sewing sweaters

At first, I was terrified of sewing sweaters.  It had to be hard, right?  Well the answer is no, not really.  I mean, I did ruin one, but it wasn't as cute as I thought it was at the store anyways.  Probably was fate working in my favor, preventing me from wearing it out in public.  One of my favorite people gave me a green sweater with polka-dots, which fits in perfectly with my recent obsession with mixing prints, but did not fit me perfectly.  It was a bit big for my taste, and the sleeves were ridiculously long.

I wanted to keep the cuff of the sweater, so I created a fold right above the cuff and chopped.

Then I set my machine to very low tension and did a straight stitch to attach the cuff back to the sleeve.  Make sure you don't pull it at all or it will stretch.  Since the sleeve hole is fairly small, I had to sew inside the sleeve.

Then of course, add a zigzag stitch right next to your straight stitch and cut off the extra material.

Because the sleeve was wider where I cut it, plus a little stretching from the sewing, I took it in a little along the inside seam.  Then I took in the armpits, just as I did in this tutorial.  Keep your machine on a very low tension to do the seams here.  I did not cut the extra material out of the armpits here.  It wasn't very much material and, being my first time sewing sweaters, I wasn't sure how it would hold up.

Now it fits perfectly!  I wore it to work.  And then I wore it everywhere else.  I'm a cardigan kind of girl!

This is my power pose.  Ever since I watched Amy Cuddy's TED talk about using your body language to trick your mind into feeling more powerful and calm in high-stress situations, I'm always power posing.  Check it out!  It really works--I do a different pose every time I make a presentation, have an interview, or generally any time I'm stressed.