Crepe Sew Along, Week 2: Sewing the Muslin

Sorry I haven't posted this week.  It isn't because I have done nothing or have nothing to show -- I just haven't taken the time to post.

One thing I did this week was to sew the muslin for the Crepe.

Here it is:







As you can see, the fit needs a bit of work.  I can actually tighten it a bit more if I let it ride up a bit:



I think that helps show just how much extra fabric there really is beneath the bust.  I haven't gotten to altering it, though.  I waited a while for the post about sewing it and this week I have been swamped with shopping.  Bleh.

There is extra fabric above and below the bust, the darts are a bit high.  I can actually move the bust area to the right spot, but then the shoulder seams are too far forward.  I may want to go down a size and add a full bust adjustment rather than simply changing the position and shape of the darts, but I fear that the sleeve will be restrictive if I do.  I fear there will be several more runs of muslin making in the next week or so.  I think I need some assistance in pinning things out first, though.

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A few articles

There are some online articles that I have found recently that I would like to share with you.

1.  Last week, a friend shared this article from Scheneier on Security about why we should close the Washington Monument.  I think this is a very good article reminding us of the objectives of terrorism and the politics of security and fear.  Let us contrast the words of FDR in his 1933 inaugural address, "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself," with all of the current political statements.  Somehow, as the average American has become less and less in danger every day, we have become more fearful, or at least more willing to give in to our fears than our forefathers were.

2.  Certainly, I am not immune to unreasonable fears.  One of the articles I wanted to share is an article from Zenhabits.net about procrastination.  This article cuts to the quick of what procrastination is about for me, and offeres some suggestions for overcoming it that I think are things that I could implement.  I have been procrastinating about my job applications and also about my plans for setting up a creative side business and even just personal creative projects that would be more fulfilling than some of the things I have been doing lately.  Somehow, many of these things are overwhelming for me.  I don't know where to start, I fear failure, and I think "just a few minutes more" of whatever I am doing for instant gratification -- usually surfing the internet.

3.  Emily of The Family Tree Project wrote a lovely article about the things that have been stopping her from working on her design project.  I can definitely sympathise with how her expectations for her work are actually getting in the way of her doing the things she wants to do.  She found a way to get past the deer-in-the-headlights feeling that thoughts of not meeting certain levels of financial success provokes.  You would think I would jump out of bed every day thinking, "I can work on whatever I want today!" but I don't.  I have too many "shoulds" getting in the way.

4.  I realize that I am just a step away from all of these things falling into place.  I can really use some prompting, though.  I found The Happiness Project, which seems to have some inspiring ideas.

I guess a lot of this comes down to taking charge of your own actions and not giving into fears, whether those fears are large or small.

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After the jump...

A number of my posts are rather long and image heavy, like the previous post about the Detroit Urban Craft Fair, and I realize that not everyone who follows my blog will be interested in all of them, so I have just gone through my old posts and added "jumps" to the particularly large ones.

I realize that a few of you who have told me that you are reading my blog are not so internet savvy, so I wanted to alert you to this change.  Any time you read my blog, you may see a link that says "Read more".  Click on the link and it will take you to the rest of my post.  You will know that it is a link because the color will be different from the rest of the text.

Try it:

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Detroit Urban Craft Fair

On Sunday, Scott and I met up with a girl I met at Spinner's Flock and went to the Detroit Urban Craft Fair, which was held at the Fillmore in downtown Detroit. It's a beautiful theatre with painted freezes, and the vendors were spread out throughout, wherever there was space for a table.



We only purchased a few things: some fun buttons, a mustache hand mirror, and a fabric flower fascinator, but I did what I typically do and picked up a number of cards for things I thought were worth noting, before I decided what to buy.

Information on those vendors after the jump.

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Crepe Sew Along, Day 1: Cutting Out the Muslin

Today was the first day of the Crepe Sew Along, and I jumped off the starting line. My pattern had arrived from Colette Patterns on Saturday, and the pattern itself is very nice.



The pattern envelope is more like a booklet with a back pocket for the pattern itself. It also contains a full set of instructions and a glossary, plus a spot to write personal notes. The pattern also included sizes 0-18, and the sizes are pretty close to ready-to-wear sizes, rather than typical pattern sizing. I don't like to cut into my patterns any more, especially expensive ones; I prefer to trace the size I want onto some spare artist's tracing paper I have and then use that pattern on the fabric itself. One reason I do this is because I sometimes make mistakes about which size I should cut out. Also, a lot of fitting techniques involve cutting up your pattern, and I believe I will feel much more comfortable doing this on a traced part than the original. Plus, I can't loose the small pieces.



For my muslin, I used an old pink gingham sheet that was used for padding when I moved. This was my first time using dressmakers' tracing paper and a tracing wheel, which is pretty neat. I have always been reluctant to transfer markings, because I wasn't really sure what I was supposed to be doing. On my last project, I marked with thread, which worked well, but this was so much quicker.



Once the pattern was cut out and the markings were transferred, I did as Gertie directed and stitched along the seam lines so that I will be able to see where things will end when I do my fitting. In retrospect, I probably didn't need to stitch along the darts, but I just read wrong. Also, we are only making a muslin of the bodice, since the skirt is flared.

I'm all ready for step 2!

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Crepe Sew Along

Yesterday, the fabric arrived for the Crepe dress that I will be sewing as part of the sew along on Gertie's New Blog for Better Sewing, which I mentioned back in mid November. I did complete both of my in-progress sewing projects and the next one I had planned to sew before the end of the month, thus meeting my self-proscribed prerequisites for joining the sew-along. I made a silk sash, refashioned a t-shirt, and made a steampunk bustle, finishing the third project on Monday.

Tuesday, I went to Haberman Fabrics in Royal Oak, which I had heard has a reputation for good garment fabric selection. Boy do they ever! I have never been in such a nice store for garment sewing, with a huge selection of natural fibers and some of the fabric made specifically for high end ready-to-wear. Unfortunately, since it is cold weather here in Michigan, they had put away or not re-ordered much of their selection of cotton prints. Plus, I had really set my sights on several that I found at Aunt Bea's Fabric, thanks to the sew-along promotion, and anything I bought locally needed to match up to those gorgeous Japanese prints. I had narrowed it down to three, and I ended up ordering one from there. I am very pleased with the fabric, though the background is not as purple as I thought from the on-screen preview image. Now I just need to get the lining and notions.

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Concept Boards - Taking Note

Early last month, there was a post on the Collete Patterns blog about concept boards. I really like the idea of having a visual collection of the things I like and being able to see them together to get an overall feel of what I am going for, but I am loath to tear up magazines or books that I like, and I don't have easy access to copying or scanning them. I also find a lot of inspiration on the internet, which I then feel the need note so that I can return to it. I often have multiple tags open in my browser, and I have been dumping some of those ideas here so that I won't lose them. Of course, it doesn't seem to be very interesting to you, my readers, given that I never get any comments on these posts.



Thanks to The Snug Bug and Ysolda Teague, I have found the solution to this dilemma, which is a website called Pinterest. When I come across something on the web that I particularly like, something that inspires me in some way, I just hit a button on my bookmark tool bar and "pin it" to one of my boards. I can also see what other people have pinned and follow them, repin, etc. It really helps me to get a cohesive vision. If you like the random images that I post, then you can follow me there.

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Thanksgiving

Happy belated Thanksgiving!

I am thankful for the ability to spend my days with the man I love, and for all of my wonderful, supportive family and friends.

Sadly, the above picture is not from the Thanksgiving dinner we attended at Scott's aunt's house, it is from BraveTart's blog post about a heritage Thanksgiving. Her post is a beautiful post about creating a locavore feast that truly celebrates the harvest bounty of her area. Her recipes look amazing, too, so check it out. I have a fair amount of sage in the front yard, since it is the only herb Scott planted last year that is perennial here, so I definitely want to try the Sweet Potatoes with Brown Butter Sage Marshmallows.

Thanksgiving here was fairly standard and typically traditional. I hear that things were a bit more exciting at my aunt's house, with people trying new recipes, and sneaking The Pioneer Woman's sweet rolls.

I bought a turkey at the grocery store after Thanksgiving to get some extra savings, and since we didn't bring home any leftovers. Plus, I like to make broth from the carcass every year. I cook it down so that it is concentrated and freeze it in ice cube treys which I then empty into a plastic bag in the freezer. I use these cubes like bullion cubes any time I make a recipe with broth all year long, and it gives me real broth that isn't full of salt. Plus it's really easy, since the broth can bubble away mostly unattended.

I guess I'll be making a second, more low key Thanksgiving. Maybe we'll invite some friends. I can experiment with sides. Any suggestions?

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Home updates

So, here's an update on some of the things I accomplished last week.



I finished painting the walls blue in the half bath. We still need to fix the ceiling and touch up the edges in some of the places where the masking tape didn't behave.



We also installed curtains in the living room in lieu of the vertical blinds that I hate so much. This was the best photo I could get at the moment with the sun shining in so brightly. I bought these curtains at IKEA, but they were tab-top, and I wanted to create a clean line from the cove ceiling to make the toom look taller, rather than showing a band of green at the top. On the other hand, I liked the regular folds that the tabs created, rather than the random bunching you get with a channel. So I just folded the interfaced top portion down to the back side, pressed and sewed along the former top edge, sewed the tabs down, then threaded the curtain rod through the tabs. Voilà!

Creating this IKEA hack and hemming the curtains was the first thing I have sewn since I mentioned completing sewing projects this month in order to join in the Crepe Sew-Along. My sewing machine was being frustrating, as usual, in failing to maintain its tension and going crazy on the back side of the seam. I ended up using Scott's machine instead, and I like it a lot better. It is a tiny travel machine, but it isn't finicky, and it sews reliably. I also like its case, which includes special places to store thread, bobbins, and other accessories, plus half of the case can be attached to the machine as an extension table. Still, it really is small. I had trouble lifting the foot over the curtain hems at the edges, because there wasn't enough vertical play. The 6" hem was already rising up the vertical because the arm wasn't long enough to lay it flat. Plus, the stitch-type selector dial is not functioning, so it is limited to being a straight-stitch machine, though it is supposed to have a variety of useful stitches available. At any rate, it is still preferable to my mis-behaving machine, and I will be using it for all of the projects I will be tackling this week.

I did go into my stash and decided that it was silly for me to keep some of the projects that I had tried to rescue due to fit issues, etc. Others should be on their way soon, with proper use of muslins.

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Things Worth Noting

This is just a collection of things that have caught my eye over the last week or so.



Mata Hari, posted by For the Visionaries. I just love the lines of her hairdo and the headpeace. There is something so striking about her.


This necklace was made by Just Expressive I think that it is a really creative way to put a necklace together. I love the color combination and the contrast in textures.

I also feel a need to share the eggcorn database. Eggcorn is a word coined (and now included in the Oxford English Dictionary, I believe) to describe words that people miswrite due to the way that they sound, especially in idioms. These are the kind of things that I encounter on the internet that make me cringe. I have occasionally even seen them in e-mails from people I have worked with. It usually bothers me and I don't know whether to correct them or let it lie, especially in a professional setting when you don't want to see a person making that kind of mistake in something sent to a client. After all, I don't want to be that irritating person who tells you that, for example, penultimate means next-to-last, not some somehow greater or more important way of saying last. Plus, I know I am not a perfect speller, and I do make typos. It's just that eggcorns aren't just typos, or not really knowing how to spell a word. They are generally misunderstandings of what a word or phrase means, like using "all intensive purposes" in lieu of "all intents and purposes," or using "isle" in lieu of "aisle." Certainly, I am guilty of not knowing some of them; for example, the idiom I thought was "tow the line" is in fact originally "toe the line," meaning something more like "step up to the plate" rather than to just go along with it. At least I can feel better that it is one of the most commonly used eggcorns, and it is actually starting to become acceptable. At any rate, this database is fabulously interesting, and it kind of helps with that "stupid people on the internet" feeling.

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Interior Design

As I wait for the primer in the half bathroom to dry, I am going to take a moment to share some of the things that I have been enjoying in the design realm recently.  Unless noted otherwise, I have pulled these from Apartment Therapy.


I really like the way that the pictures are grouped in the background, with the letters. I also like that green pillow.

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Joining In

This week included several big firsts for me, as I finally joined in some of the groups that I have been planning to join since before I moved.

First, on Monday night, I went to my first dance class in Michigan. For those few of you who do not know me personally, I will explain. I really love Scottish Country Dance. This is the traditional social dance of Scotland. You dance with a partner, interacting with a larger group, called a set. You don't have to bring a partner, though, as etiquette dictates that you dance with a new partner for every dance, so there is a lot of mingling and meeting new people. It is a lot of fun, and the people are very welcoming. There is a broad age range of dancers, and there are groups all over the world. I have been dancing since 1999, and I roped both my best friend and my mother into joining me. I had even taught class occasionally in Atlanta, so you can see how strange it was for me not to be dancing, even though there is class four nights a week within about 45 minutes of my house. I just kept putting off calling the contact people. I was so glad I went on Monday, though. The class and the room are both fairly small, but there is a wood floor and live music. The thing that was the most exciting, however, was that one of the dancers is an old college dance friend of mine. She was a freshman when I was a senior, but she had been dancing since she was a kid, and she attended two of the classes I attended each week. She and her sister and best friend all attend the class.

On Sunday, I went to the monthly meeting of the Spinner's Flock, which is a handspinners' group that meets west of Ann Arbor. There were about 100 spinners in attendance, and nine or ten vendors, mostly of fiber, but one sold handmade soaps. There was a program on Estonian lace knitting, and a special area where people were giving assistance to beginners. While the group is large and convivial, I did not feel like they were as welcoming as the Peachtree Handspinners Guild because the group was fragmented. Everyone was clustered around tables scattered throughout the room, whereas at PHG they form a big circle. Also, there was no way to go around the room and share introductions, news and knitting, though there were announcements made. Once I just picked a spot and introduced myself, everyone was very nice. I just found it relatively difficult to break the ice. Still, it seems like a good group with a whole lot of resources, and I met one girl that I may be joining for other knit nights and LYS excursions.



The next thing that I may be joining is the Crepe Sew Along over at Gertie's New Blog for Better Sewing. Gertie's blog started as a project to sew all of the patterns from the 1950's book Vogue's New Book for Better Sewing, but it has turned into much more. She has made it a forum for interesting discussion and a place to find great sewing information and tutorials. She is very inspirational, and she makes difficult things seem totally approachable. After watching her most recent sew along, I think I could tackle a custom fitted, hand tailored, fully interlined coat. Still, it's probably not a good idea for me to start there. Fortunately, her new sew-along is the beginner-friendly Crepe dress from Collette Patterns.



I have been an admirer of indie pattern company Collette Patterns since the first collection, when it was the owner Sarai's side venture, rather than her main employment. I can't quite remember whether I found it through Gertie or if I found Gertie though Sarai, but the designs are lovely, and from everything I have heard, the patterns are exceptionally well put together. The price is steep compared to what you pay for patterns a a chain store, but it sounds like what you get is higher quality, and you are supporting the livelihood of the designer. One main reason that I haven't purchased any of the patterns yet is that I haven't been sewing much, and I haven't used what I already own, so it is hard to justify buying new, especially given my employment situation.

Still, given the discounts available for the sew-along, and the rave reviews I have read recently, I have decided that if I can finish some of my existing sewing projects by the end of the month, then I can justify joining in, even if I'm a little late. I would check out local independent fabric shops first, but I found myself following Gertie's links to online retailers giving discounts, and I am finding the fabrics so inspiring.

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Baking and Canning

Today was a day for baking and canning. Yesterday, I dug up the rest of the potatoes, and today I used the green tomatoes that were harvested last week. I made green tomato and apple chutney and green tomato pickles. I haven't tasted the pickles yet, of course, but I like the chutney. I tried it on the bread I baked today.

With the last of the apples we picked, I also made more miniature apple pies for Scott to take to work.



There's a little how-to after the jump.

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Fiber and Faucets

Saturday, we went to a little fiber festival in Mason, MI, featuring fiber from four different local farms. I purchased about 12 oz of wool roving for spinning, shown above. The green is hand dyed Romney, and the brown is natural-colored Blue Faced Leicester from a sheep named Snickers. I believe it will match the handspun I made Scott a hat from a few years ago.

Mason is just a few miles south of Lansing, so we spent the rest of the day with a couple of friends who live there. We saw the house Bones bought earlier this year, and then went out for sushi, followed by a trip to the MSU dairy store, where we bought some interesting hard cheeses to try and ate some ice cream.



Sunday, Scott installed a new goose neck faucet in our kitchen. I am very exited about it because I can now get our big soup and canning pots under the faucet to fill them properly, plus it's much more attractive. Unfortunately, getting the old faucet out was a major ordeal. The shut-off valves under the sink were not functional, and once we turned the water off, they were stuck so hard on there that Scott was forced to cut them off with a hacksaw. He also struggled to unbolt the existing faucet from the sink, even with the help of penetrating oil. All of this unforeseen trouble led to several trips to the hardware store. Eventually, the faucet came off, and all of the new fittings and fixtures went in like a breeze. The pretty, new faucet is working great.



Inspired by our trip to the fiber fair, I spent a lot of Sunday spinning and plying the yarn pictured above. Sadly, my photography skills are a bit lacking, and the skein appears a bit washed out, but on the whole it is much more washed out than the original fiber was. I think I regret my choice to divide it into three sections and ply them together for a marled yarn. The result was a subtly variegated sage green yarn with an overall feel like an elven cloak from Lothlorien. My sections weren't quite even, so once I ran out of the first single, I navajo plied the remaining yarn. You can see the resulting small skein sitting on the table in front of the main skein. The difference is marked between the contrasts in this skein and the blends of the other. In retrospect, navajo plying all of the yarn would have created an effect that would have made the yarn better resemble the roving. I am not entirely sure what made this not as successful as other marled yarns I have made in the past, but I suspect it was a combination of the width of the roving and the length of the color sections. This has certainly been a lesson in controlling color results from my spinning.

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Living and Dining Room: Before & After, Plus Inspiration

Here is the progress that we have made on combining Scott and my things into his space. Really, this is just documentation of the way I added and rearranged the art on the walls.

Dining Room Before:



After:



More after the jump.

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Halloween Party

I was pleased the kitchen paint job done before our Halloween party last Friday. Scott always hosts a fairly large party on Halloween Friday, and this year was no exception. We even had a friend dressed as Captain America tending the bar for awhile:



I brought out my Black Cat costume from Dragon*Con:



Scott also rocked a Dragon*Con costume, because we concentrated our costume-making efforts on turning Thander into an Imperial Walker (AT-AT):



A good time was had by all, and we even had 11 people spend the night and stay for breakfast. We made "superhero breakfast", which is what Scott calls eggs-in-a-basket because of V for Vendetta. We used a star-shaped cookie-cutter to make them even more super hero themed. On Sunday, we used the leftover stars to make little french toasts:



I promise, they're bread, not murdered starfish.

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Kitchen Before and After

While I didn't really take before pictures of the entire kitchen, here is the summary so you can see what we finished last week. Remember the before, peachy-pink with stenciled ivy?



See the result after the jump.

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Dyeing and Spinning

I am finally pleased with the color of the handspun I was dying. It's not 100% what I was going for, which would have been a tad deeper and more blue, but it is still vey good.

I used additional grape Kool-Aid packets. Unfortunately, there was no blue Kool-Aid at the grocery store I went to, and the off-brand I bought turned out to be a red drink in a blue package. Fortunately, I did buy some food coloring from the baking aisle, and that turned out well. It's essentially the same kind of dye as is in the Kool-Aid. I used a whole bottle from the mixed color package, plus a few drops of green. I wonder why you can buy individual bottles of red, green, and yellow food coloring, but not blue?

Once I had dyed it, I tackled untangling it, because I had not tied it in enough places to keep the skein neat. Ply it was a five yard skein, which is just plain annoying. Next, I will be using it to knit the Peak's Island Hood, by Ysolda Teague.



I think it will be nice and warm for the upcoming Michigan winter.

Also on the handspun front, last night I got my wheel out for the first time since the move and worked on singles for a three ply yarn that I am spinning from Dragonfly Fibers hand-dyed merino silk roving that I bought at Stitches South in 2009.



From this:

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Paint Progress

Today should be my final day of painting. Good thing, too, since we are having a lot of people over on Friday for a Halloween party.



I did end up thinking that the Benjamin Moore Buxton Blue was too light. In our house full of dark colors, it ended up reading as baby blue, which wasn't good. On Monday we went to the closest hardware store and got a gallon of Dutch Boy Founding Father.



Remember, here's my inspiration, from Plain English Designs:



I'm really frustrated with myself because I think it isn't right either. I think if I hadn't been so impatient, and we had gone to the other hardware store and gotten the Benjamin Moore Jamestown Blue, which is the darker version of the Buxton Blue, then I would have had exactly what I wanted. I should have trusted my original instinct in the store that the Buxton Blue would be too light. And I should have brought home a color card and thought about it all more. I didn't have a color card at home when I decided to go darker, and I would have had to drive to the store to get one before I made my decision, whereas the other store was right around the corner, and I had a couple of colors I was looking at from there, plus I had tried to go to the other store the day before, but they were already closed. I was just too impatient, and now I think the color is too dark and kind of a boring plain blue whereas I wanted a greener, grayer blue. It's good enough, I suppose, and if the walls weren't primer white, it would probably be better. It's definitely not exactly what I wanted, but I am not going to do any more painting now. I am far too frustrated about having my kitchen and entire living area turned upside down, plus the price of paint is really adding up.

What I am totally pleased with is the repair job that Scott did on the cabinets over the sink.

As you can see, there was a stupid gap between the end of the top moulding on the side and the end on the front. This was on both cabinets on either side of the sink.



Scott filled it in beautifully with wood putty, perfectly mimicking the molding itself.



I am painting the final doors today, and I will show some after photos when have put them up.

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Progress and Inspiration

Over the last two days, while I had no internet access, I painted more of the kitchen. On Monday night, we went to the hardware store and priced some things and purchased others. One thing we got was a new light for the kitchen to replace the cheesy chandelier that was there. Scott installed it last night.



He also very kindly sanded the rest of the spots that I had plastered, since sanding is one of my absolutely least favorite task. Today, I primed the rest of the walls, except the one behind the appliances because I was unable to move them.

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Progress and diversions

Friday morning, I was distracted by looking at other people's design blogs, and I was just getting to working on plastering and sanding when we had a brown out. I ended up doing two stupid things: going to the grocery store while hungry and going to the hardware store while feeling bad about my house.

I was lucky, though, in that the hardware store was having a half-off plant sale.



I brought home some green-edged hostas and daylillies to provide some contrast to the white edges hostas in our front yard.

Yesterday, we went to the Eastern Market, a farmer's market that has been held every Saturday in downtown Detroit since 1891. According to the website, it extends for six blocks. It is a very interesting place, with local farmers, and people who bring in some produce from elsewhere, bakers, florists, and spice vendors in the main buildings, surrounded by shops selling food, drink, and candy. A lot of those buildings are butchers and fishmongers who clearly cater to restaurants, as they sell huge slabs of meat that a typical consumer would buy a slice or two of. Some of the adjacent buildings were restaurants, and some were both butcher shops and sandwich shops! We had a great time exploring, but I forgot my camera. We plan to go back next week for the beer festival, so I will try to remember then.

After we got home, Scott had to do some work for a deadline at his office. While he was doing that, I went outside and planted the things I bought Friday.

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Paints and dyes

In many ways, this week has been very frustrating for me. I have been preparing to paint our kitchen, which means that I have spent a fair amount of time scrubbing the walls and cabinets. This is a task that leaves very few visible results, which can be discouraging at the end of the day. Sometimes I feel like I have done little other than looking at other people's logs about what wonderful things they have done at their houses. That might be inspiring if I actually needed ideas rather than having more ideas than I can implement.

The main reasons that I haven't posted this week is that I hadn't finished anything, and for a while there, I didn't have anything to show for what I was working on.

Scott has been planning to rework his kitchen, but it still has the decor that it had when he moved in, because his plans are the ambitious kind that he is not ready to start yet.



Those of you who are familiar with my taste will guess that I am not a fan of the light peachy pink walls, and I am more likely to be found freeing a tree from being strangled by ivy than using ivy in any decorative or horticultural capacity.

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Pomatomus and Other Fibery Goodness

Tonight, I finished a pair of socks that I have been working on since August. The pattern is Pomatomus, by Cookie A. I don't know about the rest of you, but the cat kind of cracks me up in the picture above.

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