Category: Garments

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A Sunny Dress

Remember how I make something each year, and I call it my birthday (insert garment name here)? (2016, 2017, 2018, 2019)

I fully realize this is arbitrary, that I don’t make party dresses (with the potential exception of 2016) and for the most part these are purely descriptive and meaningless to anyone except me.

With that said… Welcome to Birthday Dress 2020. And here is my novel.

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Normally I make these garments prior to the day, and then parade around in them on the day.

We went into what I over-exaggerate to a lockdown maybe a week before my birthday, can’t quite remember. (It was voluntary but strongly suggested stay at home… You could have left the house for a walk, past Jess. It would’ve been fine). Wasn’t that three years ago?

So I was less motivated to make ahead, and instead made it on the day. And the next day. And the day after that. I was a little scattered, but also made so many noms. If I couldn’t celebrate my birthday out, I was going to over-celebrate in. Also, Marvel movies.

I can’t get into the first day until we talk about the fabric, though… I think I had a good dose of panic when the college I work out announced it’s decision to do online learning, and no, I did not buy large quantities of toilet paper. (I’m not an animal. Also it was all gone by that point. I’m not getting desperate). No, I decided to go craft supply shopping. I bought altogether too much fabric (I have plans, I promise), some foam for some props, a mystery yarn bag from my local yarn shop, pins for more intricate lace making (oh yeah, I’m making lace now. This is something I do now), and too much snack food.

When I got home from that massive shopping trip, I was still amped and antsy, so I ended up doing a ton of random crafty research, probably Pinterest fueled, and then decided to do some ice dyeing. I still had a lot of linen/rayon from a purchase last year, the same stuff I used for my green Flints, so I decided to use that. It’s been cut down into 2 about-2-yard lengths, and the first one I dyed was in the color scheme that I have called “Van Gogh” for awhile now. Think the sunflowers and the cafe terrace and the many of the famous self portraits. Light aquas and blues, soft greens, rich golds and light oranges. That’s what I aimed for here.

I followed the general directions from Dharma Trading Co, which is where I’ve gotten all my dyes, and I think it turned out pretty well. I love the flow of the shapes that come out of it. It doesn’t look quite like tie dye, nor painting. It’s unique, and I love it.

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Back in November, I bought two new sewing patterns, and this one is the Hannah Dress from Victory Patterns. After a muslin from a bed sheet, I was ready to go, knowing that I had to shorten it by a couple inches. For the main body fabric, I used a sunny linen/rayon blend from Joann’s, and for the side panels I used the ice dyed linen/rayon.

Sewing it up went well, and I tried to keep the process as calm and level as possible, which was mostly successful. And I know this because I filmed the whole thing. (Cue the nervous laughter). It’s hard to remember how much ironing there is in sewing until you edit a video about sewing a garment… Please enjoy!

This was a great first project in this crazy time, and it’s been a great thing to put on when I need a bit more pep in my stay at home step. In the future I’ll definitely lower the neckline. It hits right at or above the collarbone, and will hang awkwardly when seated, and I also get a little claustrophobic with a high neck. But otherwise I love it!

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See you next time!

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Jasika Blazer – Take 2

Now that it’s been nearly a year, I think I’ve finally processed making this blazer.

Last year after the Jasika Blazer was released I jumped on the bandwagon and made a “wearable” muslin. As in, it was wearable, but not particularly professional in real life, and at the time I had an interview scheduled, and I really wanted to wear a blazer, and I didn’t want to try to go and purchase one if I knew I could make one myself.

So the second one was made in just about a week, and I’m super proud. Also, I haven’t worn it since. More on that later.

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The fabric for the main body of the blazer is a lightweight cotton from IKEA (Main fabric). Honestly too lightweight for it. Hindsight. The lapel is made with a brocade from Joann Fabrics (Option 1). Also not my favorite. When I moved, something must have caught on it, because there’s a big pull of thread on one side. And the lining is from stash.

Looking back at my Instagram posts that I made during this period, it seems to have been pulled together smoothly, and sure, it seems like I took a day off after I saw Avenger’s Endgame, but I didn’t announce to the world that anything went wrong, at least?

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I remember wearing it made me feel both like a powerhouse, and self conscious when it buckled in weird places.

The first one was made from a true medium weight fabric, and so it stayed solid in areas that caved in this second one.

I also think I should have shortened it a bit further, and maybe used a different cup size, as when it’s buttoned I get some weird gaping between button and bust.

So you are seeing it unbuttoned, as that’s where I’m most comfy photograph-wise.

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If it seems like I’m feeling down about it, I’m not. I’m proud of this blazer. I’m proud of the journey that both of them took me on, because I’m definitely more comfortable with speed-tailoring.

But I just don’t wear blazers in real life, I did not get the job that I interviewed for right after making this blazer, and that’s hard. The job that I’m currently working was possibly my next interview after the blazer one, and it involved an online interview, so I ended up wearing a nice sweater instead.

Plus, I just now tried on both blazers a year later, and they’re more snug at the waist than I’d prefer. We’ll see what happens when the world has reached an equilibrium again, but I think these might be destined for a thrift store.

I think it’s also that I’m really enjoying a more cropped silhouette for my upper body garments. And these blazers are full length, which hit me (in my eyes) at a weird place and makes me feel and look shorter.

But I learned so much, especially with this one, and the next time I make a blazer (that’s more my style) I’ll have the confidence to make it! Now that I’m up north, and I found a store that sells reasonably priced wool, I might even try to make a tweedy one! Not anytime soon, but you never know!

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Rust Bucket

Late last year I made my quickest sweater ever.

I mean, if we’re counting, it’s my third knitted sweater, and fourth sweater overall (after 2 crochet ones), so it’s not like this is a huge track record to beat.

But oh boy was it quick!

Two weeks.

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Feel free to laugh, but I’ll be the one laughing in an incredibly warm and squooshy alpaca sweater.

Also this sweater cost 20 dollars. And time.

Since I moved to New England in early fall, I needed to get a new driver’s license. The closest DMV to me is between 30 and 45 minutes away depending on whether I’m functionally awake, whether it’s precipitating, and how far (not) over the speed limit I want to drive on unfamiliar roads. Luckily this DMV had Saturday hours, but only until noon.

Have I ever told you that I’m not a morning person?

So the way I convinced myself to go to the DMV was to treat myself to yarn afterwards! And it was such a great store. Yarn piled taller than me, an excellent sale rack, and such nice employees! I think I spent an hour just checking out what they had!

While perusing the sale section I found a bag of multiple skeins of alpaca yarn marked at $10 in browns and greys. Then I found some coordinating rust alpaca and got 2 skeins for $5 each. So the brown is Mirasol Sulka, the rust is Mirasol K’acha, and sure the grey is Araucania Coliumo.

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And then I set out to make a sweater that did not require five billion skeins when I had six. I started out using the Chunky Knit Fisherman’s Rib Sweater by Handy Little Me before getting to the end of the first ball and realizing that I would never ever make it to the end of the sweater. So I ripped some back and started freestyling and knitted and knitted and knitted.

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The real winner here is finding the Fisherman’s Rib. I love the very squish that it makes! So stretchy too, and very plush.

I ended up with something like kimono sleeves with a tiny eyelet detail and a round neck. In the pics I’m wearing it over my first Sew Over It Vintage Shirtdress.

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And it’s warm and it’s comfy, and it’s cropped in a good way! I’ve got a few more knits for the blog, so I suppose that’ll be the plan for the next post! See you next time!

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Longest Lived Me Mades

I’ve definitely waxed on and on that I worked in a costume shop during college.

One of the many advantages is the availability of excess fabric that qualifies as scraps. And that’s what both of these cardigans were made from, over a couple of weekends about 6 years ago.

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They’re both an earthy green, because it’s one of my favorite colors to wear, and I guess I was able to get sizeable enough scraps of pretty much the same color!

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(PS We’re back with the blurry photos… I’ve learned my lesson, I promise!)

I think the first one I made was what I call the “round” one, because it’s got rounded edges on the fronts. I knew what the general shapes should be for front, back, and sleeves. One weekend I went into the shop when I knew it wasn’t going to be busy and I just draped the fabrics on a dressform and cut the vaguely right shapes out. The front and back fabric has a nubbly texture, and isn’t very stretchy, while the sleeve fabric is, so I’m glad I made that choice.

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The one thing I remember from that weekend is that I put it on and immediately found it super uncomfortable because it wasn’t reaching around my back all the way. So I cut straight up the middle of the back piece and added a rectangle of the sleeve fabric. And then when I tried it on, I didn’t love the volume of the addition around my waist, so I made a couple tucks!

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To finish the neckline and armbands, I turned each over once and sewed it down. For the circular area of the front, I just serged it.

It has been a staple of my wardrobe for years. The downside is that I made the arms a touch too short, but I almost always shove my sleeves up anyway, so it works as long as I’m not in the middle of winter, I’m good.

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The other one was based off of a blog post I found through Pinterest (and have since seriously lost track of) where it laid out the way to cut out this cute cardigan with exposed seams and a facing detail that was pulled back by buttons.

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My fabric is more flimsy, and I was super new to interfacing, so I had no idea that the buttonholes would be super flimsy… but they are. Going in, I did know that I wanted full length sleeves… but more on that in a sec.

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I made up the cardigan, taking care with sewing down seams (both exposed and not) with a zig zag stitch, and I used some pearly buttons at the shoulders and a very special button for the front.

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This button was part of my very first purchase from Mood Fabrics. My mom and I had watched some Project Runway while I was in high school, so during a trip to NYC, I met with my parents and my mom and I dragged my dad to Mood for a quick look around. On a next to nothing student budget, there was a lot I could dream about buying, but I did purchase some lace and this button. I keep thinking I’ll scalp it from this cardigan someday, but I haven’t found another good thing to put it on!

Remember how I said that I wanted full length sleeves? I found out that I couldn’t, not with that fabric, so I found another fabric, that I think was a grey or a black, and it didn’t have stretch. As a newbie sewist, I was naive and thought it’d work out. I made what could be considered sleeve extensions. They were uncomfortable, and they were

A couple months later of not using the sweater, I decided to unpick the weird sleeve extensions and here we are!

Six years with these, and here’s to more!

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Jasika Blazer

When the Jasika Blazer was announced, it almost felt like the release was timed for me, because I was just starting to get some good job nibbles in motion, so I purchased the pattern, gathered some of the materials and stalled. Not for too long, but I definitely waited until about halfway through the big CCP Blazer of Glory sewalong before I started to catch up.

I’ve made two of these blazers since then, but this post will be about the first one (I’m still in recovery mode for blazer number 2).

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All of the materials were stashed for this first blazer, but that also means that a lot of different fabrics went into it. Six in fact. Six fabrics.

1 – Navy blue twill that makes up the bulk of the jacket. I think it’s polyester, and it’s pretty heavy.

2 – Green cotton, possibly flannel for the side panels

3 – Green velvet, which later became crushed for the collar and lapels

4 – Navy blue brushed twill for the bottom sleeves… Because of an interfacing error the original twill pieces became unusable. So I cut more out of the only navy blue twill I had left!

5 – Light blue lining with painted blobs, otherwise known as the only lining fabric in my currently limited selection I could get the back pieces out of.

6 – Turquoise/green lining, because it almost kind of matches. Not really. But kind of.

 

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But before I cut into the fabric I made a muslin. For the muslin, I cut out size 12, with the C cup FBA pattern piece for the front, I think. Size 12 was good, but in ultimate hindsight (one muslin and two makes in) I think I’m probably halfway between the normal pattern and the FBA pattern, and should consider dealing with that next time… If I need a next time.

When I tried on the muslin, though,  I realized that I needed to take in the side seams a little, since I’m a petite person and the side seams were doing nothing for me. I also removed about two inches of length from the body and sleeves, and could probably stand to remove more. And finally, I did a swayback adjustment, which ultimately was successful on the outer, but less on the lining. Now that I’ve stepped back, that segment of the lining caused problems solely because of improper adjusting of the lining piece. But the altered muslin did look pretty good!

In making the garment, I did want to do it all from stash, so I did cheat a little and used a double layer of lightweight fusible in place of the hair canvas… Looking back, I don’t know how much of a difference it is. It is definitely stiffer than my hair canvas shoulders on v2, but not super stiff.

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I ended up doing a lot of hand sewing in this garment because of sheer determination and lack of willingness to see stuff on the right side of the jacket. Like with the lapel easing… You are very unlikely to see the underside of the lapel, but I decided to hand sew the required ribbon in anyway because what happens if my machine spits out a threadball… Then I’d have to unpick it and hand sew it anyway, right?

(In hindsight, I still think this is fair, but also it was a bit fussy.)

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Then I found out that the marker I had used to mark most of the front was waterbased, and that steaming would smudge it. Silly Jess. I only have white chalk at the moment, because most of what I sew is dark or colors, but the interfacing I had for the fronts was a light grey, so I needed to mark it with something darker. Luckily for me the actual jacket front pieces were navy, so the red smudges would never show through, but it was a good lesson to learn.

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Let’s not talk about pocket 2…

Sewing the welt pockets was fun, to a degree. I’m not a precision sewist, so I wasn’t sure how it’d go, but I just jumped in and went for it.

For the record, I’ve done double welt buttonholes before, so I felt pretty confident going into it. Thank you coat that I’ve rarely worn because NC is too warm for it!

And then after the welt pocket, it was basically smooth sailing! I have pictures for before and after the collar/lapel insertion, and then the finished garment! I definitely remember completing the lining in one sitting, in maybe 4 hours tops (from cutting to assembling to break to sewing in with very careful detail to the instructions).

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I made my own shoulder pads and sleeveheads out of cotton batting from my quilting stash (hip hip hooray for stash!),  and because I have what I consider very sloping shoulders, I made them extra big. I don’t think it looks like 80’s shoulders big, so I’m not worrying about it, but just to bring it up: very sloping shoulders may need to adjust somehow…

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And yeah, I think that’s it. It was a worthy garment to make, and really boosted my skillset. Plus… very soft velvet lapels/collar.

Sadly it’s too warm for NC, which started believing it was summer in mid April, so I’ll have to give this blazer a second opinion in fall.

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Emerald Flint Trousers

A month or two ago the Sewcialists announced that they were going to put on a mini challenge over a weekend, and that it was just for fun, so no pressure or anything to join up.

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These are not the right shoes for this length… Oops.

So of course I put a ton of pressure on it.

But in reality, I knew that I didn’t have anything else on my plate that weekend, and that I could probably spend the entire time sewing.

So I did.

The mods announced the challenge on Thursday, so I dutifully took the incredibly entertaining quiz and received the word “Spicy” as inspiration.

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Because I am not a spicy person, and spicy food disagrees with me, I thought about what would spice up my wardrobe. I remembered a passing thought I had a few  months prior when I was wearing my grey Flints, that it would be awesome if I had some green Flints to change up my wardrobe. And thus, a plan.

I had not yet cut into my lot of rayon-linen blend from Dharma Trading, so I cut off about 2 yards (in hindsight should’ve done a bit more) and prepped to dye the fabric.

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Got out: 5 gallon bucket, dye, soda ash fixer, canister of salt, desk chair, wooden spoon, fully charged computer with a show playing.

(My roommate must have thought I was nuts, since this was my first time dyeing fabric since I moved in.)

And I sat and stirred for what felt like hours. And was probably an hour and a half.

Then comes the requisite wash and tumble dry before I could find out what color I actually had was. The suspense was killing me! I used two color catchers on that load, and both came out pretty blue, so I’m glad I used them.

The fabric came out the perfect green. So the next day I ironed (ugh), did some small pattern alterations to fix the weird wrinkles in the back (meh), and cut out the pieces (so wide, so many), and started piecing together the pants. Just like the grey ones, I bias bound every single seam, which did not take up as much time as I thought it would, because by Friday night I was done, excepting hems.

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The next day I waffled about the length to hem, so I decided to put some trim on the side, and found this cool black crochet trim in my stash that has little bobbles along the edge. I aligned this with the side seam and sewed it down, and then I hemmed the pants. They’re skimming the ground when I’m in my normal shoes, 1 inch off in my dance heels, and I try not to wear anything flatter.

They got the swing dance seal of approval that night, both with others’ compliments, and how fun they were to dance in. So comfy, so swishy. Just so good.

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I’ve found that the fabric has terrible recovery, and the waist will bag out massively as time goes on, but I keep a safety pin in the waistband and adjust as needed.

Secret pajamas for the win!

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Movie Socks

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I’m definitely an impulse knitter. Unlike sewing where I’ll plan and mostly execute, with knitting I’ll get started on a project and let it simmer for altogether too long until I marathon to the finish.

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These socks were started the night I saw Deadpool for the first time, probably a week after it’d been released in theaters (prime knitting in an empty theater time).

The first one has a bump, or rather a pattern miscalculation, near the toe from an unfortunate incident with a movie called “How to Be Single.” I was there for a friend’s birthday, but I couldn’t stand the movie, so I was the weirdo who pulled out spiky sock knitting during a friend’s birthday outing to a chick flick and then cupcakes (RIP Sugarland). These socks are old enough that the cupcake place has since closed.

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I would tinker with these at various movies, watching TV, passenger in long car trips for a while. Definitely some Star Wars was input. Possibly Spiderman Homecoming.

And at some point I finished the first sock. I should note here that I was basically making this pattern up as I went. I knew I wanted a small twist up the front, and a larger twist up the back leg, so that’s what I aimed to design. With mixed, but overall good success.

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I had taken moderately good notes on my self directed pattern, but second sock syndrome hit me hard. When I finally did start working on the second, I had accidentally deleted part of the notes… Whoops.

So the second sock is definitely more sister than twin, but I think that’s okay… Because it’s done!

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Over the holidays in 2018 I finished the sock during the super long drive.

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Victory! Till the next round of procrastination, at least.

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Want some cake with that Frosting?

As usual I’m about a month behind on my posts, nearing a month and a half any day now…

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(Sorry for those curious about what I made for Christmas… Check in closer to February… I hope)

So in the beginning of October, Heather from Closet Case Files and Kelli from True Bias put on a challenge to bring frosting back to the online sewing community.

Basically frosting is the stuff like party dresses and bright green coats and silk pajamas and stuff. Cake, on the other hand, is black t-shirts and jeans and workwear.

On a side note, frosting is so much more fun to post about… its pretty, the details are memorable, and you don’t have to blow out the picture to see any design details on your black on black on denim garment… Whew, I did not know I had that many feelings about the three or four black t-shirts I’ve made.

This came around about the same time that I told myself that I was definitely this time going to finish my latest costume… Which was also a long tabled costume. And I did! Not by the deadline, but eh… Only like two days afterwards?

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I’m hoping to get a post on my Cinderella dress sometime in the next month or so…

So I knew that I had a whole bolt of tulle that I wasn’t going to use, and then I made a plan, in theory to help motivate myself to finish the Cinderella dress… It didn’t help.

I would use the tulle to make an awesome poufy skirt, then either make a woven T-shirt out of a gorgeous fabric or a camisole out of something pretty, and then a lace shirt on top!

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Knowing this, I got around to finishing up my Cinderella dress, then nearly immediately got to cutting out the tulle circle skirts… I got up to about 15 before I was happy with the opacity. Now, I didn’t finish the skirt… I just left it out on my dress form for about the next 3.5 weeks…

At some point in early November I made a trip to my local fabric store and picked up a yard of this lovely (and practically neon) lime green silk cotton twill. And proceeded to use it for an unintended purpose, and made a camisole out of it.

This was definitely after I’d written a post about not making Ogdens out of anything very stiff… Maybe not posted, but definitely written. So I made one out of twill. Not my finest moment.

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Overall the camisole turned out nice. It’s not one I’d wear on its own in summer, but when worn with a black sweater, or with an overshirt, it looks quite pretty. I lined it with scraps of some undyed rayon lawn from these projects.

But then I remembered it was winter, and I had been making most of these pieces while completely covered in blankets… at my sewing machine.

So I decided to continue on and make the lace shirt? When I really wore this outfit in the real world, I definitely wore a sweater.

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I used my trusty Onyx top as the pattern, and used up the very last of this lace. I did have to piece the lace together on the back (and maybe the sleeve?) in order to complete the top.

Basically I laid one scrap on top of the other, lined up the pattern so it matched on the top and the bottom, pinned them until they wouldn’t shift in an earthquake, and then carefully sewed the pieces together.

Then I finally realized that I’d not finished up the skirt, so I cut out the waistband from some old stone colored mystery fabric (on the Sunday I used in my previous post) and the next week I sewed up the waistband and attached it to the skirt.

I had a quick photoshoot before work one day (though I only wore the camisole with a sweater to work… Not the skirt), and froze while I was trying to show off the garments. So there wasn’t a lot of smiling, because I was cold and rushing, but I do love the garments.

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The next week I wore this entire outfit to a ballroom dance, and though I looked and felt cute, I discovered one incredibly important thing.

The skirt is ridiculously itchy and uncomfortable. So itchy, even over top of a slip. My refrain for the night was “So itchy!!!” and I also found that it takes up the entire seat area in the car and spills over into part of the console… But can I repeat, itchy?

It’s possible I’ll make some kind of underskirt, but it’ll be in time out for now…

The other two pieces are awesome, and I’m enjoying pulling them into my wardrobe.

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So that’s my #sewfrosting outfit! It’s very bright, and not something I’d wear regularly, but it also is quite a cute little gumdrop ensemble! I’m glad I have pieces that I can wear in real life that’ll remind me fondly of this challenge.

Sometimes you need a little frosting to make you appreciate cake!

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Suki Robe

Over the summer I bought the Suki Robe pattern by Helen’s Closet, printed and assembled, cut two versions, and sewed them up in about a month. (ETA Helen has removed this pattern from the Helen’s Closet roster, so I can’t link you to it. Helen suggests the Lahja Dressing Gown from Named Clothing as an alternative.)

It’s one of the only things I actually finished on my Summer Sewing list.

As I mentioned, I made two. One that’s actually a dressing robe and one that’s more pretty and decorative.

Both were made from stash fabrics, though the dressing gown has sleeves made from rayon leftover from a dress that I cut out at the same time. The decorative one is made out of a delicate silk (I think, at least), and the dressing gown was produced from a polyester that has just a bit of grip to it.

Cutting them out went smoothly, except for not having quite enough fabric for either one. Darn stash fabric. So the dressing robe got contrasting sleeves, and the decorative robe got a slimmed down front panel that just has the neckband, and not the corner detail, like it mentioned in this hack post.

The dressing robe was sewn on a machine with French seams in about 4 hours, and it was awesome. Quick, everything lined up, etc. I did have trouble with the inset corner dealio, but the steps were well laid out, I just got a little cocky. And didn’t follow them well.

After finishing it, I put it on for pretty much the rest of the day, and it was fun swooshing around the apartment. And up until winter hit, I wore it most mornings…

The second one, the decorative one, was slower. The fabric was so delicate that I wanted to sew it by hand. Each seam was sewn with a backstitch, then I roll “hemmed” the seam allowance down to finish the seam. The neckband was only slightly difficult, as I had to match the rolling a couple times that didn’t quite match up. Every edge that was not a seam was rolled as well, except for the hem where I used the selvedge.

So that was the summer. And these robes are great!

But then it got cold… So I bought some fuzzy fleece and some minky (Yay 50% off at Joann’s!) and got to work. (You know… About a month after actually buying the fleece.)

I cut out the full pattern as designed this time, but didn’t look up the instructions because I was honestly too cold to waste the time… I keep my apartment cool in the winter to save energy and money, but it does mean that I’m wearing a blanket while doing pretty much anything… Let’s not talk about how I got powdered sugar on my blanket wrap on Thanksgiving… So I needed this robe asap! I also didn’t press any seams, mostly because I was lazy, but also I gave myself the excuse that I didn’t know if I’d melt anything or lose the pile on the minky.

And I’ve almost never taken off the robe since… Okay. I’ve gone to work. But once I get home, the robe is first step… Maybe second after slippers.

Now let me find my vacuum so I can get rid of all the minky fuzz…

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Hand Embroidery on My Daily Garments

I was going to use this post to just tell you about my two black rayon Onyx tops, but realistically they’re only slightly altered from the pattern and boring on their own… What’s more cool is all the embroidery I did on them, a skill that I’ve been working on for the past few years.skirt.jpg

Maybe we should start waaaaaay back, with this shot of embroidery from my Merida inspired skirt. This was a linen skirt that I embroidered a motif from Brave’s concept art on. Each motif took between 4 to 6 hours, depending on my mood, brainpower, and willingness to have rather big stitches.

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Then we get to the first of my Onyx tees, the one with stems, leaves, and flowers. I embroidered this while on a road trip between Asheville NC, Nashville TN, and New Orleans LA.

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Next after that came some new to the blog embroidery: my Ariel blouse! I embroidered small waves around the neckline and did some chain stitch around the sleeve hem. I was really trying to drive home the Little Mermaid vibe.

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A couple months later (for instance, after I finished my defense and my paper for my Master’s thesis) I found myself embroidering another Onyx tee, with coppers and aqua. Don’t tell the other ones but this one is my favorite! I affectionately call it the Orange Peel. I guess because it looks like an orange with seeds in it if you squint and then close your eyes and imagine.

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Then around last Christmas I made my first Ogden cami, and after I made the small adjustments I needed to make it wearable, I embroidered the armscye to keep the facing down. Not a lot of embroidery, but it make it special.

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In July I made an Ogden dress (that was featured in my upcoming post about my Ogdens) and embroidered an abstract selection of french knots on the front, and a large running stitch V on the back.

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My favorite pair of jeans had an unfortunate turn of events… The left pocket bag started rotting out (and the other one has started too…), so I did a subtle little bit of visible mending to put in new pocket bag fabric, instead of taking the entire pair of jeans apart to do the same thing.

As for making these pieces of embroidery, I have been mostly just using the fabric plus interfacing required by the patterns to keep it steady. No extra interfacing, at least. I do use a hoop when I can though.

Laundering it is not much extra. When I used household machines I barely even worried, but now that I have to use industrial laundry room machines, I make sure that all of the hooks and closures on my clothing are closed before I put them into the wash, so there’s less chance of catching.

And that winds down my embroidery post!

I do have some embroidery I’d like to do before the month is out (sew frosting anyone?) so I’m hoping to get some shots explaining how I go about it… So look out for that in the next couple weeks.

I know that I’ll continue to embroider on the things I make, because it makes me happy, but it’s been trickling in a bit slower this year. As with my sewing, my embroidering has slowed down now that I kind of make for a living, but I am trying to make it more intentional. So we’ll see what’s next, right?

Cool.

Also, I might be making embroidery patterns for sale soon… Any requests?