Flypaper thoughts home for the winter version

• Other years we are well on our way down south in January
• This one I am sitting in my chair next to an animal sandwich
• Trying to warm up
• Daisy and I went for a walk just now
• She got cold
• Despite her winter coat
• So home, I sat her next to me
• And wrapped her in a blanket
• The cat decided to lie on the blanket, on Daisy's back
• She's been waiting for weeks
• To find a way to attach herself to a dog
• With whom she has a one sided relationship
• They both went to sleep
• Now I can't move because they might wake up
• And Daisy might realize there is a cat on her back
• So I am being quiet
• Quiet and cold are the words for this month
• Not that we aren't busy
• I have made four new pairs of warm pants
• And made forty sewing new year's resolutions
• #1 sew from the patterns I already have
• Same as my intention from last year 
• And the year before
• But this time I mean it
• Like I will next year
• Fortunately I can be pretty busy in my own house
• Firing off projects all over the place
• Making corn tortillas
• Sewing elastic into rings
• Talking to my neighbours when I walk dogs
• Who's that my husband asks, waving at you?
• Dexter's dad I say
• Molly's dad
• Garth's mom
• You know the pug who must be 400 in dog years
• Blind and pulled by his mom in a sled
• Mr. Crow who is trying to walk the equivalent of some trail in Britain
• He was booked to hike last spring
• Now translated into miles around and around our streets
• I count him four times a day past my window
• Good to have an interest
• Speaking of my husband
• He bought me Masterclass for Christmas
• He's really having a great time with it
• Just finished a course in how to be a hostage negotiator
• I can't make stuff like this up
• He says it's more interesting than Malcolm Gladwell
• Which I find hard to believe
• Says he has been using his new techniques on me the last  two days
• Wants to know if I have noticed
• Noticed what I asked?
• How I am using my 80% voice 20% of the time now
• I mean what do you say to that?
• Keeping to myself that after three kids I am pretty sure
• My own hostage negotiator skills are pretty excellent as they are
• Fair enough he wants to catch up
• I have identified some wardrobe gaps
• Biggest one is golf clothes
• I haven't made much to golf in the last few years
• Pieced together Costoc skorts and any top with a collar
• Had to be sure I wouldn't be a golf drop-out first
• Then I found friends who didn't keep score
• So now I need to turn my mind away from my putting
• To what I will wear
• This is going to be a challenge
• The rules of golf seem to involve wearing polyester
• And paying way too much for it
• Upside is that I can see potential for legitimately dressing in loud colours
• Contemplating figuring out a golf dress
• Could churn those units out if I could figure this out
• I wake up at night and wonder about piping
• And decide to just make shorts to wear underneath 
• Rather than attaching
• These are serious issues
• It's cold
• My son has bought a wood fired sauna
• He lives by the water and no doubt plans to jump in the North Atlantic afterwards
• Me I am wondering if it is possible to knit in a sauna
• What do you think?
• Resolution #3 knit an aran cardigan
• Been meaning to do this for 20 years
• I knit socks and watch strange CBC TV
• Just finished a great series about the Northern Alberta decoy duck carving competition
• To that you can knit socks
• Many of them
• But might do me good to read a chart and pay attention
• When you are hostage to the winter
• Your mind can wander
• Not sure I have the skills to do this cardigan
• How hard can it be?
• The motto of my life

Revisiting patterns

I really like the dress I am wearing on the cover of my latest book. It is so comfortable and the cotton blend ponte is so wearable. I also made my mom a top from this fabric because I like it so much. I got both the fabric for the dress and for the cardigan from my local Fabricville.

There is a story behind this dress.

I used Jalie's Nicole I had made this dress when it first came out and reviewed it here.

Despite really loving the fabric and the style of the pattern I haven't really worn that dress much at all. It sticks to my rear end and stomach too much.

However like I said I really like the style so I decided to take a different tack and try it again. This time I selected not the size my measurements would give me, but the size that the actual garment measurements would give me to what I know to be comfortable around the middle of my body.

This meant going up two full sizes from the armholes down - essentially changing this pattern from close to the body ease to an additional 1.5" of ease.

Here is the result:

So so much better and now one of my favourite patterns. (You can see I did this in the fall - in major catch up blog post mode here).

I think this is a strategy I am going to work on with other patterns. Because Jalie comes in so many sizes and those sizes go up in fine increments it is possible to tweek the ease a bit without a lot of distortion of the pattern lines.

I think I am going to try the same approach with the Lisette skirt pattern, which has beautiful lines but on me made me look like an egg cup. You will notice that when I did that review I focused on the construction techniques and not my body fit.

Once I had this success I decided to go back and look at other patterns.

One of these was the Charlotte cardigan. I had some nice red sweater knit but wanted something really practical and warm. As a result I just lengthened this pattern to something more jacket like to wear with the dress.

The sweater knit was fairly soft though so I didn't make buttons and buttonholes. Instead I used those big snaps that I consider one of the best inventions of this century:

I think there is a theme here. 

One of my take aways from this strange time of the pandemic is about doing more with whatever you have on hand. My house, I have rediscovered, has deep sewing supply resources that I have had no choice but to mine this year.

I used to think, with irony, that I collected patterns, notions and fabric like squirrel. Like I was waiting for the big storm and I couldn't get out.  

Well what do you know. 

That storm came and I was ready.