Today I thought I’d share some of what I do when I have a completely plan free day… Which is a strong way to say I’ll show you how I procrastinate. On projects. With other projects. All day long.
Let’s start by explaining the project I started out wanting to do on the Sunday in question (for context, it’s the one after Thanksgiving).
When I’m itching to start a project, I try to pause, and go through a couple questions:
- What do I need to make?
- Do I really need it, or do I just want it? (Not a dealbreaker, just a consideration)
- Do I already have the materials?
- Do I have the time to complete it before/around other obligations?
In this case, I needed some long sleeve tees. I’d donated a bunch last year in my move since I wore them so infrequently, but now that it’s winter again, I realized it was time to make some long sleeve versions. So I really needed to make one. And I already had the material, a soft warm plum colored rayon jersey, with a little spandex if I remember correctly. Finally, I had all day to complete the project. (Which made it the perfect project, but also didn’t work out terribly well).
When I picked up the fabric from my shelf, though, I remembered that I had wanted to make a nightgown out of this cool blue stretchy not-lace fabric, so I pulled that out.
After I decided on my plans for the day, it was time to make some tea. This is some Harney and Sons tea that my brother gifted me a few years ago.
With tea in hand, it was time to get to work!
I pulled out my Nettie hack for T-shirts from my traced patterns, when I realized that the front was still marked in pencil, so I needed to stop and write out the name in some marker.
In pulling out that pattern, though, I saw the tap pants pattern, and remembered that I needed a pair for #sewfrosting challenge. I pulled out some appropriate fabric at this point. I did realize at that point that I wasn’t getting to the not-lace, so I put that away again.
Then I remembered that I needed to draw my third watercolor insect for my self-guided monochromatic watercolor fantasy insect challenge. So I did.
Next I cut out my tap pants, then the t-shirt pieces.
And stopped for a cookie break.
For the #sewfrosting challenge, I also was sewing up a tulle skirt (you saw it in my 2018 misses post), but I needed a waistband for that, and I’ve learned that straight waistbands don’t cut it for me, so I started drafting a curvier waistband for my Belladone pattern, and traced the rest of the pattern while I was at it. I’m converting to tissue paper versions of my patterns, so this was in line with that endeavor. And then I cut those waistband alts out of some stone colored fake linen.
Another cookie break!
With all the pieces for three projects cut, I then got distracted again, this time by the silk cotton Ogden cami I had just made earlier that weekend, which I have yet to properly blog. I had big plans of embroidering the neckline, which were later dashed, but I hooped it up just in case.
This was when I realized, over lunch, that I had planned to do Gift Guides, but had no pictures yet. And while I was at it, I could take some extra pictures of my old pattern storage, and my new pattern storage (since the transition was still in progress). And if I cleaned up the room I could take pictures of the craft room for a post. And if I took a shower I could take pictures of my Suki Kimonos for a post. And while the sun was good I could take better photos of my embroidered clothing.
This batching of pictures is something I do a lot, since it’s hard to count on the sun behaving enough in winter to be out the next weekend.
So that’s when I decided to put my cut pieces of fabric for my shirt and tap pants away in my vintage suitcase, and leaned into the photography.
Sometime during the afternoon I decided to bake bread, and right after it was fully dark outside, the bread came out of the oven. I enjoyed a small pretzel loaf, not much bigger than a roll.
Finally, I spent the evening doodling and watching tv.
*
Just in case you thought I hadn’t finished the projects, I did in fact finish the tee, about two weeks later at work, while I was watching the floor. It allowed me to serge all the seams, so that one is not breaking anytime soon. The tap pants were completed later in the week, in order to finish the frosting challenge on time.
I am capable of following a list, but if I don’t have a list prepared, this is pretty typical!
So, now that you’ve got a play by play on my distractional tendencies, I gotta ask: do distractions enrich and shape your life as well?