It’s currently the second week of school holidays in Victoria (which is how I’m managing to get some sewing and crafting done).  Dan is working from home – he’s all set up in the garage, to avoid interruptions to his many video conferences.  I’m also set up to work from home.  I’m only doing a few hours of work each week of the school holidays, then I go back up to 24 hours per week from home once the school term goes back.  And I’m feeling anxious.  Anxious about how I’m going to juggle the time, and especially the headspace and motivation, to do good quality work while also supervising and supporting my daughters as they do school online for all of term two (at least).  We acknowledge that we’re incredibly lucky to be in the position of being able to convert to completely working from home, and still be earning our usual incomes, but we still have stresses associated with the current situation.  I’m so glad that indications are that we’re ‘flattening the curve’ here in Victoria and the rest of Australia, but we all know that it’s very early days.

I’m sad for both of my daughters too.  Clare’s final year of school is nothing like what we’d imagined.  She’ll now be doing assessments/exams at the time she thought she’d be celebrating with friends at the beach.  So many things missed – 18th birthdays, final school production, the list goes on and on for the class of 2020.  And for Stella, she’d only just started high school.  Friendships were just forming, and now we’ll be right back at the beginning.  I haven’t even met her teachers yet as parent-teacher interviews were cancelled.  I know these things are minor in the bigger picture, but sometimes I just want to cry.  Yet once again we’re lucky – the school already has Google classrooms set up and uses laptops across the board, so I know that they’ll still be learning and connecting.

So I’m making the most of the school holidays to sew up some patterns for easy, comfortable clothes.  Patterns I’ve used before, so nothing too challenging for my poor overcrowded brain.

This is possibly the fourth time I’ve sewed the Style Arc Abigail knit top. Size 12, no alterations. The fabric is viscose jersey that I snaffled from the Tessuti Fabrics remnants table late last year.

The pattern is designed to have an attached neck band, but I have never included that pattern piece. I think it’s just great as a V-neck top. The slight swing shape is perfect for my body, and the centre front seam makes it very straightforward to get a lovely V neckline.

Construction is straightforward. Shoulder seams sew first, then the neckline is finished. A straight strip is sewn to it, right sides together, and I keep a little tension on the strip as I sew (especially around the curvier parts of the neckline). Then press the seam allowances toward the strip, turn it to the inside, tucking the raw edge underneath, then topstitch it in place. Then you can do the centre front seam on the sewing machine, with judicious pinning to ensure that it lines up perfectly at the neckline. The rest of the construction is on the overlocker.

The Style Arc website says: This fashionable top can be made with or without the choker neck band. The swing silhouette makes this top stylish but easy to wear. The neck band is a current fashion trend but if you prefer a “V” neck top just leave out the neck band. Long or short sleeves? It’s your choice on this style. FABRIC SUGGESTION: Knit jersey or baby wool.

I hemmed the sleeves and the bottom of the top with a zig-zag stitch.  I often find this works better on softer, stretchier knits as it doesn’t ‘tunnel’ or stretch them out like a twin needle can.  I used vliesofix tape to secure the sleeve hems, but for the body I just turned it under and stitched.

I’m rapidly developing ‘isolation hair’, as I was due for a haircut the week before we went into stay at home mode, so did a quick google for ‘twisted headband tutorials’ and sewed up a headband from the scraps. There are a multitude of tutorials for doing this – YouTube, blogs, etc. Just pick one that resonates best with how you like to do things (and make sure that you choose the right size – you don’t want to accidentally make one for a baby when it’s intended for an adult). Clare quickly snaffled up the one I made.

I reckon I might need to start sewing one of these each time that I make something from a knit. Although I also think that it’s best that I leave them to my daughters.

While searching for headband tutorials I also found a terrific one on YouTube to make a turban style cap. That’s much more my style than the headband! Maybe later today (after I finish those few hours of paid work).