Monday, March 28, 2016

We Announce an Interruption in Your Service

The normally scheduled programming of the Ernie3K Network (patent pending) is going to be interrupted for the usual spring events.

Trip to cowtown collegetown to feed/buy socks for/visit Thing One
He didn't take this with him to college.  I need to bring it with me for him.

It's done now. Hemmed 'n everything.

Last minute panics over Emerald City ComicCon cosplays
Yes, there is more than one, and mine are pretty much done, but other people are panicking.

We will return with many photos and a summary of events after April 10th.

And I'm posting snaps on Instagram. All you have to do to keep your feed is to 'like' stuff there. You don't need to get post notifications. Not yet anyway.

You know I like you, but when my phone trumpet goes off, I want it to be "Hey Mom, I'm in trouble".

In the meantime, go read this article

Making a pocket? Measure your hand first!
It links to several other irritating topics, the mostest being


On a related note, my hand spread has lost about an inch over the years. So my steady 9" ruler is now about 8".

Monday, March 21, 2016

Next Dress McCalls 7155





I confess, I'm not buying the pattern. I don't have to, because Janet has given us the b side in the photos


I can draft a pattern for me from my blocks using that basic diagram.

Don't worry, there's a wing in Lanetz Living named after me. I do not like to consider how many patterns I've bought; it's like romance novels. It's the enjoyment you get out of reading them.

Yeah. Really. And I'm insulating my home with the boxes.

But back to 7155. 

It's a pullover with "unmounted sleeves".  That term is new to me. It's not cut on the bias (at least the yardage requirements indicate so) and I won't need so much french dart in the front as I might need it in the back.  A tempting alteration I think I'll just skip for now.

I have a dress like this already, that I wore to bits and only have the bits left. It had a center back zip that I shifted to the side. It was the college go-to dress that convinced me that wearing a dress was easier than getting pants and shirts to match.

In the near future, I will be writing about my uncanny inability to get the top of a zipper not to bulge out like toad eyes. Too many examples to bear thinking about.
But the side zip insertion puts that bulgy thing in the armpit, out of view.
And makes dressing myself easier (that shoulder thing).

That topic comes up with this dress. Maybe cosplay isn't your thing, but I like it.


Hemming and the sleeve closure on the agenda for today after work.
Oh, yeah. Back to work.




Wednesday, March 16, 2016

Offgrain Straightening


I'm sorry, this makes me laugh so so hard.


And there's the ad for Spoonflower......(upper right)

My offgrain cotton twill yardage from Spoonflower was grained up by myself.
I pinned mine to the wall while wet, and let it dry.

Yes, I used a level to line it up properly.



It did not stay ongrain forever, and the pants in this set are unwearable now. 

What was I thinking with the vest? I couldn't quite get it placed where I wanted it,
 and it pains me to look at how it visually argues with itself.
Don't blame the Folkwear Vintage vest pattern 222 - it's the best out there.

Their printing process is better on the lighter weight materials, and it's easier to straighten them. Getting them to stay there...working on that.

Remember, if you can't get something to grain up, don't make something you want to last. Unlike my pants, the fabric will try to regrain itself. 

It really really really is not worth your time. It will only break your heart.



Sunday, March 13, 2016

Geoffrey Beene Probably Did Not See This Coming Vogue 2232

I am not quite sure why I thought this pattern would be a good choice for ripstop rainwear.

I think it's the seams.

This is not the Gaultier I am talking about, but close enough

Years and years ago, in about 1995, I saw a photo in the New York Times magazine section with a organza dress by Jean Paul Gaultier with very heavy, almost boned seams. I loved it, and it's still haunting me. I have lost the photo (had it up in the sewing cave) through a move and a baby and another one, but I still ponder the potential.

And it shows up here. No relation to the original at all. This is a muslin, that is a nonfinal version of the desired item, in similar materials.

Ripstop! With silver ripstop seams!

Uhmm....nah.

 I do like the sleeves in a crisp fabric, but the rest wants something drapier. I would lose the v in the back, and the construction where the fronts and the backs are all one very very long piece cut on the diagonal? Skip it, no reason for it not to be two pieces with a shoulder seam.

It could be a lovely chador.

Or a rockin' choir robe.

No, I am not going to finish it. I did set in the sleeves to see if they would improve things.
No. No they did not.

front view - lovely zip pucker

back view - very Starfleet

side view - rainready choir wear!
                                            I see stuff sacks there. Several.

Sunday, March 6, 2016

Sew Expo 2016

I live in Seattle, which is an hour north of Puyallup, home of the Sewing and Stitchery Expo.
I live right off Interstate 5. I can hear it from here.

After a great deal of calendarical dithering, I determined I'd be going to SewExpo on Thursday to catch Laura Nash's vintage pattern class, and whatever classes worked out for the rest of the day.

Which I would have made if I had left Seattle about an hour earlier. Not for traffic on the highway, but traffic trying to get ON to the highway.

Seattle, you have too many cars.


The weather was perfectly nice. This is a terrible photo, because I take terrible photos out of the car window while I am driving (nuff said). But that grey mountain shape in the lower center of this is Mount Rainier, which is very visible from some parts of Puyallup. And you could see all of it's snowy glory that day.
So....cars.

A really sad attempt to yarn bomb the Sasquatch at the entrance of the Washington State Fair grounds.  He needs a full sweater.

Since I missed the 830, I did the shopping first.

Vogue Fabrics had wider aisles this year, and nothing I needed.



Love this shirt. Love Judy. More on her later.

I took an illustration class from Julie Paschkis once. She is a great example of how you can use your talents in all markets, and her lines for In the Beginning's quilting cottons are clothes-worthy.
And hard to cut into. I just pet mine.

I predict more people will do scale draping. It really works, and it's easier to take a gamble with a smaller amount of fabric to try something out. Especially next to a mountain of magnetic pincushions.
Are they cushions if they aren't cushioned?

Buttons. I am a sucker for you. Put five on a piece of string and watch me drool.

Huh.
New pattern this year. 
Look familiar?


Huh. I must be crazy.


Lorraine Henry does a nice presentation about moving darts and altering pattern pieces. I have seen this several times before, done by a variety of people, and she does a good job of explaining it. She does not have a book, but her methods are all over the internet. The key to her method is preserving the seam line length, rather than cutting through it to alter. 

This year the omnipresent WSU banners cracked me up. My elder child, Thing One, is a freshman at WSU, over in Pullman. So I give them more money now!

Marla Kazell was the  technical advisor for the book, Couture The Art of Fine Sewing by Roberta Carr,  which is kinda like finding out someone else painted the Last Supper. Marla's presentation was about prepping a jacket pattern, and recutting the center edge and facings offgrain so they would hang straight. It's just how it is. This was a tough sell for some of the participants, who just couldn't get it. 

And Judy Kessinger's Fit Nice class. 

Theoretically about pants, but about her pants pattern, with some great old lady advice about just not giving a dang. I don't need another pants fitting system, but I enjoyed my 90 minutes with her. It was a hoot and then some. Her website is full of videos that are worth your time, videographed by her sons. Go check em out.

And then we go back to shopping. Or buying in this case.
Treasures of the Gypsy. 


Yes, they have many shiny things and they are really serious about you keeping your damn hands off them. I get where they are coming from, I love them to bits. Don't mess with them!

The Venus of Willendorf. And five thousand Elinor Peace Bailey patterns.

I own about four hundred yards of that nylon bird fabric. I pick the birds off and use them for trim.


My beloved needle threader was on sale at Hancock's booth. I did buy another, as a gift. Really.

A scone for luck


The haul: the free tote bag, the black striped 3 yards of japanese woven cotton goodness, the poly digital print from Marci Tilton, 18" of shiny beaded red trim, six beautiful resin buttons, a 3/8" curved ruler (finally, now I can stop coveting one), more typewriter fabric (two 1/2 yd pieces to be kluged) and class info pages.


And how quickly I sewed this beauty up! Thanks Ms Tilton!


Huh.

Thursday, March 3, 2016

Unresolved Stuff from 2015, unpiled


Somehow, the idea of running a post about the stuff I didn't deal with last year, as I am working on a SewExpo post that's not coming together; this just appeals.

Welcome to The Leftovers of 2015


I began the year by deciding a McDowell drafting system would bankrupt me. It would solve every pattern drafting problem I ever had, circa 1889.

I never posted this this lovely sketch by Seurat of the Eiffel Tower under construction, from the DeYoung museum, from the trip to the High Style show.



Clara Berg promises more lectures on the clothing in the Museum of History and Industry's collection in the spring. Almost spring!


The handle for the Dalek bag will get made. I got more fabric printed up at Spoonflower. I can see it from here (points offpage)

I am not going to make this dress, but I do want to make something with the flavor of this overlapping collage of fabrics. And I have a couple yards of that rick rack on the far left edge.

The yard of this Liberty lawn will turn into something.


The raincoat with the perfect hood will be made (dumped the Miyake for an 80s Vogue noname hoody). I have all the parts. And then version 2 will sit on the table edge for another year

Well, that's the plan.

The thinking chair (from Thing One's old skateboards, surprisingly comfortable to sit in with this overheating laptop on the arm. Also good for stacking the quilt rolls on the arms and stitching over/under.

Plus, a terrifying story about knitting and old ladies on the bus.