Sew Distracted

Minor Burps Perhaps, But Still Here.

The world has not stopped, although at any given moment parts of it seem traumatized by events somewhere or another.  I have not stopped venturing into the sewing studio either, even though at the moment there is not a great deal to show for my time or efforts.  The studio is actually my sanctuary, a place where care, fear, and stress disappear. It is not that I have quite overcome the many-directional pulls of distraction, but in the end, it is not distraction that grounds us or provides meaning in life.

I did manage to get almost all the fabric unpacked, put on shelves, and catalogued.  This is the first time in many years that everything is easily visible.   I have to admit to being only "almost" unpacked because after going through all this, I found three banker's boxes of fabric in the basement, boxes which were never supposed to be in the basement in the first place.  Alas there is no space on the shelves to unpack them so they remain in fabric purgatory, out of sight and out of mind until I at least sew something and clear some space.

There were other aspects of sorting and cleaning up going on -- beginning steps of creating a system, although no system is finished until it holds up to actual work.  There is always a disconnect between the imaginary world of design and the real world. I am certain that any attempts at organization will go through upheavals and revisions, but for the first time really, I am beginning to see and feel a place, a haven really, to come into and let the work itself take center stage.

It feels good to be in the studio.  The pressing table has seen more use as a photography station than for pressing of late.  I expect it will continue to do double duty, at least until the yarn has been sorted and catalogued.  At least the yarn has at least been corralled into a single space and I have catalogued and sorted enough for any short-term projects.  I admit, it felt good to be taking photos, to put my hands on every piece of fabric, to satisfy my organizational demons.  Conflicting emotions arose, every piece feeding both creative instincts and angst over the too-muchness of it all. The best I can do is admit that there was a period when George was ill and I was not sewing, a time when I consoled myself by buying fabric.  I cannot say it was cheaper than therapy, I can say that what you see on the walls serves as my retirement fund, my wall of dreams, and a place of great calm.  There is no point in fretting over the choices of the past, only in accepting that we each do the best we can.  Whatever choices we make or fail to make, they are intimately woven into the fabric of who we are.

There has been a little mending here and there and more than a few alterations.  Mostly no photographs were taken of same, and that is OK.  I have attempted some embroidery as well, although for the most part my fingers are out of practice and not quite as adept as once they were, partially due simply to inactivity, partly due to repercussions following last year's chemo-induced neuropathy.  I will move forward, regrets cast aside. Hopefully skills will improve. There is no point in life in dwelling on what I once could do, even as I realize that I should have celebrated more and fretted less. 

I did buy a shade card set for Appleton wools, necessary for a crewel-embroidery project that is mostly still in the planning stages.  Shown here on a piece of wool boucle that had been washed and partially felted.  If anything I love the colors more after felting than in their original state.  I was all gung-ho with excitement when I conceived of this project, but tiredness, arrhythmias, and life slowed me down, and it got put aside for a few weeks.  Not to be concerned, there are several projects on my cutting table now and I want to work on all of them.  Something will come of it all, even if that something is not quite what was initially envisioned. 

 

This is the year for play after all.  It is not the results that are important but the process of exploration, of doing, of experimentation.  Who knows where it will all lead, and ultimately it is not really important if it leads anywhere at all. 

 

Other entertainments

I seem to run in fits and starts.  At times making time to play and write seems easy, at others I fall into bed exhausted at the end of the day and wonder where all my time went.  Sometimes I distract myself as well and end up on completely new tangents.

 I started the weekend looking for a piece of blue knit.  I knew I had it but I couldn't find it and this really ticked me off.  Somehow in the middle of the searching process I decided that it was time to finish cataloging the yarn in the yarn/fabric closet, a job I had worked on extensively last December, stopped for holiday guests, and never resumed.  

The impulse to organize yarn may have also been prompted by the fact that I came home from knitting group with four bags of yarn Thursday night.  My LYS is going out of business and I did my part to reduce the inventory.  I did finish the yarn inventory though, and got everything put away (whew, room for everything!) And I also mentally revised my "to knit" list to fill a few gaps and knit what I think I need now.

The blue fabric eventually turned up, pretty much right where I was originally looking.  I put it on the cutting table where it has been sitting ever since.   It is an inexpensive knit I purchased just for its stretch factor and because I liked the color.  At $3.00 a yard it was a good fabric to play with, to experiment with knits and hopefully learn a little something.  The plan was to test a summer dress and a top or two, items I actually intend to make in other fabrics, but which I am just unsure enough about that I would prefer to make a first version.  If v1 works, at least it is in a color I love, and if it doesn't, no beloved fabric has been wasted.  Somehow though, my motivation got washed downstream with all the rain and the change in the weather.

My work in the fabric closet was more than just an organizational exercise however.  As I photographed new yarns, folded fabric and reorganized I found myself being revitalized with new ideas swirling around in my head.  Although not finding something was frustrating, and at that moment the idea of a stash felt stifling, having it organized and accessible, being able to take out the pieces and let the ideas flow is liberating and inspiring.  

Before my fabric closet foray I was stuck in a rut of a few summer outfits.  I was thinking about what I would make next, but only in a limited way, as a single piece to add into the mix.  Playing with fabric and yarn, and taking inventory, opened my eyes to connections and possibilities I had forgotten.    

The blue fabric and those dresses offer possibilities beyond the immediate. Besides it is still August, and although it feels like fall  now, there are still summer days ahead. So this fabric remains on the table, and I hope to get started on it this week, but that may be  iffy.  We are going up to Lake George on Thursday to see my brother who is up from Texas and on Saturday I am having a passel of the neighbors over for dinner, all a great deal of excitement and interruption to our normally quiet routines.  We'll see how it all goes.

 I'll leave you with a plate of cookies.  I whipped these up last night from this recipe by Aran Goyoaga, who writes the blog Canelle et Vanille, and they are half gone already.

In fact I seemed to do a lot of baking over the weekend.  G had a chocolate craving so I baked brownies, then I baked brownies again. My baking pantry has seen little use of late and at this point I was out of chocolate and cocoa so I needed to make something else.  This cookie recipe had been at the top of my file, waiting for the perfect opportunity.  They are fabulous.  In fact this is my second batch.  Did I mention G has been suffering from a major sweet tooth?  Better him than me.  Anyway the first batch, which I made with shortening, looked more like the original photos in the blog, but mine are darker because I used unprocessed cane sugar rather than regular white sugar.  That first batch was devoured in a day. For this second batch, I was out of shortening, so I used butter.  Butter causes the cookies to spread more, but they are still soft and delicious.  I do love to bake, especially if someone else will eat the goods and save me from myself.

Not only had I forgotten how much potential I had in my fabric closet, I had forgotten how much baking calms my soul and eases stress.  Back in my college days I would bake cakes and cookies and brownies for the dorm before finals.  And I continued to bake for years, until the combination of relearning to bake with gluten-free flours, and just the other stresses of life seemed overwhelming.  This may have been a mistake, luckily one that is easily rectified.

I'm still here and I'm still not sewing.

That doesn't mean I am not thinking about sewing.

I have started getting a "collection closet" together.  It is shared space which will house both yarn and fabric and I have gotten some of each on the shelves.  What you see here is mostly new purchases (yes it is true, when not sewing the temptation to buy fabric is somehow that much greater) but also some older fabrics that have been sitting around in my sewing room for some time.

The closet is not going to hold my entire stash, but I would like at least part of it to be a staging area for grouping together upcoming projects.  I am not sure how I am going to go about it yet.  At the moment I was just happy to get a few things put away.  

I have these basket units from The Container Store that used to be in my clothing closet where they held sweaters.  

So far, I like the baskets for the knits and I think I will continue to store them here.  I have lots of space as I haven't moved that much over here yet.  They look awfully pretty, and I can see what I have easily.

I am also going to use some of the baskets for coordinating fabric groupings  -- that is whenever I get back to sewing anything.  Perhaps dreaming of groupings is pushing it a little too far.

But I still have that taupe grouping that I didn't make this summer sitting right on my cutting table.  It is buried under a bunch of other things at the moment but it will eventually be unearthed.  And luckily it is a color that can easily take me in toward fall.

Fishman's Fabric Haul

I promised to post photos of my haul from Fishman's Fabrics after my Chicago Weekend, a month ago now.  I did have swatches of a group of fabrics for which I was trying to find coordinates.  For the most part I was successful.

First are two pieces of silk organza.  They are two separate shades of gray, a very nice quality of organza. 

They were purchased to go with another piece of organza, to work with a particular set of garments:












Unfortunately in the intervening time my plans have changed so the garment I described to my companions is now going to exist in a different fabrication.  Needless to say these organzas will be used.  I am fairly picky about organza, the cheap stuff really makes me itch and is not worth the agony incurred when using it in a garment.

Two colors of silk duoppioni, the perfect shades to coordinate with a particular fabric, and another piece of duoppioni which coordinates with my original fabric as well as with a stunning piece of linen I found at Fishman's.











Here you can see all the fabrics that I was planning to work with, the original fabrics which were already in my stash, and the new additions:


Well, actually, I don't have the organza in this photo, but you get the idea.  I will be telling you more about these fabrics over the next few days as I plan the garments I intend to make.  At least some of these are also possible for the June Capsule Contest over at Stitcher's Guild, about which I will also be writing.

There is one last piece of fabric I purchased at Fishman's, A stunning piece of linen, destined to be a dress:



I want to write more but now I have to head out to dinner and my hotel for the night, where I unfortunately do not have internet access (because my portable computer is still not working and not yet in the shop).

We had big thunderstorms here this afternoon and lost power briefly, phone/internet service for several hours and we also lost our water supply.  There was one big, really really close lightening strike.   I suppose that the electricity in the ground fried the pump that operates our well.

I won't know more 'til tomorrow.  DH thinks we are going to camp out here without running water for the weekend.  I am not convinced. 

Oooh! Fabric!

There has been no sewing this week, although I still hope to whip out a simple robe in the two days remaining before my departure for Tennessee and DSD's doctoral hooding.

However, a package arrived from Vogue Fabrics with my Chicago purchases.  It included this:

The silk duopioni on the left is an odd shade of gray/brown/bronze that happens to pick up the colors in a group of fabrics around which I wish to build a small grouping or collection.  In fact all the fabrics in this photo blend into that grouping and are in the color families I was seeking out.

The two left fabrics were on sale for $2.99 a yard.  The two organzas on the right are 54" wide and were also on sale.  I purchased more than I will probably need for my group, although I might use them as underlining.  I am not worried about finding a use for these.  Organza is a basic and these colors are perfect colors for blending with many of my fabric choices.

Then we get to the frivolous stuff, the fabrics that were not in the plan.  One was on sale, one was not.

This cotton lawn was light and felt sinfully soft and smooth.  It is a good shade of red for me and I love the geometric pattern.  At $2.99 a yard it seemed like I would be foolish to resist.   It will become a lightweight summer top.

I also purchased this lovely wool.  Several of us looked at it and decided it wasn't quite right.  When I went back for a second look it seemed like it was the perfect shades of gray with a touch of brown and muted blue that I wear well.  When I saw that it was a panel and the size of the panels I knew what I wanted to make and so, after further consultation with Patti and Patty, it went into my bag.   Since this will be a fall project I will not start it now but I am planning to put it in my bag for San Francisco in July, when I will be participating in another Sandra Betzina sewing week.  It looks like I am developing a sense of what I will be sewing that week and I will start gathering together my projects and setting them aside the end of this month, when we get back from Tennessee and the Carolinas.  I will update you more about the plans at that time.

The package from Fishman's has not arrived.  One fabric needed to be ordered and I was told it would be about a week before they would be able to ship.  If it arrives Monday I will post photos.  Otherwise, since I am leaving for 10 to 12 days early Tuesday morning, it will all have to wait.

I DID finish one knitting project:
This is the tee I have been working on knit from Trendsetter's Binario  yarn.  The pattern is by L'Atelier in Redondo Beach, CA and is part of a set called "Compare and Contrast".  It was the sweater-of-the-month for May 2007.  Hey one year late, not so bad.

I have started the contrasting vest that goes with it, but I have already worn the tee once over a thin cotton turtleneck.  It may be May but it is still cold here.  Unfortunately it has been cold and gray, gray, gray, so photo ops have been limited.  Perhaps by the time I finish the vest, the sun will have come out again.

weekend update

I have made no progress on the UFO piles.  Well, no that is not quite true -- I did hem some workout pants so that I can go to the gym decently clad now that I can no longer hide beneath my coat.

This may not look like much to some, but these are really just  this year's UFOs.  There is at least another large box and drawer full hiding away and I really need to finish some of those as well, regardless of season.  The psychic weight of the UFOs is stifling my creativity. 

That said, and despite the fact that there are at least 4 unfinished current knitting projects, not counting the ones from last year, I am making good progress on a  new sweater.  The front and back are completed and have been blocked:













The yarn is Binario by Trendsetter and I am knitting it on US 9 needles, which yields a rather open lacy effect. 

I had intended to start working on the pattern for a particular project today and I did pull the pattern out and start studying the pieces, thinking about cutting and potential alterations and starting the muslin. Then in a panic I realized I need to start something else as well so I grabbed some pretty cottons and washed, dried, and pressed them, so that now I am ready to start tomorrow.  At least I hope I am ready.  I haven't checked my notion supplies for over a year and really have no idea if I have everything I need, but I have faith, and I know I have thread.

Here are the fabrics I am going to start working on this week:

moving into fall

I have managed to unpack all the fabric I purchased in San Francisco and integrate it into my fabric collection.  At the same time I managed to move the summer fabrics out of the active stash and back into the collection, keeping some of the new fabrics, as well as some old friends, for more imminent projects.

One of the projects that has remained in my mind revolves around the green challis skirt made last year and reconfigured this year.    I still have the wool which was intended to be a coordinating jacket:

I believe the new silk band on the skirt really makes the reds in this skirt pop and the combination works even better with the jacket fabric now than it did before.  I am really looking forward to making up this fabric this season.

This second photo is the silk that I had put aside for the lining of the jacket.  You see that it also picks up colors in the skirt, but does not quite coordinate with the silk band on the skirt.  I may still use it as a lining, or I may put it aside.  I need to do a little playing around with fabrics and styles yet before I make a final determination on this. 

I do know that I want more of the silk charmeuse that I used on the skirt, and that I do not have enough.  I sent a swatch off to Britex last week and just received a call, after I started writing this post, that they do indeed still have that silk in stock and will be sending me some more.  I am thinking of using the silk to make a coordinating blouse to wear with the skirt, or even perhaps to use the silk as a part of the jacket as well, tying all the pieces together. 

Once I had the skirt and jacket fabric together and started thinking further about using the silk, I immediately recalled this Marfy jacket:

At the moment I am thinking of using the tweed for the jacket with the silk charmeuse for the trim.  I don't know if I will add an additional trim or not.  I had originally planned to make a longer jacket with the fabric and if I do not, I may have enough extra to make a simple pencil skirt as well.

AT first I wondered if this jacket would be a little too precious with this skirt, but I am inclining more and more toward going ahead every day.  I will have to make a muslin first, which will help me also check out the proportions and styles to see how they go together. 

Strangely enough I must have had wines and pinks on the brain because a fair number of the fabrics I purchased at Stone Mountain and Daughter also coordinate with the rose tones in the green skirt:

and I seem to have developed an entire rose/wine/plum/green collection for fall.

Most of the fabrics are fairly light-to-mid weight; cottons, rayons, and very light weight wools.  I am still anticipating that it will be a while before I will need to break out the heavy duty woolens.

In that vein I also put together a collection centered on blues, grays, and blue-teals.  This one is basically inspired by several Japanese cottons and then evolved from there:

As you see, there is plenty to keep me busy. 

And I still have knits on the cutting table that I did not finish this summer.  They are mostly long-sleeved tops so they still have plenty of wear opportunities this year.  So it is probably time to stop fondling the fabric and start cutting and sewing.

New Trim

I am still unpacking and putting away from my trip to San Francisco.

Today I unwrapped the trims I purchased at Aida Dalati.  I did purchase two fabrics, one that is for fall, and one that I am holding until spring as I came home to find that it perfectly matched a piece of Zegna silk I got from Michael's . 

But it is the trims about which I am obsessing at the moment.

This trim is hand sewn amethyst nuggets.  I know exactly what I want to make, but I am not sure if I have the fabric yet (I haven't looked).  Something this fabulous needs to be a simple trim on a simple garment.  I purchased something very close at Stone Mountain and Daughter, but it is not quite perfect, which is OK, because I was really not thinking of that fabric when I purchased the trim.

I have faith that the perfect thing will turn up.  It always does.

I also purchased a piece of this simple ribbon. I see it as a decorative accent on the front of a simple silk charmeuse or crepe top.  I have gray 4 ply in the perfect color, and I know I can get more of that fabric or get the same color in charmeuse or other silk fabrications from Mood fabrics.  I just need to narrow down my choices, and reduce the clutter of ideas that are currently filling my mind. Perhaps something with layered silks, or satin organza. 

I am always scattered like this, with too many ideas until I finally settle down and the perfect thing falls out of the mix.

Last but not least (actually the second thing I found after  the amethysts above) are these fabulous buttons:

They are cubes and you sew them on at the corner, so they look like dice.  I am having second thoughts.  I believed I knew what I wanted but then I started second guessing myself.  Perhaps I want to use them to make a jacket inspired by this one:

But then, if I do, I need twice as many buttons.  Perhaps I need to think about this.  Perhaps I need to call Aida Dalati and see if there are any buttons left.  Perhaps I was a mistake to post this photo of these fabulous buttons, assuming the ladies who participated in Power Sewing the week after me haven't already scarfed them all up.

Eye Candy

Yes, the box of fabric arrived from Kashi yesterday evening.

It took me all day to get around to taking the photographs.

The Fuschia rayon lycra jersey was the first fabric I chose.  There were other things I kind of had my eye on, but that was the first fabric I found that really screamed "buy me".  So I did.  I bought lots, thinking something along the lines of top and skirt, or sweater set (and skirt) or dress....vague ideas at best so I needed to be prepared.

Then I was talking to Carolyn and my eye fell on this wonderful cotton voile print.  I am talking about the orange fabric in the middle here.  This is not a print in which one can get lost in a crowd.  I immediately thought of a skirt to wear with the knit.  The pinks are the same.  I immediately thought of something floaty, with multiple layers of fabrics, and perhaps asymmetrical pieces.  Then as I was watching the others shop, I saw someone pick up a really fabulous piece of deep pumpkin/bunt orange silk.  I remember charmeuse, but it might not have been. I was sorely tempted and my idea started to change.  But I did not buy the orange silk because I suddenly remembered that I might have something similar sitting at home, and I did.  That lovely piece of orange silk twill will become the lining for the skirt that will be made of the orange cotton.

Kashi showed us some fabulous silk prints that had just come in and this one really stuck in my mind.  He had it in black, and this wonderful bright navy blue.  Now I don't do particularly well with classic navy, but this one is wonderful.  So I wandered around thinking about it.  As usual with a successful purchase I had an image forming in my mind of a dress, but a printed dress with a coordinating, or contrasting for that matter, print as well.  But I didn't find anything.    I decided to buy the silk print anyway and just after he cut it, someone came in and bought some of this perfect navy blue silk, the perfect blue to go wtih my charmeuse.  It was not what I was originally thinking but immediately my thoughts began to transform themselves.  I took some of the solid as well.

Remember that burnt orange charmeuse?  Kashi had
it in purple too.  Purple is a much better color.  This one is actually deeper than it appears in the photo, purples seem to be hard to photograph. 

Then I pretty much sat down and let others shop and tally up their purchases.  I was done cutting and just needed time to get my order written up, but I was happy to look at what everyone was buying and ooh and ah their purchases.  Then, just as we were writing my order up, I saw another silk.  Truthfully I had seen it before, but it hadn't clicked with me until right then. 

I am sure you know what I am talking about; you see a fabric you love but you can't for the life of you figure out what you would do with it.  There had been another fabric like that at Kashi's, a beautiful deep dusty plum printed eyelet, but I passed on that one.  This next fabric spoke to me but I couldn't quite understand its language.  And then it occurred to me:  bias.  Cut the fabric on the bias.

Again I am thinking about a dress, but I don't have specific patterns in mind.  I never commit myself to anything until the fabric is cut.  dreams are free after all and I reserve the right to change my mind.

Summer Fabric

I have been playing with fabric.  I have been re-arranging, sorting, storing and generally thinking and dreaming about fabric and projects.  Newly purchased fabrics have been cataloged and filed in the collection and a few old favorites have been brought out to perhaps become new summer garments.  At the very least they will inspire summer garments.

This is a stack of fabric that I have added to one of the cubbies in the sewing room.  They come from all periods of my collection.  The aqua fabric near the middle is the Armani fabric I posted after shopping at Leandro Fabrics a few months ago.

What these fabrics have in common is that they have companion pieces that are dancing around my head as potential outfits.  Some of these plans are quite nascent now, for example the armani jacket is still vague in my head although I do still intend to get to it this summer, probably a little later when things have calmed down a bit, perhaps as late as July after visits from step-children and others are past.

Some of these projects might be completed sooner, but none of them are on the immediate production list.  I still seem to have a few stacks of knits I want to work through, and perhaps a few skirts.  At this point simple projects seem to remain best, and I am loathe to start some epic project only to have it delayed until the point that it just becomes another UFO.

A few surprises have materialized as well.  As I put fabric away in one of the fabric closets, this set of buttons fell out:
Buttons are not supposed to be stored with fabric. In fact I wonder what I was thinking because I would never use these buttons on the fabric with which they were cohabiting.  They are awfully pretty though, large, heavy metal with rhinestones.  Somehow they don't say summer to me so they will be put aside, with the rest of the gold buttons, until the pefect garment comes along.