Bloomin' marvellous

My most recent make was such good fun to do.  A pair of bloomers!  A friend of mine was looking for witches britches as a present for another friend and couldn't find them anywhere.  After a quick google search unveiled the work of a Wellington based blogger (The Dreamstress), I started thinking along the lines of tap pants and then found Colette's Madeline Mini Bloomers free pdf pattern.

So I present to you...

A pair of purple witches britches.


So about the pattern: 
The front and back pieces don't match up correctly around the crotch - there's a weird little triangle of fabric (about 2-3cm on the crotch seam) you have to cut off when the crotch is sewn up or amended on the pattern.  I did get a little confused at this stage but thankfully scrapyard fabrication had already blogged about the mismatch.  I amended the traced XL pattern but I'm not sure I'll bother if I sew a different size for me in future and just cut it off when I've sewn the crotch together.  Wendy of SewBiased suggested via facebook that they were incredibly low rise so I added two inches to the top and as I wanted to make witches britches I also added another 2 inches to the legs.  I hand sewed the lace to the legs (though If I had thought about it I would have sewn it on before sewing up the casing.  I also added button holes to the waist rather than elastic as I didn't make it for myself and needed the recipient to be able to resize if needed.

If I end up making these again (I have a strange hankering for a pair of these for my own good self), I'll take Miss Fancybelle's advice and make up the size according to my hip measurements rather than my waist as its really the only relevant measure.


My fabric and makings:
I used a sheet I've had in my stash for a while (since 2007!) as the purple fabric.  The thread was a purchase from a carpet shop in Masterton a few years ago and the ribbon and lace were purchases from Spotlight for the project (thank you Christmas present vouchers - oh how I love you!).  It took two metres of lace (one for each leg!) at $1.49/m and about 5m of purple ribbon (I used 15mm) at $0.99/m.  So the costs I can account for are just under $7.

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