Enough already! Sit down and sew...

Let's face it. I have a ton of fabric! Quilting fabric, garment sewing fabric, weird "what can I do with this?" fabric... I got fabric!! And I have been lazy in this summer hear (well ok, I'm always lazy, just using summer heat as my excuse) and haven't been keeping to the #MakeNine plan. I have only made 2 pieces of clothing and 5 other (computer bags for my sister and BIL and 2 vinyl front bags for my niece and nephew, shopping bag for my cousin) this year. Not sure if I ever posted pics of the bags so here they are...

So I woke up this morning with renewed sewing energy. Cleared off my desk first so I could type this and now will go clear off my rather messy cutting table and get to picking out a pattern! Oy! I do have a fair number of patterns to choose from but I want to make a light summery top I think first. Off to brave the mess...

Multi-faceted Sunday...

It was a busy week at Lake Rhonda...

Little bits of a lot of things...

Found a pattern for my Hawaiian shirt. Got matching thread, now to get sewing!

A few weeks ago I had my old (like from when I was in High School old) guitar restrung with the intention of playing it again. I even went out and got a guitar stand so I could have it out and handy for practicing! Last week I finally went to the ACC Monday night guitar group and had so much fun! So now I have two instruments to practice!

A couple of weeks ago I also started a Japanese calligraphy class at the Belle Cooledge Community Center not too far from my house. I got there a little early and one of the older women who was setting up came up to me and asked "Are you here for calligraphy?"
"Yes" I replied and she gave me a funny look.
"It's Japanese calligraphy you know" she said.
And to either put her at ease or throw her for a loop I answered. "Daijobu desu". (that's ok)
She started for a second then replied back to me in Japanese and we chatted for a couple of minutes in Japanese. Then she put her arm around me, laughed and said "You'll do fine in here then!". When she introduced me to the teacher a few moments later she told the above story and we all had a good laugh.
Then I was immersed into 2 hours of Japanese and learning beginning steps of calligraphy all at once. My head felt like it would burst but I was so happy? I hadn't spoken that much Japanese since my trip last year!

Last week I decided to try the pen version instead of the large brush and because it is better for kanji (character) practice, I will do that style first for a while.

And I decided to relearn Japanese kanji on my own again. I gave myself a little pretest to see how many of the 1st grade kanji I could remember (I used to know all the 1st and 2nd grade ones, oh 35 or so years ago!). The red is what I didn't remember! But as soon as I wrote them again, some I remembered easily, others I had totally forgotten. Will be an interesting study this time around!

Like I said it was a busy week here! Oh and I started an exercise class also at ACC before my Japanese class on Mondays. Had to have Andy go out into the garage to find my old light weights to bring to class next time. I am so weak! I watched the 80 year old ladies do the exercises sets with no problem and I was huffing and puffing! Yeesh!

Down to the wire...

Remember how I was going to make one garment for me each month in the #MakeNine2018 challenge?

Well I finally made it!

Decided to copy a tshirt I really liked, dolman (as opposed to set-in sleeves), loose fitting. So I had found this jersey at the little fabric shop near me (Hi-Fashion, link in the tab above) and decided to try using it. This was the first jersey I had sewn in a garment for myself (or at least in recent memory) so it was a little bit of a learning curve.

But I got to use both the serger and my regular machine for it (although it wasn't til I was done that I remembered I hadn't put in a stretch needle! Yikes!).

And it turned out pretty well I think for a first try:

All the hems are folded over hems, no neck facing so it was pretty easy. So now I have 2 tops, one a month in my new #MakeNine2018 challenge for myself!

If any of my old sewing pals are reading, feel free to post a photo of what you have been sewing in the comments below!

So here is the #MakeNine2018 tally so far:

1.             Scout Tee -- MADE. March 2018.

2.             Purple fabric Hawaiian top (for the CCC Ukulele group)

3.             Knit tee shirt -- MADE. April 2018.

4.             Sun Dress

5.             Shorts

6.             Long pants lounge wear (for around the house)

7.             Knit Top with ruched sides or sleeves

8.             Vest with separating zipper

9.             Woven fabric Shirt with buttonholes and buttons.

Getting organized and sewing...

Aside from being in a teeny tiny room to sew, I have way too much stuff underfoot which makes it difficult to move around. We recently put in a wider ironing board too which narrows the space to come into the room. I have been pouring over Instagram and Pinterest for ideas on how to reorganize my small space. Slowly but surely...

On another note, a couple of weeks ago I finally started making the pillows for the new grey sofa we got. We had gone to Berkeley to Stonemountain and Daughter and Bay Quilts where I found some delicious Japanese fabrics, some for clothing and some for making pillows. Then at IKEA we found pillow inserts so I just had to start sewing!

More to come with those!

Then last week I went to one of the small Asian fabric shops near me, Mihn Phat Fabrics, and found these lovelies! The middle one is jersey and the other 2 are a cotton/poly that feels and drapes like rayon. Cheap too! $4 or $5 a yard for 54-60 inch widths!

I have started making that same Scout Tee top (from last post) in the right hand fabric. This time I am making the sleeves more open/flouncy and the whole top a little longer.

Then yesterday we had to go to the Roseville Costco so I could get glasses frames for my new prescription. The Costco near me didn't have any small enough. Apparently I have a small head with eyes closer together so I need a size 49 frame. Anyway, since we were going to Roseville anyway, we also went to a Wearable Art pop-up shop that was being held in the Lincoln Public Library. I found this cute bag which had been a class sample for one of the talented women in the group (Mary Boalt). Picked it up for $7. The style is awkward so I won't probably use it much but since I had been wanting to paint and mark on cloth more, it gives me a lot of ideas on ways to paint on canvas then make it into something. Next week I will be at my art friend Leslie's house and we are going to play with painting on canvas. Nice inspiration!

If any of my old artsy readers are still around, I would love to hear what projects you have been working on lately! Feel free to leave a comment/photo in the comments section below!

Hashtags and sewing...

Talk about Full Circle... when I was very young I used to make doll clothes at my grandmother's house (I think I grew out of that one quickly), and then in junior high and high school made a lot of my own clothes. A purple mini-shirt and a brown velvet maxi-shirt come to mind immediately although I know there was other stuff I sewed back then as well. Just cannot remember anymore!

Then, a few years ago, and I decided to start making my own clothes.

 

I posted about the washi top HERE. I have worn that top several times and am happy when people compliment me on it. But then time passed and I didn't sew much else (aside from a little quilting and home stuff like placemats).

Flash forward to now and I have rediscovered not only my excitement about wanting to sew but also how motivating a few YouTube and Blog challenges can be! Enter the hashtag! While watching some random YouTube video about sewing, the idea of #2018MakeNine (also labeled as #MakeNine2018 in some blogs or videos so I am just using both) came up. Again. Then again. So I looked into it and discovered a whole world of people determined to make their own clothes this year.

I searched YouTube, Pinterest, Instagram... all with those hashtags and found all sorts of ideas, explanations, and some cool clothes people were making. I decided to jump onto the not too fast moving train and just start in, even though at the time it was mid-March. But luckily, making 9 items within a year's time was still easily do-able.

One of the things people were doing however that I had not done was to plan ahead. What were they going to make in their Make Nine? So I spent some time this weekend thinking about it and came up with two ways to think about it. I have a list of the 9 items I want to make and along the way, came up with Ten Techniques that I want to re-learn or learn for the first time. A lot of sewing for me is review because way back when (teens and 20s) I learned how to do most things, but then just let it all go. So I am finding once I review a technique it comes back to me easily.

I still do not have specific patterns attached to my list of Make Nine but at least I know what I want to make. Here is my list of #2018MakeNine more or less in the order I want to make them:

1. Scout Tee -- MADE, photo below!
2. Purple fabric Hawaiian top (no specific pattern, just what I want -- for the CCC Ukulele group)
3. Knit tee shirt
4. Sun Dress
5. Shorts
6. Long pants lounge wear (for around the house)
7. Knit Top with ruched sides or sleeves
8. Vest with separating zipper
9. Woven fabric Shirt with buttonholes and buttons.

This is the Scout Tee top I made for my first #2018MakeNine.

Here are the sewing techniques I want to work on this year:

1. Sewing in a knit facing (round collar)
2. Sewing a knit V-neck
3. Sewing a woven fabric V-neck
4. Fancy seams: French seams, Hong Kong seams, Flat fell seams
5. Using the twin needle for top-stitching
6. Sewing darts
7. Ruching (gathering)
8. Making buttonholes
9. Sewing a blind hem on both sewing machine and serger
10. Using zippers in clothing: separating, invisible, pants closures.

I am sure more will be added to that list as I stumble upon something new!