Butterick Has Never Been So Fierce

Ok, I don't normally see fabric and have an instant vision about what I want to do with it and how exactly I want it to turn out. Just doesn't happen. But this time, it happened. Oh, it totally happened. The second I saw this fabric the mental image of these shorts came to mind. And for once my plan worked out damn near perfectly. I don't know what it is about the fabric I bought in Costa Rica, but so far the two pieces I've made from it have been FANFUCKINGTASTIC. Exhibit A: Summer Truffle. Are you ready for Exhibit B? Behold:

CHEETAH SHORTS!!!!!

The pattern envelope for Butterick 5682 has a woman wearing her normal denim-colored jeans with a sensible button up shirt. She's even wearing sensible belts with her pants. I cut 3/4 of the inseam off and used it for orange cheetah print shorts. And that's the awesome part of sewing: you can change things up if you want. I think I succeeded in that at the very least :P

 Like I pointed out earlier, this fabric is de Costa Rica. I was sooo excited to find a fabric store in Heredia, my friends and I just wandered upon it one day while going to a bakery for lunch. And it's pretty lucky we found it too, because when I asked my host mom if there were any fabric stores, it turns out I was asking if there were any factories....awkward. Lesson: fabrica = factory and tela = fabric...beware the power of false cognates!!!! So anyhoo, it was within the remnants section of this fabric store where I had my vision of cheetah shorts. I didn't even notice the little flowers in the background of the fabric until I was getting ready to cut it; I just saw orange and cheetah and was all, LETS DO THIS. I'm not even sure how much it cost because the man piled all my remnants onto a scale and told me the price and that's what I gave him and then I went home giddy on a fabric high and that's how that happened.

I followed the pattern except for the giant inseam length I cut out. I think the hemmed inseam length is something like 4 inches--don't judge I'm only 4' 10"! I made a muslin for a size 12, which is what my measurements say I should be. I've never made pants before and wanted to figure my shit out before cutting into my cheetahlicious remnant. Wellll size 12 gaped a ton at the back waistband and was pretty loose in general, so for the real deal I made a size 10. I decided to leave off the back pockets since I never really use back pockets, ever, and I figured they'd just blend into the back and you wouldn't even be able to see them. I shortened the pattern at the waist by 1 1/2 inches because I'm shorrrrrt. I used this tutorial to shorten the waistband and fix the gaping. I was relieved because at first I thought I was going to have to attempt a swayback adjustment and wasn't feeling very confident about all this cutting up and hinging and extending patten pieces. But all I had to do was cut 8 lines into the waistband pattern and overlap each line by 1/4 inch. So all in all, I took the waistband top in by 2 inches.

Guys, I was so excited about this project whilst sewing it. I was only going to sew for an hour or so on Thursday, but once I started I couldn't stop. All I had left to do last night was the hemming and finishing the waistband edge. And since I love these things so damn much I attempted flat felled seams! Yeah buddy, these shorts are LEGIT! I used bias tape to finish the pockets and for the waistband edge, because I figured a flat felled seam would never work with so much bulk. I topstitched with a double needle for the hemming. I didn't have a black zipper, so I used a brown one, nbd, you cant even see it anyway. I followed Grainline's method for inserting fly zippers because the pattern instructions confused the shit outta me, not gonna lie :P I absolutely love the little heart button I used on the waistband even though it blends in so much. And yeah, the buttonhole is pretty terrible. I made it too small at first then attempted to lengthen it. I guess that's supposed to teach me to measure things more carefully or something :P

the different shades are actually little flowers and leaves :)

The sewing for these went really smoothly. Ok, actually, I broke 3 needles and bent another one beyond use...3 of those were due to zipper and one just randomly broke, I don't even know why. But yeah, whenever instructions tell me to go ahead and sew over zipper teeth from now on, well, Imma be skeptical...But OTHER than that, the sewing went great! I don't know if it was because I was really in the zone or what. I was super terrified because I had the idea that sewing pants was pretty much the worst thing in the history of ever. But I followed the instructions an hey! I actually wound up with shorts! Lookatthat! :D

And the reallllly crazy thing is that they fit well. I saw a bunch of crotch wrinkling with my muslin, and just kind of stared at it in the mirror for awhile without really knowing what to do. The crotch is like the cursed part of pants patterns; I've read sooo many reviews/blog posts about the woes of crotch fitting. I took 1/2 inch more out of the waist for the legit shorts than I did for the muslin, so maybe that did the trick. Or maybe the cheetah print somehow masks all the flaws. Either way's cool with me ;) With my modification, the waistband fits me really nicely. They sit a little higher on the waist than I'm used

look at that nice seam finish! and ignore that orange blob, idk what

 the hell it is

to. They're not legitimately high waisted; they're just not low rise. But the way I see it, this just means there's zero chance of crack attack, and I like those odds ;) Oh, and they fit my butt too! I'm think I'm obligated to try making these up as actual jeans and see if I can make this miracle fitting happen a second time! If/when I make these again I think I'm going to make the pockets deeper though. I can fit my phone in them, but I have a pretty tiny phone. Let's just say these pockets 'aint holdin no iPhones.

I'm on a sewing high right now :D I MADE SHORTS AND THEY DON'T SUCK IN FACT THEY LOOK EXACTLY HOW I WANTED THEM TO!!! And they were quick too! How did that even happen?! I love it!

 Except there's one problem....what does one wear with orangey cheetah printed shorts? I don't really wear orange anyway (even though orange and black are my school colors) so I'm kind of clueless. Before these shorts orange never really appealed to me. But come on. As cheetah shorts? How the hell could you not love these? Actually, when I first tried them on, my thought was, I'm not sure if these are the most awesome or awful things I've sewn They straddle the line, forsure ;P