The Imaginative Seamstress

Okay everyone..a switch has been made! I know that my first style of maternity scrunch top was wildly popular, but, I have discontinued making them for the time being. In it's place is a very similar top. Practically the same style, but instead of ties in the sides, there is elastic creating the scrunchy look. The reason for the switch is the time difference that it takes to create the tops. The ones with the ties were really killing my productivity time. To answer the question: "How will this fit me if I'm not pregnant?" See pictures below. I am not prego in these pictures. My 'Natural Waist' (tiniest part above the bellybutton, also where you crease when you bend) is 27", and my low waist/high hip/below belly button is about 31".  This is how it looks on me.  You can tell that it fits in the chest but the stomach area is loose.  And here is me wearing the top with maternity belly pillow. (Just like they have at the ...

K, so this one is the first nursing top that I've done with elastic in place of the ties. I tested it out on Monday after my sister and a friend both asked for this design over the weekend. My sister wants just a nursing tank, but my friend wants maternity + nursing tank, with elastic instead of ties.

 I've just completed and mailed off a nursing tank, to a customer. I took a few detailed photos of the top, including photos of it displayed on the dress form, with the inside facing out. I won't be typing much today, as I had a needle go through the tip of my index finger, on my left hand, and its rather sore. But enjoy the pictures! This is a design that you've seen here since Spring of 2012, but these are the first photos I've shared showing the inside of the suit. Here is where I turned it inside out. Its difficult to tell that its inside out because the print goes all the way through the fabric. That's one way to tell you've got a good fabric :-) Look closely at the neckline and arm holes. You can see some color difference around those areas. The black half circle you see at the center chest, is my hair tie. I placed it there so you all could see where the panel stops. Its designed so that if its done right, the under panel will com...

Last night I was playing with an idea for a nursing top. This is what came out of it...  The fist try seemed cute, but not for a nursing top. The over layer, being sewn into the side seam, kept the fabric too restricted for nursing. Pardon the rough edges on this one. I didn't take the time to finish the armholes and neckline when the photos were taken. And so I tried again..   Front  Back This time the over layer went all the way around the body. It was cut fuller and was much easier to lift up if someone desired to wear it as a nursing top. (If its to be a nursing top, I will cut slits in the under layer) I did finish the arms and neck of this one. Its a size 16 and will be for sale in my etsy soon.   

I came to a point of needing a mental break from orders. And it was really great to take a break! If I don't take time for some creativity I'll go crazy with all these custom orders that require me to pay close attention to details all the time. This was my mental break... I took some time on Tuesday night/Wednesday morning to finally put this idea together! It had been sitting, cut out on my table for at least a week. And this idea has been rolling around in my head for about a year now. Its a criss-cross styled nursing top. I had one cut out last Summer and just never got it all put together. Its still in pieces. Just recently I cut out 2 from this shiny teal fabric I'd gotten in. It was light weight and sparkly! Like I said, I cut out 2. Both would look exactly alike on the outside, but the nursing access would look different on the inside. I had asked a friend if she'd be willing to try them both out and tell me which she liked better. Well, I put one together and d...

This was an order for Mother and Daughter suits.   In this photo, the black skirt is not actually the bottoms that were ordered with the suit...its just a skirt that makes a perfect photo prop, no matter which top I put with it :-)  And the top, just like the little girl's scrunch top, without ties... I've done it with a woman's size too...  The reason I came up with not having ties on a girl's suit was my imagining that children would play with the strings. That they might easily become untied, or pulled on, even become a hazard in the water. You never know with kids! Anyway, I've taken that same idea and applied it to an adult's top. Not for the same reasons though. The reasons I tried an adult's top is in theory it was going to be easier to construct than the original scrunch top, and in theory it would take less fabric, because I knew it took some less to do it this way. Well, the using less fabric thing didn't pan out like I thought ...