Twinkle Sews

This is a great book with some lovely patterns for clothes. You really need to know how to sew with this book.  The instructions are all written and brief. I read them over many times before starting my project. Even then I still made fixable mistakes. I printed my patterns on A4 which means my printer misses the very edges of the pattern this is not a problem as I just allow for this when sticking them together. The sizing is hard to work out as each pattern has different instructions for picking which size pattern. I will explain what I have done when I post about the individual projects.

Burda 8361

First Top

Is the one on the right (black, green and white). I had the same problem as everyone who has reviewed this pattern the baggie bust. I have found it is because the gathering goes to far down around the bust to the side of the top your bust is higher than this. The top was way to long from the shoulder to the bust so I had to take 2.5" out of the shoulders at the top. Lucky the arm hole opening is quite long so it still fits under the arm.

Under Bust

Second Top

I adjusted the pattern for this top so that the arm hole would be the original size this is much better. This would be especial important if you wanted to sew the top of the sleeve together. You cant really see it in these photos but I left the sleeve top open as option A suggests. To fix the baggie bust I have only gathered from about 1" away from the centre point until the pattern pieces fitted together. This had made the sides of the top sit perfectly flat against my side. I also angled the line under the bust up just a bit as I felt it went to low for me on the original. This is a great top it is an exact copy of a top that I bought RTW which is why I picked this pattern. I have plans to make this in a few different fabrics.

Burda 7866

I am happy with mine but I made the smallest size which is 10 it looks so much bigger on me than it looks on there model. Its really comfy I used a double knit. It is a little annoying fixing the unattached belt all the time. I have plans to make a modified version based on what I saw someone else do with this pattern. They eliminated the belt by using elastic at the sides of the bottom piece to give it a gathered look.