New York, New York

"The city's got the right name - New York. Nothing ever gets old around here."

~Ralph Stephenson

Last week I went to New York. While the purpose of the trip was professional, I did get to do a little sight-seeing, and one of the sights I was sure to see was the garment district. It was quite amazing.The fabric stores are so unbelieveable! Rows and rows of fabric. It was quite overwhelming at first, but I once I got used to it I was in sewing heaven. Here are a few pics.




Me in Mood fabrics. If you've seen project runway you know what I'm talking about, if you haven't then you should check it out.



My friend Natalie in Mood.


My friend Gwen of after the dress in Rosen & Chadick Fabrics. This was the BEST store I went into for cotton prints. They had such an amazing selection I could've spent a small fortune in there and not gotten everything I wanted.

The other stores I visited were B&J fabrics, which was much too pricey for me, but very fun to browse, and Metro Textiles- a small store with a fun little owner guy who really layed the sales tactics on thick.

My next post will feature my purchases in NYC.

Project picture post

My sister decided to put the girls in the pjs and take a picture even though they're, as she put it, a TAD too big.





They'll have to wait till next year to wear them I think. :)

Past project Wednesday

My most recently finished project was two cute pajama sets for my twin nieces. Again I was able to find fabric that was similar (giraffes and elephants) but different colors. I'm afraid they're actually going to be too big on them right now, so it may be a while before I can post a picture of them wearing it, but I promise (assuming my sister sends me one) to do so when I can. In the meantime here's the finished sets.




You can read more about it here

My labels

Recently I was given the wonderful gift of some sewing labels. I add them to pretty much everything that I sew now. I like the special touch they give a gift. I just added one to the bag and remembered I hadn't posted about it yet. Here's what they look like (sorry the picture is a tad fuzzy.)

Tiger bag complete

"Lettin' the cat outta the bag is a whole lot easier 'n puttin' it back in." ~Will Rogers

I finished the bag I was making for my mom for her birthday.

My mom teaches at a high school where the mascot is the tiger and their colors are orange and brown. I think it will make a cute school bag for her.

The inside has a big pocket and a divided pocket.

The details:
This bag was quite a project and I only got it done in a weekend because I pretty much did nothing else the entire weekend. Next time I think I'll give myself a little more time for gift making.

The bag is formed by the patchwork layer (cotton fabric), a layer of buckram, 2 layers of fusible fleece, and another cotton fabric for the lining. Sewing all of that together was a bit difficult for my machine. I broke the needle 3 times. One time because the lining had bunched up so it was extra thick. Once I realized what had happened I had to take the stitches out and redo it which was a HUGE pain considering I was using a small stitch length. Also, getting all of those layers under the foot was a feat in itself. I think my machine is a bit grumpy after all that.

I hand stitched the binding on the top, and that was quite a chore, though I eventually got the hang of making the slip stitch and it got much easier. Overall I'm pretty satisfied with it despite the fact that more swear words were used in the making of this project than all of the others combined. :) I don't think I'd make it again necessarily, but I'm glad I tried it once.

Well my quote works two-fold. There's a slight chance (very slight) that my mom might read this and the cat will be out of the bag, and also one of the kittens decided to take a nap in it and I managed to snap a picture before she hopped out.

If you change your mind

"In order to learn one must change one's mind."
~George Byron

After buying the fabric for my mom's bag, I decided I really didn't like one of them. Of course I decided this AFTER I cut out the pieces. So I think I'm going to go buy some more fabric that I like a little better. I hope this doesn't happen often, it could end up being quite expensive.

Patience young grasshopper

“All human wisdom is summed up in two words - wait and hope.”
~Alexandre Dumas Pere


The smallest size of the penguin costume, xs, is too big for my nieces. The xs fits a 23-24" waist, and they have a 20" waist. So I had to decide - make the extra small and hope for the best, re-draw the pattern a size smaller, or make a bigger size that they can wear next year.

I chose option b - redraw the pattern pieces a size smaller.

After working for 2 hours on one piece, and not making much progress, I started to doubt my choice. I was very close to just making the extra small and hoping for the best. I took a break for a few hours and decided that I would be terribly disappointed if they didn't fit, and it may not even fit them next year, so I would just suck it up and finish redrawing the pieces. It took me almost one entire day, probably around 6 or 7 hours to redraw the 8 pieces that I needed, but it went much faster once I got the hang of how and where to make the measurements from the xs lines to make my xxs lines.

It took a lot of patience but I was pretty happy with how it turned out. To me it looked pretty close to the original lines and sizes, as if it were almost a real size included on the pattern. I mean it's not perfect or anything, but I'm quite pleased with the way it turned out. I wish I'd taken a picture but I didn't think about it until after I'd cut them out. :(

Now we just hope that the new size fits them!