My green Hello Kitty machine is making strange, rattling noises, and probably has to be taken to the shop soon. This evening’s sewing crisis involves two bent needles, the last of my 80/12 ones. I’m a recent convert to gathered skirts, and I finished gathering and attaching the skirt using my Featherweight. More to come soon.
Esteemed Sewing Assistant, looking totally bewildered and sitting on some fabric.
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Alright. After an unexpected hiatus of almost of almost two months, I definitely think I’m back.
Over the weekend, I had a chance to meet Lauren, Oona, Cindy (Cindy, where is your blog?) and many more inspiring ladies who sew. We hit up the usual — Mood, Pacific Trimmings, Chic Fabrics — and a bar afterwards, but sadly I have no photographs to show for this.
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I worked on more of McCalls 5805, but with no additional photographs to show for it, since it looks the same on the dress form. I cleaned up and serged the side seams, bottom seam, and the shoulder seam. I also cut, underlined, and serged the gathered skirt together, but haven’t assembled anything yet.
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This is what the bottom skirt part will look like. There’s a huge border print of even larger roses. The cotton voile looked a little see-through so I had to underline it with black cotton broadcloth just to be safe.
More sewing to come, definitely soon.
One of my friends is getting married in the summer, and I need to make a dress. I’m trying to narrow down the styles/patterns for it. I have it narrowed down to three:
McCalls 7488. This is one of the most unusual dresses in my pattern collection. I plan to remove the gathers from the waist and convert them into darts.
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McCalls 6604. Another really interesting pattern, with double scallops.
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McCalls 5395. Basic sheath dress.
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My first pick so far is the double scallop dress. Any ideas?
After many, many weeks of no sewing, there is still — no sewing.
I recently got a new job doing something very different than my day job, and I’ve been really busy settling in. The work starts earlier, the hours are later, the work is a lot more difficult, but moving from web design/dev to straight iOS dev (making iPhone apps) has been a lot of fun.
I really want to finish sewing what I’ve been sewing so I can move onto the next which I need to sew — a special occasion dress for my friend’s wedding.
Lately I’ve been up to Mario Kart tournaments, staying out late, studying during my spare time, working on side projects and generally being busy.
Mario Kart tournament at work.
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Astoria.
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Botanica.
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Brewing beer with no stove at work.
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The Norwood House.
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Toby.
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Waiting.
Snow in Mott Street, which is strangely deserted.
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Changes in your day to day life are always going to be stressful, no matter how welcoming you are of change. Sewing has been the last thing on my mind these days, but here’s what I’ve been up to in my spare time.
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Trying to get through Scarface for the second time.
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Other people’s guitar (and keyboard) porn.
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Creepy dolls.
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Reviving old projects.
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I can only sew once a week these days, so I’ve been working on this slowly but surely. I lined the bodice with cotton broadcloth. I still need to serge the edges and cut the skirt.
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I finally had a chance to cut out the fabric I’m using for my one-shoulder dress. It’s cotton voile with a rose print border at the bottom (not shown).
Ninja socks + homemade tote bag.
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So I haven’t done much sewing (or much of anything) this week since I’ve been trying to get over this cold/cough/flu for the past week or so. Last weekend I sat on my couch for 12 hours in my pajamas, huddled in a blanket with The Esteemed Sewing Assistant, drinking hot tea and watching a Sopranos marathon. I’ve managed to drag myself coughing and sputtering to most of my normal activities this week, but hopefully next week will bring more sewing.
Which reminds me, for any of you who participates in Sew Weekly — do you know how to access the themes for January/February? I want to plan my next few Sew Weeklys, but the area where the themes are usually updated haven’t been updated since December.
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I was looking through my stash and I found this interesting dress pattern. I plan to make View A, with the pouffy skirt, and to add pockets.
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I’m back to taking pictures inside my living room, but hopefully not for long, since I could barely get decent pictures of this project.
This year’s first finished sewing project is a tote bag. I actually finished this last year, a few days ago, but only had a chance to post about it now.
I’ve wanted a really cute tote bag to bring when I do errands for a few months now. I almost bought one on etsy, when I realized I could make one myself for a fraction of the price. I used leftover black denim for the bottom piece and some quilting cotton skull and roses fabric for the main piece. I lined it with the quilting cotton. It’s lightweight and folds up nicely. I’ve used this already to bring my gym things and so far, so good.