Ha

Funny story.

My husband read my post yesterday and said he actually liked that dress, it was the other blue dress he didn't.

So I really appreciated all your comments and you are right, I will be raising the neckline and changing in the side seams a bit next version. I think it has potential and I am going to be looking at other wrap dress patterns as suggested too. A wrap dress is just too multi-purpose, dress up and dress down, not to be figured out.

Since you're asking here is the other blue dress my spouse was not nuts about, despite having seen me wear it before without comment. Navy pique cotton and in this picture a little wrinkled from sitting:

And here is the detail of the back zipper, set below the neck a few inches in the seam for a neat neckline finish, since the dress can go over my head when I put it on due to the wide neckline:

And here is a shot of the facing, one piece which I love about this pattern:

Finally on the out of control wedding fabric buying front I have found a solution to my dupioni issue involving how to do merlot when you are working with a fancy lace layer for the top that has that slight bright pink thing going on.

Got a real nice sort of dark, dark pink swatch from Mood and that works so I am redefining Merlot to sort of a Beaujolais, maybe even a screw top, almost a Zinfandel in a dark room, almost to a box wine - the kind that you take out the silver bag out of the cardboard and squeeze out one last little bit into a coffee cup so the kids (who are now full adults) won't know mom is drinking while she is doing the dishes after Thanksgiving. (All those who were raised in the responsible Canadian Prairies will not need to have this explained.)

Which now leaves me with, among other things, 5 yards of dark red, sort of merlot, Dupioni with a slight black under sheen when you bend it (you know how dupioni works). 

Make me an offer.

Slip on Suzie

To explain myself here is the Slip on Suzie faux wrap dress I made from this StyleArc pattern:

I am always a bit wary about wrap dresses. In my experience they tend to unwrap if you live in a windy place like I do most of the time, or fall open at the Christmas concert when you sit down which is not an optimal grandmother look IMO.

This dress has a closed skirt at the bottom, no wrap, and goes together in an hour if you don't spend three hours trying to figure out how to overlap the various pieces to get the wrap.

I bound the neckline rather than turn and stitch because I am chicken and like to use my hands to head off disaster.

I had read several pattern reviews that said this dress was too low (probably is here too) so I made it in a size smaller than I usually wear to get the fit on my bony shoulders and added to the width from there down. It is my general policy to alway fit the smallest area first and add - always more successful than trying to take something in when the core fabric has already been cut away.

Here are two shots taken on the old RV site and not accessorized at all. If I were a better blogger it would be, but I am sort of waiting on my lunch and getting ready to go golfing.

This really does need a necklace and maybe a belt. The spouse, who rarely offers fashion comments unless you count "what am I supposed to say?," tells me this is not my best look which probably means too bare at the neck and too wide in the middle, which actually describes me so this is not really a surprise.

Here is another shot, that verifies the need for a belt or maybe a another look at Stylearc's other wrap dresses that have more shape, and might give me some.

The truth is I kinda just like this dress myself. I see this design as a real basic, great for travelling, good for accessorizing if you weren't in your flip flops in an RV park, and timeless in that you can keep wearing it until your daughter says "mom you always wear that dress."

My photographer thinks maybe I need blog reader feedback since his didn't impress me and in the meantime I am thinking of this two alternate patterns in the quest for a classic wrap for this not too classic sewer:

What do you think?

Multi-tasking update

Yes I know I have been a lousy blogger. 

Truth is the last year has been exceptionally busy and I have taken what they call some me time since my last class of the term ended at the beginning of the month.

When I go home life picks up the pace again, and I figured if I felt I needed this break I did.

Of course my idea of a break has been to do something different rather than nothing at all. 

My days involve golf with my husband, a long beach walk, maybe a bike ride and about four Daisy walks. I have also been doing illustrated below, note the multi-tasking - canning some mango chutney (I am working on my own recipe) and crochet.

I actually find crochet more fun than knitting but maybe that's because it's faster and because I am learning something new. Pretty much I can sew anything I decide to do and can figure out most knitting but that's not the same as trying to understand something different, which I find energizing.

Here is what all this looks like in an RV:

I think it is safe to say I am turning into one of those women who just get nuttier as they get older, and apparently at top speed.

You know I also do some political commentary on the radio, this week it has been talking about the budget. I am always glad listeners can't see who is speaking, or what else is going on around them. One of the great virtues of radio.

On the sewing front I am ramping up for the wedding sewing and spending a small fortune ordering in the wrong fabric. I will be able to open my own special occasion store when all this is through. It all started with a sales lady at G Street who convinced me that beaded lace with a sort of shocking pink undertone (which attracted me like a moth to the flame even though I am committed to an outfit in merlot) would look great over the right colour of wine dupioni. Sort of an add some sparkle idea.

The thing is the right shade of dupioni (which either I am spelling wrong or spell check doesn't sew) is pretty hard to come by if you are doing your shopping from an RV with some help from the nice man at UPS. Plan B is if the latest shipment from Mood isn't it I am going down to Winn Dixie and buying some wine coloured dye when I certainly will become the only woman dyeing beaded lace this week in the park.

On a more encouraging note, and I haven't checked the horoscope yet, it appears the stars have aligned and Vogue actually spit up the exact pattern I need for the girlfriend's dress, the light purple one posted a while ago. Here it is:

I was considering doing my regular uncharitable review of the new releases (see picture at the beginning of this post, I certainly am well-qualified as a fashion maven, right up there with my qualifications as radio personality), focussing on those that appear to be made out of napkins from some hotel dinner dance event, but I have decided to give them a break this time around since they have saved my life with this one.

Thank you Vogue.

Babs gone AWOL: flypaper thoughts

• The good thing about teaching online is I can work when I am in Florida
• The bad thing about teaching online is that I am working when I am in Florida
• Full-time this visit
• Might be reviewing that for next year
• Great visit with the son's future in-laws over Easter
• He has brought new friends into our lives
• Made a Slip on Suzie once I realized it was not summer in Maryland
• Made two standard sized muslins for the flower girl dresses
• This way I can try them on four little girls and see how the basic pattern needs to be adjusted
• Let's have a shout out for public libraries
• I belong here and they are amazing
• Where else in life are there so many super helpful people trying to give you a good time for free?
• Moved RV parks
• From the golf cart crowd to the bike riding crowd
• More room to spread out
• More our crowd
• Becoming friends with my dad's best friend
• Weird stuff happens as you move along
• Amazing how many things don't matter anymore
• Was decided in DC that I will be wearing merlot to the wedding
• As in fabric not being sloppy with the drinks
• I can do that
• Lady in G Street most helpful
• Going for a long skirt thing and a beaded/lacey top
• That way my head won't explode with the fitting
• No point in having a mother-of-the-groom with an exploded head
• Everyone else is taking dancing lessons for the reception
• My chances of getting the husband to do that are slim to none
• He is of the generation of men who think dancing has to do with facial expression not foot placement
• I usually disguise my rhythm by dancing with the kids
• Those four flower girls are going to come in handy
• Folks will just think I am an ace grandmother 
• Corelle dishes are unbreakable until they break
• Then we are talking a million shatters
• Started on a second crochet top
• Just got to watch the how to sew it up video
• Still snowing at home
• Not here
• Off I go

Why I am here

For those of you in Nova Scotia or parts near there this will not be news, to you but that part of the world has been under snow siege. A fellow in a neighbourhood like mine took this shot:

This is actually not funny anymore. Schools have been closed too many days to count and there is an indefinite parking ban on all the streets.

Under these conditions I am not over emphasizing how nice it is here when we talk to home. But privately I am just so glad we came down here early this year. My husband is able to take it easy and the weather is helping his hips. I just can't imagine how he would have managed shovelling all that snow. He is the kind of guy who would go out and do it even when he shouldn't.

My youngest son's girlfriend is in our house and taking care of things. Her facebook status is "sore arms" or "listening to tunes and shovelling." She is a wonderful gardener and is starting all my transplants for me to be ready when I get back (we are going mega vegetable this year - even threatening to put some raised beds in the front yard).

In exchange I am making her dresses for the wedding. Here is what she is thinking of:

Like this but sleeveless. I have to figure out how to negotiate the fit around the neck and armhole while maintaining the blouson, will probably make a muslin for that.

This looks pretty simple to sew but not sure how to rig it. The obvious choice is a lot of draping, and eventually I want to do this in a good fine knit, but I figure this might be tricky to keep it from being too bulky. Not sure if I want to break my head with a ton of muslins but draping seems obvious. And there is the wrap part. Thinking I might amalgamate a top and skirt pattern. Would like a pattern to launch me. Any ideas?

So thats what's percolating around here.

Also a Daisy update. She is doing very, very well. This is a nice simple life for her here. Walk on the beach, eat, sleep, walk on the beach, eat, sleep. Repeat. My husband built a set of stairs so she could go in and out of the RV more easily and there are lots of dogs here which she loves.

The shattered soul we rescued from the puppy mill is long gone. It's amazing what a year being safe can do. 

I was walking her a few days ago and a huge black Newfoundland lay down in front of her (the dog submission thing) Daisy just marched up and started to play. The owner laughed and said to me "That little one's full of piss and vinegar isn't she?"

If only he knew.

What an ordinary sewer bought and two garment store reviews

First off let's remember this is me writing this blog.  

Not some fashionista photographista but a person about to go online teaching who rushed her fabric bags out into the sun and threw them over a lawn chair and snapped some pictures.

OK, set up the expectations appropriately?

I am in the middle of sewing planning for some wedding outfits for various family members and collecting fabric probably too crazy for my own outfits.

Here we go:

From Mary Jo's in N. Carolina. I have some idea that I could do sleeves and a bit of a bodice with the rest dupioni. OK just idea #93.

After seeing a lot, a lot of lace with beads and sequins I was quite taken by this completely random ... stuff. Don't worry no one at home will let me wear this to a wedding.

Heavy silk jersey for my youngest son's girlfriend. From C&J

Red silk knit out of the bag obviously, heavy and a gorgeous hand. A wrap dress for me.

Melon coloured crepe de chine $15 a yard btw

More crepe de chine. My daughter said something about a striped skirt, she's probably changed her mind now. It would make a good top for me. Such a quiet dresser I am.

Beautiful silk charmeuse for another dress for girlfriend of son #2.

 And now onto two stores I want to talk about.

Both of these places do not have websites so you might miss out on them.

The first is: 

New York Elegant Fabrics 222 W. 40th.

This is a really neat place with a lot of classic fabric that so many places don't carry any more. Swiss dot in many colours, seersucker, home dec, fancy- really a fabric location of your dreams and fabrics priced well and what they are worth. 

If you are the kind of shopper who gets overwhelmed, they also have something I really like - at the end of every bolt there are 3" swatches already cut and you can just pull one of these off and take it home so if you have one of those awful "why didn't I buy that" moments you can snap a picture and email them or even send off the swatch back so they know what you are talking about.

Nice relaxed salespeople. Listen I could live there.

C & J Textiles 7th floor 230 W. 38th

C & J is like an office.

Well dressed folks at desks with papers and phones and business being done you can see through a door. They are manufacturers and garment industry suppliers - those are the deals being done in there.

However the front office is a showroom of discontinued fabrics and leftover bolts, going at good prices for superior fabrics, plus these sample cards of their silks and other fabrics:

Colour card for the silks (every kind you can think of) All fabrics in all of these colours, you just have to tell them what they want - no minimum cuts, and some person in the back will bring it out to you.

This is an upside down picture of the silk cotton (heavy like taffeta) and the colours that comes in

Fabrications means the list of types of fabric they have in the above colours - this will blow you mind - words you haven't seen in a long time - crepes, 4 ply, crepe. And this is a sideways picture in case you haven't noticed.

Prices?

Good I thought considering what you are getting, for silks:

Crepe de chine  54/55" $17.50

Charmeuse 54/55"  $21.00

Heavy (as in not slinky or clingy) silk knit $33.00 also wide width

Pretty cool?

I thought so.

The ordinary woman's guide to the garment district

I have written about the garment district before and will write about it again. Thanks to the wisdom of a son who moved to NYC I go there at regular intervals.

I am somewhere between feeling pretty comfortable and finding things out that I can't believe I didn't know about before. 

What I haven't lost is my natural ability to be clueless, and like all fundamentally clueless folks I want to share when I have figured something out.

Now this is not an exhaustive or very savvy list. 

There will be more instalments when I have more to tell you in the future. After all I am not Mimi G. or Carolyn, just a visitor who is lucky to be able to go there every once in a while.

OK.

Here are some basics:

Transport:

It depends if you are doing a fabric focused trip or fitting this in as part of a larger venture I guess. I have been in and out of all three airports and tried just about every configuration of taxi, shared whatever, to get myself from the airport to the garment district (West 40th- 37th between 5th and 7th Avenue).

I have tried JFK and LaGuardia. Tried booked cabs, busses and standing in those lines that never move. I have taken Ubers and illegal cabs. I have wasted hours while some shared driver drove everyone else in the van somewhere else first.

Listen.

If you are fabric shopping go into Newark Airport. 

Once you get out of baggage take the Air Train (millions of signs) clean, fast and frequent which will connect you to a New Jersey train which will take you to Penn station in Manhattan where you can easily walk yourself right into the garment district. No muss, no fuss, lots of people who can help you buy the right tickets. A real get in and sit down and you are there situation. Also your cheapest option by far.

Now if you are going right from your plane to fabric shopping you might want to have a pull along case that is empty along for the ride and a change of underwear and clean socks in your purse.

Eating:

I always go to Ben's on W38th. Note because the food is spectacular particularly but because it is authentic. Absolutely go there with your head set to realistic and with the knowledge cholesterol is not so much on the new hit list.

Ben's is not the place to go if you are vegan, gluten free, or want a good big salad. It is however an excellent place if you want 10 inches of pastrami in your sandwich, a matzo ball soup with one baseball sized matzo, or cabbage rolls that appear to be made by stuffing one whole cabbage.

It is also an excellent place for people watching. 

Ladies who lunch married to men who now have the garments made in the East, teenage boys actually eating 10 inches of pastrami while talking, and Latina waitresses trying to explain kosher to tables of Norwegian tourists who want milk in their tea.

Bathroom breaks:

If you forget to go at Ben's there is always the ladies at the back of the first floor at Mood.

Now the fabric:

There are the standards, Mood, and not just for the bathroom, Elliot Bermann, Parons, B and J and others like that. Most lists cover those and those are probably the first places most of us go. We figure better places better fabric.

Not necessarily so.

The thing is for first timers the garment district is sort of weird.

The best stores are often up several or many floors up in office buildings and the tiny stores at street level seem to sell only sequinned whatever, the stuff that you would need if you were in the skating competition business or going to other places at night than Joann's before they close, or the grocery store. Five inch heels kind of places.

You walk by all those stores and think "Wow that's way too flashy for this mother of three, where are the good stores?"

Aha. This is where you are being fooled by the garment district.

The idea around that neighbourhood is that the window is the best place for the fancy stuff, the fancier the better - this does not mean however that they don't have exactly what you need down back.

What you are looking for is a place so crowded they don't have a cutting table, they stand the rolls up vertical and cut like that. 

A place where they say "that sandwashed silk 54"? 

"$15 a yard," two thirds what they would charge you at Mood and half what they would charge you at B and J.

A final word.

To shop in the New York garment district you never walk into a place and say "No thanks I am just looking." 

That may work at Joann's, or Fabricville or Fabricland (assuming any staff ever approached you) but in NYC you have to tell them what is in your head and they will start pulling the bolts faster than you can look at them.

You will never find anything by yourself in these places and they expect to work it. 

In NYC everyone expects to work it.

So if what you really want to say is:

"I want something to wear to my son's wedding that is not too matronly, maybe in persimmon"

"I want something to make a summer cardigan in with holes in it"

"Or I want a summer print in cotton that doesn't have flowers in it'

Just say it.

And if they can find it at all, they will.

Tomorrow two new to me stores I really like and pictures of what I bought.