I’ve been giving a lot of thought to the disaster that was Butterick 5261. I think I’ve imagined something that will salvage it, because I’m really quite proud of the work I did. Hate the shirt, but very proud of the construction.

My theory is that I can make short sleeves, crop the shirt, add a waistband, and skirt and have a retro summer shirtdress. Hopefully I can buy some more yardage. I’m sure it won’t exactly match because it certainly wouldn’t be the same dye lot, but Jo-Ann always has that fabric. Plus, I’m hoping for a cool, easy, summery, wear it around the house day dress, so I’m not going to get too hung up on the dye lot. You can see my inspiration pins here. Sorry for the lack of photos, I’m not sure how to blog pins. hmph. Might be worth looking into.
Speaking of inspiration, I’ve found a tool that has proven to be very useful. I got a tablet when we ditched our smart phones in September, and ordered a fine tip stylus to use with it. Then I found this silly app called sketch guru. It has turned out to be so useful! I’ll sit and sketch out some crazy sewing idea whenever the inspiration hits, most of which I’ll probably never sew. It gets it out of my head and onto “paper.” Here’s one example, Iwas lost in sewing blogland one day, ended up watching a video from Gertie, and quickly got lost day dreaming about making a shirt. It really has nothing in common with the shirt she’s wearing in the video, but that was the jumping off point.

I’m not considering quitting my day job to become an illustrator, but it works for me.

I’ve become frustrated with my sewing and clothing. I’m writing a more detailed post about this, but the first step I have taken is to compile a list of sewing skills I wish I possessed.

Making that stupid B5261 has forced me to take a look at my actualy sewing skill level. I mean, buttonholes are NOT hard. I’ve known this for years, but had yet to actually make a series of them successfully. Plus there are so many skills that I’ve read a million times, I know how to do them if I ever have a need. Yet I haven’t found a need, so I don’t feel like I can own those skills. I suppose that’s really the second step I’ve taken, the first was to start a list on the bulletin board over my sewing table of projects sewn. Just to keep track.

Happy Valentine’s Day to those of you who celebrate it.

I’ve never done a year end recap, and I’m not sure that’s what I’ll do today.  2013 was a big year for our little family, and I managed to do a lot of sewing.  Not so much blog worthy sewing, but sewing none the less.

I’ve moved my sewing area to our dining room in the new house.  In the old house, my sewing occupied the largest bedroom, tucked upstairs, all away from noise and people walking by. I was pretty convinced that our too small dining room was going to be the worst thing to happen to my sewing.  I don’t think that’s been the case.  I find that I sew more often now, maybe for smaller bits of time, but certainly more often. I think that sewing in small bits of time is the only way a stay at home mom of a preschooler can probably ever sew.

Its funny, but its been a shift in my way of making. For example, Christmas day, while we’re getting ready to pack up and head to my in laws, I sat down and hemmed my pants.  They’ve needed hemmed since I bought them last winter, and never got worn because of it. But for some reason, that day, I decided to just sit and take the few minutes to hem them.  Things like this, I call them Make Do and Mend projects, are getting done much more quickly than they ever would have at the old house.

I’m revising projects more than I used to as well. Months ago I’d made this little fabric basket to keep make up in that nestles in our medicine cabinet. After using it, I decided that it really needed some interfacing, and something done with the raw edges that were fraying badly.  So as I type this, its sitting next to me, fray check drying, waiting to be taken apart and fixed.

It is certainly a lot harder to organize a sewing room that is also the dining room where we eat all of our meals.  Its actually making me a bit crazy. I think I have way too much fabric.  One of my new years resolutions is to sew through some of it.   I have so much sewing stuff that I just don’t know what to do with it all.  I’m trying out the rolling it up method for fabric storage.  I’m tagging it with how many yards, and tying it up. We’ll see how this goes. I borrowed my mom’s tagging gun that quilters use to baste sometimes, and that stores use to tag clothes with prices.  Should work better than nine million pins constantly stabbing me every time I try to get fabric.

I would love to say thats everything, but its not. There are three giant moving boxes left. One is filled with two space bags of shrunken fabric. The space is a work in progress.

I’d love to sit here and make plans for all the sewing I want to do this year. In real life though, I can’t imagine that I’ll do a lot of garment sewing. My body is changing pretty rapidly, and I get frustrated because I make something, and a month later it doesn’t fit right. Anything I make will have to be easily taken in, so that’s kind of a fun challenge, figuring out how to make something so it can easily be changed in a few months.

I got two really cool sewing gifts for Christmas that I’d like to share, plus various little projects I’d like to blog about.  Oh, and a skirt that I made that I drafted myself.  So expect more posts soon.

My biggest project right now is purging stuff.  We downsized by about half of our living space square footage when we moved up north. I got rid of 4 truck loads of stuff, plus at least 3 car loads before we moved.  And then a couple weeks before Christmas I got rid of two more car loads.  I don’t know how much more I need to get rid of just to be able to put things away. Its really ridiculous. There were boxes that were basically untouched from when I moved out from my last apartment with  a roommate in 2007. I’ve been doing some reading on minimalism, and its very appealing to me.  I stumbled upon The Minimalists right before Christmas, and have been reading their books.  I haven’t been into our consumerist culture for some time, but then there are times when the urge to buy something that I just have to have bites me in the butt.  My rejection of that part of our culture is one of many reasons why I began sewing. But perhaps that journey warrants its own post.  So point being, I’m decluttering on a massive scale, and aside from mothering, cooking, and cleaning, that’s the next big thing around here.

I hope you all have a wonderful new year, and thank you for reading.