Free Pocket Pattern – OccasionalPiece

Let’s go to the movies! The Oh! Granny movies! If I could wave a magic wand I’d change the world so you could see the congregation of Grannies we’ve all started together, but this screen capture video will have to suffice. If you make a Granny Square, I’ll add you to the group — just tag me on Instagram.

Here are my two starter Grannies for June:

Block #9 (above) and Block #10 (below)
If you want to jump in, it’s never too late. More info is on a previous post, plus a free pattern.

Obviously my micro-season of red, white and blue has influenced this last one. And by the way, I really enjoyed reading all your micro-seasons, left in the comments on the last post. After hearing my stories about my garment sewing (see below), Wendy came up with another micro-season: WWIT, or What Was I Thinking? I find myself in that season often.

Did you see this one as we rolled the movie? This is from Allison; she made a pictorial chart in Canva, and is adding in her grannies as she makes them.

I’ve got some more squares cut up in my sewing room, and will soon get to making more.

I keep running into Granny Square designs. This is from PomPom London, a purse maker. I may or may not have just purchased a red purse from them.

My apologies, this model in this color is apparently sold out, but I also like the one-zip City Bag in blue, if that suits you. I’t ‘ve had it for a few months now, and has the best cross-body straps (hands free!) and I can even fit a small, short water bottle in there. I’d say, if you’re hot for a red purse, check back as they replenish their stock often, or choose another (they have three different reds). I’ve now seen three different copycat ads for purses in my IG feed (see below about junk in our media feeds), but PomPom London is the original. And yes, each bag has a pompom, or tassel or whatever.

Short Story: Hair dryer died. Got a new, different (better) one, based on the dryer in my hotel room in Paris. (PS. I mention these items, but no one is paying me.) This year has seemed to be the Time Of Getting Things Repaired & Fixed/Replaced, and I’m getting a little weary, but there you go.

Chimney collar repair, with Tobi on top and David as assistant. And more great news is this:

Yes, the stair bannister was finished, and delivered (late one night, felt sorry for Bryan, but he’s a good guy and his IG feed is fascinating to look at, if you love watching other people work).

Short Story: router died.

Ending: We’re back on the internets with a new mesh network. The bigger problem is that home repairs TAKE TIME, even when you are not the one doing them. I mean, ~~gawking~~ checking on the guy up on the roof seriously takes away from the sewing, if you know what I mean. And don’t even get me started on the lengthy tale of getting the router up and running.

However…I finished up the final squircle!!

I started sewing these nine months ago.

And here they all are, sewn together. (Big smiles.)

Now to consider borders. I have one I’m thinking about, simply because the quilt is intended for a taller person, and more length is needed. Did I mention already that a partner in crime, Gladi, has also finished her squircles?

Now for the WWIT micro-season: a pattern review. And pattern-making review.

My friend Susan, in Australia, has made two of these jumpers, and because of her success, I decided to try. I was a pretty experienced sewer from back in the day, but my advice for this jumper is: Take Your Time.

First off, find the pattern. I went to the Internets (now that it was fixed) and found the pattern at Lakes Makerie. Usually I print off my PDF clothing patterns at Tape Free Patterns (recommend highly) but Lakes Makerie had an option where they would print it off and send it to me for a small extra charge. I liked this! It didn’t include an envelope for the pattern like Tape Free does, but their service was very convenient and fairly quick.

Top two (first two) photos are of the back pleat. I did a modified length — not too short, not too long — and didn’t like how they finished the pleat. I just did a standard finish. Third photo is the inside, and yes, I turned my pocket fabric right side out so I could see the beautiful fabric, hoarded since the Dawn of the Century. This is a navy cotton/linen lightweight fabric, with a metallic thread running through the slubby face (even though it looks grey in the last photo).

This jumper has a scoop neckline, which I lowered by 1/2″ (upon the advice of those on social media), two button plackets on either side, generous front pockets and (last photo) two back patch pockets which are getting unpicked soon. Why? Because while I tried it on and loved it (and see Susan’s post link for how her sister looks in hers), but on my smaller frame it just looked a bit too blocky; the pockets don’t help.

This is why I make my clothes, so I can make my clothes how I want.

So I added two self ties, and stitched them on about 6″ in from the side seams so they’d line up with the shoulders. They help define the waist area a bit more. Button shopping was a challenge without any sewing shops nearby, but I did find some at Hobby Lobby — cheesy plastic ones — but they’ll keep the dress on. On the advice of others, I also cut a smaller size. Do This.

On the left is the Box Box Dress (Merchant & Mills), and on the right is the Hope Dress (Style Arc). I’ve noticed that I tend to find the next dress I want to make from social media and blogs, so here are two that I have made and enjoyed. I did add pockets to the Box Box dress, as well as modifying the sleeve, as I like my sleeves a bit longer.

Here’s a pocket pattern (free download) if you need one.

OPQuilt Pocket_Pattern Download

Cut it out, hold it up along the side of your garment, and just try it for where you want it, making sure your fingers can touch the bottom of the pocket bag. I use a different method of putting in pockets these days (shorter video HERE, and the longer video is HERE). My first pocket installation using the newer method was a bit ragged, but now I’m getting pretty good at it, only because the volume of mistakes I initially made sent me on the Path to Knowledge.

Okay, that’s all for garment sewing — I try to put this topic on Instagram, but just couldn’t include a pocket pattern on that site for you. 🙂 According the latest, if we’re smart we’ll all get off of social media, given that most of what we see is ads, even when you think it’s just a someone-or-other showing your their favorite thing:

Click HERE to listen. I did want to read the article by Lane Brown, but can’t get past the paywall. Kai Ryssdal is good host on the Marketplace podcast, and the show is not political in the least. Which is how I’ll close.

I said something off-hand last week about the upcoming California Primary Election to a neighbor when we encountered each other during our morning walks. It did not go well. I was upset for days at how it blew up quickly, but then — the quilting world came to my rescue with this:

My Stars and Stripes
Probably made by Ella Evans
Made in Tennessee, United States; Circa 1900
Cotton
IQM 2013.025.0001

The International Quilt Museum writes: “In this piece, we see the American flag as an enduring symbol of American patriotism. Made by Ella Evans, this quilt holds identical Unions in opposite corners each with forty-five stars — an accurate rendition of American states in 1900. Evans made this quilt for a man named Otis Golden. Evans cared for Otis and his brothers after their mother passed away.”

Even on opposite sides, we can still be part of one entity. Our church did a nationwide discussion of the Constitution last week, and my husband and I took the opportunity (and reminder) to read the full Constitution. It was instructive, a bit over our heads in some places (the Senate’s interpretations on the side did help), but it reminded me, as does the flag quilt by Evans, that we are all in this together.

Thanks so much for reading, I appreciate you very much–

Well, actually Rabelais said “The dress does not make the monk,” but since I’m not a monk like Rabelais — although I do sit monk-like day after day at the sewing machine — I prefer my variation for the title of this post.

There comes a day when an occasion arrives and even though Thoreau cautioned us to “Beware of all enterprises that require new clothes,” it was time for a new dress for a granddaughter’s wedding, even though I’m aware that I’ll be mostly on the sidelines as this newer generation Does Things Differently so I need to get with it and adjust. But still, maybe it’s that I wanted a new dress? And that my sister had been making a lot of outfits from Merchant and Mills patterns and I Wanted In On The Fun.

*The Beautiful Bride, from her IG account. Her mother is a photographer, so they snapped the bridal portraits early.*

IDK how you feel about me sliding a dress post into a quilting blog, but this is what I’ve been doing with my sewing machine and time. The idea was to make a wearable toile out of each of the three patterns I was auditioning. Which meant that the dresses made from the flat folds picked up for cheep at M & L fabric shop probably wouldn’t fit me as well as I would want them to, which is why I’m not modeling them in this post. I also remember why I leapt over to quilting long ago: The Fitting Question. I remember at age 20 feeling like I was as large as a barn. And at 30, I thought I was zaftig. Oh, honey, I now want to say. You looked fabulous. The problem is that I was trained to sew on that 20/30-yo person, and now this person (some years down the road) is not who I know how to sew for. But I’m trying.

Dress Number One

I need to take out most of the extra ease I put in, but I wore it out anyway, along with beads from a quilt show. Jewelry rights a lot of wrongs.

Dress Number Two

Again, I put too much ease into this wearable toile (again, struggling with fit), and if I choose this one to make for the wedding, I’ll make it more like the pattern. I got all my patterns from Hart’s Fabrics in Santa Cruz, California and they came lickety-split, especially considering that Merchant and Mills patterns are from England.

In five years of owning my sewing machine, purchased in December 2020, I’d never used my buttonholer. I had to watch a video online to figure out how, but it worked like a charm the other night.

Dress Number Three

I’m still in the middle of Dress #3. It’s a Simplicity pattern I’ve had forever, and is a plain-Jane shirtwaist dress. I found two lengths of this blue-and-white fabric in my stash. Guess I forgot and ordered it twice, but it came in handy when I needed to make one more wearable toile. I’ve re-cut the sleeve piece twice; I like my sleeves a little longer — like to my elbow — but we’ll see how this turns out.

Pockets

I don’t know about you, but to me a good pocket is mandatory. I traced off an old pattern to make myself a basic pocket pattern, and here it is for a Free Download:

OPQuilt Pocket_Pattern Download

It basically looks like what’s in the photo, above. I used fat quarter-inch seam allowance on the outside edge, but you can cut it larger, if you want.

For placement on your dress, when holding up the main section of your pattern to your body, bend your elbow and figure out where you’d like your hand to slide in. Think also about where the bottom edge will be; you don’t want to be reaching down to get the car keys out of your pocket. Then mark that.

I sew the pocket onto the side of the dress in a 1/4-inch seam, press to the pocket, then serge that section only. After pinning the side seams/pockets together sew about 1″ below the top edge of the pocket piece, then all the way around the pocket, then to a point on the seamline and then down the seam to the hem. Like this:

Serge or zig-zag the raw edge. Or as Merchant and Mills patterns say, “Tidy up the edge.”

You can also stabilize the pocket by sewing it into a waist seam. To adjust for that, grab a pencil, like the one from your Dad’s art box, and draw a curvy line upward. Try to make it match your waist seamline. This is the cheesy way. Watch the following Video (That May Confuse You or Help You) to see it done more professionally than just a pencil line: How to sew a waist-anchored pocket (this also helps you draft your own)

What else?

Whichever one I think will work best will get sewn up into a light blue linen print I’ve been hoarding for a couple of years. Then I think I’ll sew a skirt or two when I return. I’ve seriously neglected my wardrobe the last few years, and I generally hate all clothes in the stores. (Or maybe it’s just trying them on that I hate.) Thankfully my sister is cheering me on, and my husband is an angel and has learned to say nice things about my wearable toiles, such as “You’ve never looked better,” and tries not to choke as he delivers his scripted lines.

I’m skipping my A Quilting Life QAL update post this month, mainly because I haven’t yet worked on it. I’ll just do both July and August together, after I return from the wedding of this lovely grandchild #3. And then I’ll launch back into some of my Economy Block sewing, too, as well as some quilting on the New York Beauties. Oh! and seaming together my Posh Penelope. August will be busy!

It’s heating up here…enjoy your July–