Question for you

I feel really bad about not posting, but life has been dense.


OK, the update.


I was definitely the only person who wore a bug suit at the event last night. A couple of people even told me that they couldn't believe I made my outfit. I am sure they were being honest.


The high point for me of the whole black tie event though was seeing my students. Some of them were working as servers, some where on the door. I had a moment just while I was leaving when one girl found me in the hall by the coat check and said " Come here give me a hug" and she told me that I had given her confidence to be herself. That meant so much to me. 


Is there anything we can do as adult women that is more important than giving a young girl faith in herself? What a protection that is from what we adult women know really lies ahead.


I want to tell you a story.


I once had an important job. Good salary, great pension, fancy title, etc.


Well then one of my sons graduated from high school and I went to the ceremony. I had one of those moments standing in the auditorium and I looked at the graduating class and I looked at the teachers and I thought, their lives have been worthwhile, their work goes on to the future. And at that moment I knew I should have been a teacher, like my dad who left a good profession and went into the high school classroom.


You know when my dad died we had to put speakers on the outside of the church so all the kids who were standing in the street could hear.


Well the universe noticed and let me be a teacher too,


What matters in life?


There is a lot should have mattered to me that didn't. In the end all that really matters to me is young people and my sewing. And looking at other women who sew and really seeing who they are. Does that matter?


Does it matter that when I see someone's mother, some women in jeans and a hundred obligations. Some woman with a few extra pounds with a to-do list from last week, and so many people asking her to be someone - that I can see a focus on a bound buttonhole, on those pants that finally, after twenty years of trying that really fit, that I can see someone there really trying.


I notice.


That, in my bug suit, is who I am and what I see,


Sewing is the spirit man, sewing is the spirit.

New Look 6051 bug suit

After a very fun sewing day with my local guild in a church basement I was able to produce this version of New Look 6051. It is sort of a poncho thing in bug fabric as part of my some-old-little-black-dress disguise.


No doubt some of you are going to look at this and think "is she crazy enough to be wear that?"and I can only answer, yes I am.


Of course on the night I will wear proper jewelry and deal with the hair somewhat, but for the purposes intended this is fine with me. Question for you though. You can see the grey coming in here. I decided to let my colour go in the hope that it would be good for my fine-thin-disappearing hair, make it thicker maybe or healthier, but is this a good or bad or useless idea?


Next. Back to the sewing:


Technical notes are :


1. No, the pattern did not call for an asymmetrical hem. You can achieve this exact same look in the privacy of your own sewing room by sewing the waistline elastic on crooked. Not that hard to do if you concentrate.


2. The pattern called for two button holes in the front, as waistline casing and a drawstring. I did not do any of this. Reasons- I am not so crazy as to do buttonholes in chiffon. And there is a local to this location policy, to never put details over our stomach.


Also zig-zagging on elastic on the inside was fastest, even faster if you do it crookedly. That's a tip.


So you see I am almost back under control here, and if there is any doubt here is a candid shot of my contractor/husband, entertaining me. And no I did not put his head through the wall. Tempted... Not really.

What a guy, you can see why I married him.

Back in business

OK.


The house situation is not much improved yet, and there have been a few events - like the time today when a demolition 2X4 flew across the room and hit me in the leg. Big bruises and sitting on the bed with ice and complaints that only some online fabric shopping would make up for the duress ...etc.


As a result my dear husband put together my sewing room for me which now is the only really organized space in the house and all that really that matters.


And tomorrow I am going AWOL and joining a sewing guild splinter group at a local church basement to sew for the whole day.


Let's talk about that Black Tie Bingo. 


It is a charity event where people get dressed up and are handed daubers and a bunch of people who have never been in a Bingo Hall in their lives laugh nervously and try to figure out their cards. I am going as an invitee at a table bought by the local gaming agency ( think State Lottery Corp. if you are in the US) because I know some folks who now work there. It is actually the only serious table at these events - that's one table where you don't have to explain the odds or the rules of the game to anyone.


Now what to wear. I have more or less given up on whipping together one of those nifty Vogue patterns due to present conditions, so I am reverting to Plan B.


Plan B is my standard wool crepe Little Black Dress, except I refuse to wear it as a standard issue. I can tell you right now that if there are going to be 400 women at this event 398 will be wearing black dresses with pearls, and the other two are new hires in club outfits.


And I have a general rule about dress-up clothes and this is it.


Never spend more sewing time than the event itself.


Two hour cocktail party - two hour unlined dress.


Six hour wedding - six hour rendition of a TNT in fancier fabric.


You get my drift.


Now factor in no time to sew at all.


I figure that what I should do is some kind of poncho thing or a trendy whatever to disguise the same-old-LBD.

This is my pattern, I am ashamed to say I bought a pattern for this as I could have figured it out. If I wasn't out of time and recently under water.


I have bought a sort of chiffon with little sparkly eyelashes on it in dots ( if I wasn't tired I would show you) and tomorrow I will see if works at the sew-in day.


I showed the fabric to Miss Scarlett, who was over here this afternoon, and she looked at it and said " I like your bug material Babs. Are you going to have a beautiful bug face for your party?'


She was under the impression that this was a Hallowe'en costume.


But then again she is only two.


But now I am worried. The girls at the sewing guild splinter group with give it to me straight I know.


If all else fails I can wear it for the Trick or Treaters. We usually have hundreds and hundreds of kids. Our street is a long one on a hill and I swear parents from all over the city bring their children to the bottom of our street, drop them off, and then wait at the top of the hill.


More later, with pictures I hope.


What sort of eye shadow does a beautiful bug wear?

My internet has been soggy

I feel bad about not posting, something I really enjoy, but conditions have not been ideal around here.

I told you were were gutting/replacing the kitchen, which turned into tearing out most of the ground floor. Well that involved moving everything downstairs.


And then  downstairs went under water.


Along the way we lost internet too - so I have been a person without a sewing room, without internet, and with all her patterns more or less like an old newspaper someone left out in the rain.


I am not complaining (and to those of you who were nice enough to pm me, I haven't been able to get back to you, but will now try to) and in fact I am OK about all of this. Since I am fairly used to chaos, having caused a lot of it my own self in this life I am sure.


The thing is though that when things get too much I generally regroup by going down to my sewing room to look things over  - and well that option is not available to me now.


Here are the pictures:

Birthday flowers from my daughter- so much appreciated in all the mess

  
When the water is rising you just throw things to high ground - not an ideal work environment at present.

The emergency drainage hole that was put into my sewing room floor, after the floor was taken out in a huge rush and thrown out the window. Noticed DH posted a comment taking issue with my description that this was just a hole in the floor - apparently it is much more than that. He didn't want my readers to think he breaks concrete floors for any other than strategic reasons.

This used to be my downstairs bathroom floor - the water was shooting up this drain like a geyser. 


Enough about me.


On the sewing front I will be making Miss Scarlett her "beautiful pink dog suit" tomorrow night after work on the kitchen counter. 


She needs a lift. 


She has adjusted to the new baby sister very well if you don't count the only wearing one yellow rubber boot and a diaper to eat dinner, the "DON"T LOOK AT ME" comments and the fact she has developed a lisp from trying to talk with a soother in her mouth "JUST LIKE A BABY" even though she never had one when she actually was a baby.


Oh, to be a mother of a two year old again - not sure if all my stories that my daughter, Miss Scarlett's mother, and her brothers, were far, far worse are all that helpful. Grandmothers think things like the boot and the soother are hilarious particularly if they can go home to their nice orderly quiet home to sew.


That is if they had a nice quiet orderly home with an intact sewing room in it.


One last thing.


I have an invite to a black tie thing next week - and I can see my box of fancy fabric - but I can't get at it. I would have to climb over the dehumidifier and two shop vacs to get it and if I slipped I would fall down  the Useful Hole in the Floor. I have fabric in there that has been waiting years for a chance to play Black Tie Bingo (OK it sounded classier before I told you about the Bingo part).


Maybe next year.


But don't for a minute think I am not sewing up marvelous things in my head.

What is plan B?

Flypaper thoughts:

• Storm today, road washed out.
• Sewing room under 6 inches of water.
• Husband got home from work just in time to lift machines and fabric to safety.
• Tomorrow is my birthday.
• My mom sent me a Home Depot gift card.
• Good thing.
• Each son has asked for a sweater for Christmas.
• I have a feeling they mean Christmas this year.
• Last time we drove from Nova Scotia to Tennessee I knit two dish cloths and one sock.
• They have to be kidding.
• However my sewing room is under water.
• I have to stop talking to the TV.
• What's with those Viagra type commercials where the couple are suddenly transported to two bathtubs where they start to hold hands?
• I have three children and I have never held hands in twin bathtubs.
• And I am not going to start.
• The minister of finance is taking me out for lunch tomorrow.
• I knew him before this happened.
• Knowing him it's going to be separate checks.
• My husband had to take a sledge hammer to the concrete floor in my sewing room to make a place for the water to drain out.
• So far it has just filled up with water again.
• Now the floor has to be fixed.
• The dogs want to know why they haven't been taken out for a walk.
• Dog pee is a highly effective solvent on floor tile glue.
• Just so you know.
• I have just eaten two chocolate cherry blossoms.
• Thank god.
• I mean that.
• So far I have cast on one sweater.
• That's it for today.
• Try again tomorrow.

Technical notes Butterick 5533

Here are my thoughts on this pattern.


I like the jacket. 


I am glad I made it and will wear it a lot. It's corduroy as the pattern suggested, despite the bulk of the many top-stitched pleats at the back, it isn't too puffy as I had feared.


Of course the back detail will date a bit. It is sort of the last vestiges of the empire look but because it's in the back I am hoping not quite as distinctly that. For the couple of years I will probably wear this to death I think it is more interesting than a simple camp coat would be.


It felt odd to be working in corduroy. I can't remember the last time I sewed this fabric. To me it is sort of a fabric from my past. When we were kids my grandmother and mother used to make us spring and fall jackets out of this stuff, lined with flannel to go with the corduroy pants we wore for our entire childhoods. It's tough stuff and actually so easy to sew like all cottons.


I have written before, and won't rave again, on the dumbness of a pattern that is obviously a warm type jacket without included pattern pieces for lining. I made my own in the easiest way possible out of Kasha lining - you know satin stuff on one side and flannel on the other. It is Nova Scotia after all and the leaves are turning.


Here is my cheater lining technique:


1. Cut out one of everything but the collar in lining. I bagged and lined the pockets.


2. Because of the large back piece with all those pleats I didn't want to trap and pull that with a straight lining so I trimmed about 12" from the centre back and made what is still a large box pleat in the lining piece that attaches to the yoke. Here is a bright picture:

3. I turned under the long unnotched edge of the facing and top-stitched that to the front lining pieces to save myself the thinking time of calculating the seam allowances to connect the two. This added two layers of bulk to the facing area but I don't mind that - just beefed up the interfacing and actually gives the front nice support.


4. I have bagged linings a million times but don't do that much anymore. I find the lining shifts a bit and I have to sometimes pull the sleeves down or worse the sleeve linings seem too short and hike up the sleeves a bit. So here I stitched the sleeve lining by machine to the armhole seam allowances and slip stitched the bottom of the lining to the inside of the sleeve hem so I could control the ease of the lining. I made a box pleat of the sleeve lining at the top of the sleeve cap to deal with the ease.


5. I stitched the lining/facing body unit in after having machine hemmed it. Of course the lining takes the place of the back neck facing and it is neat.


6. I then turned under and slip stitched the seam allowances of the lining body around the sleeve top. I realize most instructions that have you sew the lining in around the sleeve top have you do this in a different way - machine stitch the body to the armhole and then slipstitch in the sleeve top but I don't like doing this. You have to ease in the sleeve cap with hand stitches etc. and that requires care and thinking - so much easier to deal with the straight body raw edges.


So that's the lining, and it works.


Only other caution I would note about this pattern is that the sleeves are surprisingly narrow at the wrists.  It was OK for me because I felt this would make the jacket warmer (and again where are the lining pieces?) but you might want to check this for individual fit. Also one view of this pattern shows the shaped sleeve bottoms rolled up like a cuff and they are too short to do this. I had to do what is shown in other views and have them down to make this sleeve long enough. 


If you want a cuff, add.


Finally there is a fair bit of weight at the back with those pleats so shoulder fit is important if you want to be comfortable. If you typically do a straight or sloped shoulder adjustment make sure you do it here.


That's it. A very practical, slightly stylish, probably date stamped garment that is perfect for the casual side of my life.

Butterick 5533 quick shots

Here is this jacket:

Now on me in the yard in jeans grabbing dogs and not doing the leaves as intended:

I am not really styled here, unless you count wind and dogs, but this is a lined corduroy jacket and this is exactly how I will be wearing it.


I will write some detailed technical notes tomorrow (got a few assignments to mark before I go to bed) and there are definitely some thoughts I would like to pass on with some detail shots, for the benefit of anyone else who might want to make this.


I have one other thing I would like to share tonight.


I got a long detailed email over the weekend from the woman who was my first important boss. She is now 80 and her email was full of her activities and the long list of people she was driving, buying groceries for, supervising their healthcare, visiting, moving, packing and unpacking. It made me tired to just read it.


This woman never married and had a great career where she totally micro-managed us. She once sent me out to buy new panty hose in the middle of the day because the shade I had on were not the right match for my dress. I kid you not. 


She was also the first person we called at midnight one night when a group of us had gone out to socialize/dinner and had left an industrial prototype (one of two sent to North America for testing from the factory in Europe) in a car in the parking lot - where it was stolen - undoubtedly by a competitor - and she actually, somehow, managed to keep the bunch of us from being fired. I would have fired us.


This woman was, and is, a powerhouse.


Reading her email this weekend, and seeing how she has moved from a very useful work life to a very useful retired life, I had an insight and this is it:


It is really important how you spend the older half of your life. It is your one chance to show that you paid any attention at all in the first half, that you did more than just let it all go by. How you are when you are older is your best demonstration that you didn't just have things happen to you, you learned from it.


When you are older, and how you do it, really is your evidence of your life's work.


And doing it in a red jacket is probably a good idea too.


More on this pattern later.