this black and white dresden pops!

i've missed the past few Iron Craft challenges. i was busy with something else (damned if i know what) the week that the theme was Creative Activities (ie, things you'd enter in a state fair), and though last week's Shrink to Fit mini challenge would have been a great excuse to make a mini quilt, or something even littler like that patchwork ATC that i made years ago, i completely forgot about it.

but this week's challenge was different!

the theme was Black and White, and it fit perfectly into a few things i'd been meaning to get around to anyway.


you might not remember/know this, because i'm terrible at posting about it, but i do make clothes on occasion. i used to make clothes a lot, along with costumes for both theatre and burlesque, but since i've been obsessed with quilting for the past year, my garment sewing has pretty much fallen by the wayside. which means that i really really need some new clothes!

so one of the things that i've been meaning to get around to is making some new skirts. i have quite a few pieces that i've bought in thrift stores to reconstruct, and not nearly enough variety in the skirt section of my closet!

and i've been thinking about using quilting imagery/symbolism on skirts. i honestly don't remember where the idea came from, though i know i've seen a few different variations around since i've started thinking about it, so apparently it's a common idea!


new skirt + quilting imagery + a stack of black and white prints =





a dresden plate on a skirt!



the dresden plate is topstitched onto the skirt, and then the centre of the dresden was made using that applique method that everyone's been raving about for circles - you know, when you sew a super lightweight fabric to your regular fabric, like an interfacing or something, and then cut a slit in that and turn it right side out? i've seen it called double applique. anyway, i'm not super impressed.... you can see the lightweight fabric along the edge of the circle. it would be great if i was doing a zigzag around the edge of the circle, but if i was going to zigzag it, why don't i just do a raw edge applique?

but anyway, i still love it. the skirt itself is my favourite skirt material - doubleknit weight polyester, which i've always called fortrel. fortrel is technically a specific brandname, but everyone i know has always called all polyester of that weight fortrel. it's nasty to wear against your skin, i know, but it makes the BEST skirts! it hangs awesomely, and lasts freaking forever.



i bought a long black fortrel skirt at a thrift and cut off the bottom half for this skirt, which means i'll have enough left for another skirt from the top. i made a waistband using a comfier black knit, and a wide elastic. simple, effective. next i want to make one with hexies.....

whew... lots of WIPS and little things!

lately i've been feeling like i'm having a hard time getting stuff accomplished. i'm flittering back and forth between projects, with not enough energy to finish all of them entirely. the past few weeks have been very busy, and though i don't often talk about it here (i completely missed blogging against disabelism day this year!), healthwise it's been a rough few months. i said last week that i was feeling discombobulated, and i think that's a very good word for me lately!

but there are some really exciting things happening! one i think is supposed to be hush-hush, and i'm cool with that in a don't-count-your-chickens-before-they're-hatched kind of way. i don't want to jinx anything!

the other two i can totally tell you about, but i'm going to save them for separate posts, just cause they're THAT cool, and cause i have lots of pictures to go along with them!


however, i do have lots of little odds and ends to show you and catch you up on!


i've been sending lots of letters, fun little ones.


like these accordion style playing card letters...




funky letters typed out on vintage ledger pages


letters with random sewing added as detail






and letters with fun envelopes, like these ones - they're security envelopes turned inside out and glued back together again.



i made myself a fancy hairclip to wear to a friend's grad, and altered a dress to go along with it.


i love the ruffle i added when i shortened it! (cause i'm really really short...)

i'm making myself a workbench for my drill press

(and not to be all conceited or anything, but the pictures i took of myself sawing turned out pretty damn hot... there are more in this folder!)

i'm totally appreciating the little movie clips that friends have made, while mentally planning one myself (i'll probably never get around to it!!)
an awesome one about trans "allies" that aren't really allies
(and totally check out bearabouttown's other amazing videos about stuff like access, ableism, and "women's spaces"


and an awesome one about personal space, consent, and the right to say no and be heard


i've been working on zine stuff and a baby quilt, making myself a few skirts (LOVING my ruffle foot lately!!), housesitting for my parents and trying to sort fabric while i was there, making curtains for my living room, and i'm working on an embroidery project which will never end, and planning so many more....



that sounds like a lot, doesn't it? it's really just because i haven't updated in so long, it sounds like a lot when you smush them all together into one post! plus, a bunch of them are still WIPs - one day i'll finish something.

Silk 10yd Skirt and my sister the sewing genius!

you're wondering what the fabric was that was so distracting yesterday, right?

silk! mmmm, silk. gaaah, silk!

my little sister is, as usual, incredibly overbooked and frantically busy. about a week and a half ago i took pity on her and asked if there was anything i could do to help her. she's finishing up several custom projects, including several weddings, and still needed to finish her own costume for a big annual costume "ball" that friends of hers organize every year. considering that a lot of her clients are within the same social circle, she tends to really go out with her costumes (plus, she's like i used to be, when i had the energy - any excuse to make an elaborate outfit!) she asked if i would make her a gathered belly dancing skirt, commonly called 10 yard skirts, because the bottom tier is 10 yards around. it was something that i could do without her corset making expertise, plus i have a ruffler foot, so it would take me much less time than it would her.

i, in my typical procrastinating way, left it to the last minute. not entirely on purpose, because this has been a pretty crappy week, but i could have started the first steps on wednesday or thursday, but didn't. i kept thinking "it's just a skirt. how long can it take?"

a LONG LONG time!

first, math is so not my strong point. since i was using the ruffler foot, i needed the gathering to be about the same amount for both lower tiers. i added up the total length, considered that i had 3 strips that long once i'd cut them, and then figured out how long each tier should be. it took me way longer than it should have, but that was partly because i couldn't find a calculator and everytime i sat down on the computer to use google (i love using google as a calculator, i'm a geek, i know!), i'd get distracted by other things. plus, i tend to forget how many breaks my body needs now. you'd think i'd have learned, but i'm in subconscious denial or something.

anyway, i wanted the difference between the layers to be x2, so the final measurements were 86" for the top tier, 172" for the middle tier, and 344" for the bottom tier. not quite 10 yards, but pretty close.

the fabric she had was a 6yard length of sand washed emerald green silk. GORGEOUS. (sandwashed silk is sometimes called sueded silk too) she found it at value village for $5 or $6. she has amazing luck finding fabric at value village!

so super gorgeous, super soft, and super duper slinky and slippery. i had to pin every 1/2"-1" all the way along the selevedges, and even so, it didn't cut straight. the last time i sewed with sandwashed silk was cutting up my parent's worn out shirts to make barbie clothes, at the height of the sandwashed silk trend - late 80s, early 90s!

eventually i just went with it, because there was nothing i could do. luckily with a skirt like this, minor curves are minimized by the gathering anyway. the ruffler foot worked super slick once i had the setting and the stitch length down, so that was awesome.

this morning she came over, and we realized that the silk had really stretched from the weight of the gathers, and the skirt was way too long. blegh! i had to unpick the waistband and redo it and the buttonholes 4" lower before i could put the elastic and the drawstring through.

but i got it done! and it looks amazing. i went through 3 needles (i used fine sharps needles, but even so, the silk seemed to dull them really fast, and the fabric pulled once they were dull), and a crapton of thread, but it turned out gorgeous.



none of the pics i took managed to show the colour perfectly, so just imagine a super deep emerald green, okay?





it is so so full! it doesn't look super bulky, since the silk is so thin, but it billows out fabulously behind her when she walks fast.



i'm really happy with it, but slightly rethinking my plan to make myself a knee length tiered skirt....


while she was here, i took some pics of the custom corset and chemise that she finished up this morning. (she made an awesome period accurate pair of bloomers too, but i didn't get a picture of them)


(we were in such a rush to take the pics, we forgot that the chemise seams and hem hadn't been pressed yet, so ignore that!)











isn't it gorgeous? her corsets are AMAZING! the amount of work that goes into each one is mind boggling. she does have an etsy shop, if you'd like to see more of her corsets,but she keeps selling them locally, so there's only a few left in her shop. i keep telling her she needs to take pictures and show them off more!

skirts, skirts and more skirts!

remember how one of my goals was to make something for myself every month? i haven't managed to make anything yet this month (i'd better get a move on!!), but i did in january! i went on a bit of a skirt binge one night, cutting out fabric for 4 skirts all in the same straight skirt basic pattern.

i LOVE skirts! i wear them over tights or leggings (mostly capri length) and they're a great way to add a bit of pattern or colour to my all black wardrobe! (i wear almost exclusively black. an ex lover of mine was lying in my bed and looked over to my closet and said "wait! you have COLOURS in there!" yeah, but unless they're skirts, i don't wear them!) skirts are also simple and quick, and since they only take a yard, i can buy pricier fabrics and enjoy them all the time without feeling guilty!

i also discovered the blind stitch foot on my sewing machine, which i LOVE! it totally inspired me to make some skirts just to hem them!

so these are the ones i made. all pretty basic, all comfy but still cute. (note that my dress form is vintage and fabulous, but is MUCH smaller than i am! the skirts all hug my curves, rather than hanging awkwardly like the pics make them seem!)

it's actually funny that i fell for this fabric, because i have a serious hate on for heathered colours (you know, like sweatshirts that are heathered grey? i hate that! it's an awkward in between colour). but i totally fell for the fabric used in the next two skirts, despite the heathered tones. animal prints makes me more forgiving!






this one is a bit plain, but i love grey on black plaid!

it's almost like a cross between plaid, stripes and herringbone, when you look at it closely.



this one was a bit more complicated than the first three. the fabric is really awesome, it's a double knit where the two layers only attached together where the polka dots are. the dots are close enough to keep the layers together, but i really loved how the edges curled when i preshrunk it, and i wanted the bottom of the skirt to do that.



at the same time, the fabric isn't quite sturdy enough to just leave unhemmed, i knew it would get too stretched out. so i cut out the skirt a bit shorter, without the hem allowance, and i used the machine blind stitch to sew a wide black twill tape about an inch above the cut hem. this will keep it from stretching too much, but it's not really visible from the front side of the fabric.



since the twill is keeping the fabric from stretching, i also put a slit in the centre back so that i would be able to walk!


i wish i had thought to match the polka dots on the back seam, but it totally slipped my mind. oh well.


i also finished a skirt that i started almost a year and a half ago! i sewed the skirt, and did the embroidery back in september 2007, and then i never got around to hemming it. it was pressed and everything, all i had to do was the hand sewing. once i fell in love with my blind stitch foot, i dug this out and hemmed it in a wink!


(this is the most accurate pic, colour wise)


closeup of the embroidery. i purposely made the stitches bigger and used 6 strands instead of my usual 2 or 3, because i wanted that look for it.

the magic of the machine blind stitch!


i still have a ton of fabric earmarked for skirts, and lots of pieces waiting to be reconstructed into skirts. maybe that's what i'll make for february as well!

may/07 - hoodies and skirts

the excessive number of hoodies i've made lately -


with fabulous vintage buttons.


teal hoodie with more fabulous buttons that unfortunately don't photograph well and welt pockets (and apparently i'm unable to take non-blurry pictures unless my hands are right in front of the buttons! you get the idea though)


red gathered front hoodie with welt pockets


mauvey purple gathered front hoodie with ruffles around the hood (it was the sample, so it's not as nicely made)


brown gathered front hoodie for nilla with a ruffled bottom



i told you it was excessive. i have fabric for something like 4 more too. all of these have slightly puffed sleeves too, cause i'm obsessed lately.

and some skirts i made for a swap-


dyed blue doilies sewn onto light blue fake linen like material with a darker blue underskirt.


brown jersey with gold pinstriping, reversible, other side is solid brown jersey


the back of the skirt that's impossible to take pictures of

the front
light brown twill stamped with acrylic ink in shades of brown