What I learned from Bragust and AlteritAugust: Link Party

I like theme month sewing challenges until I don't. I can follow and be impressed/inspired by the wide variety of responses, and then worn out by the repetition. 
These two do pique my interest, as two of my sewing failings are the bras in my life, and the stack of mending and altering that grows without any effort on my part. Both #braugust and #alteritaugust live on Instagram, but that does not mean you have to contain your interest to that platform.

I'm not sure how evident my alteration work is on this blog anymore. I still do a lot of it, it's just not as novel or photo-worthy (that Sjoden top being an exception), and it's done as soon as I think about taking a photo. And how interesting are photos of things in the machine in process? Not much to me. But alterations are most of my sewing, either for me or friends or money from friends.  My thinking on this has moved towards preservation rather than refashioning. The main point is I want to see sewing bring life back to stuff, while preserving the original intent if possible. At the end of the day, it's just stuff.

Sew North started #AlteritAugust a few years ago, to bring back to life things she'd made or worn and get them back into regular use. https://sewnorthco.com/alteritaugust-2020/  This is positivity talking. Any talk of alterations reminds me of this series on Ikat bag, which really gets to the nut of the issue: 

http://www.ikatbag.com/2011/12/alterations-making-choices.html

Altering an item involves respecting it's making and its purpose. Ikat has a series of posts on this topic, but this one discusses why you might not want to. The purpose of alterations is to create new value and use for the current owner. If you can, it's good to retain as much of the original in the seam allowances (see Mrs Mole https://fitforaqueen.wordpress.com if you want to see this in action). If that's not a concern, respect the process and do it right. Take your time. Measure twice, cut once and only after heavy consideration. And if you do bodge it, there are workarounds, or maybe you're just going to do what you can and put it in the donation pile. Or salvage the bits and use them later.

Sewcialists has #Braugust, and they are putting out some goodness 

https://thesewcialists.com/2020/07/28/all-chests-welcome-resources/ reminds me that Melissa Fehr has put a lot of time and attention into describing her techniques. The post https://blog.fehrtrade.com/inspiration/4723/elastic-edges-three-ways/ can be summed up with suggesting  "A walking foot for your sewing machine. I cannot stress enough how much of a difference this will make to your activewear sewing success!" 

 I cannot sew elastic to fabric without failure. I was hoping for some advice on sewing  elastic to lace somewhere in this month. Lacking that, I am falling back on Nancy Zieman

http://www.nancyzieman.com/blog/sewing-general/the-absolute-easiest-way-to-sew-elastic-to-a-waistline/

There are a lot of sewing advice gurus, but if I'm sorting through a pile of results from a search on a sewing issue, and a Nancy link comes up, I go to that one first. She wrote so much, recorded so many programs in so many places, and she wasn't afraid to try something new. Even if I disagree, I learn something.

Sophie Hines, from IG Stories, Lingerie Sewing Tips

https://www.instagram.com/sophie_hines/

https://www.instagram.com/stories/highlights/17947844347182034/

Sophie Hines has a tutorial set in her stories on Instagram: Lingerie Sewing Tips. I'm sorry that's the only location I can find for it, but they are there. She uses a jillion pins. And she sews over them! Ahhh! In this tutorial, she has some of the best action shots of construction and sewing I have seen. She makes very simple advice make sense.

A happy discovery has been the Ginger and George LBB bra, specifically the YouTube tutorial showing how to construct one. 
because.....
There's No Sewing Elastic To Knit Fabric.
Is Miracle!
(youtube link)

This lime green is from Em's scrap pile (the ultimate in repurposing: giving someone else your scrap bag of leftovers), I only made one layer to check the fit. It's remarkably close right out of the box, using a couple of hints from the tutorial. I highly recommend watching the YT tute. It's a simple, clever pattern with few moving pieces that is easily hacked and altered. There are a trillion cup sizes on the PDF, which is layered to reduce vision strain, and has a guide as to which pages you'd need to print. 
There's a free code in the video for this pattern, but I liked this so much I GAVE THEM MONEY FOR IT. 

As it turns out, from reading all of these: what I need to do is this: 1) reduce the pressure on the pressure foot, 2)put the most stable layer on top while sewing, 3)match elastic to the edge of the fabric and the seam allowance and trim excess fabric AFTER stitching. I need that extra bit in there to make a stable seam. Last but first: I'm going to need to make samples to test different stitch lengths and needle types (and sometimes thread) to determine which works best for what I'm doing, so samples will be necessary from the scrap from cutting out my project.

And sorting out that tension

http://dragonpoodle.blogspot.com/2020/05/necchi-bu-nova-and-tensioner.html

We all make the same mistakes with where we think the tension has gone wrong. Dragon Poodle is here (second half of their post) to set you (and me) straight.

And you know I'm leaving this here so I won't lose it

Honestly, if the only thing I did all day was point you to their website, I'd consider it a good day's work.

Thank you benevolent scrap bag.