In the Pink!

Here's the dress I mentioned in my previous post. The wind was blowing the skirt around quite a bit. I took some pictures standing in the sun but the colors in those looked very washed out.

I don't have much to say about it other than, it's my new favorite dress. I guess I should add that almost every dress I make that turns out good is my new favorite dress until I make the next one, but wow... Pink! I have decided that I need to wear more pink. At least, that's what I have decided this week.

Kwik Sew 2671 is more than a TNT pattern. It is my number one go-to basic casual summer dress pattern. I have made it over half a dozen times, mostly modified versions. I have other patterns that I like but these are the dresses I wear the most so I keep making them. This is View B bodice with View A skirt. Instead of the tabs I put elastic in back. I made a casing of the seam allowances. The pockets are just rectangles. I never can get those curved corners to look right.

Next up? Yet another dress using this pattern but with even more changes. Then maybe some toddler clothes.

UPDATE: Oops. Forgot to say that I also had to make the armholes smaller. This pattern was designed as a jumper so the armholes are huge.

Yes, More Fabric

What do you do when you just can't decide which project to start next? Well, go shopping, of course. Look what I found! I absolutely love every one of these.

The two pieces on the left are both 4 yards each and will become dresses. Unfortunately, Walmart, the only place within 40 miles of me that has zippers, did not have the right color zipper for either one. I was going to make the large floral first but I will definitely need a zipper for that one so I started thinking about the bright pink and came to an unusually (for me) quick decision to make yet another Kwik Sew 2671 - bodice of view B, skirt of view A with some other small modifications. It's all cut out and ready to sew.

I sort of have slight issues with pink. I love, love, LOVE pink but I feel a little self-conscious wearing a lot of it, like a whole dress, especially a bright pink like this. Is it too girly - I mean like little girly? Will I look like a freaky giant baby in it? Will I be taken less seriously wearing so much pink? (Not that anyone takes me seriously anyway) And, is it the wrong color for my complexion? Yes, it is but I don't really care so much about that and I'm trying to not care about the rest of it because I'm going to love this dress and I'm going to wear it to death.

The other three are 2-yard pieces. The top one is not quite as bright an orange as it looks in the picture. It's more a faded, antique-y looking orange. I don't know why because all the other fabrics in the picture look pretty accurate. I can make tops out these but I'm a little disappointed that there wasn't more than two yards of each. I don't really need more summer tops because I don't wear them all that often. I mostly wear dresses when it is hot. I might look for contrasting fabric to go with at least one of them. But I'm not going to rush. After the pink dress I think I might go into the deep stash and make something that has been waiting for a while.

Pink and White and Bratty Cats

My primary sewing motivation is awesome and adorable fabric. When it comes to patterns and styles... well, I think I can honestly say that I'm not completely lacking in adventuresomeness but I do always have 4 to 6 "safe" patterns that I use over and over again. This is one of those.

First I have to show you some close-ups of the fabric. These kitties might be adorable but they're also rather bratty. Just look at those faces. They are definitely up to no good.

Especially this one on the sewing machine.

Now this one in the flower pot looks sort of sweet but still probably up to something.

Of course somebody had to get into the knitting. It's traditional.

I bought the fabric from eQuilter over a year ago. The pattern is New Look 6963. At first I was thinking of making it with sleeves but I like my insect shirt so much I decided to do the same thing with this fabric. Which was a good thing because it turned out that I didn't have enough fabric for the sleeves anyway.

And I love it! I think it might look better with my black jeans but only crazy people wear black in Oklahoma in the summertime. But, with the jeans and a long cardigan this could work for early spring too.

Still Here, Still Sewing

No, I haven't abandoned this blog. And there's a little voice inside saying, "Are you kidding? No one would care if you never posted anything ever again. It's your destiny in life to be unpopular and ignored." But of course I do get a comment once in a while and they always make my day.

Anyway, since I posted last I have had one sewing FAIL and one sewing WIN. I will try to photograph the win in the next few days and post it. The fail? Well, I've always appreciated that so many sewing bloggers are willing to put their failures out there for others to learn from so, maybe, but I want to let it sit for a while and see if I can come up with a fix and then I will post both the fail and the fix.

We went on a short vacation and then I didn't feel well for a few days so it's been over a week since I've done any sewing at all. Now I'm trying to decide what to make next - always a tough decision. As usual, I've been looking through the stash for the next project and every piece of fabric I see I think, "Yes, this, soon. But not right now. Right now I want to make something else." So, I'm getting very anxious to be sewing again but it might be a couple of days before I actually start something.

First Lady Style

To be honest, at first I wasn't impressed with Michelle Obama's fashion choices. Some of the clothes she wore (back in 2008/2009) seemed a little odd to me. Not surprising since I'm not exactly a fan of modern fashion. So I just stopped paying attention to the First Lady's clothes. I have very little idea what she's been wearing for the past 5 years, but I happened to come across these photos of Mrs. Obama and daughters' recent trip to Europe and I am totally smitten with several of the dresses she wore on the trip.

I doubt I would ever wear anything with this much lace but this gives me ideas. I like the blue and yellow together.

This is lovely. Simple cut and a scattering of colorful flowers.

And this is my favorite. I am seriously lusting after this huge paisley print. Unfortunately, in all of the pictures I could find of it she is either sitting down or standing behind a podium or a giant bouquet of flowers.

There are several more at the link above. I also like the orange shirt dress and the one with the black bodice and print skirt.

I Am Not a Princess

I have always liked princess seamed dresses. (and blouses but especially dresses) I had one when I was six years old that my mother made. It was dark red with some kind of tiny geometric print and had long, straight sleeves and a high neckline and buttoned down the front. I loved it. It seemed to me that it was a very grown-up style dress. Sadly though, as a grown-up I have always felt that princess seams don't do me any favors. However, a few years ago I decided to make peace with my physical imperfections. (well, to try to at least) Concealing them under sack-like clothes doesn't really help. And after trying a few princess seamed blouses and dresses, I've decided that the style really doesn't look too bad on me?

Anyway... The local quilt shop had a sale on batiks recently. This lovely green came home with me and let me know almost right away that it needed to be a princess seamed dress. I used a blouse pattern, McCall's 6076 and lengthened and flared it out into a dress and left off the sleeves and added pockets.

Everything in my yard is very green right now. I thought I should pick something not green for a background. Here's a closer look at one of the pockets: (You might have noticed my phone in the other pocket. Of course, that's why I must have pockets.)

I'm kind of loving it. I love the colors and it's comfortable. Maybe a little bit old-fashioned house-dressy (which isn't really a bad thing) but also kind of nice.

It Was On Sale!

Denver Fabrics was having this incredible sale, hundreds of fabrics for two and three dollars a yard. You might think that with a sale like that I could have found more than just four fabrics that I had to have and in fact I could have bought more but for some incomprehensible reason I restrained myself and this is what I ended up with:

Going clockwise from the top left:

The first is a brown stretch "baby" corduroy. It is destined to be slacks. I always need brown slacks in the fall and winter. This is a nice, soft, stretchy fabric so these will be very comfy.

The pepper print is a lightweight cotton. It will be a top and I'm thinking I might make it soon, like sometime within the next two or three weeks.

The beige fabric is ripstop cotton. It will probably be a shirt for my husband. He likes his shirts to be made of fairly weighty fabrics. But I'm also thinking that it would make really nice cargo shorts for me. I'm trying not to give in to that selfish temptation.

Finally... I am an idiot. You would think that in all the years that I've been sewing I would have learned all the different kinds of fabrics by now but this last fabric was not what I was hoping for. They call it "peach skin" so I was envisioning something that in some way resembled the skin of a peach. It doesn't. Well, it's not shiny and a peach is not shiny but that's about the only thing and not enough, in my mind, to justify the name "peach skin". It's actually a very lightweight, silky polyester - not the sort of thing I ever wear. Yes, I did know it was polyester but that can mean so many things in terms of weight and texture. Anyway, I love the colors but that's about it. I don't like sewing this kind of fabric and I never wear it. I'm not considering it a total waste yet. I could swap it for something else but I'm not going to rush into that. It can sit in the stash for a while.

The "Chartreuse Is a Neutral Because I Say So" Top and the Problematic Orange Skirt

Okay, no stalling; here it is. I won't say don't laugh because I know you will anyway. Or at least I hope so. It's better than, "What the...?!"

First I have to talk about the skirt. I made it years and years and years ago. It actually started life as a dress. I can't find the pattern. (i.e. If I took the time to look for it right now this wouldn't get posted until August.) It had a square neckline and pin tucks in the front, no waistline. I had made one other dress using that pattern and the neckline was too wide and the armholes too big. I tried to fix the problems on the second try but it still didn't come out quite right.

So I got this wild idea to turn it into a skirt. And I love it. (though I would rather the dress had turned out better.) The length is a little weird - longer than my usual mid-calf length but not long enough to be a maxi. It's a bit longer than I intended and I've thought about shortening it but I actually like it just the way it is.

But the only top I had that would go with it was a white blouse. It looked okay but I really wanted some choice besides white. I don't wear white very often because I have a deep-seated fear of clothing disasters involving massive quantities of barbecue sauce or blueberry pie filling. Yes, I know such a disaster would equally ruin a green blouse but... well, you know... it's a mental thing. So anyway, this lovely skirt has been hanging in my closet for years, rarely worn but not forgotten.

Then I got this crazy idea that the color this skirt needs is green - a crazy green that doesn't even match the little green leaves on the skirt. The pattern is Kwik Sew 3511. I had made the version with the collar a couple of times but this was my first time making the scoop neck version. It's a bit deeper and wider scoop than I'm comfortable with. It's not indecent by any means. It doesn't even reveal any cleavage. It's just that I feel like I have this vast expanse of glaring white chest. The only solution, of course, is big jewelry. This two-strand wooden bead necklace is the biggest I have. I think it works okay but I feel like I could find (or make) something better.

So, it's a little crazy but I like it. I am so going to wear this in public and if I end up on PeopleofWalmart.com so be it.

My Favorite Stores

I guess this is more about a favorite fabric than a favorite store but I just ordered again a few days ago so I have this one on my mind: Spandex World. I love their cotton spandex knit. It's a good medium weight with good recovery, it comes in lots of colors, and it's only $8.00 a yard. I've only ever ordered the solids but they have some lovely prints too, as well as a lot of other spandex fabrics: nylon, metallic, stretch velvet, stretch vinyl, stretch lace and more.

Stories About My Mother

Today is my mother's birthday. She would have been 82 years old today. Strangely, that doesn't seem all that old to me now. Oh... it's old but not old. It seems only as old as 62 seemed to me, oh, maybe 10 or 15 years ago. But I won't waste time talking about the unfairness of life and its shortness. (She lived to be 78)

I think I was four years old. Mom found a picture of a dress in a catalog. It was brown if I remember right. The skirt was solid brown and the bodice was gingham and it had an unusual double pocket - a solid brown pocket centered on top of a larger gingham pocket. Mom happened to have a small piece of turquoise gingham and an even smaller piece of solid yellow fabric. She proposed making for me a dress inspired by the dress in the catalog. But there was a catch. It would have to be the opposite to the dress in the catalog: gingham skirt and solid top and of course a gingham pocket on top of a larger solid pocket.

Well, this was simply unacceptable to my four-year-old self. I whined, I argued, I pouted, I argued some more and pouted some more. I can't explain it now except to say, "I was four," and it just seemed very, very wrong and the fact that there wasn't enough solid fabric to do it "right" was irrelevant. I guess I thought that my mom could do anything. She went ahead and made the dress the only way she could, gingham skirt and solid top, and once I saw it completed I liked it. I actually thought about making an adult version of this dress for myself - exactly like the one my mom made- just because she would have gotten a kick out of it but I never could find the exact right gingham.

Fast forward about six years. I was ten. We had found this great looking bright lime green pin dot fabric with a border of large pink flowers with orange centers. Mom was going to make a typical dress with a gathered skirt with the flower border around the bottom. But I had an idea. I wanted her to make a plain, straight dress, what she called a "shift", with the flowers going up and down the front, to one side. I got the feeling she thought it was a radical idea. She was not really hesitant. It was more like the idea caught her by surprise and she needed to think about it for a bit.

She did make the dress according my suggestion and we both loved it. I think of it as my first design idea, though it probably wasn't really. I have been picking out fabric and matching it to patterns for as long as I can remember so it's likely that I also had some original ideas earlier. Now... now I'm still getting ideas, making them happen, and I still never make anything without wishing I could show it off to my mom.

I had hoped to find photos of the these two dresses but I couldn't find any good ones. If I ever do I will update this.