If you haven’t heard, Love Notions patterns is having a big sitewide sale Monday, May 1st through Friday, May 5th. You can get an extra 10% off the already discounted sale price with my affiliate coupon code NIC10.

You may already have some patterns in mind to buy during the sale, and none of the patterns would be a bad choice. I’ve made most of them, and love them all. I wanted to share my favorites with you and why I keep making them again and again. I have tons of pictures to share, so feel free to scroll or browse on what interests you the most. If you haven’t joined the Love Notions Facebook group, I hope you would consider joining. I am a moderator and I love making connections there. You can also friend me on Facebook and/or follow me on Instagram. You’ll find my giveaway on an Instagram post on Wednesday.

The Love Notions Saltwhistle Top and Dress was just released last summer. I only made a top in Rayon Challis, last year. However, I wore that top so much last summer. Raspberry Creek Fabrics let me pick any fabric by a designer in their Designer Studio this Spring to promote, and I picked this gorgeous Stretch Crepe from Moshito Designs to make a dress. Keira designed the pattern and put out a great YouTube video on the Love Notions channel on how to make the tiers go together for the dress version so easily. Karina of Lifting Pins and Needles also put out two videos, one on making square necklines and a second on sewing the Saltwhistle Top. I highly recommend you follow these two channels on YouTube, because they are both amazing resources. I made my tops in Rayon Challis. I felt like the Stretch Crepe was much easier to work with, but you cannot beat the drape and softness of Rayon Challis

Another pattern that I love is the Rhapsody Blouse and Dress. The bottom left floral teal top is made with Stretch Crepe while the other two are Rayon Challis. All were purchased from Raspberry Creek Fabrics. The majority of what I share is with their fabrics, because I love their quality and their very artful prints. I thought both fabrics worked equally well. I noticed at the last Feature Friday that a lot of people leave that tie untied. I really love it tied.

This is an image from the recent rerelease of the Duet Trousers. I am sharing this photo, because it shows all the fabrics I usually use. However, I have made it many more times that is shown. It is another pattern that I can’t get enough of, because the same pattern pieces work in a stable knit and wovens. The very left pair in gray is stretch linen. I’ve come to the realization that I don’t really love that fabric with this pattern, because it grows too much. The right is a twill, which is my favorite woven fabric.

This pair deserves its own photo, because it’s my new favorite fabric for it. It is a ponte twill from Surge Fabrics, which sounded very odd to me. However, the color is great and the fabric wears so well. Surge Fabrics is good source for fabrics. I find they have beautiful solids and a lot of interesting fabric types.

This photo is also a good segue to my next pattern, which is the Arlington Sweater. In the photo, you can see my favorite, easy hack. I add the Classic Tee neckline and neckband to the Arlington Sweater.

The Arlington Sweater is definitely Elise’s favorite pattern, and I might pick it, if pressed to select just one favorite Love Notions pattern. Even though Elise isn’t as keen on mama made garments and definitely no photos, she does still ask for this pattern. What fabric is best? You’d be harder pressed to find one that doesn’t work. Though, I did so in testing and that’s why the stretch percentage is at 40%. Make sure you use at least 40% stretch or your neck won’t fit in the band. If you want to use some stash, Tami provides this really handy stretch guide to figure that out. Some of our favorites are sweater knits, double brushed poly, and cotton spandex jersey knit.

The Arlington Sweater isn’t just my favorite pattern to sew, but also my favorite pattern to mash and hack. The top left pattern is the Classic Tee with Arlington Sleeves. If you missed it, I wrote a Love Notions blog post that tells you how to swap sleeves from one pattern to another. On the top right is the Arlington but with the Classic Tee hem. If I don’t use the band, I almost always do that now. The bottom left is the Margot Peplum with the Arlington neckline. The bottom right was Elise’s choice. She wanted a taller cowl than comes with the pattern, so I just used the cowl off the Laundry Day Tee pattern, which is free when you join the Love Notions Facebook group.

The Vivace Dolman is another pattern where you get a lot of bang for your buck, because you get a woven and knit pattern. I really love this pattern. You also will notice that I’m sharing it with sleeves, when that isn’t included in the pattern. If you go to my Love Notions blog post on how to swap sleeves, it is explained in detail how to bring over the sleeves from the La Bella Donna on the knit version of the Vivace Dolman. This pattern works best with drapey fabric. Here I have double brushed poly, rib knit, and rayon spandex which all came from Raspberry Creek Fabrics.

On the left are two of my woven Vivace Dolmans in a dress and shirt. You may notice it’s the same ditsy floral. I adore that print and Raspberry Creek Fabrics has offered it several times. On the right is another mash with the La Bella Donna top, this time I also brought over the hemline. I made the Ravinia Skirt to match. That didn’t make my favorite list, because I only have made it a couple times. I discovered it early fall and I see several more in my future for this summer. It’s so fun to wear for work and play.

The Classic Tee is a great pattern. I like it best in cotton spandex jersey knit (also known as cotton Lycra). I have tried it in double brushed poly and rayon spandex, but this is my favorite. The top right is french terry. I tried that last fall and I really like that fabric, too.

There is also a kids’ version of the Classic Tee, which I made a lot for Elise when she was younger. It works well with the panels. You can also easily use the Sloane Sweater hack on the Love Notions blog for thumbholes cuffs for the Classic Tee. Elise asks for that a lot these days, but in the ladies size she wears currently. The top middle was a camp shirt they provided that was huge. This ended up being so great to use to remake that shirt.

If you made it this far, I am flattered and thrilled. I will leave you with Elise and I twinning in our Classic Tees. The top left, I just added bands, which worked well. We wore these for our State Fair which is our favorite summer event, but is reliably hot.

If you have any questions during the sale, please feel free to Instant Message me on Facebook or Instagram. If you IM me on Facebook, please friend me first. It’s hard for me to get to the Facebook IMs otherwise, because Facebook spam filtering functionality put the messages in some odd location. But I would really love to hear from you and get to know you. That’s the best thing about sewing and sharing makes.