I feel like writing

tonight.  I do recall when I first learned about blogs it seemed they were all about writing.  That quickly changed.  Most of the blogs I follow or even stumble across now rely as much or more on photos than the written word.  Even my journalist friend relies heavily on (his very wonderful) story- related photos.  I have had a fondness for reading and writing since I was quite young, so tonight I indulge myself here.

I miss letter writing.  I developed a mail phobia sometime after buying my house in the 90's, a kind of delayed post traumatic stress disorder reaction to being homeless while pregnant with my 5th kid.  I sailed through the homeless period remarkably well, probably because I've always enjoyed change.  I can always put some positive spin on change, while stagnation can weight me down into deep, suspended animation depression.  Anyway, though I developed the mail box phobia, it was ok because I had email.  I used to love early mornings at the computer with a big cup of coffee on a day off, kids at school.  I'd write lovely, lovely emails.  Now facebook and text messages have whittled down those long rambles of the written word to quick, little, and to the point notes.  I don't ponder and write much anymore.

Thank God for the library and Kindle, I still read plenty. 

It's still very odd to write what I think or what I feel for posting onto the internet.  For all to see, forever, right? 

Teaching my grandaughter

just a little about sewing.  She's got a short attention span and low frustration theshold at age 9.  She cut out SOME of the pieces and she sewed most of one pair of the pants, including learning how to draw the elastic through.  By the second pair she thought that part was fun.

 

 And now the flannel leftover pile is smaller.  I have to make room for new fabric!

fill the salt shaker

with salt.  Some great advice I picked up from somewhere regarding what to do if you are so depressed it's hard to do anything.  Picking a simple goal is likely to result in accomplishment and so provide stimulus to continue with greater goals and more energy.  I am applying it to creative endeavors these days, and when I can't bear to contemplate or work on a greater project, I try to get to work on some very simple ones.  The other day I made rice bags for hot or cold therapy from left over flannel in hopes of prodding myself into a bigger project.  It worked!  Nothing amazing, mind you, but I'm pleased enough.  I finished another pair of big butt baby pants (pattern by Rae, here) and made a little ruffle skirt for the younger cousin without a pattern.

 

These are from vintage printed denim from my stash.  I bought it when my kids were babies sometime in the early/mid 80's, but it looks 1970's to me.  When we tried them on the waist was too low, so I added the waist band out of necessity and the bottom ruffles and waist tie followed to tie in the contrast fabric. The flower is one laying around I just safety pinned on.  I'm pretty happy with the end result.

 

This rear gusset is what makes them "big butt".  They are so cute on little diapered bottoms!  I added piping to play up the feature. The pattern is $10. but is simple and unique at the same time.  She does have a free downloadable for baby pants without the gusset.

 

There are two tiny grands at my house, so if I sew for one I try to sew for the other.  This simple ruffle skirt is out of twill or a light weight denim from the stash and scrap lace. It broke up all those polka dots on the shirt and leggings.  I doubled the fabric width for the second tier, I'm thinking now maybe 1 and 1/2 would have been better for the weight and hand of this fabric.   I didn't use a pattern, but I was inspired by this picture and tutorial by Tanya Whelan at Grand Revival Designs.  She does multiple tiers and also a version of a skort ruffle shorts, lots of other great stuff as well.

 

Now I have to stuff all those trims back into the drawer.  Ah, well, it's a great way to take inventory. 

vintage fabric score (and more jamma's)

All fabric 50 cents! There was a big box at my local thrift store. 

It felt like looking into my mother's fabric stash, were she still alive and still keeping a stash.  I'm pretty sure I had a blouse made out of this in 1975.

 

This one really made my heart sing!  It looks to me like the old corelle casserole dishes, like a 1970's kitchen.  It puts old country and western songs playing in my head.

 

Here's another one that I'm sure I had a blouse made up of in the early early 70's.  Very sheer with those bars of almost entredeux like strips.



 

This looks home dec, but it is calico (quilt wieght) stuff, maybe with a bit of poly blend.   

 

An added bonus, not vintage but nice quality broadcloth yardage, $4 for about 7 yards of these two grays.

 

 

Of course, I feel guilty buying fabric at all, when I have a fairly large stash of stuff from the 80's all the way up to this winter, waiting to be made.  Including some cut out but not yet sewn pajama pants projects from christmas!  I have completed some, 6 of the requested 9.  After my shopping spree I got busy on the almost-last pair, and the only pair I was sewing from fleece.

 

The fleece was accidental. I bought all the flannel on line and of the two men's patterns, one turned out to be more feminine than I thought would be appreciated.  So I used the fleece, with some heavy cotton plaid from my stash for trim.

 

 

I quickly started to remember all those tips for working with fleece, like use a stretch stitch (plain zig zag is a good one) and stabilize for button holes.  That's what is happening above, any paper that is within reach I rip into size and use.  These button holes were not faced and the fleece is stretchy so I used paper above and below the fabric.  Works wonderfully, tears off easily.  You don't need an expensive tear away or wash away stabilizer unless you are working on your wedding dress or a baby's baptismal gown, any paper is fine.  Some other notions/gadgets I used were:

 

$1. thread snippers from the dollar store.  Performance beat the heck out of some I bought from a well known sewing company. Saves time for lots of pesky thread cutting over scissors.  The little bottle of fray check there is a favorite for button holes and many other sewing jobs.  I've used it for years, good stuff.

 

The quick turn fabric tube turner!  This was a first time for me, it is an inexpensive tool that I just never bought before because I have safety pins and know that trick, right?  And even if it was cheap, I can always spend those dollars somewhere else in a fabric store.  I've got those cute girl grands, and I figured I might be wanting to turn some spagetti straps.  There are a few different methods but I thought it was time to try this one, and I liked it. Invest if you promise 9 people drawstring jamma pants.  I did the other 8 pair without, no biggie but from now on, I've got my quick turn tube turner thing.



 

What's this? One of my longtime favorite notions, a soap sliver for marking fabric.  Preferably dried a day or two, then they last for months of marking.  Show up very well and duh, wash out.  This one was hard milled lavender, has the benefit of great fragrence everytime I pull it out.  I do have chalk markers and disappearing markers, but I love the soap best unless I'm working on very light fabric or need a precise fine line, like darts for a Barbie fine.  Otherwise, this works as good or better.

 

 

Only 2 more to go, and that Mom didn't want them until she moves into the house she's having built.  They might end up waiting until next year for sewing.  I'm ready for some other projects.

Repairing my Mom's afghan

 I've started work on repairing this afghan my mom knitted.  I'm not sure of when she made it, just that it was my favorite thing to be under if I was sick or very cold.  I suspect very early 70's at the latest, and more likely the 60's.  I'm pretty sure she used a synthetic or synthetic blend fiber, as it has been through the washer and dryer probably close to a hundred times.

I've had it in my possession since the 80's and am a little ashamed of how far I let it deteriorate.  I knew how to do the most basics of knitting, but didn't knit, and it was always on my list of things to do when it started getting holes in the center of some of the flowers and then splitting on some of the seams.  After it passed into my daughter's possession it only got worse until I finally stole it back with the intention of finally mending it.  Strangly enough, I found some supersaver yarn that seems to match the pink extremely well, and the gray is only off enough to see if you hunt hard for it.

I've seamed up the 3 pink squares on this shot already and I'm pretty happy with the results.  I'm using a crochet hook and kind of ladder stitching it back together and it closely resembles the original.

It's parts like this one that have me worried.  I've got double pointed needles and a gizmo called a knook that might help, along with a very close to the original pattern.

wrist warmers

This has been a nice little project to take to my job as a nights shift home health nurse.  It is my first knitting project with double pointed needles and I was very proud of how fast my technique improved from the first warmer to the second.  The first one had a definite and noticeable ridge where the stitches changed needles, the second blends nicely.  I am excited because this means I can move on to socks and mittens!  Scarves bore the heck out of me.  How many dishcloths can I make? (Lots, I'm telling you).

The pattern came out of knitsimple magazine, and it IS pretty darn simple.  I believe I can learn to knit without pattens faster than I can learn to sew without patterns, as I grew up with sewing patterns but I'm learning knitting as an adult.  I don't mind buying a pattern for something involved, but easy stuff like this?? 

I have a circular needle and a bulky ball of yarn in the bag for when this is done.  It's a very good hobby to prevent sleep in my occupation, with the bonus of having something to show for it when I'm done.  More than I could say for farmville (yeah, I was one of those) and angry birds.

I dreamed

I had already designed and started this blog.  Man, I was surprised to open my last post and see that there was only a blank page on a "draft".

I'm figuring out how to work past this blogger issue of posting pictures that has been an problem for me all month.  I had to post to Picasa and then upload from that last time I tried, now I can get them directly from my phone (a nice new smart phone with 5 mp camera, so ok), OR I can just use firefox to upload from my hard drive, my preferred route. The uploader will not recognize either my PC or my laptop's drive from internet explorer. No edits at all for todays uploads, normally I would adjust exposure and color.

I have been so inspired by all the blogs and businesses out there blooming from home sewing endeavors that I see on the internet.  Last year I dusted off my sewing machine that has been sitting undercover for a good 15 years or more, and even bought new parts and repaired my vintage machine (wait- are both my machines vintage now?  My computerized kenmore is from 1991 or so).  Unfortunately, couldn't figure out how to make the serger operational.  It is frozen, the motor whirs but no movement of the needle shaft or anything else.  It was a cheapie, and not fun to work with anyway.  I may treat myself to a new one IF I keep sewing.

Christmas before last I made jammie bottoms for several of the women in my family.  It was so much fun and so well received that this year I decided to do it for everyone.  I knew I was time pressed because I insisted on buying all of the flannel when it hit 50% off.  Unfortunately, I didn't find this until black friday, and then I was working night shift and had to do it online.  NOT my most favorite way to select fabric, and then I had to work through selection after selection being out of stock when I chose it for the cart.  But by December 3rd or so, I had fabric for 10 pairs of jammies at my house and decided to do it assembly line style.

Virtuously dusting out the bobbin compartment each time the bobbin ran out, and oiling the top too.
You want me to finish this story on how it all turned out wonderful, don't you?

There were 2 pair for men, 5 women's (including myself), 2 babies, and one school girl.  ACK!  I had a very hard time finding any fabric for men, and one of the two final choices turned out to be more feminine out of the box than it looked online.  OK, I bought some fleece for whatever, and that turned into the second man's pair.

I did mention I work night shift, right?  Hopefully not forever, but for now.  I am frequently groggy and low motivated when at home and awake.  I'm also pretty broke, having had my income reduced by $30,000 annually when I went to night shift. I raised 5 kids as a single mom and now I'm temporarily supporting and partially supporting a substantial number of my kids and their families. There are currently 8 1/2 people (school girl is here at least half the time) living at my house.  I've moved my sewing into my bedroom to try to reduce choas. Alas, there are frequently babies or even bigger people asleep in my room and constant flows of just stuff moving across the surfaces in there- my debris, animals, purchases, clean or dirty laundry, homeless people's stuff.... I seem to attract a lot of other people's stuff.  My washer broke, and I stalled on prewashing those fabrics for a couple weeks. I already have enough laundry to lug to the laundry mat, and it was going to cost extra, and we were talking MAJOR yardage here. I would never have put it all in one load at home.  Mandatory to prewash cotton flannel though, shrinkage is a definite issue.

Sooooo, 10 days before Christmas I started cutting.  I had to draft baby patterns, but that was easy.  Had to trace for different sizes from multi size patterns, pretty easy.  10 pair.  When I started sewing I discovered I cut too many mediums, and one too few xxlrg.  OK, one medium can get sewn later, and I don't get a pair.  I think I hate flannel anyway, it sticks to sheets when I want to roll over.  On to the fun part, embellishment!!

Grosgrain ribbon on the pocket and hem of one man's pair, lace or ribbons or rick rack on pockets of women's. I have some satin blanket binding and a beautiful vintage midwieght plaid waiting for hemlines.

I had fun pulling out some of my fairly antique sewing aids, like this gizmo for perfect hems (truthfully, a thin cardboard one is better, this metal HEATS UP with steam) and the wooden point turner I broke down and bought after thinking it would be handy for the past 20 years or so.  It is.

I decided not to sweat mistakes that made me think, STUPID, but really don't matter much.  It would take Steph forever to discover I rolled the inside hem of her pocket the wrong way, and she wouldn't care when she found it.  The bottom hems are where I got real happy and I can't show that.  OOPS, cause I still haven't finished them!!!  The assembly line got me 0/10 pair finished, though there's a baby pair in the laundry after being worn rolled up without a hem at all. 

I'm less than happy with the project since it did not come even close to the deadline.  I don't know why I'm not truly UNHAPPY either.  I know I'll get them all done, while it's still winter, and people will still be happy with them.  The babies' pairs match the mommie's incidentally.  I'm slipping in a few things in between, knitting I take to work so it's guilt free (though I'm no speed demon on that either).  I made a sweet little dog bed for a crate that was missing the plastic bottom. He had blanket on wire and now has a dense foam cushion in some circa 1983 denim cowboy print that I never could figure what to use for.  I have dreams of couture inspired baby and girl clothes, and beautifully fitted pants and shirts for me.  I believe I can make some dreams come true. Despite my apparent failure on this project I really do have skills, albeit rusty and distracted skills.  I'll confess some more, I have 2 half finished baby quilts, although I have 4 grandkids and another on the way. 

So, though I love to devour all those blogs out there with soooo much productivity beautifully presented across their web pages, I'm pretty comfortable with my own feeble offerings.  I'm happy that the dust cover is off and the motor hums again.  I'm kind of thrilled when I cut into some of those fabrics and trims I've hoarded since 1979.  Someday maybe I'll show you some of my extensive library on sewing, stitching, and quilting.

I'm making a solemn promise to post when the jammies are done, even if it's December after next.  I think it will be this winter though.  Maybe by next post I'll get a nice layout for the page too!  Not today, other obligations calling.