La Bici

It's here - my new Citibike membership!  You may have heard that just before summer, NYC got a new bikeshare program called Citibike.  I've been traveling for most of the summer but joined Citibike as soon I returned and am now an official annual member.

I just finished this skirt, intended for many bike riding adventures.  Although summer wanes, I believe I'll manage to get in a good ride or two.

La Bici - Front View

La Bici - Back View

The pattern is the Crescent Skirt, #1101 from Sewaholic and is my first Sewaholic pattern!

From the Sewaholic website

It was a fairly easy pattern to make up and really fun to sew.  The yoke is made from several pieces to which I added red piping for a bit of spice.  I made version C since I knew this skirt would get a work out on a bike, and I didn't want my chonies (undies) to show.

The fabric is a wonderful bicycle print, Henry Glass cotton (I know, I can be a bit too literal) from one of my favorite fabric haunts, Fabric Depot in Portland, OR.  Like a nice cotton should be, it was super easy to work with.

I made a bit of a boo boo during the initial pattern cutting stage.  I started cutting the pattern based on my hip measurement and tapered a size down in the waist (something I have to do with the big four pattern companies).  Luckily, I did a tissue fitting before I started cutting my fabric and realized that the waist would be entirely too small if left así.  Looking back at the pattern envelope and the sizing, it turns out that I should've just cut the waist the same size as the hip.  (Isn't taking your measurements and comparing them to the sizing on the pattern envelope sewing 101? - ay ay ay!)

Well, I was able to tape some of the cut away pattern tissue back onto the pattern pieces and for others where I had already recycled the cut away pattern tissue, I simply measured, cut and taped paper to the pattern tissue.  My project was saved in spite of my silliness!

Self-inflicted yoke crises narrowly avoided!

Changes I made to the pattern:  I omitted the twill tape as per the pattern instructions.  I felt that with the strong interfacing I used for the yoke pieces and the structure added by the piping, I didn't really need to add the twill tape.  Secondly, I inserted an invisible zipper, instead of a regular zipper.  Other than these  2 very minor changes, I made it pretty much as instructed.

Overall, I'm really pleased with how this turned out.  I love the nice deep pockets and the yoke design.  It's super comfortable to wear, and yes - it's perfect for bike riding.

¡Hasta pronto!