I have lots to say about the Summit Pack sling bag I made, so I'm going to break it into two parts - starting with my review of the actual pattern. (Part 2 will be about what I did differently and more about my finishing preferences.)
I will begin by saying I really like the completed bag and I think the pattern was a good purchase. But it is not a good first bag project if you haven't made a a complex bag or backpack before.
As I mentioned before in a previous post, I did a lot of smoothing out the pattern pieces to get rid of all the wavy edges. I'm not sure if those were caused by the designer tracing a rtw bag or prototyping & cutting apart to get a pattern, but either way, that could have been corrected before final pattern.
I found the instructions annoying to follow. There were good photos but often not of the details I wanted to see for clarification. I found myself having to reread sections multiple times as I went because the formatting was a little awkward.
One of the most annoying things about the instructions was the fact that the seam allowance amount was only listed on the description page, and it even said it would not be listed out directly in the rest of the 23 pages of instructions. (If I hadn't cut the pieces out so long before assembly, I wouldn't have spent so much time searching for that information when I came back to sew it!) Every time seam allowance is mentioned in the instructions it says "use regular SA" which is longer to write than "use 3/8" SA".
Eleven of the pattern pieces are not drafted and are only listed as dimensions on a chart at the end of the instructions. The full bottom piece would have fit on a piece of printer paper, but instead prints as only a half piece marked "cut on fold".
There are absolutely no notches on the pattern and I really wanted there to be a few because of all the curves and trying to figure out where things lined up. (The designer mistakenly uses the word "notch" in the instructions when she means to say "clip the curves".)
Many pattern pieces needed to be trued-up. I am a very precise stitcher, and I want the edges of a finished pattern to line up. I found myself pinning a seam and ending up with overhang at the end. I eventually realized the instructions were starting on the opposite end and then trimming off the extra overhang from the other end. If there had been notches, it would have made that less frustrating, but if you're always trimming off the overhang, you can correct the pattern! (see pic 3 for example)
The cutting chart says to cut 4 zipper tabs. You actually need to cut 8 if you want to clean finish the inside of the zippers.
The biggest error in the pattern was the bottom piece - it has one whole inch of unnecessary ease on the straight side! This explains why so many other versions of the bag I've seen photos of have some weird puckers in the final seam. I chose to turn my bag differently than instructed, so I was able to handstitch that seam at the very end and more easily control that ridiculous amount of ease. I have now corrected my pattern to remove that ease in case I ever decide to make other one. (Comparison of original and corrected pieces in photo 4.)
If any of you buy the pattern, email me and I'll send you a pdf of my redrafted bottom piece!
Overall, it's a decent pattern and the pieces fit together just like the instructions say they will. I was always trimming off exactly where it said I would be, but I have corrected all my pieces so I won't have to do that again.
#bagmaking #CloudsplitterBags #SummitPack
I spent the day priming things for paint and then I remembered to shoot a quick video. #SewingStudioBuild
I started cutting all the edges while Janet was away yesterday morning. When she got back after lunch, she pulled out a roller and started filling in. I'll put a pic below in the comments. #SewingStudioBuild
We broke for lunch and then came back with a portal ac unit plugged in to an extention cord from the house. Can't wait until they finished hooking up all the electrical and we have the mini split cooling the room for us - it was stupid humid today! #SewingStudioBuild
I thought you all might be interested to know what happened to the original treadle base on my antique Singer. This was all my husband’s doing, as he’s wanted to try this project for years. He’s gotten into woodworking this past year, so he’s got more of the skills now. The table portion is from a fold-down IKEA table that used to be my cutting table, back in the pre-kid days when I had a whole room for sewing. (It’s been living in the basement folded up for years, mostly used for garden seed storage and a few small tools.) He added the sink basin and faucet. We’re debating about me making a small curtain underneath that would hide the pipe work, while still showing the treadle base.
This project sparked another room makeover, though this one is our half-bath so it isn’t nearly as involved as our kitchen and kids’ rooms have been. Several of the other items in the picture came from a couple of local antique shops, though the old milk crate belonged to my husband’s ...
I haven't been sewing since a big project finished about a month ago - I'm just burned out (will post photos at some point).
After a couple exhausting weekends of installing a new dishwasher because my 29 year-old mechanical stopped rinsing properly 😥, I was motivated enough to start reorganizating the rest of the kitchen. It's always a domino effect, and I'm still not finished, but I washed the curtain I made a million years ago and properly dusted/washed all the pitchers and decorations on the window shelves. (I even polished the formica tabletop!) So the window area was photo-worthy.
Back when made the curtain, I was smart and used velcro instead of a curtain rod. I put a male sticky-back strip on the top of the mini-blind housing and sewed a soft female strip of regular velcro onto the curtain. The curtain itself is all one piece gathered to that strip of velcro - easy to pull off and throw in the laundry (not that i overcome laziness and actually wash it regularly but whatever).
I ...
Been so busy, I forgot to share photos of the final Paquita costume! Well, most of these photos are “semi-final”—after the photoshoot and first dress rehearsal, his teacher asked me to tweak the front seams below the waist so they would stay close to the body (not flare out like in the photoshoot) when his arms were up. This involved re-doing the bottom trim but the final result was worth it, so! The full sleeves were not as dramatic as we thought they were going to be, but still a nice effect. I really love the elbow sleeve detail and maybe will post more about it later.
