A Hoppy Christmas

What's that, sleighbells jingling? The salvation army bells ringing? No? Hmm, must just be me. This project is a belated christmas present for my brother who hasn't seen it yet. When I saw this fabric I knew I had to make a quilt out of it. My brother, if you hadn't guessed, loves beer.

I used the Kaufman Cheers Collection. It's a pretty simple quilt, I only cut out the blocks on the panel and corresponding sized blocks of another print in the collection, sashed, and then sewed together in strips. The back is more of the black beer glasses. The sashing is a charming print with the words for different beers.

I had visions of grand free motion quilting spelling out the virtues of beer, but went with simple stitch in the ditch quilting in the sashing for a cozier quilt. Hand bound in an orange shot cotton I had in the stash that matched.

It's a pretty great man quilt, if I do say so myself.

A Surfeit of Mccall's 6044's

This past week was my Dad's birthday. As the man who has everything, it's notoriously difficult to even make him something useful. Thankfully, I have found the button down shirt.

This is the 3rd shirt I've made for him and my fourth total. I get a bit better each time. This is Mccall's 6044. It has a few different options and I really like how it fits. It's also a ton easier than the Colette Negroni, which was my first foray. The 6044 does not have a back yoke unless you're doing the western style.

I made it out of the Robert Kaufman Fineline Twill in Forest Green. I am loving this fabric. It comes in a ton of different colorways, has a nice crisp hand, and isn't too wrinkly. It is a very fine twill, as the name suggests. There is actually a right and wrong side, and I think the collar stand may give me away on that one, so be careful to keep cutting consistent. I have also been informed that one cuff is backwards. Next time.

I flat felled all of the seams but the armholes and the slits on the sleeves. The buttons are mother of pearl from amazon that are left over from a different project.

For Christmas, I made him a flannel version out of kaufman tahoe flannel. It is the Shirt Of Many Buttons. I did not pay attention when making the buttonholes and I didn't realize until I was sewing those suckers on. It was not one of those mistakes that no one notices. He has to leave the bottom one unbuttoned.

The tahoe is very nice and lofty, more brushed than the mammoth flannel. It's quite nice. This is definitely my favorite men's shirt pattern.

 He's looking good for 60, ya'll!

A Knitter's Maker's Tote

I recently started going to my LYS (local yarn shop) knit night on Tuesdays to chat with other ladies who also like to knit. Now, knitting is definitely not my primary hobby, sewing will always take first place in the handicrafts category, but knitting is a little more social and a little more relaxing than sewing. I probably only finish about 2-3 things a year with knitting. It's my tv hobby.

Anyway, I needed a thing to carry all my supplies in to knit night. I happened to have this gorgeous print by Sarah Watts in her Cat Lady collection for Cotton + Steel. I am a total Cotton + Steel fan, and especially Sarah Watts. That she also lives in Atlanta means that my dream of becoming her best friend is actually a little possible (you too, Jody Benson). I managed to find two coordinating prints also in my stash.

I've been eyeing this pattern for a while, so I knew that I definitely had to use my cat lady fabric to make it. It's Anna Graham of Noodlehead's Maker's Tote. It's this genius bag (she's a genius bag designer, after all) with gussets and lots of useful pockets, that has binding all the way around.

I wasn't surprised to find the construction was absolutely on point, as usual. An inset pocket, bellows pockets, and a separating zipper all make this for a fun and practical sew. I use the Pellon double sided fusible foam instead of soft and stable. I used soft and stable for another project, and at first I didn't like the finished result of the fusible foam, but now I think they're about equal. The foam was actually a little hard to fuse.

The most challenging part was binding the whole thing, but thankfully the thing is hand stitched the front (I love me some hand binding) so it turned out pretty awesome. The trickiest part was sewing the zipper in neatly and covering the raw edges.

If you're not familiar with Anna's patterns, they're all excellently laid out with thorough instructions. I personally think that any advanced beginner or beyond could tackle this, with only a minimal amount of cursing.

It fits this whole sweater project, plus Vogue Knitting magazine, with room to spare, and so many notions in those awesome pockets! I don't know if I'll ever make another, but I'm certainly going to keep this pattern around.

Fabrics Used:

Cat Lady Pouncy Ball Green
Cloud 9 Organics We Are All Stars Lime
Kona Cotton Geranium
Kona Cotton Iron Grey

A Fantastical Mermaid's Tail

My love of fabric, mermaids, and all things sparkly came together when a co-worker asked me to make her daughter a mermaid tail for her birthday.

It just so happens that there are some amazing mermaid sequin fabrics out there right now, and they are fantastic. So many brilliant colors to play with and swoosh around. However, I wouldn't work with sequins unless you paid me, so here we are.

I used the Made for Mermaids Mermaid Tail Pattern and altered it just a little. I used this gorgeous mermaid sequin fabric that is green with glints of blue and purple on one side, and matte charcoal/black on the other. Just gorgeous.

For the lining, I used minky to make it extra soft. The sequins are heavy and scratchy, so it was important to have a cuddly inside. They're also not washable, so that's where the alterations come in.

Instead of attaching the lining and the outside, I used velcro on both, hidden by the minky cuff at the top. It was pretty easy. 

I'm loving the shimmer and shine! 

Intention

Hey ya'll, in the blogoverse.

So I created this blog a year or so ago in an attempt to sew more. It lasted all of one week, and under a different name. I was going to sew one thing a week (woah, crazy). This time, I'm going to be a little more realistic in my goals.

This year, I'm trying to be more intentional. I've started bullet journaling, and surprisingly, have stuck with it more than any other planner I've ever attempted. Maybe because I've got more control over it and it's not as linear. I like how it gets me to reflect on things, like how I'm feeling and how I'm doing health wise.

I use it for planning sewing things, too, but sometimes the platform is just a little too small and a little too, well, "pen and paper".

Ha, I'm a funny one, let me tell you.

So in an effort to be more intentional in all things, from my work, to my journaling, to my reading, and more, I'm doing it for sewing as well.

I want to have a record of my projects: what worked and didn't, what I liked about the technique, what thing I never want to try ever again, the fabrics that work the best for me, brands I like, and a place to plan my projects other than my head and random dispersed scribbles in ten different notebooks. I want to be able to look back and see the progress I've made and the new things I've tried. It's nice to be able to look back and see how far you've come, wave at your younger self far down the path and yell at her to "Keep coming, it's better up here!". Just don't tell her about the mountain that's coming up, guys.

So I'm going to try to blog everything I sew, and maybe a little more. The good, bag, and the tossed. Let's go.