A Broken Promise

I promised myself that I would not become like my mother and hoard fabric.  Up until now, I've done pretty well; at least in the whole yardage category.  I admit to bins full of wool blazers, wool and cashmere sweaters, or men's shirts meant to be turned into either purses, hats, and aprons.  Now that I think of it, I also have a stash of upholstery fabrics.  Okay, you've got me--I've failed miserably at un-stashing.

When I saw a quilt posted on a friend's wall I followed the link and found Marybeth at http://www.cambridgelane.com/.  We've since formed a friendship and gone to places like the Georgia Quilt Show.

This friendship led to meeting Anita Heady who opened Sewcial Studio in April http://www.headyfiberarts.com/.

Since then my love of fabrics has been re-kindled.  Anita has so many great quality fabrics that my promise will definitely stay broken.  If I'm not careful, I'll be moving the contents of her store to my stash.

Here's a panel I bought yesterday.

My first thought was to use it for a new comforter for my bed and add more fabric around it to make it the right size.  But then after I brought it home I'm wondering if I'll just make a wall hanging out of it.

Which is leading to my newest passion - modern quilting.  I've loved quilts for a long time but the exact measuring and fitting each piece together drove me to distraction.  There's even an art to crazy quilting.  So far, I've only made crib quilts.  They're a size I can handle.

Now with my new friend Marybeth and her longarm quilting machine I can make any size.

I was also inspired yesterday by my trip to Washington, Georgia to see the Quilts of Gee's Bend.  There was only a sampling at the Fitzpatrick Hotel but it really whetted my appetite for seeing  more and making my own.

I'm eying my stashes of shirts, blazers and sweaters in a new light. 

A Study in Muslin

I've been doing a lot of alterations and home decorating projects in the last couple of years.  Some have been a bit of a challenge.  Like the car engine you take apart and put together only to find that you have an extra piece.  But that's the thrill of alterations.  Kind of like a mystery I need to figure out with no butlers involved.

I have done custom clothing along the way; like skirts, a casual dress, and a wedding dress. Re-purposing of thrift store finds to make aprons and purses is probably a step between alterations and custom clothing. 

I just got a call from a customer who would like some summer blouses made.  She's giving me a try and brought over a blouse that a student started to sew for her and gave up.  During the to figure out how I could rescue the blouse, my customer mentioned that if this works out she might like some more of the same style and would I be making a pattern. 

Sure I could make a muslin (trial runs of a garment so you can fit it to the person before you sew it in the fashion fabric).  I remember reading an article in Threads Magazine by Susan Khalje, a couture sewing teacher, and perused through the back issues until I found the right one.  Okay, I'm up for a challenge.

Instead of using actual muslin fabric I pulled a thrift store sheet from my stash.  First step, iron.  I haven't ironed a sheet since I did odd jobs in high school!  Okay, you're thinking it was before they invented polyester.  I'm not that old but there were ladies who didn't like wrinkly sheets.  I won't bring up the aunt who used to iron socks so that they'd fit in a drawer.

After ironing I laid the pattern out and marked the seam allowances with a pencil.  With all these multi-sized patterns there are no markings for that any more.  Then I took my colored transfer paper and a tracing wheel and marked the sheet with all the necessary information.

Before this article I just cut out the pattern in the muslin/sheet and went from there.  With the couture method there are a few more steps.  Since you can only see the markings on one side of the fabric I needed to sew with a basting stitch and contrasting thread on all the seam allowances.  You also cut at least an inch beyond the seam allowance just in case you have to let it out more than 5/8 of an inch.  I don't envision that with this customer but it's good practice.

Now with that done it's time to sew it together.  This time I use matching thread.  Don't want to be pulling out any of the seam allowance thread since it will be used in making a pattern later.

Like most things, once the prep work is done it goes together pretty quickly. 

 However, I do have a concern,  The customer doesn't like back seams so I took that out.  It's not going to be made out of a knit fabric and without that stretch I have no idea how she's going to get it over her head.  I've loosened the shoulder seams so she'll at least be able to get it on.  Then I guess we'll go from there.

Another mystery in the making.

Heads Did Roll

Hi, my name is Roary and I'm guest posting here at Sew Grammo.

I was born in Las Cruces, the third largest city in New Mexico a little over ten years ago.  My family is small but I'm treated royally.    I live in a secluded neighborhood on a hill with my parents, a retired NMSU professor and website designer and my dad, a retired doctor.

So you can imagine my surprise when just a few weeks ago while relaxing in my den that my head rolled off.  I'd show you a picture but it's just too painful to look at myself with my head in my lap.

I can't even begin to tell you the surprise in my mother's eyes when she arrived back from her trip to Mexico and saw the stump on top of my neck.  She immediately emailed SuBEARstition Teddies where I was bearthed and was referred to a specialist in bear repair.

Dr. Harry Restore to the rescue!  I was shipped off to his small clinic in Georgia for reconstruction surgery. Luckily the damage wasn't too severe.  At the time of my bearth it was believed that dental floss was the proven method to secure a head to the body.  It seemed strong and it smelled minty fresh.  It was later proven to be only good for cleaning teeth.

The floss was removed and replaced with strong bonded nylon.  I think I'm good for quite a while now.  While Dr. Restore was in there I had him do my eyes.  You know after a few years things tend to sag a little.  Now I look as youthful as the day I was bearthed.

Today I travel back to New Mexico.  The accommodations were great at the clinic with lots of TLC but I'm looking forward to being back in my own den.

Adiós Amigos!  Roary