Technicos: Sharpening Flannel Buttonholes (Green Sewing)

Green Sewing with Leftover Stabalizer Scrap
The irregular hole on the left hand side remains from the fabric's
previous life supporting machine embroidery.
Plenty of area remains to help out my buttonholes.

(Originally published in my Sewing Blog Me Encanta Coser/Enchanted By Sewing) When I made my first test buttonholes on my birdie vest, the first thing I learned was that two layers of flannel, even though they were interfaced on the inside, did that gummy thing under the needle. I bet you know how that gummy thing works, the fabric just doesn't move through right. Two layers of flannel will do that to you. They just want to stick together.

I've used different kinds of stabalizer in various ways when it comes to buttonholes. Having recently been working on sewing area cleanup, it occurred to me this time to try out some of the scrap pieces I've saved from machine embroidery. There's such a lot of stabalizer leftover around the design. (Yes, I can't help but keep it. Occasionally I use it to write project directions on for myself.)

In this case I was able to pencil my buttonhole measurements and guidelines onto the sheet and sew through onto the buttonhole. Not only did the fabric slide really well, My buttonholes came out nice and straight!

Good Night My Someone: Red Plaid Nightgown

The chicken illustrations are something I created for my
art journal a few years back.
This chicken lives with my neighbor Jen, and is named for me.
I'm proud to say that she (Laurel Chicken) and I appeared in Sunset Magazine's
The West's 100 Best Pets Contest:-)

Sunday morning, I finished the last of the night wear projects I talked about in my December Enchanted by Sewing podcast. 

I've been continuing to look for the missing pattern for this many-times used, Tried and True nightgown, while doing major cleaning and reorganizing holiday-time domestic projects -so far no luck.

Wonder how long this latest flannel addition will last..... I'd guess at least two years but would be surprised if it holds up for four. This was budget, on-sale flannel. I made my husband's nightshirt out of what could be higher quality, but maybe I was simply swayed by the description and the feel of the material. I wonder if better quality flannel fabric has a higher life expectancy, or merely feels better? Perhaps when I get to the textiles class in the fashion program at Cañada, I'll find out more about that.

I noticed while sewing this gown how very loose the weave can be in flannel. The plaid lines moved around no matter how many pins I put in. To give the bodice more oomph, I interlined/underlined the bodice with some blue flowered cotton, a remainder from another long-ago sewn spring nightgown. You can see it peaking out from the back bodice. The interlining was in addition to the interfacing I used down the front to support the buttons and buttonholes. I also used black decorative stitching to further support the button area. 

I did the machine embroidery on this bodice last winter. I think if I were embroidering similarly shaped bodice I'd probably do twice as much. My embroidery machine is older and I think this is the largest size motif I can create.

Working with flannel on this nightie is making me think about what I'll be doing with the flannel vest I'll be sewing soon. I'm wondering if interfacing the entire thing would be overdoing it?