Summer Trousers with Dragons

No, I did not get mad and yes, I did wear them outside of my bedroom.

It all started the last week-end before my yearly vacation. I had decided not to stress out and not to start any sewing project (big or small) before leaving on vacation because, coming back to it after 3 weeks means that I forget everything and also, it is easy to start a summer project beginning of August which you just have totally no interest in finishing beginning September when the weather gets colder again.

So I just sewed a little Kobo reader pocket. And started reading my tourist guide. That's where I realized that I had no trousers to wear on the flights (a few of them planned during the 3 weeks' vacation) or to the buddhist temples. I panicked and had to sew one.

Fortunately, I found this fabric in my stash. It comes from my trip to Indonesia two years ago where I bought many batiks or batik-similar stuff in full colours, the type of fabric I can only use for home-wear of pyjamas, as there is absolutely no place else I could wear this on a regular basis in my ordinary life. Except for - a vacation in Asia, there you go!!!!

The fabric was sold as cotton, but after sewing it, I am pretty sure there is some viscose content as well. Never mind, that is fine for what I intended to sew with it.

I used the only real trousers pattern I took time to adjust to my butt - already sewn here as pyjama trousers and it worked perfectly. Just what I needed - lightly large trousers with pockets. This time, I put large elastic in the back, secured it on the sides and in the back center seam and kept the lacing only for the front. There is a little bit of volume in the trousers and I find that on the previous model they fell off easily and the fabric does not distribute evenly between the sides and between the back and the front. The fixed elastic solved quite some of these problems.

For a little moment I was considering pattern matching but I definitely did not have enough fabric to use so not such a thing could happen :o) Also, the fabric had a very specific orange border which I almost managed to avoid (and used for pockets inside), there is only a little piece of it visible on the inseam - the the density of the orange dragons is bigger than elsewhere. Again, I think I can totally live with that.

I must say that I was really happy with these trousers and wore them on our Mekong cruise as I was slightly afraid of mosquitos and sunburn. And they will work well as home trousers as well.