sewing jeans Archives ~ Angela Wolf's Sewing Blog

Sewing Pattern Alterations – Fitting a Jean Pattern for a Round Stomach

Sewing jeans are really easy once you get the hang of the process, but fitting the pattern can be challenging. The next few posts are going to deal with exactly that, fitting various body shapes. This pattern alteration is needed if you have a fuller stomach, in the old days referred to as an apple shape. Although, I am not sure where the fruit terms originated from, I really don’t like them. I would rather be a glass! Wine glass, red wine glass, martini glass, goblet, water-glass, I think you get the idea. It just sounds a little more glamorous than an apple or pear 🙂 Anyway, if you made up a jean muslin and the pattern fit great in the legs, hips, and tush, but you just can’t get that center front closed … here you go:

Fitting a Jean Pattern for a Round Stomach

1. Tape the front pocket in place. Start by drawing lines on your pattern (don’t cut yet):

Draw a line (green) across the hip and up to the tip of the side seam.
Draw 2 lines (purple) perpendicular to the green line,

2. Cut along the green line, cutting up to the side seam put NOT through the edge.

3. Slide the pattern open. Look what happens, you just gave a little more room in the front tummy area in the width and height of the pattern.

4. The upper waist curve is too extreme if left like this. Cut each purple line, down to the green line, but NOT through it. Slide each line open until the waist curve angles down more like the original pattern.

5. Redraw a new waistline and center front crotch curve (red line).

If you are having difficulty redrawing the front crotch curve, slide the pattern back together. Mark the bottom edge of the facing area and trim off the front fly facing. Follow all the steps and then tape the front facing back in place once the new center front is drawn in, lining up the facing with the marking on the pattern. Draw a line extending the facing up to the waistline ( I used this pattern piece, because I knew someone would ask about that).

Here is your new front pattern piece, use this for the front and left, of course one will have a front facing section and the other will not. This is the same alteration for any pant style when you need a little more room in the tummy area.

How are your jeans coming along for March’s wardrobe challenge? The judges are almost finished with February’s winners, hope to announce them this weekend.

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That’s all for today 🙂 Sun is shining and snow is melting, thank goodness!!!!

Sewing the Front Pockets on Designer Jeans (part 1)

Another quick lesson on sewing designer jeans, sewing the front pockets. I have broken this into two parts as this lesson will cover attaching the silk charmeuse lining and topstitching the pocket edge. The next lesson shows how to add a coin pocket and closing up the lining. To get started you will need your front jean pieces and the pocket lining. You will usually find cotton as the fabric for the pocket lining, but I prefer to use something a little more luxurious, like silk charmeuse. Because the silk is so thin you can’t see the pockets through the outside of the jean, not to mention the fabric feels awesome against the skin.

Again, experimenting with some of the new features on my Brother Dreamweaver XE VM6200D stitching this pocket is painless. First off, look at the size of the new “J” foot. (The picture has the original foot alongside the new foot). The longer length really makes a difference when sewing across layers of fabric. The foot glides across humps, thicker seams, even uneven edges as the pocket we will topstitch. I call this a BIG plus!

Onto sewing the pockets … pin your silk charmeuse lining to the denim fabric along the curve of your pocket. You can stitch from either side, I chose to stitch with the denim on the top so you can see the sew straight laser vision guide a little better. I have aligned the laser with the raw edge of the fabric, allowing me to sew the entire pocket curve with a precise seam allowance.

Press the Pocket Lining … Turn the lining to the inside of the pocket and steam press, using the tailor’s clapper to permanently hold that crease (shown on video below).

Topstitch the Pocket Edge … Again, utilizing the laser light to make sure my first topstitch line is perfectly placed 1/8″ from the edge of the pocket curve. Then I move the laser light to align with the previous topstitch line, but here is a new one for you. I am able to use the v-sonic pen pal to touch where I want the laser light to move to. You have to check out the video below to get the full visual of this unique feature, but simply put … engage the pen pal, touch the bed of the sewing machine where you want the laser light to shine, and hit OK. That’s it! Just imagine how easy sewing straight rows of topstitching will be 🙂

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AOuS5b7lrw]

Brother™ has provided me with the DreamWeaver XE, but all opinions expressed are entirely my own

Sewing Jeans with the Brother DreamWeaver XE VM6200D

I was thrilled to take part in preview of the new V-series sewing machines from Brother. The three new machines in this new V-series offer new technology that can really make your sewing and embroidery fun and easy … sew straight laser vision guide, v-sonic pen pal, drop light embroidery placement, just to name a few.

Since my Angela Wolf Jean Pattern’s are ready to launch in October, I thought it would be fun to put together some blog posts sewing my jeans to help you follow along and brag about the new Brother Dreamweaver XE VM6200D. This machine just came out so if you are thinking of picking up a new machine, you have to check this one out.

So, I have to tell you about this sew straight laser vision light. When I heard this, I really couldn’t imagine how this could work. I sew all the time, how on earth can this help me sew a straight line? First off, if you need help sewing a straight line – this feature is incredible! For me, I usually use the foot or guide on the plate to sew straight. I have to admit, after using the laser light for an entire day I noticed my eyes felt better (from not staring) and I was able to sit up straighter, instead of leaning over the machine. I know your thinking, go buy glasses 🙂

Anyway, this is how this works. The laser is shown on the main sewing screen. Simply touch the icon and you are given a range of 10.5mm to adjust the laser position. In the pictures below you can see the laser light on my fingers. The lighting on this machine is so bright (perfect for sewing black fabric), I had to lower the light level to less than half to take this picture.