I'm going to Sew With a Plan!

Well, a plan of sorts. I need a winter maternity wardrobe, as in pretty much a complete wardrobe - once the weather turns cold and I get very round I'll have very little to wear outside the house.

Some people on a message board I'm on were talking the other day about how they were intrigued by Timmel Fabrics' SWAP contest, but thought that sewing 11 garments on a deadline was a bit daunting. Others (like me) needed clothes sooner than the rules of the contest would allow them to start sewing. So we came up with an informal, pared-down version of SWAP where you make 8 garments and have enough combinations to wear a different outfit every day for a month (more or less).

Here's my "SWAP storyboard" so far:



I'm using a couple of patterns that are basically free online tutorials: the Thai Fisherman's pants and One Seam Dress with the modification of an attached tube top replacing the waistband for more coverage discussed in the comments and in this gargantuan thread on Craftster.

I resized the line drawings so that they are very roughly proportioned to my shape to get an idea of how they'll look. I also changed the drawings on some to change details where I want to alter the pattern, such as the third top from the left, where I want to add ruching in the front of a regular (non-maternity) drape-neck shirt pattern. Some of the drawings were pretty small to begin with, so they look a little distorted now.

My sticking point is the last top/jacket (it's not even in the storyboard). A "requirement" for the smaller SWAP I'm doing is that the jacket should be able to do dual duty as a top on its own. At first I was just going to do a maternity button-down shirt, but I don't think it will layer well with some of the more flowy tops I've chosen. So I was looking at this Vogue cardigan that can be worn as a wrap top:



The other choice is a jacket from Burda - I already have the magazine, while I would have to buy the Vogue pattern:



The problem is that it can't exactly be worn on its own without anything under it. I'm tempted to make it anyway because I could just throw it over a maternity tank and wear it anywhere, and I have a ton of tank tops.

Who knows if I'll actually get this all sewn before the baby arrives? That's not really the point, anyway - a lot of this stuff can still be worn afterward.

Peer Pressure

Well, this past weekend I took a semi-private spinning lesson (it was me and a friend and the instructor) with the lovely Barbara Clorite. We learned all sorts of stuff about plying, and basically anything we could think of to ask her. We plied some (stale) sample singles we had brought with us then wet them to see if they were balanced, and I was delighted to find that my sample was almost perfectly balanced!

I immediately came home and put some more plying twist into some yarn I had under-plied a week or so ago

She may do a larger workshop later this summer for some of the ladies in the spinning group I go to, but it looks like it will be on a Saturday, so I will be working and unable to attend.

During and after our lesson, my friend clued me in on something that, in her words "all the cool kids are knitting." I finally succumbed to her prodding and joined the Mystery Stole 3 group. What convinced me was that the pattern is designed by Melanie of Pink Lemon Twist, whose Hanami shawl I lusted after blogged about not very long ago. Her Leda's Dream and Scheherazade stoles were the previous two mystery stoles (both final patterns are available for purchase here).

Of course, I will be way behind the majority of the group because I just joined yesterday and the first "clue" (i.e. first part of the pattern) comes out Friday. I'm still deciding which yarn I'll use and whether I'll use beads (they are, apparently, optional).

Buy, 'bye.

I've stalled on my fabric organization and my room looks worse than ever. I've been neglecting the blog, as well as basically every craft/fiber project in my mental list.

I found out I'm pregnant with bambino #2 a little while ago, and I'm suffering from major energy and motivation drain.

Anyway, in fiber news, last weekend I attended an alpaca shearing day at Parker River Farm! I only got to see two animals get shorn, because the weather didn't cooperate and it began to drizzle (they can't be shorn with wet fleece). Those animals are unbelieveably cute, especially a white Suri alpaca named Diego, who is due for his first shearing this season, and looks a little like a cartoon character with his underbite and floppy mop-top haircut that falls over his eyes. Unfortunately I didn't bring a camera with me this time.

Then this Wednesday I went to the Newburyport spinning group, but not before stopping off at Three Bags Full, a yarn shop that is, unfortunately, closing its doors. I picked up a couple skeins of Malabrigo Aquarella in a beautiful teal and green colorway called Solis, and three skeins of Reynolds Andean Alpaca Regal with a vague idea of knitting something baby-sized out of it.

the Malabrigo:


and the Andean Alpaca (I got it in black and #28):


I may have to go back and get more of the aplaca in different colors to knit this:



In fact, upon closer inspection of the pattern I think I can make it in black with white ears using materials I already have!

Daydream believer

Well, I used the fact that the baby took a nap this morning to absolutely waste my time web-surfing. I'm a bad SAHM. Of course, as soon as I began to type, the sound of keys clacking woke the baby, which only proves that I should have been more idle.

Anyway, I found the most beautiful shawl when I arbitrarily clicked someone's blog link on the Spindler's email list:



(The shawl pattern is for sale here.) I need a new project like I need a hole in the head, and I actually spent a moment contemplating handspinning some alpaca for this. Sometimes I just have to laugh at myself. I can't even finish mattress-stitching a sweater that's already half sewn up!

The blogger I found is Taueret, who I have now added to my RSS feed. I need to be careful about finding interesting knitting blogs though, I used to have quite a habit. She also cracked me up with a "look at the hideous/funny photos from my vintage pattern books" post. I think the picture speaks for itself:



Pure wool softened with a mist of mohair, then hardened with a double barrel of buckshot! The sweater's not bad, but the pose is priceless.

There must be something of the eternal optimist in me, because even in these "hideous old pattern" books, I always seem to find something I think would look nice knitted up in a color I like, etc.

When I saved that picture to post it here, I titled it "shotgun handknits," which is ironic because having a shotgun pointed at me is probably the only way I'm ever going to finish any of my WIPs. Maybe I'll post a copy of this pic in my craft room as motivation, and psych myself up that this chick will come after me if I don't have a sweater done SOON.

Looking at that picture made me think of buckshot jeans. I don't recall where I heard about them, probably some kind of "weird news" story or something.

That's it for today, the baby is getting cranky.

"Ruler" Folding Madness

I found this post on Happy Zombie via Nutmeg's Material Mama podcast, as well as her posts about it on the Sewing Mamas forums (registration required).

Although the tutorial calls for using a quilting ruler to fold, I decided to use something larger because I don't quilt, thus had lots of pieces that were several yards long. Once they were folded over the ruler they were too thick to fold in half. I settled on using two of those portfolios that hold a pad of paper.

I also used the folding as an opportunity to catalog my fabric stash for some bizarre reason. Maybe I'm nesting. Anyway, it was easy to add a step of measuring the fabric, since I already had to smooth it out and fold selvedge to selvedge, and since I cleared the living room to do it, I was right by the computer anyway.

Here are my before pics, a wreck of a craft room after about a week of just opening the door and throwing things in:



I took a "before" shot of the shelves and closet where I store my fabric, but now I can't remember where I saved it.

I've been folding here and there whenever I find the time - usually about a dozen pieces or so each time. I'm up to 160+ yards, and the end is nowhere in sight!

New Hampshire Sheep and Wool Festival

This weekend I got to spend my first Mother's Day as a mother at the New Hampshire Sheep and Wool Festival. It was an absolutely gorgeous day, as opposed to last year, when I went during a torrential downpour.

First things first, we went straight in to cheer on our friends participating in the Sheep-to-Shawl competition. There were very few participants, in fact there was only one adult division team and one kids' team. It was a shame, since that meant there wasn't really any competition, other than against the clock. Of course the kids won the people's choice award, but I voted for the adult team anyway, since I knew some of the participants, and they really went all out with themed costumes and a "mad tea party" setup, as well as battling some serious loom issues. Here's a picture of them removing their shawl from the loom:



I wish I had gotten a shot of the kids weaving on their hand-made loom which was built from giant pixie stix containers, but there were a lot of people around their team's area when I was there and I didn't try too hard to get a shot.

I got a lovely partial Cormo Romney cross fleece from This & That Farm. Last year I hit my budget limit before I got to their booth, but they had some lovely fleeces, and my friend who was with me (and has a larger fiber budget) bought a hogget fleece from them. After seeing how lovely her fleece was, and the sample they sent her this year, I made it a point to seek them out. And this year I really had to, since they didn't have much fleece left by Sunday. I bought 2 1/2 pounds of fleece from a sheep named Connor:



Then I got an awesome black alpaca fleece, unfortunately I don't remember the name of the guy's farm since it wasn't very prominent in his booth as far as I can remember, so I'll have to ask my friend Kelly. I'll probably come to find that his name was plastered everywhere and I was just oblivious.

We had a late lunch, in which my husband got a lovely shot of me chewing. This was just before the baby tried to grab and eat the book.



Pardon the color adjustment, my husband never looks at the camera settings and this picture originally had me looking very much like Violet Beauregard, pre-juicing.

I also got some lovely soft angora from Chris of Woolybuns. She was very nice and now that I see her blog it will definitely be on my "to read" list. We hit her booth at the end of the day when I reviewed our day and found we had skipped a building, so I didn't get to see any cute bunnies since they were all gone by the end of the day, except one who had had enough of the crowds.

Of course my raw fleece buying led to my digging out several other bits of raw fleece I've accumulated, and now my craft room is even more trashed than usual:



Anyway, I dug out 3 pounds of what I *think* is Romney, but I can't remember since it wasn't labeled. I decided to scour this first. This stuff was REALLY dirty. The below pic was taken after 3 washings and a few rinses. The tips really had the dirt locked in. I'm going to let it dry a bit and tease the tips open before washing again, and after reading a bit online, I'm going to use a ridiculous amount of Dawn next time.



Also after reading a bit online last night about the problems I was having scouring the Romney, I learned that I'm probably ruining my septic system by scouring fleece in the washing machine. Don't tell my husband. So now I need to go out and get some five-gallon buckets.

Whew! I need to blog more often if only to avoid insanely long posts like this one. There's much more, but I'll save it for later since the baby has had enough of me spending time at the computer.

Burda magazine and SWAP

I got the March Burda World of Fashion magazine yesterday - it was my first time buying the magazine.

I was a little disappointed to find that there were clothes pictured in the magazine that did not have patterns. Particularly the children's clothes; they were pictured with T-shirts, golf shirt type shirts, and other items that I thought would have patterns, but did not.

However, that is not to say that I don't think the magazine is a great value. I think it is excellent to be able to get so many patterns for only $8 (especially when buy it during a sale at your local fabric store and get it for 25% off that!). Not to mention the fact that the same patterns are pictured in different fabrics, so it gives you even more ideas about how to make the patterns more versatile. Take this skirt for example:

In the magazine it is pictured three different ways.

Anyway, lately I've been toying with the idea of doing the Sewing with a Plan thing (SWAP). You see it in various places online, although it seems to originate here. I've read this a few times before, but the other day I came across it again, and it finally stuck with me that the key to the whole thing is to not pick fussy, complicated patterns that you won't finish. You should use the easiest patterns you have, especially ones you have made before, and you can make the same thing out of different fabrics.

Well, I've wasted too much time online already; I should be sewing!

Cilantro-ranch turkey sandwich

I just made the most delicious sandwich, and I wanted to get it down so I can make it again.

from the top down:
Basic white bread from my Breadman manual
Ranch dressing
fresh cilantro
red-leaf lettuce
thin sliced yellow onion
thin sliced green bell pepper
white American cheese
deli turkey meat (next time try mesquite flavor)
spicy brown mustard
bottom slice of bread

yum!

Beatles nursery mural

DSC02365
Originally uploaded by pleiades07.

Well, I have gotten some sewing done, but nothing is photographed yet. I do have a picture of the mural in the baby's room, which was just finished a few days ago. I absoluetly love it. The next day after we got all the furniture in, we just sat and stared at the wall endlessly. It was painted by Amy Cornellier of Xhibition Designs.