Sewing

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!

Crafty · Sewing

Haunted By Past Projects

I hope you are all doing well. We finally have some nice weather and I took my lovely gift card to spend it all! I was very restrained.

The featured post is a knit that will be a simple dress. I also got some peacock fabric to make a bellydance costume, a piece of shirting to fix a too small project, and a cotton fabric that mimics wool for a jumper. I told one of my coworkers that I would show off the dress they had bought me after I made it. 🙂 The jumper fabric is one I’ve wanted for a while. I also snuck in some crazy flamingo fabric to make an apron. It was too much for a 50’s style poufy dress, I thought.

I also cleared off my sewing table downstairs and sorted some more boxes and unearthed projects from the past. I was disappointed with most of them. They all are too small! Yesterday was a super frustrating sewing adventure trying to fix them.

Take this dress for example:

Super cute, made from a vintage sheet. This was one of my first efforts and I misread the pattern and didn’t add a zipper. I took it to my MIL and said “Is there supposed to be a zipper?”  She very kindly didn’t laugh at me, just told me yes. I then promptly put it in a bin and forgot about it. The skirt part fits, but after I cut the back for the zipper, it doesn’t work. The Husband says I should keep intact for motivation, but it might get chopped for a skirt.

This was supposed to be pants, but I was silly, and didn’t wash the fabric, so it will shrink like crazy. Also, why in the world did I choose brown linen?!

I wouldn’t have worn these, even if they were the right size. Geez… Anyone want some linen remnants? I might make some tote bags for Etsy with them or something.

This dress is still in the muslin stage. I despise making muslins. Ick. You have to make two dresses, one of them unwearable, if you don’t use good fabric. I understand why you would want to make a muslin, I just haven’t.

I may try to dye this after I’m done. It has some complicated techniques that I wanted to try before using my fancy (not brown) linen. Maybe I can actually use this muslin!

I cut out a new pattern this weekend, despite Fancy not wanting me to do anything but pet her. 🙂

I pulled a couple of fabric possibilities for it. This red batik has a very light floral pattern.

This fabric was originally grey; however I washed it with a large piece of purple batik and now it’s light purple… It still looks pretty.

I want to make the red in the first version and the purple one in the second, without a high low hem.

Now, I did end up with one successful project at least.

I had tried serging the edges of the white fabric and it was not a pretty sight. Now it has pretty edges and strawberries on the back!

I realized I make pretty aprons for my Mom, but forget to make them for me! How silly!

Well, that’s my UFO update for now. I’m hoping to have some more to report next week. The Husband has started asking me “What do you need to finish?” when I say I don’t know what to sew.

Wish me good seams! And less frustration!

Crafty · Life Posts

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas!

I slowed for a minute on cookie baking, but would prefer to think of it a strategic retreat to regroup. 🙂 I have to decide on what to bring to the Husband’s Grandma’s house for Christmas. Peppermint bark may make an appearance.

I have been sewing, but it’s been Super Secret Christmas sewing, so can’t be shown until after next week.

In the meantime, here is some of our Christmas decor to make it a little more festive!

Christmas trains! This wouldn’t fit with our village on the mantle. Next year, we’re going to set up a table for it.

Another train! Also, the ornament from the in-laws for Fancy’s first Christmas. They couldn’t find a queen one, so it says “King of the House.” It totally fits. How could we be expected to refuse this face?

Here are our Firefly ornaments. I thought it was appropriate for them to fly. The black one has a “firefly” license plate on it.

We like to think of our decorating style as electic. 🙂

Icicle lights in the kitchen window. We found these at a summer rummage sale and I forgot about them until I was sorting presents. They look so pretty when the lights hit them.

We didn’t get a bigger artificial tree this year because Fancy has started guarding everything in sight. This is up on the table where she can’t get to it and it seems to be good.

I did some organizing yesterday. My sewing area is crazy again. It’s not completely put away yet, but this bin and some other piles are at least sorted and ready to be put away.

Here are the piles of neatly folded and sorted.

The fat quarter piles look so pretty!

I also got a present for myself in the mail today! It’s “Rainbow Quilts For Scrap Lovers” by Judy Gautier. I know, I know… But I’ll use at least four of these quilts!

This one is partially appliqué, but the background is pieced, so I might be able to get it done.

Reverse appliqué on this one. But it looks easy enough.

So pretty! And it could use up a lot of weird scraps.

I saved the best for last….

I love owls! I will definitely be making this one. Sometime… after I get the other thousand projects done…

For now though, I have a dog sleeping on my foot and should probably go to bed too. Have a peaceful night!