February month-in-review

Aside from the dress in my last post, I thought I'd just do a recap of what else I've been making this month, since it's a lot of works-in-progress and stuff that I wouldn't give individual posts to. Also, thanks for all of the lovely birthday wishes and compliments on that dress!

1. First off, the totals. I tend to only count stash as busted once the project is actually sewn up, so for this month, I used up a total of 9 1/2 yards of fabric. I did buy one pattern (The Sewaholic Granville blouse, since Tasia was having her big birthday sale and I actually didn't have a standard button-down shirt pattern in my stash) and a zipper, but overall, I did manage to stick with using things I had.

• The maternity dress was 3 yards. 
• I used half a yard of ugly quilt cotton plus some ugly quilted fabric that my mother-in-law dropped off to me the day before to make an ugly pillow to keep between my knees and help me sleep with reduced hip pain, because that's been an issue for the last couple of months and my OB suggested a thinner pillow than the one I'd been using. I didn't measure out that quilted fabric, I literally just folded it up into the size I wanted and sewed the ugly cotton into a pillowcase around it. So I'm not going to show that here, though I did post it in the Stashbusting Sewalong group on Facebook, since one category in this month's fabric contest was Ugly. (I literally don't even know how that fabric got into my stash. I didn't buy it.)
• As for the rest, I made this:
  
  

Doug and I almost have the nursery (aka the Hobbit Hole) set up, minus whatever we're given in the baby shower that my mom's been planning and a few minor projects. He had the idea to do a hammock for stuffed animals, since we need to keep those away from the dogs. Malkin in particular has a habit of tearing holes and ripping all of the stuffing out as soon as he gets his paws on them! I had a lot of tulle left over from making my wedding dress, because I seriously overestimated how much I would need. Good thing it's cheap. I didn't use it all up, since it was in two pieces, but I did manage to use up a 6-yard piece by cutting 4 layers and zig-zagging the edges to hold it all together, then binding the shorter edges/making tabs out of a scrap of thicker white cotton from my scrap bin. Not bad for an afternoon's work, I think, and I'm happy that I found a way to use up some tulle on a project for a boy!

For the record, a majority of the stuffed animals in there are actually ones I'd kept from my own childhood/teenage years that had some sentimental value. Though the Donald Duck and the little German shepherd puppy were gifts from the soon-to-be grandparents, and there's a bunch of Dr. Seuss-style fish that my mom made as well.

2. I'd mentioned earlier in the month that I had some pretty massive, time-consuming baby projects to make, so I thought I'd give the update on that.

First of all, I've been going to my parents' a couple of times a week to work on the cloth diapers that my mom and I are sewing. They live closer to my teaching than I currently do, so it makes sense on the days I have fewer lessons to drive up there for more than one thing. Most of her projects are packed away now, so she's using her sewing time to help me, which is so great of her. We still have a long way to go, since we're ultimately making 72 (2 dozen each of 3 different sizes), but everything is at least cut out and ready to sew, and we're making a pretty big dent on the smallest size of diaper. So this is one of those.


And this is what I've been working on instead of knitting for most evenings lately, using this pattern. It's taking awhile, since I've been having fabric glue issues and therefore have been basically hand-stitching the majority of this, with a little machine sewing thrown in to secure the edges of pages when backing them to hide all of the mess. Oh well...toys for boys need to be sturdy anyway, right?




And here's a little closeup of the Fellowship of the Finger Puppets so far--the imagery is based a little more on the movies, so I'm going with that. So this is Boromir, Pippin and Legolas. I probably would have finished all 9 puppets last night, except the fabric glue that I bought yesterday specifically to assemble these just isn't sticking to the felt very well! (My previous fabric glue had gotten too dried out to use, and these pieces are way too tiny for hot glue. So once again, I'm hand-stitching!) I've got 6 puppets in various stages of completion, and then 8 more pages on this book, I think. Some are much less intricate, so that will help. I also have a second book all cut out and ready to go that's Doctor Who-based. If nothing else, maybe I can have these done in time to give Hobbit for his first Christmas?

So my goals for March, aside from continuing to make as big a dent on these books and diapers as possible:

1. Sew my diaper bag, which I cut out earlier this week and that is therefore ready to go for my at-home sewing time. I'm planning to start that today.
2. If I have time, sew myself at least one more article of clothing to get me through the next couple of months. Probably a top, since hopefully the weather will start to warm up and I can at least graduate to 3/4 sleeves. Especially if I make it nursing-friendly so I can wear it in the fall, too. 
3. On the non-sewing front, I'll probably also have to start thinking about some cooking days, since one of my plans is to try to get our freezers filled with as many prepped meals as possible so I don't have to worry about food too much in the first month. (And by prepped, I mean either just defrost, or throw in the crockpot/oven and be done with it.) I have a list of recipes to make, including breakfast and lunch options that I can eat with one hand, plus a second list of ALL the ingredients, but I probably won't really start with this until closer to the end of the month/beginning of April. We still need to eat in the meantime, so I'm focusing on using up the older stuff that's in there first.

On a more personal note, since this still sounds like a lot, we've decided that I won't be resuming my retail job this spring as usual. Our plan was for me to stay at home with the baby anyway, though I'm still going to be doing my music and now sewing lessons, which I do have babysitting lined up for. (Thanks, Mom!) But since spring is the busiest season at that job and I'll be in my third trimester the whole time, and there's several factors at that job that would make it very physically difficult (having to bend down to lift plants for scanning, stools with no backs, 6-day workweeks, the owner smokes in his office often and cigarette smoke makes me sick even when I'm not pregnant, the nausea still hasn't fully gone away, etc.), we decided that it would be much better for me to use those last couple of months to just focus on final preparations instead of struggling through two part-time jobs plus all of that. Which is also why I'm planning to do cloth diapers and cook ahead, since in the long run that will save us money on diapers and avoiding takeout while we're first learning how this parenting thing works. I can't say I'm too broken-hearted over the thought of having more time in my day to cram in as many hours of sewing and music as I can before having to spend most of my time ensuring the survival of another human!

March Stash Diet Update

It was a slow month for me, mostly due to going back to my second job/agreeing to hem that prom dress. Which is now DONE, aside from pressing the hem. (Which I'm honestly considering skipping, since the fabric is cheap poly jersey and I'm afraid of melting it!) But I still made some progress.

Sewing totals:
Total projects completed: 3 (the Robson coat, the bibs, and one more last-minute project that I'll show below), though I at least started my Shieldmaiden March costume. Even if I didn't get past the cutting stage.
Total fabric out: 17 yards (including 5 given away for Sew Grateful week)
Total fabric in: 2.5 yards. I went to Joann's the other day to get some notions, and ended up buying some stretch denim-- I had a credit for number of pieces used up, it was on sale, and I do legitimately need some jeans. Also, the only denim I had that isn't the metallic leftovers from the TARDIS skirt was non-stretch, and I think I'm going to need a little more give in my jeans.
Difference: -15.5 yards. It's going down!!
Total stash left: approximately 322 yards. Which is a lot closer than you'd think to what I said the February totals were, but I had that Excel issue to blame for that.
Pieces of fabric completely used up: 4, plus 2 given away. That makes 11 for the year so far, and 2 more before I have another fabric credit.
Patterns used: 2, since I'm not counting in-progress stuff until the month it's done.

Knitting totals:
Total projects completed: 1 (a scarf)
Total yarn out: 100 yards, plus whatever I've done on WIPs.
Total yarn in: None this month... I probably should have done this in February, since I did buy several then for the next Craftsy class.
Difference: I can't really accurately assess this, since I didn't do the math...
Skeins of yarn completely used up: None, though I am SO, SO close with the yarn from that scarf.
Total stash left: I added it up again, since I'd never added in the February purchases, and I'm now at approximately 21,859 yards. Yiiiiikes.

So, this last-minute project... I already mentioned that Doug and I were spring cleaning our house this weekend. We made a Target run after we finished up so we could get a few new things for the house--he hated the shoe rack I brought with me and wanted a more stable one, I needed to get some mailing envelopes so I can send out swap patterns, etc. One of the things we agreed on was to get some new living room curtains--there's 2 layers there, and our dogs have this habit of looking out the window and jumping up to hit the windowsill anytime people pass out front. So the sheer ones got torn. I've hated the outer layer from day 1--it was this ugly colonial-type blue that didn't really go with the pale green wall color, but the thing that really bugged me is that the tops had horizontal pleats, one was pleated further down than the other, and one curtain was shorter than the other! (#sewcialistproblems, am I right?) I had the thought that morning, and mentioned it to him, that I should just make new curtains for the kitchen sliding glass doors and move the kitchen curtains to the living room, since I'd bought the fabric to do so before we got married and it would save us some money. He agreed, so after we got home, I knocked out a new pair of curtains in about 3 1/2 hours.

The top is the curtains that have been there since I met him, the bottom is the new set.

I'm not a fancy curtain person--I'd rather let the fabric print do the talking than deal with pleats and gathers and whatnot. So I kept these super-simple. They're unlined, folded over at the top to make a casing for the curtain rod, and the other 3 edges hemmed. Literally all I did for cutting was fold the piece of fabric in half length-wise, cut it, and then finish the edges. So not the most exciting project from a sewing standpoint, but my kitchen looks so much happier now, and the living room looks warmer, and it was a really satisfying project to finish for something so simple. Plus it knocked 5 yards out of my stash just like that, even though I'm not counting home dec fabrics towards my new fabric allowances, and cleared a nice chunk of space off of my shelf.

July in review, and a design decision

Honestly, looking back over this month...it doesn't look that great on paper at all! The only project I finished during the entire month was the knit top that I wrote about in my last post. And while I'm still close to finishing my little accessory project, it's not done. But as I'm looking back, it turns out I didn't really make any specific goals for July anyway. So in this case, nothing ventured, nothing failed! Works for me!

As for August, I only have one real goal: To finish those darn jeans! I spent some time yesterday working on the pattern, and have a back and most of a front, and a yoke, and a pocket. I still need to draft the front pockety bits, the fly front bits, the waistband and the belt loops (because if I don't at least include a pattern piece for them, I will most certainly forget to cut them out). I was originally going to work on that tonight, but decided I needed to do a little of cleaning and exercising instead, so it's not going to happen. Especially since I still have to do the workout. Darn you, real life responsibilities!

Ok, so it's probably my own fault for spending an extra-long dinnertime making a sewing room board on Pinterest. But I actually have one to think about designing now! And I need ideas!!

Back to the sewing. I guess that it doesn't help that a good chunk of what little sewing time I had this month was spent sorting through patterns and fabric swatches and such to get a plan for my wedding dress. But now my hand has been forced. Meaning I had to just make a design decision and go with it, Here's the story: n Monday, a particular fabric store that regularly appears on a particular sewing-related tv show that we all know just happened to announce a 15% off sale for silks, including every single piece that I was eyeing for wedding dress potential. So I needed to figure out estimated yardage needed, stat.

The plan is now to use the back of the Cambie pattern for the bodice, mostly as is, though I'd like to use some nude organza in the sleeve cap and upper back in order to strengthen the lace, and then leave it white on the bottom.

As for the skirt, I decided to go with none of the options I'd posted before. Instead, I'll be using this. The picture didn't copy so well from the website this time, but if you look at the ivory sketch, hopefully that gives a good indication of what this dress is. I figured it would be pretty simple to make the seams line up with the darts, the skirt is still pretty full but doesn't use gobs of fabric (4 yards at most for the skirt per layer--i.e. outer, lining, underlining, etc.--if I estimated right), and things will stay nice and smooth around my waist, which is what I preferred. Also, this one has a center back zipper, which means that the only potential alterations I'll need to make will be to move seamlines to line up with darts, and lower the top of the skirt a bit to line up with the Cambie waistband. Even with my woefully limited pattern alteration skills, I should be able to handle that. It'll be a fairly simple design, but since my wedding is going to be late morning and as casual as a church ceremony can be, I'm good with that.

So that's the good news. The bad news is that my swatches, which I ordered last Thursday before I knew about the upcoming sale, have not yet arrived. And the sale ends in about 4 hours. And when I called, I was told that since the sale on the website is computerized, so there's nothing they can do to give me the sale prices even though I do have swatches on order. Well, crap. 

On the brighter side, I did get a few swatches from fabric.com, and found something I liked for the outside of the dress that compliments the lace well. It's reorderable, so I should have no problem getting the yardage, and they run sales on a pretty regular basis, so I figure there's a pretty good chance I can get some kind of discount between now and October, which is my self-imposed deadline for actually ordering fabric.

Now I just have to figure out the following:

1. What to use to underline this with
2. A skin-toned organza for lining the upper part of the back and the sleeve lining, so it looks like just the lace but has that extra strength. And perhaps for concealing the lace in the seams, since I am 98% sure that particular design decision is going to result in more handwork.
3. What to line this with, since I'm pretty sure I'll still need a separate lining to hide the mess
4. What to do about the green waistband. Also, Doug requested that I sew him a tie, and it would make sense to use the same fabric. This is largely dependent on what my bridesmaids decide they want to do for dresses, since I don't want to choose a shade until I know.
5. The biggest decision at the moment: What to do about that bra. I am strongly leaning towards building it in, since I'm concerned that a longline strapless bra underneath a bodice that will pretty much require boning of some kind for stability purposes would be rather uncomfortable to wear all day. It's just a question of how, since my built-in recycled from the old underwire bra cups didn't quite lay as well when wearing my Lonsdale as I hoped it would. 

I was flipping through my copy of Couture Sewing Techniques this morning, and Claire Schaeffer recommended making a corselette out of cotton tulle. (If my brief Google search is any indication, I'm not sure this exists for a non-wholesale buyer, so I'm not sure what fabric to actually use yet.) The instructions for how to make the actual corselette look good, though so far I've completely missed any how-tos on actually getting it into the dress. The one picture showed the dress front flipped down, so I'm not sure if I'm supposed to leave it detached at the top or not! The other option I've been toying with is signing up for Gertie's Bombshell Dress class on Craftsy, and just using that pattern to basically make a bra. The neckline looks pretty similar to the Cambie's. But using the book I already have is free.

Have any of you dabbled enough in formalwear and/or bra-making to give me any advice here? I'd greatly appreciate it!

Wrapping up: thoughts on Me-Made-May (and the month in general)

So now that I'm at the end of another month of me-made, here's some thoughts and stats....

First off, the day I apparently forgot to post, which was day 16:

The "If I Had $1000000" dress, worn with a Modcloth belt and those Montego Bay sandals. Jewelry is the "Earth" set from the elements series. I was a bit ambivalent about the outfit, personally, due to the over-poofiness of the skirt. I'm strongly considering chopping out the organza that makes it do that in the lining, and just letting it hang a little longer. (It also feels a little too short for comfort to me.) However, this was one of the outfits that got the most love in the Flickr group, with 7 comments. (A lot for me.)

Now, some stats:
# of me-made/refashioned clothing items worn: 36
# of repeats: 0
# of pieces of handmade jewelry worn (counting necklace/earring sets that were designed to go together as one): 29
# of repeats: 5
# of non-jewelry handmade accessories: 1
Favorite outfits: Days 3, 4, 8, 13, 21, 23 and 30
Least favorite outifts: Days 2, 7, 9 and 31-- the common thread in all of these was that I just didn't feel like the store-bought pants looked good and/or flattering with the tops.
Separates combinations that I'll be most likely to wear again: Days 3, 4, 8, 10, 11, 14 and 17
New articles of clothing made: 1 (the "Zeros and Ones" blouse from day 10)
Articles of clothing discarded: 1 (the Pendrell blouse from day 22, due to unfixable fitting issues).
 I'm still on the fence about the t-shirt from day 19, but I guess with the right pair of jeans, it won't feel too short. So we'll see.

Other thoughts:

• Me-made May, June, July or August is not going to be a struggle for me, for a very long time. I've been switching out my wardrobe in pieces due to the up-and-down temperatures this spring, and when I was hauling out the summery-est of my warm weather clothes near the end of the month, I did a quick little count...I could probably go for at least 2 more weeks without repeats, depending on how I mix things. And that's not counting things that are seasonally inappropriate, like all of those jackets I made earlier this year. (Now, if they ever do a Me-Made December or something, I'll be in trouble for that.)
• I am surprised at some of the clothes I ended up not getting to this month. It's not that I didn't want to wear them, and I can think of at least 3 pieces off the top of my head that I thought about wearing, but just didn't get to for one reason or another. Mostly weather-related, I think. It's certainly not that I still don't like them.
• A fashion blogger I am not. It's like I've said everything interesting that I can about an outfit, once I've blogged the making of a piece. And I still feel a little silly taking all of those pictures of myself.
• That being said, I did have fun putting the different outfits together! And I do think that my little unspoken challenge to myself to not repeat outfits (and to not repeat them from Self-Stitched September, if possible), helped me to put together some more daring, interesting combinations than I would have otherwise.
• Though it's still my least favorite part, having a boyfriend who really likes taking (multiple) pictures of me every time I hand him my camera definitely helped on the photography end of things.
• The handmade accessories bit was surprisingly hard! I wouldn't have thought so, given all of the jewelry I've made over the years. But there were some days that all I wanted to do was throw on a pair of dangly metal earrings and be done with it, especially if said dangly metal earrings would have gone with the outfit better IMO. There were also days where I'd wished I had accessory options other than jewelry. So I'm trying to expand my repertoire there a bit--I have one in-progress answer to this, and an idea for a second project that also isn't jewelry, (I think handmade accessories might actually end up being easier in cooler weather, because then I always have the option of knitting a small project! When things are as warm as they've suddenly gotten around here, the last thing I want to do is throw on a knitted scarf or hat!)
• I know I've said it before, but this month certainly reinforced that the biggest holes in my wardrobe are casual knit tops and pants. I have plenty of t-shirts, but not that many that I've made, so that part of my wardrobe certainly suffers in the me-made months.
• Since this seems to be a list of contradictions, I did find that wearing dresses is more comfortable than I thought! At least, this time of year. But I still want more jeans/pants!

Other thoughts on the month in general-- I've found myself very discouraged about my sewing lately, mostly due to the lack of time. Except for the one weekend where I was visiting friends out of town, every single weekend was taken up with long hours at work. So I barely got anything done, and I sadly have to admit that I really didn't do so great on the Colette Palette Challenge. The top got done, and I have been working on the jeans (which are being more difficult than I'd hoped.) I guess I can't really call the skirt a total fail, since it was more a case of discovering that I already had that spot in my wardrobe filled with the red dress from day 4, in a more versatile way than the skirt would have allowed. But I still didn't make it.

As far as the other goals go, I did succeed at Me-Made-May, with only one flakeout day on the photos (and given that I was at work for 11 hours of that day, I think it's allowed.) And I did finish clearing out my wardrobe, though the pile is still in my room and not at Goodwill. The knitting project did get worked on, though I ended up ripping out most of it in order to fix an issue with my decreasing--it was too much too fast, and looked awful.

For this month, I do want to keep working on fitting those jeans. It's one of those projects I can do when I have a few moments here or there, but not when I'm around other people due to all of the trying on and adjusting. So I think my new goal there will be to get the jeans muslin fitted and the pattern altered by the end of the month. I'm going to keep knitting on my Strafford tee, of course. And despite my Colette challenge failure, I am strongly considering the Summer Spark Sew-Along. I mean, I only have to sew one thing. Surely I can manage that, right? I do have one particular project in mind, which will also nicely assist me in my Check The Technique list. But I'll save that for the next post, along with some show and tell....stay tuned.

April in review

I figured I'd go ahead and do this month's writeup now--I know there's still a day left, but honestly, I'm not going to make any progress towards anything tomorrow, between work and teaching and finally getting my car into the shop to get repaired from its fender-bender. I had to get two estimates thanks to the insurance run-around, and then I couldn't get an appointment at the shop for well over a week after that.

On the plus side, I do get to pick up Bernadette and the unnamed serger from the shop tomorrow. (Christina suggested Sergio, which is a great idea. But I already have a friend who is somewhat "real life", since I know her from the internet but did meet her in person once, who named her serger that, and I don't want to steal her thunder. At the moment, I'm considering Molly, after the somewhat temperamental apprentice wizard from The Dresden Files book series.) Oh, and before I forget-- turns out that the reason that Bernadette wasn't doing so well with the newer buttonhole foot was due to the foot itself. I guess it was defective. So I have to get a new one again, but if it means I get my automatic buttonhole feature back, it's worth it!

So, enough of that....on to the review. This month was a lot less productive than I'd hoped, due to having little to no weekend time to myself. I knew I'd have extra Sunday afternoon rehearsals since I have a concert next Sunday, but I wasn't expecting to end up having to work a bunch of Saturdays in a row and lose my prime sewing time as a result. But I did get some stuff done. Let's see how I did, shall we?

#1: Finish the blue corduroy jacket. Check. This also enabled me to check bagged linings on my Check the Technique.

#2: Go through the Jean-ius class that I have from Craftsy. A partial win, as I've only gotten through two of the videos so far. But I'm hoping that maybe I can at least start on part 3 this week and get cracking on that pattern.

#3: I'd like to get a quick project in between the jacket and the jeans. Which I did, with the convertible dress. I also cut out and have about halfway sewn the blouse for my Colette Palette Challenge, since I got stuck on the jeans. 

#4: Get my Onyx sweater sorted out so I can continue that. I did at least get an answer on Ravelry for something to try. But I honestly haven't touched this one in about a month. Fortunately, my KAL buddy has also been busy, so I'm not holding her up.




#5: Cast on my Strafford Tee. I have done this, and have knitted about 2" so far. See, progress!

#6: Finish putting my fabric swatches in their new notebook. Yeah, I think I did about 2 swatches this entire month. Fail.

#7: Make one scrapbook page. Now this I actually did do! Since they were very simple pages, I actually managed to get three 2-page spreads assembled. Nothing exciting design-wise, but it's something.

I guess I did better than I thought, but on the sewing front especially, I still feel rather behind. I'm anticipating this month being similarly nuts, since I already know this weekend is shot between rehearsals/concert and having to work before the Saturday practice, I already know I'm going to lose a good chunk of Memorial Day weekend due to having to work yet again on the Saturday, and I'm very much hoping that I will be out of town (and therefore not working) for one of those weekends. (But in that case, the girls I'd be hanging out with are my crocheting buddies, so there's a fairly decent chance I can get some knitting in between rounds of board games, and it wouldn't be a total loss of craftiness.) So I'm going to keep things fairly simple this month. Here's what I'm hoping to get done:

#1. Not flake out on Me-Made-May. If I have limited time to create things, I want to at least enjoy the things I've made already. And since I need to add some things to the Handmade Closet page on here, I am going to try to keep up with the daily photos, with the goal of posting those outfit photos a couple of times a week. (Besides, my boyfriend was excited to hear that I've taken on something that involves taking lots of pictures of myself that he can steal for himself later!)

On a side note, before I continue, it occurs to me that I never actually posted my pledge on here. So here it is:

I, Becky, of Sew and So, pledge to wear at least one me-made or refashioned piece of clothing a day, and aspire to wear at least one handmade accessory, for the duration of May. I also pledge to aspire to do better with taking photos this time! 

#2: Finish the three pieces of clothing for my Palette Challenge:
      a) the blouse, which as I mentioned, is about halfway done
      b) the jeans, which I need to make the pattern for and then actually make, as per the class instructions
      c) the skirt, which I've only started in my head about a dozen times when work gets boring, but haven't touched in the real world.

#3: Make some visible progress on my Strafford Tee. This shouldn't be too terribly difficult to accomplish, since I'm sure I'll at least have some tv-watching time with my guy on our lower-key hangout nights. (Thankfully, he is completely cool with me keeping my hands busy with crafty stuff while we watch movies or hockey or tv shows. Hey, maybe I'll do something totally crazy and finish that next step on the Onyx too! We'll see how it goes.)

#4: Finish weeding out my wardrobe, and get the things I'm getting rid of out of here and to the thrift store so I don't have a huge pile of laundry lurking just behind my door!

So, yeah, I'm going to just leave it at that. Hopefully once I get past the spring, which is the busiest season at a garden center, I won't be working 6 days a week anymore and can actually get some of my personal stuff done. If nothing else, I should be able to get some Sunday afternoon craft time in there, once I get through the concert next week.

March in review

Since I'm doing the monthly round-up thing now, figured I'd start the new month off right! So here's how I did on my goals for March, as stated here....

#1: The Renfrew top--done, great pattern, will definitely use that again sometime.

#2: Finish knitting the Camille shrug--check. And since I had a request from my Onyx sweater partner-in-crime, I did get an action shot of it with the dress at the wedding (this was at the reception, in a side room of the church.) Overall, it worked very well with this dress that I'd originally envisioned it with. (Aside from some fitting issues in the dress bodice itself, which I'm now in the process of resolving since I was apparently too lazy to do it right the first time. Basically, I'm taking in the side seams above the black waistband, stitching it by hand because I have to take apart less of the lining than I would by machine. I need practice on handstitching anyway, right?)

p.s. The sleeves are actually full-length, I just had them pushed up in this picture since it ended up being a bit warmer than I'd anticipated.

#3: Reconstruct that brown suedecloth skirt. Check, although I still need to do something with the lining.

#4: The next step of the Onyx sweater. See previous post for the reason I didn't finish this. (I have a phone date with my KAL partner tomorrow to see if she can help me figure out what on earth I did wrong.)

#5: Blue corduroy jacket. It's not quite done, but it's getting close.

#6: Swatch for my Strafford Tee. I did actually do one earlier this week, and am now debating what to do--according to the swatch, I had about a stitch more per inch than I was supposed to. Which honestly doesn't seem like a big deal to me, and I might just go with it since I was trying to figure out how to incorporate some more fitting into it anyway. It looks like it's pretty loose at the waist.  So I guess this confirms that I am a too-tight knitter.Maybe I should just re-knit the swatch and try to relax a bit, since I'm actually using the right yarn for once...

Essentially, though, I got 4 out of 6 done, and the Onyx was pretty much due to circumstances beyond my control. Not too shabby at all!

So here are my goals for this month:

#1: Finish the blue corduroy jacket.

#2: Go through the Jean-ius class that I have from Craftsy. Which will hopefully result in a new, well-fitting pair of jeans!

#3: I'd like to get a quick project in between the jacket and the jeans, since they're both pretty detail-heavy projects (and that's been on my mind since reading Tasia's post last week about how long sewing projects should take.) I'm not entirely sure which one yet, but I'm thinking either Butterick 5606 or a reconstruction project. (I've decided to hold off on the knit shirt I already have cut out, since that's long-sleeved and it's increasingly unlikely that I'll get any use out of it in the next several months, by the time I finish. So I may just knock that one out later in the summer when my brain turns to thoughts of preparing for fall.)

#4: Get my Onyx sweater sorted out so I can continue that.

#5: Cast on my Strafford Tee.

#6: Finish putting my fabric swatches in their new notebook.

#7: Make one scrapbook page. Gotta start somewhere if I'm serious about getting myself back into this.

One last note: The patterns have all been claimed. Sarah and Muireann, I'll get those to you asap.

A 2-for-1 quickie post

Answering a few questions via the comments on my last post::

Christina-- I used this tutorial to make the outlines for the croquis, though with Oona's modifications of using Photoshop instead since that's what I had. (I found the tutorial via her blog.) Hope that helps!

Hana-- my bust is pretty full. I think it's more that my waist is kind of surprisingly small in comparison to my hips, and I've learned over the years that if I wear things that aren't fitted or cinched in one way or the other, it just gets completely lost. Thus the reason that most empire-waist stuff just doesn't seem to do it for me, unless it does the fit-and-flare thing underneath.

Thanks for the other comments, ladies!

After spending basically 2 months sewing nothing but complicated, fully-lined jackets, not to mention the shrug that I'm still knitting, I just wanted to make something simple and fast. So I've actually managed to knock out two projects over the course of two days, which is what I'm sharing today.
The first project wasn't one that I found on my Pinterest, but I did have it saved there, so that counts as Pinterest being useful, right? Anyway, I found this tutorial for a simple roll-up knitting needle case on Design*Sponge, and figured it would be perfect for my small collection of non-circular needles. I slightly adapted it a bit-- instead of canvas, I used this thick textured cotton stuff that my mom had leftover from some project of hers, and instead of the twill tape, I made double-fold bias tape from a fat quarter I'd had sitting in my scrap bin from ages.

Making bias tape is a pain, even with that little tool thingy. It wouldn't be, except that anywhere I'd seamed it together, it wouldn't go through. But I'm seriously considering taking some more of those scraps and turning it into bias tape, just to give me a way to use some of it up. It's so handy. And I can't close the lid on my scrap bin. But I digress.

When I said small collection, I wasn't joking. I did leave one pack of my double-pointed out, but that's because I accidentally bought a second pack of size 11s after I forgot that I already had one. Thus the need to see what I have. You can tell that I prefer to use the circulars whenever possible, can't you?

I actually did something smart, and decided to stitch the bias tape on with one of the machine's decorative stitches. Bias tape is really a pain to line up, and I figured that this particular stitch would catch the edge on both sides, no problem. It worked like a charm, and I didn't mind this particular project having more of that "homemade" look, since the channels for the needles weren't exactly going to be in matching thread, either. I knocked this one out in its entirety on Friday night, including making the bias tape (aside from pre-cutting the strips during my cutout binge day I had last week), while helping my friend Nicole figure out the best way to take in a vintage dress that she was working on, and introducing her to Downton Abbey.  And I'm quite happy with the results, especially since I tend to procrastinate a lot on that more utilitarian sewing!

The second project, which I cut out later last week, was the newest Sewaholic pattern--the Renfrew top! I decided to go for the 3/4 cowlneck, with this knit print that I was given for Christmas about 2 years ago. (Please ignore the sideways picture-- apparently I forgot to save it after turning it in Picasa, and I didn't want to bother with uploading it again.)

This fabric print is kind of interesting-- when I look at it close-up, the somewhat Celtic knot-like is what stands out to me more. When I look at it from further away, the X's stand out more. And closeup, the X's look more like V's. It's like an optical illusion!

And here's my finished top! As seen with my corset-laced pants, because it's always fun to find something new to wear with those, and the weather is warm enough today that I'm feeling good about breaking out the linen pants after their winter hiatus. I think the stripe-ish bits lined up pretty well, overall. And this pattern sewed together like a dream-- I got it stitched together in its entirety within the few hours I had to sew on Monday, and that was with going back over nearly every seam with my sewing machine after serging it. (As per my Check The Technique, I did work on playing with the tension on here. It looks great on one side, but not so much on the other side, and everything I've done to fix it so far looks terrible on both sides. So I didn't trust it to not pull apart. I did learn, however, that if I serge it first, machine-sewing it doesn't make the fabric ripple. So I guess that's something.

Anyway, back to the pattern. As I said, it was super-quick to sew together, and I'm really happy with the fit. On a hunch, I actually did some grading before I cut it, from the size 8 for the chest and hips down to the size 4 for the waist, and it worked great! I didn't have to take it in at all. The length is perfect to be able to raise my arms without my stomach showing, which is a must when you play an instrument that pretty much requires that movement at all times. And I wasn't sure how the neckline would cut, thus the cowl neck for this version, but it seems like it wouldn't be too low-cut at all. So I'm absolutely certain that I'll be going back to this pattern again--it's pretty much the perfect basic knit top! Thanks, Tasia!

The one thing I would have changed was the cowl-- I love the look of it, but I had to piece one side of it together due to the way I had to lay it out with the stripes. Before I sewed it on, I went back and forth multiple times as to which way I should flip it in hopes that the un-seamed side would end up on the outside. And I guessed wrong. So there is a seam running down the front of the cowl, though I don't think it's very visible unless you're really close-up. I didn't want to re-do it and risk stretching the neckline out irreparably (ah, the joys of ripping out serger thread), and think this particular print needed the cowl to balance out the grid-like nature of it. So I just left it.

2 more things:
1. With this top, and factoring in those couple of fabrics that I got for my birthday, that takes my stash down to about 216 yards. This is down 57 yards from where I started at the beginning of last year, which I don't think is bad at all! The count will be even lower soon, since I already have 3 pieces chopped up for the next couple of projects, but I have that information written down elsewhere so I'm not counting it yet.

2. Sarah at Rhinestones and Telephones did an interesting post yesterday where she did more of a monthly roundup/goals for her sewing, and kindly said that I could borrow the concept. I'm definitely one who gets too many ideas for things I want to make, and therefore I stress myself out. So I'm hoping to use this as a way to focus a little more, and maybe even work in some of those mending and utilitarian projects that I've been meaning to do for ages. I can pretty much sum up February and January with the browncoat-fest post that I already did, so instead, I'm just going to share my goals for the rest of March. (Since the top I'm wearing today was goal #1.)

#2: Finish knitting that shrug, since I need it by the 31st. I'm getting close-- about 30ish rows left on the sleeve, then blocking, then seaming and adding the final ribbing around the back and neck. I can do this!

#3: Reconstruct a skirt that I took apart late last week. That will be this afternoon's project, at least in part.

#4: Get the next step of my mini-knitalong going. It's only about 30 rows, I can do this too!

#4: Sew that blue corduroy jacket that I cut out last week. I may be able to start this later this week, depending on how said reconstruction goes.

#5: If I get 2 and 4 done and still have some time left, I have a short-sleeved top in my Ravelry queue that I'd like to get the swatching done up for. I'm hoping this one will be fairly simple, since for once in my life, the yarn was one that was both wool-free and still affordable, and therefore I'm actually using what the pattern calls for. So I guess this will be the big test to see just how ridiculously tight my knitting tension is...

I'm trying not to go too overboard and stress myself out, since I'll be getting back to a more normal work schedule probably next week, and will have less time. So hopefully this is a realistic list!