Since an unexpected amount of snow fell in our area this afternoon, causing us to think that a nice layer of ice would cover our roads by this evening, we decided to forego our Groupon date afternoon and stay in. My husband said I was looking on the bright-side, as I mused about being able to finish his shirt tonight (as well as finishing watching the entire series of Star Trek: The Next Generation on Netflix). But I did! And he seems pretty happy about it:
Richard modeling his new shirt
Sunday, I made a muslin of a skirt for a friend. That took about three hours of cutting and sewing time to get done. Since I felt so accomplished, I started on Richard’s striped, black shirt.
A while ago, I found a beautiful, nay, sexy black shirting with white and silver pinstripes online from Mood Fabrics. I showed it to Richard, and he approved of it.
Black/Metallic silver stripes shirting
Remember the shirt I whipped up a couple weeks ago? Here’s a close up of the embroidery mom stitched on the front for me. It’s a very close representation of what my corgi looks like!
Corgi on my shirt!
This is the first “full-size” non-letter block I’ve done for the “U is for Unicorn” quilt. I went out on a limb here with my color choices. Black and white weren’t being used a whole lot in the quilt, probably because I avoided the black-on-black look. But mom did a great job using contrasting thread colors for the satin-stitching, so it really “pops”. The center of the flowers in the middle are several gold French knots.
Block 7
When I got together with my parents for lunch last week, mom delivered a couple more blocks that were completed:
Q is for Quail
Block 32
Block 36
I was so excited when I came home and found a 8 lb package sitting on my front porch: the pirate fat quarters I ordered from Fat Quarter Shop arrived! I honestly don’t know when I’ll get around to assembling it, since I have a couple projects awaiting completion (and starting, for some) in queue, but I’m still so happy it’s here, and I got it on sale!
All the fabric from the pirate fat quarter bundle
And from this, I’ll be make the Variable Star quilt that was featured in a 2007 issue of Fons & Porter:
Variable Star quilt featured on cover
Many Sewing Expos ago, I thought I would actually try to learn to sew my own garments, so I took a couple classes and from one of those classes, I discovered this book called “Sew U Home Stretch“. It has three basic patterns (crewneck shirt, raglan shirt, and a dress/skirt) and from those three patterns, Wendy shows you how to alter them to create different garments from hoodies to baby-doll dresses. It’s pretty neat, especially if you’re not afraid to alter a pattern a little bit (with direction).
What I made today was a V-neck t-shirt. There are a couple things I would do differently, but I had this idea a while ago to have mom use her fancy Bernia to embroider a corgi on the front, like an Izod gator. She said she needed a double knit shirt in order to do that. So, instead of shopping at the store to try to find a basic, double knit shirt, I made my own. Finally. And I’ll be seeing my parents tomorrow for lunch, so I put this item on my Winter Break To-Do list to get done by today so I would have it to give them when I saw them tomorrow.
V-neck t-shirt
With my Mood Fabrics Groupon, I bought a yard and a half of a light blue double knit for $7/yard. I probably only needed a yard, but it doesn’t hurt to have a little more. In fact, I probably should have made a neckband with the leftover fabric instead of doing the rolled hem around the neckline. I also did a rolled hem on the sleeves.
I had intended on hemming the bottom with a twin needle stitch, but the machine kept pulling the fabric into the area under the feed dogs. I think my tension was off somewhere, so that will have to be an experiment for another time. The alteration she suggested in the book was to take 6″ down from where the neckline usually is (this is based on a crewneck shirt), but I only did it by 4″. (Otherwise, I’d have to wear a tank top under my shirt for modesty’s sake).
I used a lot of overlock stitching, since the patterns use a 1/4″ seam allowance, instead of the usual 5/8″ seam allowance. In the future, I’ll have to make sure to mark my pattern markings differently, since my scissor clips were too deep in areas, that I had to do some extra stitching to keep holes from appearing.
From cutting to finishing, this probably took me about three hours to make. Definitely the fastest I’ve ever made a garment, ever!
Share on FacebookI figured that it might be nice to have an in-progress pictures of one of the applique quilt blocks. It reminds me of playing Operation, or even putting together a jigsaw puzzle.
In-progress work on K block
I have all my little applique pieces cut and ready to adhere to the black background on the left. If you look closely, you can see the transparency over the block, that was traced from the front-side of the K block pattern on the right (what you see in the photo is the wrong-side of the pattern that was traced, and I have my numbers on the pieces I cut out that match the numbers I labeled on the pattern).
The tweezers are used to put the applique pieces in place beneath the transparency. After I get a section done, I’ll iron it down so it doesn’t shift on accident while I’m placing the rest of the pieces. When it’s all done, it goes to mom for the satin-stitching and finishing work.
I also had the Kookaburra song stuck in my head as I worked on this block too.
Share on FacebookVery quick post of a few of the finished blocks for the “U is for Unicorn” quilt mom and I have been working on. The last block in this post is for filler between blocks. It’ll make more sense when the quilt is assembled.
N block
R block
X block
Block 35
This time of year is pretty cold when I go out door-to-door for ministry work. Last year was pretty cold too, and so I was determined this year to make myself a long, wool skirt to wear while out in ministry work so I didn’t freeze! Recently, I found McCall’s 6438 (during one of JoAnn’s $1 McCall’s sales), and some beautiful (albeit, expensive) wool crepe (suitable for suiting, tee hee).
Long, wool crepe skirt