Here goes! My first competition entry.

K.H. Entry no 1.

Bikini and wrap for myself.

The fabric is scuba for the bikini bottom inner and polyester/elastane for the outer and soft touch elastic for the waist band.

The top is constructed around a pair of triangle sew in cups with polyester/elastane outer and inner fabric with soft touch elastic for the under bust support. Tie back and halter neck.

No patterns were used, the bottoms were created using another bikini as a guide and then adjusted to fit me better, but the top was all pretty much made up as I went along. The top is the second revision as the first one was made using oval sew in cups which did absolutely nothing to hold things in place. So bad were they that when I put my hands over my head I fell out of the bottom of the cups!

I was having problems with the tension sewing the binding and the elastic on the top so the zigzag is not perfect by any means, but it'll have to do until I get back from holiday. I have enough fabric left to redo it then.

The wrap is just chiffon with a rolled hem.

Sorry for the photos, I was definitely not going to model it! Sorry! 

I need to be working quick on this one, I have a deadline of before the end of the month! I'm flying out on holiday on the 28th and fully intend to take the bikini with me! The bottoms are mostly done, just some detailing to do and the top just needs putting together and the halter neck straps doing. Not sure about the sarong yet, might need to add some detail. It looks too plain.

To be honest, that does sound like the hardware is failing. Does it do it all the time? If you watch a movie full screen or something that takes full screen and not a windows screen, is it the same? If so I'd be tempted to say a hardware fault. 18 months old, probably still under warranty?

Hi

I've just bought a second hand overlocker, a Janome Finesse 234, and I was just wondering, is it a good machine? I can't seem to find much info about it.

I'm guessing it dates from the 80's? Not sure, I can't find any dates on it or the manual.

It is in really good condition, just needs a bit of a clean up and a service, but I have threaded it, and got the tensions sorted and it seems to work really well so far.

I only paid £40 for it. Did I do OK? Or is it a lemon?

@coffeeandcake thank you. I tried to work out the bust apex on the paper pattern held up against her, but I think I just got it in the wrong place. I have revised the apex on the toile now and I'll see if I can aim the dart better at that.

@datcat23 interesting. I have never heard of a curved dart, very much still a beginner with all this. I'll have to do some googling as it sounds like it may well be the solution in this case. Thank you for that.

Don't forget you will need to alter the facing as well.

Thanks, I'd thought of that but I thought I'd run up the toile without it to try the fit, then deal with the facing if the pattern works. Fingers crossed!

Thanks @Lachica and @maliw I'll bare that in mind. It's not for me and the intended recipient is quite a bit larger in that area than me! She won't mind me saying that! 

The material she has chosen is a cute fox patterned pollycotton.

Fox print