Stripey t-shirt

Happy New Year!

I did it!  I signed up for the RTW Fast!  I thought I’d missed the boat, but Sarah extended the invitation through to-day, and after much hemming and hawing I did it.  So what was my big hang-up you might ask?  The part where you need to send a photo.  You know I prefer dummy pictures.  I am the most unphotogenic person on the planet.  I do a great job of hacking off my head, should picture taking day also be a bad face day.  Well, I got over it.  I found the best picture on the computer that I had, cropped to only my head, which made for a rather blurry picture, but probably improves the look.  Done.  (I also first e-mailed my son to get his opinion on the picture, and it passed muster.  Insecurity issues?)

So - while everyone else is tallying up their year’s accomplishments, I’ll just plow ahead with items that have yet to make it to this blog.  I was going to catch up by year’s end, but obviously that didn’t happen.

We’ll skip over the rest of the summer stuff and jump right into fall and winter.

I have a soft spot for “weird” fabrics, especially if I get comments at the fabric store to the effect of “how are you ever going to sew that?”  And so it was with this striped knit.  It’s very stretchy.  It’s wrinkly.  It has stripes that defy matching.  And those are probably the reasons that it sat in the fabric stash for quite a few years.  I had to ponder over it – for quite some time, apparently.  Actually, I did have a plan … of sorts.  Not too long after buying this fabric (and already pondering on how to tackle it) I was at a Met Live in HD performance.  The host(ess?) who talked to the various singers during intermissions (possibly Joyce DiDonato?) was wearing a top (or was it a dress?) out of a fabric similar to mine – weird zigzaggy lines and crinkly.  (Why do I remember weird random details from years back?)  What struck me was that the seams were all on the outside, and they were “bound” in black.  Bingo – that was the way to do it!  I still had to ponder the idea some more, obviously.  Well, I finally did it.  It just took some time to get up the nerve.

To keep seams to a minimum, I cut a kimono sleeve t-shirt.  (I sort of followed this tutorial on turning a t-shirt pattern with sleeves into a kimono sleeve pattern.)

I sewed the seams with a narrow serged seam (say that quickly three times) with woolly nylon thread in both loopers.  This took a lot of sample sewing – despite the differential feed being set at max, it was a wavy mess, until I finally came up with the solution of sandwiching the seam in water soluble stabilizer (yes, the stuff you use for machine embroidery).  It worked perfectly.

Just a small matter of getting rid of all that stabilizer mess at the end.  No need for differential feed, either.  To avoid hemming issues the bottom and sleeves were finished off with bands.  And … the neck was “faced” with a strip of fabric.

 

And every new t-shirt needs a new pair of pants.  The wool left over from this coat.  Just my usual Vogue 2532.  And yes, they’re lined.

As if that wasn’t enough…  Couldn’t leave any leftovers – heaven forbid.  Seems I had enough for two sleeves.

And then (I must have been delirious from lack of sleep, or something) – I even managed a little cowl scarf.

That was certainly overkill.

There’s another similar fabric lurking in the fabric stash – more black than cream….  May-be I’ll leave that one to marinate for a while longer.

Wishing all my sewing friends

a very

Merry Christmas!

This and that

This may not be an entirely appropriate post for December, given that most people are showing off pretty party outfits, Christmas gifts they’re making, but I have pictures, and if I don’t post this now …

Leftovers of linen from my pink tunic got cut up into kitchen towels.

What’s more appropriate than linen for tea towels?  And then I discovered that I had some printed fabric with watermelons that I could use for appliques.  Then came the (seemingly) endless discussions with myself on how to deal with the appliques – to fuse or not to fuse – to stitch by machine or by hand – I can take the decision process to extremes and drag out the getting done for a very, very long time, even for something as simple as a few tea towels from scraps.  After all – once I decide and actually do, I’ll be stuck with the results – forever.  Oh, for heaven’s sake – it’s only tea towels!  And why do I have to justify to myself – or to anyone else, for that matter – how I choose to stick on appliques to tea towels?  I did them by hand.

That made for the neatest looking back side.  Besides, it also gave me the opportunity to practise small neat stitches.

And then there was the case of the ugly old pillow slip.  I came across it when I was sorting out my mother’s things.  A linen pillow slip for a square pillow that was not in any way still suited for display in the living room.  It was so worn that there were holes in the linen, and the embroidery was all but rubbed off.  Garbage.  But I couldn’t throw it away.  The embroidery was probably done by my grandmother, or more likely my great grandmother (because I don’t remember my grandmother being particularly good with a needle, or even picking up a needle, for that matter).  Add to that, the fact, that when fleeing for their lives, someone in the family actually thought to throw this pillow slip into their suitcase.  It was probably in sad shape even then.  It’s a family heirloom – if you can call it that.  I took it apart.  Found another piece of equally sad linen in my mother’s stuff that should probably have been thrown out.  Backed both with some fusible interfacing to keep the fabric from falling apart in the places where it was threatening to produce more holes.  Patched the existing holes.

Front

Back

Then cut it, sewed it up and now I have a bag to hold my plastic bags that hangs in the kitchen.  It may not be the most beautiful thing in the world, but for my lifetime it will continue to be of some use, as well as a reminder of people who came before me.