Embroidered Linen Dress: Tie Construction

I decided on "beetroot" charmeuse from Mood for the tie. Can I tell you? I am in love with this fabric. I want to have one of everything in it. I want to live in it. This is definitely my color this year. It really makes the blue of my eyes pop and I just love wearing it.

The pattern called for the ties to be cut on the lengthwise grain, but I wasn't interested in buying 2 yards of silk just for a tie around my waist. So I cut ripped it on the cross grain instead. For the longer tie, this meant that I needed to splice two lengths together. I had done this once before on an improvised tie for a maternity top. I used my quilting ruler to draw a 45% angle on the intersection of two lengths pinned perpendicular to each other.

Then I stitched on that line. I was pretty pleased with my accuracy!

When turned to the right side and pressed, it makes one continuous length with a strong angled seam.

I trimmed and pinked seams and trimmed the corners down tight.

I sewed the seam allowances of the join down into the seam allowance of the tube. I decided it would make the join seam stronger. Then I used a fancy tube turner tool to flip the tubes right-side-out.

There is a hollow tube that goes inside the tube, all the way to the stitched end. Then there is a stick that fits inside the tub that is used to start the turn into the tube.

I am very pleased with how these ties look, however, I do have some pressing marks... You can see it at the top of the tie in the picture above. the pinked edge of the seam allowances is showing through. I thought pinking the seams might help to blend the seam allowance line, since it would be at different lengths. I think next time I would use some sort of interfacing. Also, I wasn't sure how to apply the pressinatrix's pressing rules on a tube, and didn't look for help on the internet until I had already trimmed the seam allowances. So my seams aren't as perfectly pressed as they could be. Next time I will press the seam allowances back before I turn the tubes.

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Frivolous photo: My husband and I packed the kids off to go camping in the mountains not too far from home a couple of weekends ago. It was in a wonderfully wooded area. I could have moved in. The kids were fabulous! The biggest challenge with camping in the mountains near Denver is that the lows will be in the 40s even at the height of summer. In the morning, we had to get under a blanket to stay warm.

In other sewing news, I am close to having my medieval dress and my cloak done. The cloak just needs a hem and the medieval dress only has the trim left to add (and an underdress to sew up). Seems too close to the finish line to share photos...