eat very carefully to fuel about 2 hours per day of exercise.

my love of wine and cheese definitely still shows in my midsection

 

[eagle1002us]

&ref=notif

Well, it helps that I’m only in my late 30s and I eat very carefully to fuel about 2 hours per day of exercise.

my love of wine and cheese definitely still shows in my midsection

Midsections are inherently problematic in my fam background. What kinds of exercise do you do to fill up two hours? Sounds like you are a cross-trainer.

In my 50s I used a rowing machine pretty vigorously and I did lose weight. I remember I used to burn up something like 450 calories per workout. Sadly, I got tendonitis and had to scale back. I used to do a lat pulldown of 80 lbs (yes!), motivated by a fall I took and DH had to help me up. Lat pulldowns enabled me to get out of the category, "I've fallen and I can't get up." However, eventually I had to cut back to no more than 30 lbs on the pulldown due to eye surgery.

I can do the stationary bike for an hour at a pop, once I reach 40-45 min per workout on the bike, an hour is not that hard.

 

[pasdedeux1]

&ref=notif

Midsections are inherently problematic in my fam background. What kinds of exercise do you do to fill up two hours? Sounds like you are a cross-trainer.

In my 50s I used a rowing machine pretty vigorously and I did lose weight. I remember I used to burn up something like 450 calories per workout. Sadly, I got tendonitis and had to scale back. I used to do a lat pulldown of 80 lbs (yes!), motivated by a fall I took and DH had to help me up. Lat pulldowns enabled me to get out of the category, "I've fallen and I can't get up." However, eventually I had to cut back to no more than 30 lbs on the pulldown due to eye surgery.

I can do the stationary bike for an hour at a pop, once I reach 40-45 min per workout on the bike, an hour is not that hard.

I do at least 100 miles a week on the bike trainer (around 15+ miles, every day), and I have a personal trainer for an hour four days a week. The rest is walking the dog, or riding a horse. My weights are decidedly average for my age group - bench 105, deadlift 200, squat 180.

It's important to me to stay active, as I watch my parents decline rapidly due to limited mobility and years of not moving properly. I made a commitment to myself and my husband that we would do the best we could to not be in that situation ourselves.

 

[eagle1002us]

I do at least 100 miles a week on the bike trainer (around 15+ miles, every day), and I have a personal trainer for an hour four days a week. The rest is walking the dog, or riding a horse. My weights are decidedly average for my age group - bench 105, deadlift 200, squat 180.

It's important to me to stay active, as I watch my parents decline rapidly due to limited mobility and years of not moving properly. I made a commitment to myself and my husband that we would do the best we could to not be in that situation ourselves.

My prob is that I gained a lot of weight after being 125 in late teens to 135 in early 30s. I never had a weight problem until I had to take some med. It was the only thing that worked. By the time newer meds (for the same condition) came along I was already in bad shape. Notice that today's tv commercials say no reports of weight gain [for whatever they're pushing?] That's because people who took early versions of certain meds plunked on the lbs., got diabetic, etc. Such weight is extremely hard to lose. Someone once said that if meds cause weight gain then it's going to take meds to lose that weight. Can't argue with that. I lost a significant amount of weight once meds improved.

Someone I knew put on a lot of weight and quit working. I continued working and continued my education.