I decided to change the way my fabric is organized yet again. I had it on a garment rack, hung up with skirt hangers and this worked for a little while but I felt like it was taking up too much room and looked messy. I needed to make way for my new dress form! Also, it just wasn’t quite visible enough.

I decided to color coordinate and roll up my yardage in put them into my Ikea EXPEDIT bookshelf.

Here is what it looks like now:

It almost looks like I have a reasonable stash and not one that is completely out of control!

Here is my cutting table arrangement. I did buy a huge ass cutting board to go on top of it recently and it is not in this picture. Instead, you get a very magnificent cat named Foxtrot:

The bottom shelf is one bin of larger patterns, mostly ones that have been completed and have tracings, etc making them bulky and also my muslins fabrics. The second shelf has a bin of patterns and a bin of medium sized scraps and the top shelf has two bins that contain projects in progress an so the contents rotate as needed.

In this pic you can see my sewing machines, a large bin of bulky fabrics, a book case, a corkboard with all kinds of crap on it that recently all just fell down onto the floor and made a big mess and the cutting table again. The mirror in the bottom right has to go, it can’t be hung up and I want to set up a dressing room type mirror like a friend has in her studio. the EXPEDIT bookcase is to my right but you cant see it in this picture.

When I get home I will either continue to work on my dress form or I will sew up a bathing suit really quick in time for Maui. I have some black with large red polka dots lycra and a new kwik sew bathing dress pattern with princess seams.

Reds and pinks!

Here are some fabrics I picked up cheap at the East Bay Depot for Reuse the other day:

Check out those awesome plaids. I plan on making Jack a stylin’ wardrobe of plaid pants for fall while he is still young enough not to know to protest. maybe a shirt the the flamingos to go with them? heh.

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I bought this little balsa wood doll bed the other day and then decided that it needed a mattress and bedding. I sewed the mattress and pillow with yellow ticking and stuffed them with poly fill.

I used an old Holly Hobby sheet to make a fitted sheet and pillow cases:

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I sewed a bathroom curtain y’all! Now the people in the wells fargo parking lot don’t have to watch me pee and take a bath anymore and the new owners of the house next door won’t ever have to! Hurray for them.

This is a nice Kokka lawn that I bought at Stone Mountain and Daughter a while back. It wasn’t cheap and so when I saw it on half price sale I bought a few more yards (and now wish I had bought the rest of the bolt).

JAck has a birthday party to go to this weekend and so I will probably also sew up a cute little bag as a present. an excellent way to use up pretty fabric scraps, I think.

I’m working on a new way of organizing my fabric right now. Last year I tried organizing it by wrapping it around cardboard like little bolts. It was a huge improvement on just having it half-assed folded and crammed into bins.

Now I am using pant (or r they skirt hangers?) hangers (cheap from ikea!). I nicely fold up 1 or 2 or 3 (depending on how much yardage there is) fabrics and then hang them my garment rack. It looks nice and neat and has the added benefit of keeping all my fabrics visible. I tend to be an out of sight out of mind sort of person so I am liking this way of keeping my favorite fabrics visible.

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I imagine that when I am sick it will be so nice to put my head on a nice cool pillow encased with the this kitty bud fabric by Melinda Josie.

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In 2006 I found this cute Sailor Jerry swimdress at Macy’s:

But now, four years (and 20 pounds) later it got all stretched out and the elastic is all old and creaky. The fabric, though tired, is still great and I may have to work it into a new dress.

Board shorts are good but can chafe and ride up ones ass. So,make one I must. Kwik sew had two patterns that looked good. I went with the one that was just a swimdress without a suit attached (kwik sew 3416) to it because it looked easier.

I’m so pissed I waited too long to buy the rainbow fabric and it sold out! duh, because it was AWESOME! So I ended up with leopard print, pink stars, and cherries. All 6 oz (the cherries may have been 8 oz), 4 way stretch nylon spandex.

I was planning on taking pictures of the process but it went so fast that I didn’t bother.

I used my sewing machine and my serger. For the serger I used 3 spools of wooly nylon with a narrow 3 thread overlock stitch. on the regular sewing machine I used wooly nylon in the bobbin and regular thread as the upper thread. I couldn’t figure out how to get the serger spool of wooly nylon to work with my regular machine. There must be some attachment that makes the spool fit, but I don’t have it.

I used the cherry fabric for the first dress and I made it in a large size. I (almost) always trace my patterns on to new pattern paper or tracing paper and then I cut into the traced pattern since too often I have cut into a pattern only to realize later that I needed a different size.

see overlap here:

no over lap here:

I swear, According to my measurements the large should have fit, but no. I thought it was great until I tested it in the hot tub and it was clear the it was not fitting in the bust area.

I traced out the medium size and used it with the stars fabric. I found an old Paul Frank bikini bottom with the cute skull on it and used it for one side of the top, it was a string bikini so I just left the string attached and then cut off the other string and used it for the other side and made this dress a halter. I also overlapped the two top pieces which seems crucial but is not the way the pattern works.

I used a rolled hem on the bottom of both.

I think I’ll go ahead and make the leopard print one this week and I’ll use an old red bikini top to add some accents.

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I bought an assload of this bird chiffon when I saw it. So cute! Finally, FINALLY I have finished my slip using the 1940′s pattern (that I tweaked a fair amount).

I learned a fair amount about what a giant bitch working with chiffon is. Next time it will be easier. I do love that about making mistakes. I have LEARNED!

Like, for instance, do not let a cute little projectlike this kick around your craft studio for a year. Why? Well, when you do finally finish it you will be kicking yourself for not finishing sooner. Also, super ravel y (or, more appropriately UNRAVELY) material will get all jacked up and unravel in very unhappy ways if you mistreat it. So don’t!

I think a serger would really have made this project so much easier as trying to fake serge the edges of this was a huge bitch. If I had had a finer needle for my machine and maybe one of those plates with a smaller throat plate…

La! I’m so happy I finished!

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A crappy picture of it anyway. It’s hard sometimes to take a good picture of yourself. It’s not that my camera doesn’t have a self timer but more about shot setup. I could have gone outside with the good camera and tripod but I’m lazy and the inside of my house is just too cluttered to make a good backdrop. This shot includes some cat barf and my husbands yellow crocs and the strap to the camera. Sorry about that!

I made this skirt with Timeless Treasures bicycle fabric that I bought at Hart’s Fabric in Santa Cruz. and some plain black lawn and some super cute ruffle trim from Joann’s. I with I had bought more of the black ruffle trim, I did buy a few yards in red that I haven’t used yet.

I copied one of my favorite skirts onto muslin and then used that as my pattern. It’s just a simple A line and only took a few hours. Here’s how I do it:

- cut main fabric and lining.
- take a lining piece and a main piece and sew them together at the top, right sides facing. Do the same for the second pieces.
- flip up the lining. on one side sew the lining pieces together and then sew the main fabric pieces together. on the other side sew from the bottom up about 3/4 of the way or to where ever your zipper comes down to.
- flip the lining into the skirt ans sew a top stitch along the top edge.
- put your zipper in
- hem the main fabric and hem the lining in towards main skirt fabric.
The End

How do you make a basic lined A line. Does my way sound easy?

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(my R key is sticking and it is very annoying)

I almost bought some of that kokka fabric with birds on it but balked at its 17.99 per yard price tag. So instead I bought a bunch of other fabric that ended up totaling more anyway. I am determined to sew myself a few skirts. Ones I can actually wear…

Hart’s Fabric is great! The staff is nice and the selection is huge and best of all they have a children’s play area!!! What a fabulous idea! I wish Stone Mountain and Daughter would do the same thing.

Instead the staff at Stone Mountain often follow you around and comment on your kid and how he better not run around because a bolt of fabric might fall on him. oh yeah lady? That is totally absurd and if like half of your weekday clientele isn’t women hauling kids around I will eat my hat.

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I need to teak the color in LAB mode in Photoshop and then I wills end this off to SpoonFlower. I’ll do a few variations and just try out some swatches.

Stay tuned for the results!

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