Simplicity 2360

I finished my "real" rendition of Simplicity 2360, which is a pullover dress with an elastic waist. My muslin is in this post. Here's the pattern:A couple of things I did differently on this version: first, I made this one with short sleeves, rather than the sleeveless version, which I like, but it makes the bodice less fitted; I actually like the fit of the bodice better on the sleeveless one. Second, I narrowed the skirt pattern so that the skirt finished 2 inches less wide at the hem. Third, I made the elastic shorter, thus tightening up the waist, which was very much needed. Finally, I made no sash. Frankly, I ran out of fabric because I incorrectly sewed the bodice pieces together, and of course, I had already surged the seams. So instead of ripping out, I just cut new pieces. I think the dress needs a belt or sash, so I'll look for a suitable white fabric in my stash, or order more of this Kaffe Fassett rayon online. Right now, I'm wearing it without one:

Here's the back:

I can explain the boots! I wore this to work on Wednesday, and it was a rare rainy day - I wore boots and jean jacket with the dress, and the boots were so comfortable, I just never changed out of them into my "work" shoes.

Overall, the dress is extremely comfortable and easy to make. I was thinking of doing a fall version with three-quarter sleeves out of a wool challis, but I think it is time to put this pattern away for awhile. I like it, but enough is enough and it is time to move on!

Parting Shot: The Crab Dress on its way to the Outer Banks. We stopped in Sussex County at a Plantation home where The Carpenter had recently restored a 200 year orangery - which is basically a greenhouse for citrus trees. He did a great job, but yes, I realize I'm partial!

Crack Cookies

It has been brought to my attention that my blogging of late has been somewhat . . . sparse. Or non-existent, even. VickiW has described it as "criminal". Two things are going on: work (not only is it busy, but I spent last week in our Illinois office), and The Carpenter. Of whom I am deliriously happy. Unfortunately, my happiness is getting in the way of sewing up the real version of Simplicity 2360 with the fabulous pink Kaffe Fassett rayon I ordered. I have been working at it a little at a time, and finally tonight I got it done. I'll probably wear it tomorrow and I'll get Aimee to take a photo so I can post it here. It turned out well: I just love it when a project comes together exactly as you imagine it. (Unlike my last post. )

But to entertain you in the meantime, I absolutely must share with you the recipe for the Crack Cookies. These are just peanut butter chocolate chip cookies, but when I took them to work, my co-workers sucked them up like a Hoover Deluxe. My friend Lynne and I renamed them the "Crack Cookies" because you can't eat less than three and they are devilishly awesome. To be extra evil I shared the recipe with everyone at work:

Crack Cookies

2 sticks of butter
1 cup peanut butter (smooth or chunky, your choice)
1 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 1/2 cups of self-rising flour
1 package of chocolate chips

Using a mixer, beat the butter and the peanut butter on medium speed until smooth. Beat in, a little at a time, the sugars. Add the egg and vanilla and beat until smooth and creamy. Beat in, a little at a time, the self rising flour. Mix in the chocolate chips.

Drop by rounded tablespoons full on a cookie sheet and bake for 11 to 12 minutes at 350. When you take them out, they won't look done, but just leave them on the hot cookie sheet for 30 minutes to finish cooking and thoroughly cool.

Notes: you don't have to make these cookies all at once. The dough will last up to a week in air-tight container. If you make the cookies from chilled dough, you will probably want to increase the cooking time to about 14 minutes. I used Peter Pan creamy peanut butter because it is the best; it has more sugar in it than most peanut butters, and thus it is the most yummy. Also, I use self-rising flour because it saves me some steps of measuring, but if all you have is all purpose flour then just use that and add 1 1/2 teaspoons of baking powder and 1 teaspoon salt. And one last thing: these cookies are so much better the next day after you make them. That one day delay transforms them from merely peanut butter chocolate chip cookies to the Crack Cookies.

And that's how you make the Crack Cookies.

Parting Shot: The Carpenter and me at Hatteras on the ferry to Ocracoke Island. And yes, the Crab Dress went too. More photos to come.

A Horrockses Mistake

When we last left off, my mojo was AWOL and I was obsessed with making a Horrockses-inspired dress. Pretty soon after, my work mojo returned, and my sewing mojo wandered back into my sewing room a/k/a the whole downstairs of my house! I then started plotting my Horrockses masterpiece which soon became my Horrockses mistake as a result of my misguided fabric choice. I started off pretty well; I chose a 1940's retro fabric with a striped motif that seemed to be a Horrockses staple. I bought all my LQS had - 5 3/4 yards and I decided to use all 5 3/4 yards on the cross-grain to create a full skirt, and use the part I lopped off for the skirt length for the sundress bodice. My mother said, "Won't those horizontal stripes make you look fat?" Oh, of course not, I thought, I'm not fat, it will be fine. Well, I was so wrong:Note that I am not modeling the dress and you only get to see this baby on a hanger, partially constructed. I got the straps pinned in place and tried it on and I looked wide as the Mississippi. You could no more get me photographed in this dress for all the world to see than you could get me to pole dance. Oh. My. God. It wasn't just the horizontal red and white stripes that made it go wrong, it was also the quilting fabric that was way too stiff for the style I had in mind. I really needed a soft, drapey cotton or rayon blend for what I was going for. I don't usually made this mistake - I'm usually pretty good about matching up a pattern with the appropriate fabric choice. I blame the anesthesia.

I learned a few things though in making this dress. I learned that gathering 5 3/4 yards of fabric requires hand basting, rather than machine basting. Trust me, it takes longer but in the long run it is easier to gather and control those gathers. And of course, I re-learned that you are never to old to make mistakes!

This whole experience made me do something I don't normally do: I went shopping for a dress. I just wanted a summer dress and I was out of energy to sew it. But of course you know what I found: cheaply made dresses that cost too much. I found one dress where I liked the style and the color, but it was crap. And still cost $ 70. That drove me back to looking at patterns and I found Simplicity 2360 which approximated the style of the crapily made dress. In addition, I saw a Ralph Lauren ad in a magazine of a dress that I wanted in a way that wasn't rational:

I can't find this dress for sale because you have to actually go to a Ralph Lauren store to find out if they will deign to let you buy it. I can't find a price on it either because if you have to ask, you can't afford it. I assume it is in the $ 500 to $ 700 price range as it is in their spring 2010 collection. And I assure you that I wouldn't pay that kind of money for a dress unless I was getting married in it.

So I am using the Ralph Lauen dress as inspiration, and I am combining it with the Simplicity pattern 2360 to come up with a summer dress. I ordered some wonderful pink Kaffe Fassett rayon fabric, but I decided to be smart about this and made a hopefully wearable muslin of this brand new pattern. I used a blue flowered rayon challis I had in my stash for several years. It was cheap, and I bought a lot of it, and made a summer dress out of half of it about six years ago. I was extra sensitive to the fact that this pattern requires very drapey fabric after the Horrockses disaster and rayon challis definitely fits the bill. I got this dress done last night and wore it to work today and Aimee took a photo:

I swear this dress is more flattering in real life than in this photo and I really like it. I like the lace, and the sash is from the prior 6 year old dress. The waist is elastic, and I've never made a dress with an elastic waist before. It was nice not having to put in a zipper. When I make this again in the pink fabric, I think I will made the elastic tighter, bringing in the waist more, and I'll make the version with short sleeves. I'll also take some of the flare out of the skirt, making it straighter and less A-line. This dress has a 30's aura about it, and without the sash, it is as comfortable as a nightgown. I'm looking forward to using the Kaffe Fassett fabric - it's rayon, but a tighter weave - no more challis for me for a while! Working with challis is like working with silk: a PITA to deal with, but lovely to wear.

Parting Shot: Also to soothe my weary soul, I made another feedsack skirt because I knew it would work. I like this one because the colors are so cheerful:

Has Anyone Seen My Mojo?????

I had surgery on June 18th (nothing dire) and I can't believe how wiped out I have been ever since. So many thing are beyond my energy level: working, sewing, blogging, emailing, or reading. For a while there, I was concerned that my blackout on communication or any other human interaction was a symptom of laziness or selfishness or both, but now that I am coming out of my funk, I finally realized: I am profoundly exhausted. I didn't get it until now; sort of like you don't realize how bad a relationship is until you get out of it and then you look back and say to yourself, "Wow. That really sucked."

And because I have felt like hammered sh*t, I haven't sewed a stitch since VickiW's quilting birthday extravaganza. Until today. I made Mother some eyeglass cases, which I made in the simplest way possible:

Kinda pitiful, aren't they? I even used an old placemat I made years ago, so I didn't even have to fool with quilting some fabrics together. I just cut the placemat into 5.5 by 6.5 inch pieces, folded them lenghwise, sewed one side and the bottom, and turned them inside out. That was about all I could manage, and she is happy with them.

Fortunately, during my convalescence I had a book Anne got me for my birthday from the Victoria & Albert Museum during her last trip to our London office. Here's a link to the book. I poured over it for hours:

Horrockses Fashions made the-have-to-have dresses in Great Britain from 1946 to the late 50's and they are just my style. (No, I don't know how to pronounce "Horrockses" either.) When Mother and I were in London last August, we saw one of the Horrockses dresses in the V&A and she took a photo:

This is a pretty typical Horrockses dress. Bright, clear colors of all cotton, with a simple fitted bodice and a full skirt. They were all the rage in Great Britain post WWII and everyone wore them, from Princess Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth II) right down to the office girls who saved their shillings to buy just one. While they weren't horribly expensive, post-war Britain was pretty austere, and for a young lady who worked as a teacher or nurse, they were seen as well worth scrimping for.

The book itself isn't particularly well written, and the author focuses mostly on the Horrockses' business model and marketing techniques, repeating herself often. The best part of the book for me were the photos showing the dresses and the young women wearing them, clearly thrilled with their acquisitions. Horrockses had it's own cotton mill that produced the fabric, and some girls who couldn't afford to buy the dresses bought the fabric and then sewed their own, like Beth Hartley who provided a photo for the book taken in 1955 that shows her wearing her handmade rendition of a Horrockses dress, and she says that every time she wore it, she thought she was the "bees knees". : )

I would have preferred more information on the dresses themselves: how were they constructed, what sewing techniques were used that gave Horrockses their reputation for a quality product, and how many yards of fabric were used for those skirts?

A lot of the dresses were sundresses or strapless dresses paired with a bolero jacket. Here is a typical dress from the book:

You can see that the insert photo is the same dress that Mother took the photo of in the V&A.

Here's another. A lot of the fabrics used had a stripe motif:

The one thing I was able to do while I laid in bed was imagine my own Horrockses dress, surfing the web incessantly looking for the perfect fabric. I've decided to make a sundress, using the bodice from a pattern I have used several times before, and pair it with an impossibly voluminous skirt, which will require gathering yards and yards of fabric. Whether I can attach such a skirt to a bodice with a 28 inch waist remains to be seen. And I have a bolero pattern from a vintage Advance pattern I have used before (but I only made the dress, not the bolero). And I finally found a vintage inspired fabric from Windham Fabrics that I think will work! But when this will all actually happen is dependent on that missing mojo. If you happen to see it, send it my way.

Feedsack Frenzy!

A while ago Anne let me paw through her antique feedsack fabrics and pick out what I liked. I picked this unusual print because a) I had never seen feedsack printed with butterflies, and b) they were pink. By playing around with the placement of my TNT skirt pattern, I found I could get a skirt out of one feedsack:

Of course, you can't worry about a "with nap" layout. Here you can see that the back pieces are opposite from the front; the butterfiles are flying down instead of up:

I don't think anyone will notice. Or care. Also, I was concerned when I cut this out because I had to lay out the pattern pieces on the crosswise grain, rather than the lengthwise. I usually prefer to layout out on the lengthwise, so that the slight extra stretch in the crosswise grain goes horizonally around my body, given me that little extra give in the waist and hips. But even being on the crosswise grain, the skirt fits fine.

So I have great plans for all those feedsacks I bought at the Mid Atlantic Quilt Festival this year! (Except for today - my AC isn't working; why does the AC always conk out on a holiday when the expected high is 95 degrees????) They will all be turned into summer skirts which, I have found, never seem to wear out.

I, not suprisely, wore this skirt yesterday to Anne's family's annual Memorial Day fishing trip in the Chesapeake bay. The Carpenter went too, and you can see that he really loved the t-shirt VickiW tie-dyed for him which he got for his birthday:

Parting Shot: I caught a fish! Well, the Carpenter caught the fish - he just let me reel it in. I'm pictured with said fish and the first mate of the boat, Kenny.

A Great Day!

It's my birthday today. My age doesn't end in a zero or a five, but it was an extra special birthday this year, all because friends made it so. Eileen, weeks before, gave me a fab purse which I haven't photographed because I'm, you know, using it. Thank God for my friends who can accessorize because somehow I missed that particular gene in my DNA. Eileen's speciality is purses, and now I have reaped the benefit of her talent.

Aimee, knowing of my admiration for the Selfish Seamstress, got me the "I just don't want to" t-shirt (in blue), the "you bloodsucking leech" mug, and the "glad I could help" tote! But her biggest gift was loaning me her brand new Toyota Highlander for the weekend while she was out of town so I could pick up Tammy from the airport. My Miata can transport two, but only if the only luggage involved is a carry-on. Tammy was flying in from Chicago for pleasure/work and she brought the big suitcase. It was by Aimee's magnificience that allowed me to squire Tammy around town.

And quite the time we had. There was shopping, there were manis and pedis, and there was definitely food! I loved having her all weekend:

And one of her gifts to me was this, which I can't wait to read: But the surprise of my life came from the new BF a/k/a the Carpenter who gave me a dining room table. Actually he made a dining room table.

This is a 7 and half foot (90 inch) trestle table made from solid cherry with no stain, and finished with teak oil.

I was stunned. About three years ago, I went to the oldest house in Glasgow, Scotland and saw a trestle table that I loved. I thought what a great idea for a sewing table - no legs to get in the way. I have a small townhouse, so I do everything on the dining room table - I eat and sew. So I became obsessed, of course. I looked at all kinds of testle tables. I consulted with my forester brother, who advised to go with cherry. And that it would be a sin to put stain on cherry wood. I found instructions on the web, and I tried to talk said brother to making me such a table, but no go. I found a furniture maker in New England who made them, but charged enough to buy a used car.

When I started dating the Carpenter, I enthusiastically shared my obsession with him, and it must have took. He showed up last night with this magnificient piece of furniture and I have never been so overwhelmed in my life. I cannot photograph it well enough to do it justice because it is just so beautiful, and well, long. Here is a shot of the breadboard at the end:

Some of the Carpenter's work:

I am humbled and overwhelmed. Is he a keeper or what????

Parting Shot: The Carpenter putting it all together at my house:

Burda's Heidi

I finally made the Burda Heidi dress which Erin has made, like, fourteen of: I got it done in time for Anne's garden party in April. This was quite the experiment as I had never used a Burda pattern before. I decided to make size 38, since it seemed to be the closest to my measurements. I wanted to use this sky blue and white fabric, though, and I realized how reckless it was to be using fabric I paid $ 9.00 a yard as a muslin. But then I thought, Wait, I have a dress form! So I cut out the bodice lining first (yes, Vicki, I used the bed sheet for the lining) and tried it on my dress form. It looked okay:

So I proceeded to go forth and experience the World of Burda. After I had it cut out, I realized that I had NOT cut the bodice back or skirt back on the fold. DOH! But still, the dress form lining assured me that I had plenty of room in the bodice. I wasn't so sure about the skirt. I decided to continue forward.

I got the dress together despite Burda's instructions which I didn't use because they were unintelligible. Fortunately, I have made a skirt with these kinds of pockets before, or I would have been totally lost. Here is a photo of the dress on the dress form with the back seam only pinned:

Pinning the back on the dress form made me realize that a 5/8 inch seam in the back bodice wasn't going to do.

I ended up sewing a 7/8 inch seam at the top of the bodice, a 3/4 inch in the middle of the bodice, and a 5/8 inch seam when I hit the waist. By not cuting the bodice on the fold and by putting the 7/8 inch seam at the top, I figure that I took 2 and 1/4 inches out of the back of this dress and it is still big. Clearly, I don't wear a size 38 in Burda's sizing, despite what their sizing chart says.

Here is a close up of the pocket:

Here's a back view:

The busy print of the fabric doesn't really show the design lines of the dress. Another of the pocket:

One change I made was to take a small hem so as to lengthen the skirt about 5/8 inch so it would cover my knee. I like my skirts and dresses to either cover my knee or hit above the knee - right in the middle of the knee looks weird on me, like my skirt is too short.

This is the first garment I have ever made using my dress form and it kept this project from becoming a complete wadder. Without it, I would have never figured out where, and how much, to take it in. I decided that when I make it again, though, I need to start with a smaller size and basically begin from scratch - but then it dawned on me like a biblical revelation that I don't have to make it again. If I'm not totally in love with it there is no law that says I have to whip up another version. I think I subconsciously believe that I have to keep making a pattern until it fits perfectly. I think it is time to let that go!

Parting Shots: My yellow rose bush is in bloom! With all the rain we have had in the past year, it is particularly stunning. I don't know what variety it is, but the flowers have a sweet, spicy smell that just makes you want to stop and sniff the roses.