EAM – Go Exploring Cardigan

Hi Friends! I have been lazy about blogging lately. I sewed this one up months ago actually. Ugg I have been a bum, but trying to motivate myself. I have several really great things to share actually. So with this first picture, you will see that I am not the one wearing my lovely new cardigan…Momma Mia is. Huummm….Keep Reading.

I received this amazing stretch velvet from Stitchin’ Pretties for my monthly promo fabric and then used some pretty SP scraps I had in my bin for the accents. Floral and Stripes will always be amazing together, you will never convince me otherwise. You can find this lovely fabric listed as Jocelyn here. I thought it would make a beautiful cardigan and I wasn’t wrong. Let’s start with talking about velvet a bit.

When working with any sort of velvet you have to keep in mind it has a nap. This just means that the fabric lays one way and and you want it to all match. Usually if you brush your hand down the garment it will be smooth, if you pull your hand up along the fabric it will be rougher. Another thing with velvet, it you won’t iron it like normal cotton fabric. Again this is because of the nap. If you lay it on your ironing board and press the heck out of it, you will crush your pretty nap. If you have to iron it, you can use a velvet board or have two besties help you hold your fabric up in the iron and iron the back side. Note to readers, I didn’t iron this at all. 🙂 Also check your stretch percentage when making a a garment. This is should be a given, but sometimes I don’t do it. This is why Momma Mia now has a pretty new cardigan and I don’t. I sewed the 5x to give myself some extra wiggle room, but it was still too tight. Momma Mia is 3 sizes smaller and it fits her well. She is so happy with it.

I decided pretty quickly that I wanted to use this lush fabric for a cardigan. After looking at several, I decided to try out the Go Exploring Cardigan from Ellie and Mac. I had not made this one yet, but really liked the look of it. All of the models on the website looked super stylish. So I quickly printed and assembled my pattern. I really like that EAM patterns are pretty straight forward and I have made enough of them to have the routine down.

My pockets flapped open a bit more than I liked, so I dug into my button stash and produced these lovelies. Momma Mia sewed them on herself! Another change I would have made was actually adjusting for height. I normally don’t height adjust on anything that is shirt or cardigan because my side waist measurement is normal even though I am short. This cardigan is on the longer length so was too long for my taste. Note to self for the next time.

The Go Exploring Cardigan is now on sale for $4. Here is my afflink. Using my link doesn’t change anything for you, but I receive a small commission from the designer as a thank you.

Beautiful Stretch Velvet fabric is here.

Author: SequoiaLynnSews

I am a single dog mom of two and we happily reside in a small house in Ohio. We spend our days playing fetch, digging holes in the garden, and sewing, lots of sewing. We have high hopes of moving to the mountains someday. The dogs don’t really know that yet, but they will understand. I shamelessly hoard fabric and feel slightly sorry for whoever has to sort my stash when I am gone. I am employed full time in a industry that requires little of my creativity, but basically lets me wear whatever I want. So it works out. I can usually be found behind one of my sewing machine avoiding human contact. I test a lot of clothing patterns and therefore always have a new outfit to share. You have most likely found my blog through some sort of sewing outlet and will quickly realize that I am sewing for a plus size body. For reference, I am 5'1 and wear a range from a 2-5x. Sizes change with every designer and you can't trust ready to wear sizing when you are making your own clothing. Your tape measure will become one of your most used tools and if you misplace them like I do, you should pick up several. I will be sharing the good, the bad, and the A-MA-ZING with you… So stay tuned. I will also try to teach you a few of my tricks along the way. People always tells me they want to learn how to sew. My best advice is you have to start. Just do it! You are going to mess up, you will break needles, you will ruin the pretty fabric, you will stab your fingers, but you will learn. You will make something and you will wear it. Someone will say, “I like your shirt.” and you will smile and say, “Thanks, I made it.” You will race home and make something else. Pretty soon you have made more good things than bad and you will feel proud of yourself and you should. I will be proud of you too. :) Ok, that is enough rambling, I have sewing to do. :) SequoiaLynn

%d bloggers like this: