Huzzah!

I have finished my mystery project, and am ready to reveal it!



This crazy skirt was made from a 1950s McCall's pattern I had laying around in my stash:





This is one of those patterns I have had in my stash for a while, and probably bought because it was whimsical and made me laugh, but never actually believed I'd make. . . Until my husband volunteered to do a 501st event at the Higgins Armory museum in Worcester, MA. This is a museum that is nothing but suits of armour, swords, and things like that. You know you've found the right place when you roll up to a building that looks like a fortress and has a giant knight looming over the top of the building!



Glenn stayed very busy taking tons of pictures with padawan-sized Star Wars fans as part of the Higgins Armory's "Star Wars day" event, but I managed to steal him long enough to get a picture of the both of us. . .



And for him to take silly pictures of me looking frightened of the knights. . .



And for me to take silly pictures of him "blending in" with the exhibits, HAHAHAHAHA!!!!!



All in all it was an awesome day, and I had a blast wearing my new skirt around. There was a hint of sadness though because this museum is actually going to be closing for good at the end of this year. :( The collection will all be moved to another museum in Worcester, but in my opinion, it won't even be one tenth as cool as it is now, in this building that was built specifically to hold the collection, and made to look like a castle inside! Also, the museum has all kinds of cool things like this Star Wars day event, and other completely amazing events like a sleepover event for kids! It's just so sad to see it go. If you live in the area and have an interest, you should totally check it out before it's gone! (And, if you want to read more about the museum closing and why, you can check out this Boston Globe article which talks about it).

I took a lot of pictures as I went along working on this dress, and a few of them are on my Instagram page. . . Additionally, here are a couple that I like. . .

A close-up of one of the knights:



And, the skirt laid flat, before I sewed up the back seam and attached the waistband:



After our Higgins Armory adventure, we hopped in the car and headed right over to the Brimfield antiques show (and stayed over night and hit the show a second day, mwah ah ah!) I had fun there too and got some great patterns! A few of them I'll be keeping for my personal collection, but I did come across quite a good size lot of patterns in large sizes (38"-46" bust) from the 1950s-early 1970s. I just added them on Etsy, and further more, I am so incredibly excited about how my skirt turned out, and wanting to spread some joy, so for the rest of the week, you can use the coupon code "higgins" to get 10% off anything and everything in my shop! Enjoy! :)

More fabric for the hoard!

I've been offered/given free fabric before, and generally, it tends to be quilting cottons, home dec fabrics, and other random stuff like that. It's never dress making fabrics. But the other day, I was gifted with a little fabric jackpot!



I don't know if it looks as amazing in this picture as it does in real life, but rest assured, these are all fabrics for making clothing, not just draperies and quilts! And, at least some, if not all, are vintage, probably 1960s-ish. All the fabrics to the left of the houndstooth are semi-sheer and would make lovely summery things (or historic costume items, in the case of the white-on-white patterned fabrics; although, sadly, there is not enough of any one fabric to make an entire dress, which would have been awesome!) Then of course, that houndstooth, which is really classic and pretty and I can totally make something cute out of it. The teal is corduroy and I was thinking maybe of a Colette Beignet skirt from that. . . And the last three are probably poly and I'm not sure what I'll do with those. The lilac colored fabric might be the right shade I've been looking for to trim a doll outfit I have in mind, however. . .

Anyhow. Yay for free fabric that I will totally use the heck out of!

In other news, I didn't make that dress for that wedding after all. I ended up finding a perfect dress that I loved at a consignment shop and was gifted it by my Granny as a very early birthday present. It's a lovely moss green that has a "shot" look to it, and I paired it with a black velvet bolero and evening bag, and silver/rhinestone accents, and topped it off with a mini hat with black dotted veiling and a rhinestone detail. Sadly, I didn't get any good pictures in natural light! This will have to suffice:



But I still love my previous idea, and have two more weddings to attend this year, so I'll be making the dress for one of those weddings intead!

And finally, stay tuned, because my mystery project is almost ready to be revealed! I'm putting the finishing touches on it today, and wearing it tomorrow. I am so excited about how this project has turned out, and can't wait to post about it!

Miette Cardigan Debut, and my next sewing projects. . .

Today I went to a Sheepshearing Festival held at Gore Place, which is an early 19th century mansion in Waltham, MA. I wore my newly finished "Miette" cardigan. And by newly finished, what I mean is that this thing has been sitting in my knitting bag lacking only buttons for well over a month! So I used this event as the kick in the pants I needed to sit down and finish it. After all, I could hardly go to an event that was all about sheep and knitting without wearing one of my creations, right? ;)



On the sewing table, I've got a big wearable craft project going on. . .


And that's all you get to see so far on that, since clearly, I am a tease! Rest-assured, it will be very silly and frivolous, and in fact, may only be worn the one time. . . But is worth every stitch going in to it because I'm having a ball with it, and more over, my Granny (who taught me to sew and got me going on loving to make wearable things in the first place) is having fun with it too and insisted on helping me with a little of the hand sewing. A project always increases enjoyment-wise when you have good company and good memories sewn right in!

Also soon to hit my sewing table is a dress I'm attempting to make in time for a wedding that is only two weeks away. . .



Since it involves silk chiffon and charmeuse, I am sure it will be more of a headache than it should be, but of course, I just had to have the slippery, tricky fabrics! I have at least chosen a design that should be fairly easy to fit: Vogue 8380, which has a raised waistline, and the neck gathers over a fabric tie. I hope to wear my hair up in some sort of vaguely mid-century twist of some sort, and adorn with the two little flowers, which were actually the inspiration for the color scheme of the ensemble. I found the necklace on Etsy, and hope it will tie in the teal-ish blue of the second flower. A black shrug will finish off the look since it's still chilly here in Massachusetts, especially at night, and this is an evening wedding. I originally had grand plans to knit the shrug in some lovely black mohair I have, but since I'm only about four rows into it, I'll be pulling something out of my closet and making do with that!

It's going to be a very busy few weeks in my sewing room, that is for sure!

Thurlow Shorts

Among my assorted goals for 2013 was to use at least one of the new patterns I bought in 2012. I'm pleased to report I've doubled that, since I used my Sewaholic Thurlow twice!

I was headed on vacation, and realized only one pair of shorts fit me at the moment, as I was at my higher weight and had a bit of a tummy. Can't go to Florida for a week and only wear one pair of shorts! So I decided to give the Thurlow pattern a try, and I selected some ridiculous dotted fabric, because, well, it suited the theme of my destination! ;)



I was pretty pleased with how they turned out, especially how I pretty much made them in one day - including flat lining each piece by hand, as I was worried my novelty cotton was too thin. (And it was; lining it made them the perfect weight!) Please excuse my poor pattern matching! I gave it my best shot, but this fabric was cheap and the dots weren't the exact same space apart, so it was nearly impossible to line up. I got as close as I could with the fronts, but had to give up with the sides! Anyhow. . . The front:



They fit pretty well! However, I did have to drastically let out the crotch area, because it would have been way too tight, (a complaint I've heard from others who have made this pattern, so that is definitely a watch point).

The other issue I had is that they are much longer in back than in front:



I haven't quite decided if this is an issue with the pattern or with my body not being right for the pattern. Maybe my rear is too small (or my belly too big!) for this particular pattern, and so it's pulling funny. Once I actually wore them around, I found that I do get a little crease beneath the, erm, cheeks:



This adds to my theory that these shorts are designed for someone with more oomph back there than I have. . .

Still, they were so comfortable that the next day - which was the day before I left - I whipped up another pair! This time in some black cotton I had laying around which was a remnant from something else. I had such a small amount of fabric that I had to play a little Tetris with the pieces, but I got it to work!



I think with a little tweaking, (I think I just need to pinch that extra below-cheek crease I was getting right out of my pattern piece), this pattern could become my go-to for comfortable summer shorts, and I'll definitely have to give the pants a shot as well at some point. . .

Stay tuned, because I definitely have more to post about! I've finished another cardigan save for buttons, and am hard at work on a couple of warm-weather dresses because spring has finally sprung here in Massachusetts! Hooray!

First sweater/UFO from 2007, DONE!

This is an exciting day because I finished my first ever real knitted sweater today! I've done some shrugs before, and parts of little doll sweaters, but this is the first time I'm making an honest-to-goodness sweater. And it's also exciting because it's been a UFO since 2007! I took the time to learn to properly seam things, and the correct way to pick up stitches. . . I even learned to make buttonholes, but the buttons will have to be added some time in the future because I didn't have anything to suit on hand. Still, calling it done because technically the pattern wasn't meant to have buttons/buttonholes, but rather, to hang open and/or be closed with a pin or something.

Without further ado. . . My first real sweater:





I blogged the heck out of the making-of this thing on my Ravelry page for it, and if interested, the pattern can be had for free here, but if you're thinking of knitting it, I'd note that the hood seems to grow out of the shoulders, which personally, I think looks a little strange. Were I to knit it again, I'd probably alter it so that the hood starts closer to the neck. But I probably won't be knitting this again because there are so many other sweater patterns out there that I'm super excited to try next! ;)

Dress forms skirt - done!

I decided to start the year off with an easy project! (Well, techinically I've already done several costuming/knitting projects this year, but this is my first contribution to my "everyday wardrobe" projects). This is just a simple elastic-waist skirt out of some fun fabric from my stash. Because it's black and white, I think I'll be able to have fun pairing lots of colorful tights/tops with it, and because it's elastic-waist, it should fit me now and after weight loss. Can't beat that!





I also thought that I might try and keep track of what my projects end up costing this year, because I am totally OCD and tend to track what I've spent on which fabrics/supplies, so, why not? This one came in at about $12.24. Not bad for a fun little skirt that I'm sure I'll get a lot of wear out of!

Distracted.

So after the new 18c ensemble, and down-sizing all kinds of pattern. . . Then, I decided to finally start the historic costuming pattern line I've been dreaming of for over a decade, plus am still looking for a job, plus still taking doll classes, plus all-kinds-of-randomness! And now, of course, holiday madness. I'm crafting several of my presents as I haven't tons of funds this year due to the unemployment situation I'm in. In between this, I did do some mocking up of some of my "flexible size" pattern ideas, and even made a skirt, but by and large, I've been distracted.

This hasn't stopped me from daydreaming about still more sewing plans! A lot of the "flexible size" plans I had were paired up with lovely, flowery, lightweight cottons from my stash. Clearly, I don't feel like working on those any more when it's winter now! But I was able to pick different stash fabrics for some of those patterns, plus have some more ideas, and in the end, I've got a nice little collection of ideas to choose from. Oddly, they fell into two color themes: red/white/black, and purple/fuschia/black. And they involve a little of everything: dresses, separates, outerwear, knitted accessories. . . So definitely something for any mood that might take me.

So these are the things I'm thinking about for playing around with in January and through the rest of the cold weather months of 2013. As for the rest of 2012, I've got a few UFO's that have been sitting for far too long, one more Christmas gift to make, and then I really need to recover my vintage knitting bag/stand thing. I got it for so cheap because the bag part is old, dirty, and falling apart. I told myself I wouldn't use it until I recovered it, but it's just so handy! So I've kind of been putting my projects (clean and safe in their zip-loc plastic bags) into the stand. But, I can see how much better it will be when I don't have to additionally bag my projects. Also, today I jammed my finger into a pin that was hidden in the folds of the fabric, where someone years ago had attempted to stop the thing from falling apart. So now, this has become a matter of health and safety! Stay tuned on whether or not I end up dying of tetanus as oppoed to getting any of my sewing/knitting done!