And the Winner Is,,,

A random drawing, followed by a drum roll...

Summerset!

Congratulations, Summerset! :)

Thank you to all who signed up. I really wish I could have given out gift certificates to everyone! After I win the lottery, for sure... ;)

Weekend Project: Recover from New York City!

New York, New York, is everything they say

And no place that I'd rather be.

Where else can you do a half a million things

All at a quarter to three?

"The Heart of Rock and Roll"

Huey Lewis and the News

I was a fabric store virgin. Before last week, I used to think that Joann's was a fabric store. Last week, thanks to a work-related conference in New York City (my first time there), my eyes were opened and I saw the light!

In between each conference session, relying heavily on Lindsay T's Google map of the Fashion District and Karla Kinzer's Garment District Directory, I'd hit the streets - Seventh Avenue, to be specific:

Of course I saw the well-known street art-work:

But what really blew my mind was the fabric stores! Both the sheer volume of fabric and the whole shopping experience was unlike anything I could have ever imagined. In some of the stores, like Paron Fabrics and Metro Textile, there was a lot of personal attention for each shopper, fabrics were brought out and offered up for consideration, and prices and discounts seemed to be generated on the fly... Not only could you only haggle over the price, but the sales person (or, in the case of Metro Textile, the owner) felt comfortable haggling over just how much you would buy. ;)

The vast expanse of fabric - like that of the Grand Canyon - can't be captured in a single photograph, but here are some paltry attempts via shots from inside Mood:

There were aisles and aisles and aisles like this... The last shot includes two friends (and co-workers), Natalie (on the left) and Christine of And Sew it Begins (on the right).

I did pick up some pattern magazines - two different issues of Patrones for Ana and Juana and two copies of Burda World of Fashion for Christine and Susan. (That actually adds up to 4 magazines for me, because everyone will share with me.) Unfortunately, the store only had one copy of BWOF left in English, so Susan got a copy in Russian (we think!)... Oh well, it will be an adventure! ;)

Finally, on the fabric front, I mostly window shopped. I did get a couple of yards of this sheer for Ana:

And of this sheer for Juana:

It was an incredible trip! Next time I need to go back WITHOUT that whole working bit... ;)

Stay tuned, I'll be announcing the winner of my 100th post give-away on Tuesday!

Friday Confession

Keeping Organized...

You got a taste of my organizational system in my Friday Confession two weeks ago, when I talked about my pattern stash. As you may remember, I keep my patterns in 4 storage boxes, labeled (respectively) "some patterns", "some more patterns", "some other patterns" and "the rest of the patterns". ;)

In other words, my sewing life is not well organized. My main accomplishment is that I keep all my sewing stuff in my sewing room. (Warning: some people may find the next sentence distressing.) In addition, I consider "piling everything in the closet and closing the closet door" to be an acceptable cleaning strategy... ;)

I'd like to be able to say that I still know everything I have and where it all is, but I'm afraid of the recoil when the truth snaps from being stretched so far... I suppose I could claim that I enjoy the adventure of browsing through my closet - I never know what will turn up! ;)

So, we've already talked about accounting systems for our sewing, but what about organizational systems? Do you have any special system for organizing and storing your fabrics? Your patterns? Your threads and/or other notions?

Did you have a system from the beginning, or did you adopt one sometime later, as your projects and supplies began to grow? Any advice for people who have reached the stage where they really need to get more organized in the sewing room?

PS - This is your last reminder to sign up for my 100th blog post give-away! I'll be doing the drawing this weekend...

Talk Back Thursday

Thank you so much to Lisa Laree, Lindsay T, Christine, Dawn, Summerset, Vicki, Lori, Caity and Becky for "talking back" to my Friday Confession last week! I confessed that I am a serial sewer, only working on one project at a time.

Let me start by saying thank goodness most of you replied cereal serial, because I have no idea what picture I would have posted if you had all answered parallel! ;)

Of course, while many people leaned towards serial, some, like Summerset and Caity, like to have more than one project going at a time. And there were also some interesting variations in the middle. Lisa Laree and Becky, for example, cut multiple projects at once, and then sew them serially.

Thanks again to everyone who responded! I love learning about your sewing lives! :)

Finally, a special "Welcome back!" to Caity! It's so nice to have you back commenting again and that makes me especially happy because it must mean that you are feeling better! Yay! :)

PS - Don't forget to sign up for my 100th blog post give-away!

In the Queue Wednesday

Yes, the "quality check" pair of FLAP shorts that I submitted to Sew Much Comfort passed! :)

As you probably remember, Sew Much Comfort organizes volunteer sewers to make adaptive clothing for wounded veterans. The clothing is provided free of charge to the veterans. The FLAP pants, in particular, have one or both side seams fastened by velcro, making it easier to be put on and taken off over wounds and casts, etc. This also makes it easier for a doctor or nurse to examine the leg(s).

The charitable organization provides the sewers with materials and patterns. I found out that the patterns were carefully designed through consultations with wounded veterans and their doctors. Sewers are encouraged to systematically vary the size that they make, as well as the side that is adapted. I volunteered to make 6 pairs of pajama bottoms, 2 with velcro for the right leg, 2 with velcro for the left leg and 2 with velcro for both legs.

Thus, six pairs of FLAP flannel pajama bottoms are now in my queue! Here are the flannels I bought for this project:

I'll probably sew these in a kind of assembly line fashion - doing the same step on all six pairs before moving on to the next step. I am going to try to line up the plaids as best as possible, which will take a little bit of thought and time. But other than that, I expect these to go pretty quickly and easily.

I'm not sure exactly when I'll get to them, but don't worry - I will! They are in the queue... ;)

PS - don't forget to sign up for my 100th post give-away!

100th Post Give Away

100th Post Give-Away!

I thought a lot about what I could give-away to celebrate my 100th post. And I came up with an idea that will be a gift to at least two people, and possibly more. I will be giving away a $50 gift certificate to Kiva. Kiva is the world's first person-to-person micro-lending web site. In other words, Kiva lets lots of "ordinary" people like you and me pool our money to make small loans to struggling entrepreneurs in third world countries.

Here is how it works: You will receive a gift certificate for $50 to Kiva. You browse through the descriptions of the people requesting loans. The list of entrepreneurs changes daily, so if you don't find someone whose dream speaks to you immediately, just keep checking back until you do. (I am currently loaning to two seamstresses - more on them below.) Once you find someone, you assign the gift certificate to that person, and that money is combined with money from other lenders, until there is enough to cover the loan. At that point, the money is disbursed.

The really cool thing about this is that it is a LOAN. That means that, over time, it will be repaid to you. At that point in time, you may collect this money (sorry, no interest) and put it into your own sewing! (Or whatever you want...) Thus, this single gift becomes a gift for two! :)

Alternatively, you may leave it in Kiva and loan it out to another entrepreneur. It is completely up to you. :)

Of course, there is some risk involved. However, Kiva does its best to assess the risk ahead of time and gives you as much information as possible about the likelihood of repayment.

I have two loans in my "portfolio". My first loan was to Miss Adjo Adimah, a seamstress in Togo, who requested $1,025 to purchase additional sewing machines and other materials to help her train four apprentice seamstresses. Twenty-five lenders contributed to fund this loan, which Miss Adimah will pay off in one year. She has already made her first two monthly repayments right on schedule.

My second loan was to Ms. Berha Aurora Rios Chota in Peru. She also supports herself as a seamstress, and requested $400, to be repaid in 6 months, in order to buy more materials - fabric, thread, zippers, etc. Twelve lenders contributed to fund this loan.

If you would like to be entered in the drawing for this give-away, just leave your name in a comment on this post. I will randomly select one name next weekend and announce the winner. Good luck!

And thank-you to everyone for keeping me going for 100 posts! I wouldn't still be doing this if I didn't know that people were reading me... :)

Weekend Project: Italian Chemise

I have about 100 pairs of pajamas. I like to see people dressed comfortably.

Hugh Hefner

Another project from my queue completed! I made myself an Italian chemise, following directions written by Jennifer Thompson and posted here. The pattern was pretty simple - a series of four rectangles (front, back and two sleeves), with gussets at the underarms. Stitching these pieces together left a LARGE neck opening, which was to be closed up by gathering and then binding... It would be difficult to exaggerate how LARGE the neck opening was. I'm not sure if even this picture does it justice - when I held this garment at the neck with my arms fully outstretched, it still sagged in the middle...

Here is a shot of the gussets on one underarm. With regards to these gussets, I followed one bit of advice that I shouldn't have followed, and skipped one bit of advice that I should have paid more attention to. Sigh... ;)

The advice that I shouldn't have followed was to make French seams. It's probably just my lack of experience, but once the gussets were attached with French seams, I had a difficult time sewing the side seams. I should have sewn all of the seams normally and then finished them all after the garment was completed.

The advice that I should have paid more attention to had to do with the size of the gussets. Jennifer said that the original pattern called for 10 inch gussets and she made 7 inch gussets to fit her body more closely. She warned that the gussets are the critical sizing element and recommended experimenting with them to find the best size for your body before sewing the garment.

I made 8.5 inch gussets, for the deeply profound reason that this was the size of the piece of fabric that I had leftover after cutting the other rectangles. Turns out that this was possibly not the very best rationale to use... My chemise is a bit tight under my arms - I should have experimented a bit!

As for the gathering, first I tried to gather each rectangle separately, but that didn't work and I had to gather the whole garment as one. I used three rows of buttonhole twist thread (very strong), and (happily!) did not have any thread breakage.

Here is a shot after gathering - I don't know why blogspot keeps flipping this image - it is oriented correctly in my viewer...

Guess what? - I made my own bias binding! (For the first time!) This is 100% thanks to you guys and your advice on one of my previous "Friday Confessions." So, thank you! :)

Here I am modeling the final garment. The neckline is a bit large and the chemise has a tendency to slip down. So far, my husband hasn't complained... ;)

A few miscellaneous details - I kept the length of the robe unchanged (just a small hem), but trimmed eleven inches off each sleeve! Also, I gathered the neckline to about 40 inches, but after I put the binding on and removed the gathering stitches, it "grew" a bit. I guess I should have gathered it more than I wanted, in preparation for this expansion...

All in all, it was a quick, fun and easy project. I may make it once more, to fix up those little imperfections. But it is certainly good enough to wear and it's fun to wear around the house in the evenings! :)

Parting Shot: Sammy and Milly, the "kittens", begin to warm up to each other now that they don't have Jackson to worship and adore...

Friday Confession

Parallel or Serial?

I am a serial sewer. One project at a time. I may have many projects in the queue - pattern & fabric purchased, fabric washed - but I am only actually sewing on one project at any given time. I don't start a new one until my current one is finished.

How about you? Do you sew one thing, from start to finish, at a time? Or do you have multiple projects going, at various stages of completion, all the time?

PS - I notice that I am close to my 100th post! In honor of that milestone, I have decided to have my first give-away. I tried to come up with something special - stay tuned next week to see what I have planned... ;)

Talk Back Thursday

Thanks to Christine, Kasey, Susan, Laura, Summerset, Lindsay, Natalie and Becky for "talking back" to my Friday Confession last week! I confessed that I have a bit of a pattern stash and asked if others also stocked up on patterns for "some day..."

Almost everyone reported having (or being in the process of accumulating) a pattern stash of her own. The thing that varied was the impetus for buying a new pattern. On one side, Lindsay only buys a pattern if she has a specific project in mind. She reported that this is partly due to a lack of storage space, and partly due to her Yankee roots. ;)

Many people were in the middle and typically shop for a particular project, but are not averse to picking up a pattern that catches their attention or fits into a collection, such as Summerset's vintage pattern collection.

Kasey, on the other hand, is a dedicated pattern shopper who never misses a sale and will never be caught patternless when inspiration strikes!

Wherever you fit in this continuum, I'm sure that the excitement of a new pattern and the comfort of a TNT pattern is something that we all can relate to!

And to Natalie - yes, I highly recommend a black furry sentinel for every household! ;)

Thanks again - I really love learning about you and your sewing lives! :)

In the Queue Wednesday

A Flannel Shirt for My Grandmother

After my Grandfather passed away, my Grandmother got into the habit of wearing his old flannel shirts around the house - partly because she gets cold easily and they keep her warm, but partly also, I think, because they make her feel close to him.

Needless to say, she pretty much wore those shirts to pieces, and now the one thing that she always loves for me to sew for her is a flannel shirt. She is very partial to red, so I am always on the look out for a nice red flannel.

I recently found this very soft flannel:

And I will sew it up using this McCall's Palmer/Pletsch pattern:

Over time I have modified this pattern repeatedly until I finally got a variation that fits her the way she likes - smaller in the shoulders, wider in the waist and shorter in the (long) sleeves.

My plan is to make this for her Christmas present (a surprise, Resa, if you are reading this!). I'm not sure when I'll get started, but don't worry, I'll get to it. It's in the queue... ;)

Weekend Project: Surprise Parties!

There is no surprise so wonderful as the surprise of being loved; it is God's finger on man's shoulder.

Charles Langbridge Morgan

It has been a wonderful week of surprises and feeling loved! On Friday, my friends at work held a potluck lunch to celebrate my birthday. Considerate of the fact that I am trying to watch my calories, they all selected healthy recipes, and we had a wonderful, guilt-free feast!

Then, on Sunday afternoon, I showed up at Ana's house with my ironing board under one arm, prepared to sew - and found another surprise! Ana and Juana had a small party for me - with pizza and a decorated Tres Leches cake! They sang the Mexican version of Happy Birthday for me (it's much longer than ours) and we told stories about various birthday traditions from each culture.

I told them about Pin-The-Tail-On-The-Donkey (well, some demonstration was involved, but if you can't get up and make a fool of yourself spinning around in a room with your eyes closed, pretending that there is a picture of a donkey on the wall on your birthday, then when can you?)

They told me that in Mexico adults often stuff their faces into the cake and eat with their bare hands. They encouraged me to participate in this tradition, but I declined and shared my suspicions that perhaps this was a joke. They thought that was pretty funny! (Or maybe they were still laughing over my mime version of PTTOTD...?)

So, we didn't do any sewing together, but Ana has mostly finished her bathrobe by herself and showed me her progress. Isn't it great? They are both really doing well!

On Saturday, members of the Sew Much Comfort organization were participating in an event at one of the big hotels in Orlando, and I stopped by to introduce myself to my regional coordinator, Joy Campbell, and one of the co-founders of the organization, Michele Cuppy.

I haven't heard yet about my quality check item, but I did learn that the current pressing need is for full length pants made with flannel - like lounge pants or pajama bottoms. Prints (masculine & adult, of course) and plaids are acceptable. I signed on to make 6 pairs (2 with right leg openings, 2 with left leg openings and 2 with double openings). Joy provided me with velcro, snaps and labels for the pants and I'm looking forward to shopping for the flannel!

So, that's it for this weekend - we'll return to posts with actual sewing content next week!

More Links in a Chain of Appreciation

Recently Summerset honored me with two awards:

This means a lot - especially from someone like Summerset, who is one of the most amazing fiber artists and bloggers that I know! :)

However, it is not my favorite gift from Summerset. My favorite is this postcard that she made for me - with design input from her children - to go in my cat-themed sewing room:

Probably no one appreciates hand-made gifts more than those of us who make them ourselves, and this postcard has a place of honor in my sewing room.

While the postcard was given with no strings attached, the awards come with some rules... Here they are:

1. Select 6 bloggers to whom you would like to give this award.

2. Put the award - prize on your blog and indicate who gave it to you by identifying her/his blog.

3. Paste these rules on your blog.

4. Write 6 of your most important values and 6 negative points you condemn.

Important Values:

• People who are warm, loving and empathic;
• People who have high standards for themselves - who are constantly learning and trying to improve;
• People with a sense of humor and of joy;
• People who appreciate the blessings in their lives and try to make the world a better place.

Negative Traits:

• People who are arrogant, self-centered, and never satisfied.

5. Inform the 6 recipients by leaving a comment on their blog.

(Note: Rules 4 and 5 apply only to the second award.)

Selecting only six is difficult, as I try to keep up with over 100 (mostly sewing) blogs! But here are my picks - I've tried to avoid people who have received either of these awards recently and I've tried to select different people from last time (even though I still love all the blogs I picked last time!):

1. My friend and relative newcomer to the sewing and blogging world, Christine. She is in the process of transitioning her blog from here to here. If you get a chance, please stop by one of her sites and say Hi!.

2. Sigrid for her blog (here) AND the wonderful site of sewing tutorials that she maintains (here).

3. Suzi for her blog (here) AND the "Big List of Sewing Blogs" that she maintains for all of us (here).

4. Dawn for her blog (here) - if you've ever read this blog, you don't need me to explain why I selected it, and if you haven't read it - you are missing out! Run, don't walk... ;)

5. Meghan for her blog (here) - more inspiring sewing projects (and the fact that she includes photos of her cats doesn't hurt...) ;)

6. Kasey for her blog (here), which I have only recently discovered and am thoroughly enjoying!

For all of the rest of you wonderful bloggers out there - I'm sorry I couldn't pick all 118 of you! But this way it will be more fun to watch the awards travel around our community... ;)

Thanks again, Summerset!

Friday Confession

My Pattern Stash

I may not have much of a fabric stash, but I think I do alright with patterns... Here's a shot of my main stash of patterns, carefully organized into 4 boxes that contain (respectively) some patterns, some more patterns, some other patterns and the rest of the patterns:

These boxes contain 135 patterns. While I have used many of those patterns already (and some more than once), I have 32 patterns still waiting to be cracked open and sewn. Here, Sammy keeps watch over them for me:

In addition to the standard "Big 4", you'll probably recognize the complete set of Brown Paper patterns, a Hotpattern, a Sense and Sensibility pattern and a bunch of Neue Mode patterns. (I got the Neue Mode patterns when I found them on sale on the Internet for $1 each!)

And this doesn't count my Lutterloh system, which contains (including 3 supplements) a whopping 434 patterns!

Of course, I don't particularly like ALL of those patterns - they come as a set. But there are easily another 30 or 40 patterns in here that I've marked for sewing some day...

Altogether, that adds up to 569 patterns! (Looks like I won't be running out of content for my "In the Queue Wednesday" posts anytime soon...)

So, how about you? Do you have a pattern stash to go with your fabric stash? Are your patterns mostly ones that you have used, or do you have a lot of new ones waiting for the stars (the right fabric) and the moon (some free time) to align? Do you have a favorite brand (or two) that you'll buy regularly, even without a particular plan in mind? Or do you mostly buy only for a specific purpose, fabric and timeline?

Talk Back Thursday

Thank you so much to Summerset, Lisa Laree, Emily, Christine, Mamafitz, Toni, Claire, Nancy W. and SunnyQ for talking back to my Friday Confession last week! I confessed that I don't use all of the feet that came with my sewing machine.

As you might expect, there were a variety of responses – including many like me, who only use a few basic feet, to some who have expanded their repertoire to include several of the more “exotic” feet, to a couple who are on friendly terms with almost every foot available for their machines!

Some favorite feet were called out, including the straight stitch foot, the edgestitch foot, and the one quarter inch (or quilting) foot.

At the same time, not everyone thinks that all of the specialized feet are really worthwhile. Mamafitz, for example, prefers to hem by hand over using the blind hem foot and is not crazy about some of the other specialized feet either.

I also got some specific recommendations on expanding my repertoire:

Lisa Laree recommended that I try the straight stitch foot and throat plate, and she reported that it should reduce the tendency of some fabrics to be sucked down under the throat plate. This advice is very timely, as Ana’s lightweight knit pajama fabric has been doing just that – if her machine came with the throat plate, we’ll try this next week. Thanks! :)

Nancy W. suggested that I start by learning how to use my blind stitch foot. In addition to doing hems, she says it is also great for edging and understitching. You all are my witnesses – I promise to practice using it on some scraps of fabric and post a picture of my efforts here! :)

Oh, BTW, my machine is a Kenmore – nothing fancy, but a pretty good little workhorse… ;)

Thanks again to everyone who took the time to respond to my confession! I really love reading about your sewing lives and I almost* always learn something useful! :)

(*It depends on the nature of my confession, of course…)

In the Queue Wednesday

My last fabric purchase in Colorado - an ivory cotton eyelet fabric for myself:

Turns out, I could have gotten this at my local Joann's for the same price, but I didn't know it at the time. Oh well... ;)

I think I'm going to make this Italian chemise, following instructions on the internet (click here).

I think it would be fun to have a flowing nightshirt to wear around the house in the evenings. :)

I'm actually thinking to make this next, after the blouse for my mother's birthday, but whether that happens or not, don't worry, I'll get to it. It's in the queue... ;)

Weekend Project: Beautiful Music(al Instruments)

Question: What's the difference between a dead skunk in the road and a crushed viola in the road?

Answer: Skid marks before the skunk.

My mother is a professional musician who plays - you guessed it - the viola. (She also plays the violin.) So, when I saw this stringed instrument fabric, I knew it was perfect for her. I got started on her birthday blouse this weekend.

The blouse pattern is fitted with vertical darts in the front and back.

In order to put on the button band, the pattern instructs you to baste up the hem in the front of the blouse (only) before connecting the front and back at the side seams - this was new to me...

The pattern calls for slip stitching the button band and collar band, so that no stitches show on the outside of the blouse.

Overall, I think it's coming together nicely, and I should finish it easily in time for her birthday, at the end of September. :)

I also spent most of Sunday afternoon with Ana and Juana. Juana had finished the fleece jacket she was making for her son - all by herself! Including the zipper! She did a great job - I was so proud of her!

We ran out to Joann's and she picked out this blouse patten (photograph on your right - with spaghetti straps & two layers) and some fabric for herself. (She picked out another sheer, so it's more french seams for us...)

She'd like to make it as a dress, so we're going to see if we can just lengthen it... I'm not sure if we'll have enough fabric or not. (This idea came up after we got home with the fabric.) The pattern called for 3 yards of 45" and we bought 2.5 yards of 60". So we should (hopefully) have a little bit extra...??

Then I spent time with Ana as she continued to work on her pajamas. Those are going well also. She finished the pants and is making good progress on the robe. She decided to leave off the hood, but wants a collar, so next week we are going to try to draft a collar pattern. I'm going to have to spend some time thinking about this...

It's going to be tough to go back to work for a full week this week, after the holiday last week. Sigh... ;)

Friday Confession

These feet were made for walking...

(with apologies to Johnny Cash)

I am good friends with these sewing machine feet:

I'm sure you recognize the automatic buttonhole foot, the zigzag foot and the zipper foot.

These feet and I, however, have never been formally introduced:

According to my manual, they are (in no particular order) the straight stitch foot, the overedge foot, the satin stitch foot, the blind hem stitch foot and (for some reason that I don't quite get) two more buttonhole feet.

What about you? Do you use all of the feet that came with your machine? If you were to advise me to make acquaintances with another foot, which one would be at the top of your list and why?

Talk Back Thursday

Thanks so much to Donna, mamafitz, Lindsay T, Summerset, Shannon, Christine, Nancy W., Becky, Claire and Vicki for "talking back" to my Friday Confession last week!

I confessed that I don't keep track of any numbers associated with my sewing - money spent, yards of fabric purchased, yards sewn, or anything.

Seven people responded that they, like me, do not keep track of anything. The general flavor of those comments was that sewing is supposed to be fun, and keeping track of things is not so much fun...

The three who do provided a variety of interesting reasons. Mamafitz has been keeping a photo album of all of her finished projects since 2003 - that sounds like a really nice idea to me! Wouldn't it be fun to look through all your projects for years?

Shannon keeps track of almost everything - partly because it is her personality, but also to help keep her very large stash organized and at her fingertips. She also noted how much fun it is to know that you copied a $1200 designer coat for just $95! ;)

Becky, like Shannon, tries to keep her fabric stash organized. In addition, Becky tracks her finances for income tax purposes.

Thanks again to everyone for taking the time to leave a comment! I love learning more about your sewing lives! :)

PS - Thanks, also, to everyone who left comments on Jackson's passing. Reading your comments helps, and it means a lot to know that there are people who understand and who care...

In the Queue Wednesday

My husband took some time out of his Colorado vacation to take me to the fabric store, so of course I had to get some fabric to make something for him... Here is what he picked out:

So, can you guess what pattern I'm going to use?

Go on, don't be shy - give it a try... ;)

Yup! You guessed it! Because a guy can't have too many Hawaiian shirts! ;)

And because I can sew this pattern up in my sleep!

Now that I've finally finished his lighthouse shirt, he asked me to move this fabric up ahead of the pieces that we bought in May in Missouri.

When? I'm not sure. But, don't worry, I'll get to it... It's in the queue. ;)

Goodbye, Jackson

Jackson and Milly

Sammy and Jackson

Goodbye, Jackson. You were the best buddy anyone could have hoped for. We were lucky to have you with us for almost 20 years, and we will all miss you very, very much. We love you and will keep you in our hearts forever...