Monthly Review- Wordless Wednesday Style
Category: Sewing
Sew Many Things!
I have been sewing a lot lately and can finally share a couple of my super secret sewing projects! I have been finding it very soothing, especially since taking a knit break and finishing a scrap quilt to go to a friend.
This one started life as a baby quilt for my step-cousin’s second baby, but my Mom sent me cuter fabric, so I had to switch it over. My friend works in a hospital setting and I sent her two quilts to use for sensory issues/cool down times previously. The next couple will be going to their collection for kids with emergency situations.
I needed to expand the quilt past baby quilt size, so now it’s a rough square. I found the coolest pastel tie dye backing for it too, so I think it should be really cute. I finished it the week I was on steroids for a cold/asthma issue and I think it was one of the things saving me from full on ‘roid rage. Ugh. They mess with me so much, but it definitely almost completely got rid of the asthma flare. As a consequence though, I didn’t really sleep much and this was mindless enough to be able to sew it on little to no sleep. It was really fun to do too, of course. I just need to bat, quilt, and bind it and then send it off. I will probably add a tie to the middle of the white squares. I don’t have colorful enough buttons, I don’t think. It’s so cheerful and bright that I hope it will bring some joy to someone who needs it.
So for the super secret part of sewing, I made two little matching outfits for my friends’ boys and a cardigan and leggings set for my friend. I didn’t have matching fabric for a shirt, so I owe her one at some point. Somehow the leggings never got photographed, but they were a pretty teal color with a watercolor decorative part as a cuff. The watercolor part had purple, white, and teal colors in it. Her cardigan is a Cocoon Cardigan from Patterns for Pirates and has pockets! I used a fancy double brushed poly in a dark grey so it looks a bit more lux than a regular grey, I think. These are my favorite cardis to wear, so I knew it would be lovely for a new Mum. I have heard from reliable sources that it is extremely cozy, so I’m happy with it. 🙂
The boys got an outfit each and they happened to be free patterns! I used Ellie and Mac’s Grow With Me PJs for the older boy’s outfit, and Patterns for Pirates Wee Lap Tee and Petite Pegs for the baby’s outfit.
I was super nervous about making them and about fit, but my friend told me they fit very well with a little room to grow. The Husband reminded me that the boys are still tiny, so clothes would need to match. 🙂
Here’s a picture of the outfits themselves:
And a picture of the two cutest boys wearing them! (Posted with my friend’s permission.)
A note, I didn’t show this picture to my friend before she sent me her pictures of the boys, so it’s kind of funny that they ended up in the same places! Also, how cute are they?! I have some more things planned, some with a Lego theme, that I can now work on, since the sizes are right. I’m glad she liked them all, I was super nervous! They were such tiny clothes!
I had to laugh while cutting the Cardigan out. My pattern weights are “somewhere safe” in the messy basement, so I just grabbed the things closest to me, which happened to be the Firefly decor pieces. 🙂 Whatever works, I guess. I have occasionally used the dog as a pattern weight when she wouldn’t get off my fabric.
I made yet another Cocoon for me too. I just can’t stop, but should maybe branch out pattern wise. I don’t have a picture of the full cardi, but it is the grey from my friend’s cardi as bands and this fabric as the main piece.
It’s so pretty and drapey! Originally it was going to be a dress, but it is way too thin and I thought I would get more use out of a cardi than having to line the whole dress. It is a cotton jersey spandex, I think, so lighter and looser than the grey cardis.
Another new material has been fun to work with lately has been vegan leather. I bought it to try out for this next vendor/bellydance show and it’s been interesting. It’s super slippery and slightly stretchy, but only in one direction. The fancy craft glue I bought for it doesn’t actually work with the felt backing that I wanted to use, so I may end up using hot glue for the rest of the flowers.
I have one tiny one done too, but it’s drying. I have black vegan leather as well, so am planning fancy hair flowers, pouches, and a couple of slouchy bags. We’ll see if they sell. I might end up with a fancy new purse! I do plan to make some of the hair flowers, both of this material and cotton fancier with beaded tassels. Bling in a hair garden is always pretty!
Here are a couple more pictures of some of the things made with it. It doesn’t like topstitching, so I won’t be doing that probably for the other pouches. Both my tester ones ended up looking weird.
This bag is going to my Marvel loving friend. It ended up not quite the shape I was going for, but is still cute. I did topstitch this one because it works better when the machine isn’t directly touching the leather. I plan to make a couple more bags with some accents for fun.
I have a couple more things in progress, but will share them next time. Next weekend is the vending event, so I have given myself until Wednesday to finish the sewing stuff. I have sorted and organized my bins a little, so that should be plenty of time.
I was the lucky recipient of these fun sewing books too, from a family friend. My Mom brought them down when she came to visit and I have projects planned from both of them already.
You can never have too many bags! My bicycling friend may be getting panniers from the first book. You know, because I have no additional projects waiting in line… 😉
I definitely have lots of sewing to do in the next couple of days, so wish me luck keeping everything together. 🙂 We’re planning to attack the yard some more after my aerial yoga class tomorrow, hopefully after that, I’ll still be able to use my arms! Wish us luck and maybe check in, if you don’t hear from me… The yard is still kind of jungly, so who knows what’s lurking near the garage!
Not So Simple Sunday Sewing
I thought I’d change it up a little and share a sewing post, so you wouldn’t get too tired of book posts. Gotta keep your interest up for the third book sale next week!
Also, I had a lot of sewing pictures building up. I finally did some sewing that was not super secret and I liked pretty much all of it. Today, I finished my grey cardigan and almost made us late for the book sale, because I had to just finish the end of the edge.
I did finish it though and wore it to the book sale. It was perfect for today’s weather, which was in the 60’s, as it is made of a silver/grey cotton lycra. Cotton lycra is much more breathable than the polyesters and it has a bit of stretch from the lycra. It’s a very smooth fabric, although you can tell by the arms that it does wrinkle a little. This was after wearing it all day. It’s super comfy and fills a gap in my wardrobe, so I’m excited to have finished it.
I have also finished off some tea wallets, a batch of Star Trek ones and some miscellaneous ones from my hand projects box.
Oh, and a random Halloween one. Earl Grey, hot, anyone?
Here are the other ones, which happen to be nice and springy.
Aren’t they cute?
Doll clothes have also made another appearance. I had a really bad evening unexpectedly at work last week and came home jangly and upset. Working on these doll clothes helped me settle, although I still didn’t get much sleep.
This one is a Made for Mermaids Dolly Paige shirt.
It was made specifically go with these space pants!
This pattern is Patterns for Pirates Bonny Leggings with the attached skirt. My machine hated this fabric and kept coming unthreaded, which cased ridiculous thread nests on the inside and there’s a part of the skirt in the back that wasn’t caught in the stitches. They still went into my office though because I wasn’t in the mindset to unpick or try to make my machine behave.
The Bonny leggings is pretty much the same as the adult Peg Legs pattern, except the doll size takes me 10 minutes instead of 20. Here are the other Bonny Leggings I made:
Your eyes do not deceive you, those are white lace leggings, although I think of them mostly as tights. That fabric was in a bag of scraps that a friend gave me from her theater department. It was actually a lace bodice that had been traced, but not cut. You can see a little bit of the blue marker yet on the bottoms. I think the little girls who play with these will be thrilled!
This Audrey dress/shirt pattern from CKC patterns is a good one because it combines woven and knits. Knits for the bodice, wovens for the bottom. It gives me a chance to play with scraps. I made two, and fudged the gathers both times.
I’m super annoyed that my necklines on these look better than some of my shirts I wear! But it’s all practice. These both close with velcro in the back.
And last, but not least, as the little girls keep asking for jackets for the dolls; I finished this starry jacket which was at home thinking about what it had done (otherwise known as it got messed up and I hated it.)
This is the Ellie and Mac Emmelyn Cardigan. I do not like how it turns out most of the time, so I may try a different pattern. It ends up wavy and crooked no matter how I do my seams. But it has pretty stars, so I’m good with the finished product at least.
I have a couple more doll clothes cut out ready to be sewn. I have a white lace and gold lame Audrey dress that I think will make the girls fall over, and a woven jacket pattern to try. I’ll probably be making pjs and a few more “prom dresses,” as they have been requested. I brought my second doll that I got from a friend into the office, just for fun.
In other news, I did buy fabric. I had plans for it and also a gift certificate for my birthday from my inlaws. It was 5th Saturday bag day at the local quilt shop and so I got my present early, also 20% off everything in my bag, including patterns.
The Husband saw this pattern and said “Well, we need this” so it ended up in my bag. It is super cute, but our house might be a little bit more eclectic in decor than originally anticipated. Although, it currently has fairy tale items and Legos as the main components, so I’m not sure how much more whimsical it could get. 🙂
Here’s the pattern.
It is lovely and I’m slightly intimidated by it. I’m sure I’ll enjoy figuring it out though. (Side note: The otters are holding paws!!)
These fabrics slipped into my bag and have been washed and are in the stash. The polka dots may be used for the flying geese quilt that I am having trouble finding a good border for.
The white fabric will probably be a bag lining or pockets. The feature picture today is of a grey fabric that will be pants and the birds needed to be a shirt. The shirt will be knit on the front and have a woven lower back. I’m excited to wear them together actually.
I have been working on some more scrap pieces too from this quilt. It will be going to my friend Cassie, who works at a hospital to be a comfort quilt, but it needed to be larger to be closer to twin sized. I had to make 5 more blocks to make it work. They are done, but not sewn together yet. I needed a break from knits for a little while. 
It’s been a fairly productive sewing time for the last couple of weeks. I have had a couple of migraines, but can normally sew, as it doesn’t require reading or screens. I’m starting my list of things I need to sew for spring and trying to weed out my closet too. It’s a large task, but I’m still working at it.
Right now though, I need to work on dinner. We had a late lunch after the book sale, but now we’re both getting hungry. I’m using a new recipe from the 9 x 13 pan cookbook and it smells really good. I may be focusing on that book for the next week or so. I’ll update you on how it goes!
Have a great night!
Book Sale Haul
I thought you all might enjoy seeing the cool books I found at the book sale this past weekend. We went on one of the days when we got another 10 books for every 10 books we bought. 🙂 Side note, I need more bookshelves.
I also picked up a couple of new cookbooks lately, but couldn’t remember if I had shared them yet. I’ll start with those. I blame Eric for two of them. We were at this weird bargain store called Ollie’s which has everything you can think of piled haphazardly on shelves. Right as you walk in, there’s a huge section of discount books. You know I can’t walk by piles of books. There are a lot of cookbooks there. I found this one which I’m hoping will help with dinner prep. (I did not pay $12.88!)
The Husband found these two and decided we needed to add them to the collection. I didn’t need too much arm twisting, as you can imagine.
This one needed to be ours for an obvious reason. The dork factor is strong with this one. 🙂 I was excited to see that there were both indoor and outdoor recipes. Not that I think we’ll have time to camp this year, but it’s good to know for the future.
He also requested we get this one. We have a lot of Asian cookbooks now. He may be trying to hint to something…
At least we’ll be set for the Lunar New Year!
We also found this cookbook at the used book part of the library a few weeks ago. I may be able to replicate some of these decorations.
I tried a walrus cupcake from one of the other cookbooks from this series and it was a total failure. A hilarious failure, but failure none the less. These might be a little less complicated.
I haven’t used these cookbooks yet, but will try to use them soon. I’m also going through my cookbooks to try to figure out which ones we are done with and can pass along. I have a couple specific themed ones I will be on the lookout for and the other book sales. I need a gluten free/dairy free cookbook for my friends who need both.
Speaking of book sales, here is the Husband’s pile.
He found some good music potentially for his next play, a couple of Dilbert comic books, and some Asimov books.
It’s possible I’m addicted to collecting books. Reading them too, of course, but mostly just having them surrounding me. I get nervous if go to someone’s house and I don’t see books around.
This is the semi-trashy romance and fantasy pile.
Note the Redwall mixed in there. I did find a couple of new authors to try and some new books from my regular authors. The black one on the bottom right has all three of the “Queen’s Own” trilogy by Mercedes Lackey. I found two of the trilogy at one of last year’s book sales and I never ended up getting or reading the third one. So now I will be able to find out how it ends and can give away the other two.
These are the fiction books that aren’t trashy romance or fantasty. 
The bottom one is “A Child Analysis with Anna Freud,” which I thought was pretty cool! It will probably come to work with me, but I should probably read it first. This sale had a lot of older child therapy books, but they were mostly texts and I didn’t know if they would still be relevant or not.
Kate Jacobs writes easy reads about women and relationships and this one is all about food. I’ve read her knitting series and it was lovely, so I thought I’d pick it up.
“The Lace Reader” is a book that I read a couple of years ago and it has haunted me ever since. I picked it up on a whim at the library and promptly forgot the author. I had to read it twice though, because it was such a good and twisty book. I’m excited to re-read it and see if it is as good as I remembered. The Herriot stories are always lovely and Carl Hiaasen is hilarious. Wacky, but hilarious. The “D is for Dahl” book is a Rolad Dahl alphabet. It looked really cute.
Of course, there were some crafty books too. The top one has a ton of resources from websites, to books, to places, techniques, and all sorts of other info. The Singer books are always good resources. I found “Sewing Specialty Fabrics” and “Sewing Activewear” this time. There’s also a Rit Dye book called “To Dye For” and a Log Cabin idea books. The bottom book is definitely the coolest book I found.
It’s actually a binder to organize a subscription magazine called “Stitch by Stitch” that has crocheting, knitting, sewing, and needlework lessons. It’s from the 70’s, I think. It has original, never used sewing patterns, plus instructions for all sorts of knitted and crocheted things! I’m super excited to play around with it.
Have a peek inside!
There’s a pattern for the pictured wrap skirt. I plan to try it with my drapey woven black fabric from the discount store.
There’s always a mini project on the back cover.
Sadly the pants pictured here are from a separate pattern pack that I don’t have.
Here’s one of the knitting lessons.
And crochet.
Heirloom sewing!
Needlepoint!
It’s the coolest set! I’m sure you’ll see more as I use it.
So far, I’m quite pleased with my new books! Fancy is cuddled next to me while I make plans for what to make next.
I can’t see how this is comfortable, but she has to be touching me. Have a nice night!
Monthly Review
I’ve got something up my sleeve for Monday or Tuesday (heh, heh, sewing pun) but wanted to get back on track with my reviews. It helps me keep accountable and on track with my goals. February has been kind of a slower month. I have had a bit of trouble with some motivation and some of the ever present scheduling concerns. Also, sudden dental issues, which always complicate things. Fancy hasn’t been helping either. She’s been very snuggly.
Overall, I have been pretty good at trying to really think through my sewing projects. I have put a 6 month fabric buying ban on myself until June. Gifts obviously don’t count. 😉 The other caveat is that if I need a specific fabric to finish a specific project, I can buy the fabric for that project. Otherwise some things would just pile up more until June.
My organization adventures for the month have made me aware of just how much fabric I have. Most of it has a plan for it, but there is no reason I need that much! It was quite a sobering thing. I’ve been re-evaluating my wardrobe too and have decided to repurpose or remake some of the things that really don’t fit quite how I want them to. I have already taken apart a couple of skirts that don’t fit well and added the fabric back to my stash. I have also started a list of all the things in my project box, with notes about what is needed to finish them.
So far for sewing this month, I have mended a long sleeved sweater and added buttons to a bag and a 3/4 sleeved sweater. All of these have been in my UFO or mending box for quite some time. I also learned that my sewing machine will gather fabric for my if my bobbin and top thread are at different tensions. This made sewing some gathered doll clothes a bit easier.
There have been a lot of doll clothes made in the last two months, but as I have recently acquired two more dolls from a friend’s daughter, I will need to make some more.
Can’t have naked dolls sitting around my office! Speaking of my office, I switched offices with a colleague into a bit of a bigger office and it was amazing how much stuff I had ended up squeezing in my littler one. It took me about 4-5 hours to reorganize and I need a couple of small things, like a game storage unit and a little table for next to my chair. It will be fun to see the kid client reactions to it. The adults will take it in stride, I’m sure. So the next time I take a picture of doll wardrobe at work, it will be on a different chair. 🙂
I have made some more leggings for myself this month, because you can never have enough comfy pants! One of them, the polar bears didn’t quite work, due to the stretch, but I can fix the waistband and it should be fine.
I don’t remember if I mentioned this amazing cutting mat that the Husband got me for Christmas, but it’s making cutting things out so much easier when I’m upstairs. I love it!
I have also made a pair of black pants, but apparently this month, have a tendency to want to write about the pants I currently have on! These ones are soft, black, French Terry, and will pass for work pants, even though I feel like I’m wearing pjs. Instead, how about a picture of my bright pink joggers? I was wearing them the last time I wanted to write about them. They are quite obnoxious, but I love them. The Husband won’t give me his opinion, as he is a smart man.
They are made from my beloved Linen Lounger pattern for Patterns for Pirates and are cotton blend french terry from Girl Charlee. I’m not really enthused about trying new pants patterns, when I like the fit of this one so well. Since my blue jean leggings need to be mended though, I have plans to make a skinnier, actual pant pattern to replace them if needed. I also do need a couple of different pairs of nicer work type pants.
One other thing I needed was a couple of nicer sweaters to wear with my pants and pretty skirts. I went through my sweaters and gave a bunch away, but now needed replacements. I like to dress up a little for intakes and not wear the dino leggings until a couple sessions in. 🙂 Enter this pattern; the Fall In Love Sweater by Ellie and Mac.
I quite enjoy it and it makes me feel super pretty and polished. For future versions, I may size up about a half, as it occasionally feels a little tight. It doesn’t accentuate all my bumps and lumps too much though, so I may not if the fabric is stretchy.
I made this second version as a short sleeved version. It needs bands, as the fabric likes to misbehave and the bottom hem is a little short, but it looks lovely on me. At least I think it does. This pattern fits me better than my normal go to short sleeve pattern, so I will definitely be making more. It has set in sleeves, not raglan or baseball style, so it looks a little more professional.
I’ve also made a very long and cozy fleece sweater to work in the basement in, but it’s come in very handy for our recent cold snap. I think my sewing was more intentional this month. I tried to focus on the gaps in my wardrobe. My drawer is still very full, so I need to do another clear out soon. I have a horror of giving away the “perfect” shirt, but there are a bunch that I just don’t wear!
My Sewing goals for this month include a neutral grey Cocoon Cardigan to fill that gap and to try the fancier pants pattern. I also want to continue to organize and purge my stash, as well as work on some quilts and UFO’s. I have a pattern for a “Fairy Sweater” which is a cascade type sweater that I have a lighter watercolor print to try to use up, but that may wait until closer to summer.
Now to switch gears to food. We had a lot of new food this month, due to the party. I think that I missed a bunch of pictures of meals that were not party food. We did have a lot of Chinese food this month, so you may not see it for a little while. Not that we don’t like it, but there’s only so much stir fry type things I can eat. Here were some of our favorites:
Lion’s Head meatballs
West Lake Beef Soup
Chicken Marsala
Wonton Soup
Fried Dessert Wontons! They were from this website: https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2015/03/cinnamon-sugar-cream-cheese-wonton-nutella-dulce-de-leche.html
They were so good! I didn’t make a dipping sauce for them. We never have Nutella in the house and I have both spoons and no will power.
The Husband had the play auditions and production meetings this week, so we had leftovers from last week, including a new recipe from The Wooden Spoon cookbook. It was not our favorite. Basically hamburger, tomato sauce, and taco seasoning with shell noodles. The Husband added a lot of cheese, but I still think it was a little bland.
One thing we did like this week was Nancy Fuller’s Creamy Stovetop Mac and Cheese from this month’s Food Network. I was hungry after work on Thursday and ended up making it at 10 pm. It was good late night snacking food though. I used a little of the dragon pepper hot sauce in it. Mmmm!
Misses for the month were the fried pork ribs and the clementine cakes. The ribs were just super annoying to fry and frustrating as I couldn’t taste them to adjust any seasoning. The cakes were a little dense for me, even remembering they were supposed to be a pound cake recipe. I need to practice cupcakes more. I’m sure no one will object to trying them. 🙂
Food goals this month are to use my spiralizer attachment and the Instant Pot at least once. Also, be more creative with lunches and get the Husband more involved in planning. His choices were very good ones this month.
Mental health related, I also want to get back to reading before bed this month. I’m having a lot of trouble shutting my brain down to sleep and I know that will help. I went through a rough patch of not wanting to actually do anything and I am working on not getting to that point again.
Of course, taking Fancy to interesting places is another goal. We went to an informational meeting on therapy dog training today and the information is good, but she definitely needs more training first. I’m sure she won’t mind.
These goals should be pretty manageable, I think. Hopefully once the play starts getting going, we can get somewhat of a schedule going. Wish us luck!
The Sew Before The Storm
We’re supposed to get 50 mile an hour winds tomorrow through Monday and the last time we had sustained high winds, we lost power. Send us good thoughts! Neither Fancy or I are cut out to be cold, alone, and menaced by the dark! This is how Fancy feels about it. Right there with you, Fancy… Right there with you!
I did have some fun outside of sewing this month. I went to an aerial yoga class and am planning on going tomorrow again. I also taught a Girl Scout Troop how to bellydance. Here I am demonstrating Isis Wings. They were sad that I didn’t have kid sized wings for them. It was lots of fun!
Here’s a closeup of my hair, because I can’t resist a chance to show off a good hair garden. 🙂
I have been cleaning and organizing downstairs more, as we got bigger shelves that fit two of my big fabric totes together. It made me realize just how much fabric I have. Here’s what the shelves now look like:
My fabrics are now all sorted by type and color, including the fat quarters and half yard pieces. The clothing fabrics are sorted into solid and printed knits. The woven pieces are also sorted. I even separated my patterns into clothes patterns and non-clothing patterns- so costumes, quilts, doll clothes, etc. It’s very nice to have everything organized.
While sorting things out, I discovered I have run out of several things I need to actually finish the few totes of UFOs. I need more D rings for my next set of hip wraps. I’ve decided to vend at a bellydance event in May, if there’s room, so I should probably make a few new things. Here are a couple of the combos. One of the peacock skirts will certainly be mine.
I want to make this one end up like this. I love the silver looks under the herringbone pattern.
I did add a button to this mushroom tote, but it looks like it pulls funny. I may have to redo it if it doesn’t relax.
One other thing I need to get additional material and black thread to finish is this dress, which is actually going to be a banded shirt. I was excited to wear it as a dress, but when I actually made it, it looks terrible! Too clingy! So I’m going to chop it off at the waist and add a black band to match the arm and neck bands. This is the Sweet Tee pattern from Patterns for Pirates. I have made it before as a shirt.
I have finished a couple things from the UFO bin. I sewed new buttons on a 3/4 length grey cardigan and mended a teal sweater that I have had lying around for at least a year or two. It just had a little hole in the back of the sleeve. Now I can wear it again and I have cleared out one bag of things that just needed to be taken apart for fabric, or just a little bit of a fix.
I made this beautiful sweater out of hacci, which is thinner, so I can wear it probably through three seasons. It’s a Fall In Love Sweater from Ellie and Mac. I have a couple more planned for this pattern. It’s a very good, basic sweater pattern. It has set in sleeves instead of raglan, so it looks more like a dress sweater than more casual. I need to go up a little bit in size, but it is designed to be a slimmer fit, so it’s not the pattern’s fault. I like it a lot! It makes me feel very pretty.
I used the same pattern to make this short sleeve shirt, but need to redo the hem and arm band. They will be of a different material, as I only had a yard of it.
It’s a cotton spandex blend, which has lovely drape and is very soft. I quite enjoy it. Now I just need some actual pants, not leggings, to wear with all these pretty shirts!
These are leggings, not pants, but they are still comfy.
I have to redo the polar bear waistband. It was unexpectedly not stretched enough. The middle ones have flamingos and is capri length. The black ones have a herringbone pattern on them and look very cool.
Speaking of cool… This is a picture of my state recently while organizing downstairs. Note the crazy eyes and the excessive layering in order to stay warm.
Please send a heater! Or warm weather. 🙂 I’m going to head upstairs and get warm again. Have a good (warm!) night!
Sewing Fun
This will be a current and catch up sewing post. I realized that I never actually did a sewing review for the year. I’m sure I’ve missed things, but will try to update some of them as I find them. (Please excuse any sideways pictures. They look correct on my computer but weird in the library, so I have no idea if they are correct or not.)
I made this table runner for my Grandma in Law for Christmas. She collects Nutcrackers, so we thought it would be appropriate.
I also made a star suit by accident. 🙂 I made these jogger pants from this lovely french terry. The pattern is a modified version of the Linen Loungers. I just slimmed down the bottoms of the legs. Sadly, I’ve worn them so often that some of the stars have started to wear off.
I wear them multiple times a week for pjs. I didn’t think I would like jogger style pants, which are gathered around the ankles, but it turns out I love them. They are definitly lounge pants or pjs though. I wouldn’t wear them out in public, but they are lovely to put on after work. I made a bright pink pair too, but I don’t have a picture of them, as they are currently being worn.
There was enough of the fabric left over to try out a new pattern for a basic t shirt. This one is the Sweet Tee from Patterns for Pirates. It was a little tighter than I expected, but looks lovely with a cardigan.
It has stars too, so obviously my favorite.
I have made a couple more versions of the Sweet Tee. I made a brushed waffle knit sleep shirt, which I made longer and a little bigger. It is currently in the wash, so no pictures yet. It’s lovely and snuggly. The neckline went wonky on me, because it was too big, but it was just a sleep shirt, so I haven’t fixed it yet.
This version was made specially for Chinese New Year. I wore it today and it was very fun. I plan to wear it for our Chinese New Year party too.
Batch cutting has been helpful in making me actually do the projects I say I will do, although it depends on what color thread I have in my machine generally. I have three pairs of leggings waiting to be sewn because I have white on the machine and not black.
Fancy was my fabric inspector while I was trying to make these leggings, which were part of the batch. I couldn’t resist the dinosaurs and I have see a bunch of little kids who adore dinosaurs. Obviously, I needed the leggings. 🙂 The Husband just rolled his eyes at me.
Speaking of the office, I made another batch of doll clothes and it was requested that my doll have a friend and then would need a big enough wardrobe to share with said friend. 🙂
Pajamas and dance leotards have also been requested. Apparently my doll’s wardrobe is still lacking a few essentials. Oh, and a doll nail salon? Who knew?
This fleece is a Relaxed Raglan from Patterns for Pirates. It’s super warm for my crafting and sewing downstairs. Or for the polar vortex anytime!
I made it a size or so bigger in case the fleece wasn’t as stretchy, but I could have sized down, I think. It’s tunic length so my rear will stay warm. I realized after I had sewn one sleeve in that I had accidently cut it out upside down. I didn’t think it was directional, but when I put it on, all my sewing supplies were upside down! Whoops! Again, not going to be out of the house, so I’ll just laugh a little and wear it anyway.
This shirt was made right before it got super cold, so I have only worn it once, but it’s really comfy. It’s a shortened Agnes Tunic from Halla Patterns.
So that’s what I’ve been up to sewing wise. I cleaned out a bunch of clothes that didn’t fit and have two and a half boxes to take to the thrift store. It feels good to be able to pare things down, but makes me realize that I have a few holes in my wardrobe. I need a plain grey cardigan, a few more solid color t-shirts, comfy underthings, which won’t get posted, and some solid color and printed dresses. Knit dresses are lovely things. Especially with pockets!
This dog of mine has stolen my pillow in an effort to tell me it’s bedtime, so I need to take my spot back.
It’s supposed to be super icy tomorrow morning, so I may have some extra time to sew! Hopefully everyone stays safe on the roads though.
Have a great night!
And Now For Something Completely Different!
Not really, but I was running out of sewing puns. (Please send me all your good ons for future use.)
I had run into a snag with my sewing. Yesterday while sewing doll clothes to go to my office, a coil on my regular zig zag foot got stuck in my fabric and completely uncoiled! I can’t get it back on and the Husband has declared it dead. Luckily, there’s a friendly quilting store down the road that carries my brand and was more than happy to sell me a new one. I did find out that I have another foot that I can use pretty interchangeably and doesn’t have a lovely wire coil waiting to be snagged on thread, so that’s good news.
The doll clothes are the cutest things, by the way. Semi-addicting too, because it takes only about 10 minutes to sew them up and I can use up a bunch of my scraps.
So far, I have made four pairs of pants, two dresses, two shirts, and a jacket.
I decided not to feel silly about it, although it’s still a little silly, because it means I am using up scraps and when I am able to make them very well, I can list them on Etsy.
So that’s what I did the last few times I have been sewing. I have been doing a lot of organization and have put myself on a fabric ban for a bit. Unless it is something I do not have, or cannot snag from my MIL’s stash or a friend’s, and I absolutely need it to finish a project.
K and I went to the discount fabric store yesterday, which is why I currently have no place to put anything. I do have plans for almost everything I bought though. The lady who is the cutting person is quite charmed by K and I as we name all the fabrics and tease each other about buying more fabrics. She also told us when she was almost through my fabrics that our friendship was “beautiful” and we had “very lovely tastes.” 🙂
I found these solids for shirts. The peach will be a camisole to wear under lighter colored shirts, or to sleep in and the sage green will be a nice basic tshirt. I have lots of patterned bottoms with not enough tops to wear with them. The white is a nice cotton lycra blend for linings. It’s much lighter than my current cotton lycra. The mint is a floaty cotton gauze which will be an adorable little summer skirt. K bought a blue version of the same material and we’ll have to wear them in the summer somewhere.
I did try to branch out of my blue palette, but it didn’t completely work. I ended up with a lovely selection of blue fabrics. The floral on the end is a very lovely chiffon, which may be a kimono for the summer. The next fabric was super interesting and I wasn’t sure exactly what to use it for, but the colors sucked me in. I’m thinking possibly a lined spring coat. I think it’s peachskin. It’s slightly fuzzy, no stretch, and feels like the other labeled peachskin I bought from Joann’s a while ago.
The denim look floral one, you can definitely blame K for. She talked me into it. (Okay, it didn’t take that much convincing.) That one will be a cute sundress and the other floral will be a sweater with white sleeves. I haven’t picked which pattern yet. The blue and white floral is quite thick and is a double knit, so very cozy as well.
The blue circle lace is going to be an overlay on top of a cute little pleaty skirt. The green lace is going to be part of a mermaid dance costume. It will be probably for next October, if I do Ooky Spooky again. I’m going to dance a veil piece to Saint-Seans “The Aquarium.”
The white lace will be a little short sleeved cardi, or possibly a cropped cardi. I have some of the purple lace already, but got another yard and a half, just to be sure. The purple lining (not pictured) worked perfectly and will look much better than the grey I had previously picked out.
I had a very nice lady ask me if she could match the lining to the purple lace and then if there was enough of it that she could have just a yard of it. She makes doll clothes. I told her that I was going to make a dress out of the purple lace that I had at home already, but was nervous to cut it, and she kindly came back before she left to suggest I make a muslin before cutting into it. I thanked her and told her I hadn’t found quite the right pattern yet, but would definitely be making a muslin. She was very sweet.
This olive green was an attempt to get out of the blues and will be a maxi style dress for spring and summer. I have four yards of it, a nice rayon blend, I think. It was in the designer overstock boxes. Most of my fabrics from this haul came from those boxes. You don’t get to cut those fabrics, you have to take the whole thing. Not that either of us were complaining. I’m pretty sure there were lots of gleeful giggles.
Speaking of dresses, the three black pieces were also in the designer boxes and are destined to become little black dresses. The plain black might become a wrap skirt though. That would be an extremely useful wardrobe item. I plan to make a plain black, short sleeved, dress with some Liverpool. The rose fabric is almost like a lighter denim. It might be very interesting for a pair of pants, but those are still scary.
So that’s my latest haul. I’m going to go make a bunch of leggings now, since they are the quickest things to get done. Or possibly join Fancy in her blanket fort. It looks cozy! Have a lovely night!
Monthly Review- November
Here I am! With puppers in tow, of course. She’s stealing my blankets and giving me sad eyes when I stop petting to type. Silly dog.
I have been a busy girl this month, but some of it, I can’t show you yet, as it’s super secret Christmas business. You’ll see it next month though. I have been focusing on presents and sewing warm things for our Christmas trip to the snowy North. Which, by the way, is next week already! Crazy talk!
This sweater was one that I was originally going to make for a gift, however, it turned out to be meant for someone who doesn’t lift (so not my brother’s lovely girlfriend,) so I kept it. Oh darn… I had to keep this lovely cardigan… The Husband claims I planned it that way, but don’t listen to him!
It’s a Cocoon Cardigan from Patterns from Pirates. I love this pattern and it looks pretty flattering on everyone, I think.
I made another one this month.
To be fair, this grey one only needed the band, but I was undecided on that and it got put away until it got cold out and I suddenly needed ALL THE SWEATERS! Don’t worry, I have some additional ones now, but I think I’m destined to be cold all winter again. It does seem to happen. Dad will say my blood thinned when I moved downstate, but I distinctly remember being super cold when I lived in the snowy North as well.
Speaking of warm clothes, I made a sweat suit, which is currently in the wash, as I wear it as much as possible. It’s not terribly glamorous and I don’t have pictures, but it’s a lovely warm blue sweatshirt material. The pants have grey flannel pockets and the top is made from the grey ribbed material of one of my other new sleep shirts.
These are the flannel pants that lead to using scraps for the sweatpants.
I used the Linen Lounger pattern and accidentally flared them. 🙂 I think they are cute though and the flannel is so soft!
I have two more flannel pants planned. I think they will have slimmed down cuffs with cotton lycra to make them stay on my ankles. My blue and grey ones slide up my legs and then I have terribly cold ankles. Fancy doesn’t always sleep on them like she should. 🙂
One of my pretty consistent goals is to use new patterns and I have made three dresses from the CKC Amy pattern, which is a knit dress with a v neck and a gathered skirt. I use pleats because gathering and I are not friends.
I love them! It’s nice to have dresses that I can count on not to wrinkle and look adorable, if I do say so myself. This dress is made from Liverpool Fabric, which is textured on one side with a pebbly feel and is very smooth on the other. I think technically it’s a double knit, meaning two sides are knit together. It’s a very stable knit and makes excellent pencil skirts and lovely dresses. I bought the last three yards of this fabric because it needed to be a dress and I still have enough for at least one shirt too. 🙂
This Cotton Lycra version has pockets! It also makes me feel a bit gothy, especially when I wear black jewelry, a black cardi, leggings, and boots.
I wore it with my owl cardigan to work and every time I went into the lobby, someone new would compliment me on it. I must have not been wearing my hair up for people to see the owl, because I have worn it lots of times before and it hasn’t been that big of a thing. I was very careful with my pattern placement and think I lined things up pretty well. Both of these were heavier fabrics, but I have some planned with lighter weight fabrics too. I’m interested to see the differences between them.
This raglan was made out of some of the scraps from the red and a grey french terry material. The french terry isn’t as soft as some other of the same fabrics I have, but it’s still a cozy sweatshirt. Here’s a detail shot of the pattern and the cuffs.
Besides the grey cardigan, my UFO bin also got some love. I finished my tree skirt! My MIL finished her tree skirt too, but I don’t have a picture of it, as there were presents all over it! It is, of course, displayed with the flamingo side up. 🙂
My other UFO is a wall hanging that’s been sitting in the box for several years. I attempted to do some hand embroidery, but it looked terrible. I finally pulled the stitching and machine stitched around the middle.
It has watch gears on it, for a slightly steampunk vibe. The squares are the tiniest scraps from my box. I enjoy it a lot and might have to make some more tiny squares.
Another recent scrap buster project I discovered was these little gnomes or tomte that were presented in one of my sewing groups- So Sew English Craftalong on Facebook. These little guys (and the one beardless lady gnome) are made from only stash materials. They are made with scrap fabrics, stuffed with scrap fabrics, and I used stash yarn.
Aren’t they cute? I want to make some specifically Christmas ones for decor. Tomte are good luck, according to Scandinavian folklore, as long as you keep them supplied with porridge.
These ornaments are also made with stash things. I bought these glass balls last year, I think, or the year before on clearance and have started to love the mercury glass look. Since I now know how to make them, I kind of want to mercury glass everything!
Two of the Christmas presents I’ve made so far can be shared, as they were for the Husband’s sister and she has already seen them. She was happily wearing them today after making sure they fit. 🙂
The leggings are Peg Legs from Patterns for Pirates and the shirt is the Relaxed Raglan. Be warned, the shirt has some rude language on it, so don’t look too close if you might be offended.
The white fabric was originally intended to be leggings as well, but it wasn’t going to look good. She loved it as a shirt, so I’m happy with it too. I might actually make clothes for other people soon!
My goals for the month include making my own snow pants, assuming tje fabric comes in on time, a few more warm shirts, including some layering ones, and finishing my warm pants as well.
Obviously, in the next week, finishing my Christmas presents is a priority and making Fancy a nice sweater.
This post got super long, so I’ll post the food review in a few days. For now, I’ll leave you with this silly meme about buying fabric.
Have a wonderful night!
A Fishy Tale
I was super excited to find out that I accidentally uploaded all my pictures from the last 30 days to the Cloud. While I didn’t have all of them back, I ended up with the quilt show pictures at least and a ridiculous number of adorable Fancy pictures. 🙂
If you’re not sick of them, you might see some more quilt pictures after all! There are some pretty cute baking themed ones that would go perfectly with some recipes from my 25 recipe list.
One of the coolest things we saw at the quilt show was a demo on fish leather. I had absolutely no idea this was even a material that you could get!
The presenter, Pam Manthei and her husband Joe, import the leather from a tannery in Iceland. Their company is called Fiskur Leather and all the skins are made from fish that were caught for food in the wild and are not farmed fish or caught for their skins. They are dyed with environmentally friendly dyes and the water is heated by geothermal energy. How cool is that?! Apparently the fish skin is fairly neutral in color and takes dye really well.
The leathers are made from cod, wolf fish, salmon, and perch. There were so many different textures and colors! The perch had this lovely large textured scale pattern and the wolf fish had these cool spots on it. The salmon has a very small scale pattern. K bought some black salmon leather to make a wallet for her Dad, who is an avid salmon fisherman. I believe he black piece in this photo might be a salmon leather.
The vendor, Pam, was very nice and extremely knowledgeable about her craft. She was so excited to hear that K and I were sewists! That was actually a pretty common dynamic we heard a lot there. Apparently we’re part of a new trend for younger people to get back into sewing. It’s fun to be trendy sometimes (although I was sewing before it was cool.)
Pam makes lovely things, most of which you wouldn’t even know were made from fish skin! Some of her purses really embrace the natural fish shape and other things completely catch you unawares.
These pictures all have elements of fish leather in them. See if you can tell where they are. I’ll tell you in the captions/
If you’re interested in knowing more about the fish leather, especially since K and I only heard part of the demo, please visit the Fiskur Leather website. http://www.fiskurleather.com/about-us.html
The whole expo, but especially this interesting material, reminded me how much I don’t know. I’m excited to learn and discover more!
