Vikings and Garb

Since I keep forgetting that I actually have a blog, I don't think I've written about my ventures into the wonderful world of historical reenacting here. Earlier this year I finally joined a local Viking reenactment group. While we aren't SCA, a lot of the members are also SCA or have been SCA in the past, and Reik Felag (traveling fellowship) has done some events with the SCA in the past. I first heard about the group five or six years ago, while chatting with someone at the local (now defunct) Renaissance festival. I'd based my hastily cobbled-together costume on pictures of costumes that were more tenth century Viking than sixteenth century English renaissance. To be fair, the Renaissance festival wasn't the kind that's about historical accuracy. It was more fairy-tale Renaissance-inspired. Anyway, I was wandering around with a drop spindle and found myself at a booth featuring works from a couple different local artists and we started chatting. One of them suggested I check Reik Felag, but since I lived on the east side of the river at that time, and the group met on the west side (which meant getting there via transit would have taken at least 2 hours, one way), I had to say no.

Then we moved to the west side of the river and I decided to check out the Scandinavian Midsummer Festival. Reik Felag sets up a Viking trading village for the weekend of the festival and I got to see the group in action. My first email about joining vanished into the aether, and then I forgot to follow up, so I ended up not joining until this spring, shortly before this year's Midsummer Festival.

That gave me enough to put together my first Viking outfit with the basics. I made a shift/underdress and a smokkr/apron dress, found a pair of leather shoes that looked vaguely right, had a bit of an adventure sewing a leather belt pouch out of scrap leather, wove a belt, and hemmed a chunk of linen gauze for a head covering. And I had a blast.

Nerdery to the max!

I've since mostly been focused on research and other sewing projects, but as our Solstice festival is going to be in January (since everyone's busy during actual Solstice; also, I'm organizing our Yule thing and need to get going on it), and I wore my Viking outfit for Halloween, I figured it was time to start adding to the ensemble.

I started with a Skjoldehamn hood. The hood is based on one found on a body that was excavated from Skjold Harbour in Norway in 1936. The body and clothing were eventually dated to the late 11th century. The person was thought to be a man at first, but later tests suggest that they may have been a woman (though naturally this is not conclusive).

The Skjoldehamn hood and variations on it are a popular clothing item for Viking-era reenactors. It's a simple sewing project that lends itself well to showing off one's embroidery skills. While the original only had, so far as they can tell, small amounts of simple embroidery, this hasn't really stopped people from borrowing motifs from other Viking pieces and decorating their hoods with them. I chose to go simple, as my embroidery skills are just basic right now.

The hood itself is fairly simple in its construction - you need a long rectangle and a couple of squares and the seams are easy to work. I used a green wool and then lined it with natural-coloured linen. I whip-stitched around the hood opening and the hem, which follows what the original had. I used an arrowhead stitch in a mustard-yellow wool along the seams to both decorate and reinforce.

After that, I tweaked my shift a bit by adding some embroidery around the neckline and the cuffs. I didn't do much there because it's a very basic tunic and I plan to sew another one at some point that'll be made out of higher-quality material. I thought about weaving up some trim on my inkle loom but decided against it since I didn't want that much bulk around the neckline and the cuffs. I'm going to do some inkle-weaving to sew around the top of my apron dress, though.  

The last thing I've made recently is a Jorvik cap. This is based on a find from Jorvik (York) of a women's cap. The original was silk; I used linen as I couldn't track down easily accessible and affordable tabby-woven silk. The character I'm developing, Embla, is probably going to be based more in Sweden, a little earlier than the cap is dated to, but I needed something that stays on my head better than the wrap I improvised for Midsummer. Embla is a volva-in-training, a wisewoman, and as such she may not have worn anything like this. It's hard to say - we don't know if pre-Christian Norsewomen wore head coverings. It was common for Christian women to cover their heads, for both religious and practical reasons, but since clothing tends to rot away very quickly, the pre-Christian Vikings didn't leave much in the way of writings, and the sagas only mention clothing occaionally, we don't have enough archaeological finds or written sources to tell us whether or not Viking women covered their heads, let alone how they did. Extrapolating based on contemporary or near contemporary sources from neighbouring cultures is the best we can do for now. Those give us a few options for women's head coverings. The wrap I made for Midsummer (top picture) was one possibility. This cap is another.

So I hand-sewed this whole thing, and then embroidered around the edge with a herringbone stitch using some handspun silk. It's a bit slubby, which I liked, and the whole thing turned out well. It also stays on and doesn't slip off easily.

And that's it for now. I have made a couple rough attempts at learning to nalbind, and I'm going to start on a new smokkr for Yule this week. I'm going to make E. an outfit for Yule as well - undergown and smokkr. J. has agreed to let me dress him for the event so he's getting a tunic to wear over some of his dress pants, since I don't have enough time to hand-sew a pair of pants and make him a belt on top of all that, and straight-legged pants work for the time period. I should probably get started.

Potato Chips

In November, I will be dusting off my TA skills and putting them to use in helping a friend with a class she's teaching on making box bags, also (apparently) known as Dopp bags (after the men's shaving kit bags). I made one, in fits and starts, over the course of a week, because I was feeling unfocused. I finished it on Monday morning and it didn't look so good. So I put together another one in less than an hour and it looked fabulous. Tuesday I did another one.

It's like I can't stop. Sure, I'm limited by the amount of interfacing and number of long enough zippers I have on hand right now, but they're fun to make, easy, and I feel very accomplished when I finish off the last of the hand-stitching on the inside. And the ones I'm making use up two fat quarters, one for the lining, one for the outer fabric. You can adjust the size up or down pretty easily, but I'm having fun with the fat quarter size, particularly because if I have fat quarters that are already cut, then the only things I have to cut out are the interfacing and the bits for the handle and tabs at the end.

Monday's messy one used dress plaid for the outer fabric, white cotton flannel for the lining, and light-weight interfacing on both sides. I goofed at the ends of the zippers and now have gaps there that need fixing, and didn't catch the tabs with the seaming, so I recycled them into Tuesday's bag instead. I'm thinking of just hanging onto it as-is for now and using it to remind the students that leaving half an inch unsewn at each zipper end is in the instructions for a reason. I'll tinker with it and fix it after.

Monday's not messy bag used plain cotton fat quarters and heavy-weight interfacing on both sides; tabs and handle made from leftover quilting cotton. I picked up a new zipper when I bought heavy-weight interfacing on Monday and used that here. 

 

Tuesday's was made with two cotton flannel fat quarters, heavy-weight interfacing on the outer fabric, light-weight interfacing on the lining; tabs and handle of the same quilting cotton as Monday's bag. The zipper's one of a handful I bought at a thrift shop ages ago.

Wednesday's was made with more cotton flannel fat quarters, since I'd bought a small bundle with  50% off coupon from Michael's. This time I tried heavy-weight interfacing on only the outer fabric, and no interfacing on the lining, to see the kind of results I got. The zipper was from the same batch as Tuesday's. It's nice having a chance to use up some of the zippers that have been lingering in my notions box for a while.

I have one more box bag almost finished; just the hand sewing left. That one was me tinkering with the size a little to use a slightly shorter zipper. I managed to goof up the top stitching on the zipper by catching the lining in the wrong place, so I had to pull out a seam and fix that, and then the rest of it went smoothly.

Then I decided to use up one of my short (9 inch) zippers to make a pouch-style bag like one I'd seen on Pinterest. I'd glanced through the tutorial a few days ago and then improvised from there and it turned out pretty well. Blue dinosaur flannel on the outside, lined with heavy-weight interfacing, some plain beige cotton on the inside, and a yellow zipper.

I may need to go get more interfacing. And zippers.

New sewing things!

My new-ish serger

So, back in August, my parents came to visit. They brought the above with them. It's a serger. To be accurate, it's a Janome MyLock 204D. It was my grandmother's.

I finally gathered the courage and time to pull out it earlier this week and try working with it. The manual is poorly assembled (Language A on page 1, Language B on page 2, Language C on page 3, Language A on page 4, etc), and not as easy to follow as I would like, but I did okay. I've determined that I find it easiest to manage when the cutting blade is disengaged, and I haven't tinkered too much with the tension settings yet (that did become necessary, though, as E. saw the dials and immediately went for them).

When I was a kid, sewing with Grandma, she would usually handle the serger, or she would let me use it with her guiding my hands so I wouldn't slice my fingers on the blade. If the machine she used then had the option to disengage the blade, I never saw her use it. It went very fast and it was very noisy, and I was a little scared of it. She offered me that one when she upgraded to this one, but I was living in a studio apartment at university then and just the regular sewing machine was plenty for me to handle.

This serger doesn't seem as intimidating as the old one did. It's newer, a little lighter (still heavier than my sewing machine), and the threading guide makes more sense. It's still noisy and fast, as that seems to be typical of sergers, and it does the one thing really well. It serges. There's a few other things it can do--serging and gathering at the same time, pintucking, some special hemming options. There are a few other feet I could purchase for it so it would make piping and do beads and gather more easily, but as is, it does what I need it to do.

I set it up on top of my dresser so I can stand and sew at the same time. This option actually works well with my standard machine, too, I've discovered, which means the backache from hunching over my sewing can be a thing of the past. Plus, standing desk. It does go back into the box between uses. I have a climbing toddler, after all.

I used the serger to finish edges for a dress for E., and the next project is either a t-shirt (to see how the serger handles the inside seams) or a pair of jeans (top-stitching and precision sewing on the regular machine, inside seams that need reinforcing on the serger). It's going to take a little practice to get used to using a different machine, but it's not nearly as scary as it was in my head.

True, the serger is obviously not practical for everything. A top I have slated to make for E. next week only requires finishing on the shoulder seams, since the rest is trimmed with bias tape, so I'm going for French seams there. I don't really want to haul the serger out for everything. But it will make some of my sewing with knits a bit easier, and it gives the "how do I finish these seams?" question an additional answer to work with.

first backpack

Toddler Backpack, front view

Toddler Backpack, back view

I finished E.'s backpack this morning. It turned out well, and she was very excited about having a new bag to hide things in. It was a good project for me to do, since I've never made anything like this before.

The pattern is Made by Rae's Toddler Backpack. The pattern itself is great; the instructions were clear and they come with directions for enlarging the pattern and for adding a lining. I kept it the toddler size, since E.'s on the small side anyway. I may need to shorten the nylon straps a bit more; otherwise she'll be dragging the ends of them on the floor.

I used a flowered canvas that got passed on to me when a friend was de-stashing. I'd originally though to use it as a child-size tablecloth for E. when she was older, but decided it would work well for this. Most of the lining fabric, the base, and the shoulder straps were made of a green fabric that also came from someone else. I think it's mostly cotton. The base for the lining, since I was out of green fabric by then, was made of a yellow cotton.

I chose to go with a lining rather than using bias binding on the inside seams. I didn't feel like doing bias binding, and wanted the added stability of a lining. I think it probably took just as much time as it would have to do all the bias binding.

Toddler Backpack, inside view

I used a yellow-green piping for most of the trim, and yellow nylon straps for the adjustable straps. I also used a light purple piping to trim the front pocket (because I only bought one packet of yellow-green piping and then didn't have enough for the pocket. The purple piping was leftover from another project), which was my own addition. I cut out an additional piece of canvas using the front pattern piece as a guide, just folded over so the pocket would be the height I wanted. I added the piping to the pocket, topstitched it, then layered it on top of the front and added the edge piping and proceeded as the pattern instructed.

Toddler Backpack, side view

The zipper is a white plastic one with a metal toggle that will be easy for E. to pull. I had to shorten it, but that's not really a difficult modification to make. Sewing the lining to the zipper panel was a little messy. I didn't quite manage to line it up with the stitching from earlier, so it doesn't look perfect, but the lining won't come out easily, which is the important thing.

If I do another one of these, I'll probably do the front pocket again, and maybe add some inside pockets to lining as well. I'm considering getting a piping foot. I ended up using my zipper foot to apply the piping and while it worked, it was hard to get it close enough to the cording. I used a denim (heavy-weight) needle, and one backpack plus a lot of piping was enough for the tip to start getting dull by the end.

The next sewing project is a t-shirt for me. Pictures to come!

book titles, sewing, and knitting

Summer shorts for the tiny one

I keep reminding myself to write a blog post, and then I forget. Sorry. I also forget about Twitter most of the time, too. I've been spending more time reading than writing lately, and I need to flip that around for a bit. There's a short story I need to finish and submit by the end of the month, and the planned release date for book 2, now tentatively called Ley Lines, is October 31, 2015. A couple of book blogger reviews for Comrades We are on their way, but I have been told that they have backlogs to get through first, so I don`t yet have specifics as to when the reviews will be available. When they are, I will link them.

I've made some time for sewing lately, the result being the picture above. There's a pair of green ones in the same pattern that are mostly done (hemming and elastic and possible applique are the only bits left). The other in-progress sewing project is a backpack for E. from Made by Rae's pattern. There'll be a full post for that one when it's finished. After that, I have a t-shirt for me that needs to be cut out and sewn up.

And I have a shawl-in-progress that`s nearly finished. It`s very pretty, and I want to complete it so I can finally give it to its intended recipient. Also so I can take pictures. It doesn`t exactly look like much on the needles. Then it will be time to cast on some socks. The many pairs I knit a few years back are starting to wear out, so the sock drawer needs replenishing. The sock yarn stash needs to decrease, too, because it composes most of my stash right now. It might be nice to use some of it up.

So, that`s all for now. My next post will probably be about E.`s new backpack.

KCW: The rest of the costume

So, I finished E.'s pants and vest. They are done, they work, and now I just need to dig an old ring out and put it on a piece of string for the rest of the costume.

Finding mushrooms on her quest.

 The Charles pants were fairly easy to put together since it's now my second time through the pattern. I haven't printed out the final version of it, so I was working with the test pattern again. I believe the final version corrects some of the fitting issues in the waist that were present in the test version. I used the more fitted waistband this time and did the elastic band in the back as well. I didn't quite get the length of the pants right, but as she'll grow taller, her pants being a bit long isn't exactly a disaster.

I used a pair of old brown pants for the main fabric, the same green flannel I used in the cape for the contrast, and did yellow topstitching. The buttons are some yellow-ish leather ones I bought at Button Button a while ago.

New pants, new vest, now if only the rock she's standing on were better.

 The vest was engineered out of an old cardigan of mine. I loved that cashmere cardigan, a $7 thrift store find, originally from Banana Republic. I finally gave up on darning the holes underneath the arms, where it was wearing thin. It's now a cozy buttoned vest with slightly wonky armhole bands for E., a side effect of not cutting the bands wide enough. I traced a t-shirt and made use of the button band already in place. It'll be a nice layering piece over the winter, as well as a Halloween costume.

I started a Louisa dress yesterday and it was coming together really well. Then I sewed through the zipper teeth for several inches without realizing it and now have to painstakingly take the zipper off and sew it back on more carefully and shorter (it's at least a 20 inch zipper, I have room to shorten it). Blasted invisible zipper foot not wanting to be compatible with invisible zipper I found at the thrift store that may be older than me. But the dress is lovely so far--blue corduroy with a flowered corduroy front pocket and fully-lined. I love how simple the pattern is, how elegant in many ways. I'm considering one with a matching front pocket and another without the front pocket.

I may not get the dress done tonight, but the hobbit child is ready for Halloween.

KCW: Hobbit Cloak

Instead of numbering the days for Kid's Clothes Week this time around, I'm just labeling my posts about it with the item I made. I made this cloak on Day 1, and today is Day 4, because it usually takes me a bit to get the pictures off the camera.

E. is going to be a hobbit for Halloween this year, which ties in nicely with KCW's storybook theme this time around. I took a look through Tolkien's intro to The Fellowship of the Ring, and it includes a note that hobbits like bright colours and are extremely fond of yellow and green. The hobbits in the fellowship wear green cloaks, so I took my cue from that.

I happened to have a child's dress-up cape pattern in a book a friend gave me last year when E. was born. The book is Sweet and Simple Handmade. It's a very nice book and my current biggest complaint is that either I am missing one of the pattern sheets altogether, or I have lost one. I don't remember there being four sheets, just three, and that's all I have, and at least one pattern in the book does not have a counterpart on the pattern sheets (and I was going to use that one for a vest for the hobbit costume--now I have to practice my pattern drafting skills instead). Also, I really hate pattern tissue paper. It never folds up again properly. Good book, would be better if it came with a CD of pdf patterns instead.

For the outer fabric of the cape, I went to Fabricana and found some green flannel. I would have loved to use wool fabric, but I don't really want to spend $25+/metre for a toddler's dress-up cape. (And yes, when I made myself a cloak, with the assistance of my grandmother, after my first year of university, I went straight to the woollen section and selected a lovely blue and green wool plaid. It's a lovely item and I've had it for years. Grown-up clothing is different, even if it is for dress-up). I am starting to really love flannel. It's soft, warm, easy to work with, and softens even more with age (true, not as sturdy as linen, but that's okay). I used an old cream-coloured sheet for the lining.

I added a hood, which I traced from one of E.'s sweatshirts, to make it a proper cloak. I used yellow ribbons for the tie at the neck. The cloak was a very fast piece to put together--several long seams each for lining and outer fabric, a couple curved seams for the hood, some careful pinning when sewing the two pieces together, and a little bit of handstitching where I flipped it right-side out (side-note: my blind stitch is improving).

The hobbit-child in motion.

I had to shorten the cloak by about a foot. It's listed in the preschool age section in the book, so it's designed with the average height of three and four-year-olds in mind. This is an easy alteration, though, and one I knew I'd need to make from the get-go. Same with adding the hood--I knew I'd want that so I got to try out drafting a hood for the first time.

Our little hobbit is off on an adventure!

The biggest problem I had with the pattern is it was very obviously designed for dress-up only, not for warmth. The width at the top of the cloak is too small to wrap around my very tiny child's shoulders--it fits because of the ribbon tie. I prefer capes that wrap around the shoulders more, both for practicality (warmth, basic fit, and oh, ribbon tie digging into my child's neck because the cloak has to dangle from the tie, not the shoulders) and aesthetics. This problem is easily solved by adding more panels when cutting out fabric. I kind of want to make another one in red.

I'm now working on E.'s pants for the costume. Charles pants in brown with green flannel contrasting fabric. I really love this pattern and these pants are going to be great for the rest of the winter, not just for Halloween.

Sewing Update

Life's been a little busy the last couple weeks. We had a trip down to Seattle for Thanksgiving and E. suddenly sprouted a bunch of new teeth. I took a class at Knit City the weekend before Thanksgiving, which was marvelous, but I didn't bring the camera so I've no pictures from the event. I've managed to do some sewing but I keep forgetting about the blog. I have good intentions, but we know where those lead.

I have signed up for KCW Fall 2014, so next week I'll be doing more sewing, accompanied by more blogging, but here's what I've been making over the last month:

Charles Pants

I signed up to be a tester for Compagnie M.'s newest pattern, the Charles pants. E. now has a pair of adorable Charles shorts. She's on the short side, so the shorts are on the long side. Not a bad thing, in my opinion--I lean towards knee-length shorts myself. The Charles pattern is adorable--there are two length options and an overalls option. I love the buttons on the fronts of the pants, and the contrasting colour waistband and pockets. I put in the back elastic waistband option and did some fancy top-stitching with one of the options on my sewing machine that I hadn't tried out before. The fabric I used was a dark blue corduroy I'd found at the thrift store and a red plaid flannel that was in some leftover scraps from a friend. The 1-year-old size did not use a lot of fabric at all--not even a full meter! Possibly not even half a meter. I wasn't measuring to see how much I used up.

E. in her Charles shorts, back view

The pattern was fairly easy to follow, and none of it was much of a stretch for me. I haven't done a lot of buttonholes on my new machine, and it got grouchy on the last one because I hadn't switched to a new needle yet, but that was the biggest hiccup. E.'s shorts are a little large in the waist, despite the adjustable waistband, because this was the test pattern. I wasn't able to stay in for the second round of testing, and I haven't yet tried out the new version of the pattern (on the list for KCW next week!), but I have heard that the waistband is a better fit now. Of course, she just had a growth spurt and is now taller and skinnier so I may need to add an extra buttonhole or two into the waistband elastic when I make it next week.

Charles pants from the side front, with E.'s camera face.

Lotta Dress

Yes, I'm on a Compagnie M. kick. I bought Lotta, Mara, and Louisa last month. Then I tested Charles, so I have that one, too. I still need to get a hold of some cording so I can make piping for Mara, but Louisa is on the list's for next week.

I made Lotta last week over a few afternoons. It came together quickly, but it had a couple firsts for me. I took the plunge and learned how to do an invisible zipper. I highly recommend the zipper mini-class on Craftsy (and no, I don't get paid for that, I just think it's pretty cool). I went out and bought an invisible zipper foot for my machine. It happened to be on sale at the nearest fabric store when I went in, so that was a lovely coincidence. And of course, installing an invisible zipper is much easier than I thought it would be. Even installing it with a lining is easier than I thought it would be. I also did my first blind hem. Again, not as hard as I thought it would be.

The fabric was a striped plain-weave that I got when my grandmother was getting rid of fabric. I don't know what it's made out of--I just know it's machine-washable. The lining is a blue broadcloth, again from the bag of scraps (like the plaid in the Charles shorts). I used orange buttons on the neckline and pockets. I had to shorten the bodice and the skirt. I didn't bother taking the bodice in, so she can wear long-sleeved shirts underneath the dress this winter more easily.

She seemed happy enough with the dress. At this age, I think she likes it when she grabs it and runs around the room with it (that means she really likes that old tank top I use as a pajama shirt). It's hard to tell. She still hasn't discovered that stuff can go in pockets, so once we've had that revelation I foresee E. using this dress to carry a lot of rocks around.

E. in her Lotta dress at the beach.

Next time I make the dress, I'm doing different sleeves, just for fun, and maybe moving the neckline notch up just the tiniest bit (no more than 1/2 a centimeter), since it's a bit deep on E. Curse of the tiny child.

My list for next week includes a Louisa dress, a pair of Charles pants, a cape, and a vest. We're going hobbit for Halloween this year, so the pants, the vest, and the cape all figure in to that. I just need to find something woolly and green for the cape and maybe something brown for the pants (or I'll stick with the navy corduroy; not sure yet). The vest will be reverse-engineered from my favourite cashmere cardigan. I've finally given up darning the underarms, since a new hole sprouts whenever I put it on. I have something that may work for the pants lurking in a box, but I think I may need to take a trip to the fabric store for the cape outer fabric. Might be an excuse to finally check out Fabricana, now that it's actually nearby. I've heard marvelous things about it. And on that note, it's probably time to stop blogging and start cutting out pattern pieces.

kid's clothes week: after it's over

Geranium Dress-owls and foxes and hedgehogs, oh my!

I managed to muddle my way through KCW again. The picture above is another Geranium Dress, one size up from the usual. E. is growing, though when I popped it on her when it was finished, it was a bit big. And a little longer than expected. Not terribly so, but enough that it'll probably be a better choice of outfit next month. Maybe she'll wear it at her first birthday party (and no, we're not having a one-year-old extravaganza; we're having family, probably my parents and my SIL, since my in-laws aren't sure they can come and E.'s godparents are having a time of it getting new passports, and I'm using my cake pan that makes little rose-shaped cakes).

So, dress. I used a quilting cotton that I found at Mill End down in Portland at Christmas time. Some leftovers went into a set of coasters for a friend, and the other leftovers are waiting for me to make them into something. I love the fabric. It's adorable, and yes, rather more pink than I'd usually go with, but I don't actually hate pink. I just object to the "nothing but pink for little girls" attitude. I went with the pleated skirt this time, the faux-cap sleeve bodice, and the cut-out neckline. I did snaps on the back, without cursing. I wanted to do buttons, but all my buttons are in a box, and I didn't feel like digging them out.

We move on Thursday morning, and at this point, we're mostly packed up. I had one of my moving dreams last night, where I didn't have everything packed, people were loading up the truck for us, and I was out of boxes and then my grandmother called in the middle of the chaos about something. I've also had the dream where the previous tenants left behind a bunch of stuff, so the closets were all full of clothes and there was a full and very noisy campground next door.

I knocked out a couple of skirts in the last day or so of KCW. I based them off a paperbag skirt tutorial. The first one doesn't look quite how I envisioned, and is a little big in the waist. The second turned out just about right.

Skirt number 1: Not bad.

The basic pattern involves cutting a strip from selvage to selvage, seaming that into a tube, then hemming the bottom and top. The top gets an elastic waistband. I went with 12 inches, but didn't make my waistband as wide as I really should have, so the skirt is a little long. I went with E's waist measurement plus 1" for a seam allowance for the elastic, but that's a little bit loose. The material is some kind of cotton I found at the thrift store.

Skirt number 2: Much better.

 The second skirt was the same length, but I folded the waistband over more to get that lovely ruffle at the top, so it's just about the perfect length for E. right now. I also went with E.'s waist measurement without an additional seam allowance for the elastic. It stretches and doesn't slide down too much this way. This fabric is a corduroy from JoAnn's that I found at the thrift store. I have enough for one or two more skirts or possibly something else. I have ideas but haven't purchased the patterns yet.


I also finished a shawl I've been working on.

Batik Shawl

The pattern, Batik, is by Kitman Figeroa, and is available on Ravelry. I've had the pattern and the yarn for a while, and I finally got around to knitting it up. The yarn is one of the Kauni fingering weights. I love the long stripes in the Kauni colourways. I knit one ball up in shades of red a few years ago, and then bought this ball at Yarn Harvest that year. I knit the medium size of the shawl, since I didn't have quite enough for the large, and it's turned out beautifully. I get to show it off at knit-night tonight, then pack it away in a box for a couple days until we've moved.

And that's it for now. We'll be without internet for a day or so, since we move Thursday and the guy from Telus is supposed to show up on Friday. Let's hope that goes well. Last time it was a fiasco.

KCW: Day 2

On track so far with KCW! I made a bonnet for E. yesterday for Day 2. I made her a sun hat a while back, and while it is fantastic, we've discovered that it's much harder for her to pull bonnets off and toss them on the ground while we're in transit. I have run over that poor sun hat so many times with the stroller.

I used the same pattern for this bonnet that I used a while back for E.'s pretty floral bonnet for her costume when we went to Fan Expo. The pattern is from MAKE, and it's a bonnet that was originally designed for upcycling vintage linens. The only vintage linens we have on hand were ones my great-grandmother and great-great grandmother made, so obviously, that won't do.

Pink fabric, purple and yellow rick-rack. No, it's not stereotypically girly at all.

 However, my fabric stash has a number of odds and ends in suitable amounts, so I ended up pulling out a very pink piece of floral-printed fabric. I don't usually often sew pink items for E. because we already have so much pink in her wardrobe, but this fabric suited the pattern well, and I had coordinating ric-rac on hand (is it rick-rack or ric-rac or either/or?).

This pattern let me practice some hand-sewing--after sewing the lining and outside together, you flip the bonnet right-side out and blind-stitch the gap together. I used to be terrible at doing blind-stitch--I kept mixing it up with whip-stitch and doing that instead, but I seem to have finally figured it out.

If I make another one (and I kind of want to), I want to line the bill with interfacing to make it a bit stiffer. The first time I made the pattern, I did the ruffled brim. This time I did the flat bill option, which I think I like better than the ruffle, but lack of interfacing on the bill means that it doesn't have as much structure as I think it should.

Baby in her new hat!

 E. seems to like the hat well enough. I showed it to her and she grabbed it and wandered off across the living room, waving it over her head. Shortly after that, she got distracted by a pair of sunglasses and abandoned the bonnet next to one of the many boxes decorating our home.

On the list for today: A new Geranium. We are moving up a size! 6-12 months, here we come!

Kid's Clothes Week - Take 2

Well, I signed up for Kid's Clothes Week again. The latest round of it started yesterday and I'm making plans. And I got a headstart on it by sewing a baby dress Friday (I just couldn't stop myself). This is the Easy Summer Baby Dress from See Kate Sew.

I tweaked the pattern a little--I enlarged the bodice, which turned out to be an unneccessary change. E. can wear it as a jumper dress in the fall and winter, and as a slightly-too-big summer dress right now. It's also a bit long--blame it on how I cut out the dress so as to avoid weird skinny strips of fabric from the edge of the material. I whipstitched the lining over the seam at the bodice. The tutorial makes it sound like you just sew bodice, lining and outside, together to the skirt and then maybe zigzag or serge the edges of the seam and I preferred a neater finish. I could just be misreading the instructions, though. I accidentally set the straps a touch too far in. They're supposed to be at the very edge of the bodice and that didn't quite happen. Oh well. It works anyway.

What I love about this dress in particular, other than the simple construction (it took me an hour or so to make this, with the hand-sewing), is the straps. They are gathered with elastic and they make the whole thing look adorable. It's a simple thing to do, but it adds so much to the dress without being over the top.

It occurred to me when I signed up for KCW that it might not have been the smartest idea, what with us moving two weeks from now and all. Now that we're closer to time, I think committing to sewing for an hour or so a day will be a welcome distraction from the stress of moving. We've checked off some of the important things, like moving our hydro and internet and booking the truck. Now we're mostly at the "get more boxes and put stuff in them" stage. The really breakable things are nearly all packed, so I can put stuff in boxes around E. without worrying about her trying to help me unload them.

Sewing is a lovely break, and it uses up some of the fabric I have lurking around, so there's less to pack in the sewing supplies boxes. I've tidied up the sewing corner of the bedroom, so that's helped a bit. I've almost finished a tailor's ham that I've been stuffing with fabric scraps. It's not quite full enough, so I'll have to do a couple more projects and use up the leftover bits and pieces.

My first contribution for Kid's Clothes Week was another Easy Baby Summer Dress, this time in a purple rayon. Rayon and me don't usually get along very well, but I did much better with it this time. I suppose it's mostly a matter of practice, fabric weights, finished seams, and lots of pressing.

Not the greatest picture, but at least she's holding still.

After that, I think I may be more willing to sew with rayon. I may need to get a non-blurry picture of the dress later. E. is walking and getting faster every day. When she sees a camera, she just moves closer.

Next on the list for KCW: a summer bonnet, aka hat that babies have a harder time throwing on the ground. It's cut out and partially pieced at the moment. In a burst of "use up random fabric," I've ended up with a very, very pink creation. At least no one will assume she's a boy in that hat.

many things

We're in the last few days before we pick up and head out to visit my parents for Christmas. It's been years since we spent Christmas at their home (years since we've been down to visit at all, actually), and we're very much looking forward to it. We'll be surrounded by people who will be delighted to take a turn entertaining E. so J. and I can get so much needed sleep.

I feel like my brain isn't working so well. E. and I arrived home from the store today, delighted to have finished the Christmas shopping. While I was wrapping presents this evening, I suddenly remembered two gifts I'd forgotten. One was for my grandmother.

J. got his Christmas present, a new computer, yesterday, and is still tinkering with it to get it working. It's not behaving properly and he may need to run back to the store one of these evenings before we take off.

My Christmas present is a trip to the bookstore and fabric store in my parents' town. I'm pretty excited about that. I've been working on sewing in small increments here and there. E.'s Christmas dress is almost done. If it ends up looking wretched once it's all together, we won't bring it, but at least the bodice fits right now. She's been growing by leaps and bounds. She's grown an inch and a half in the last few weeks, so suddenly pants that were far too long actually fit. She's still in the 0-3 months clothing (at 4 months old), but she's out of the newborn-sized clothing, for the most part. I got all teary-eyed when we put the newborn-sized diapers away on Sunday.

I've also been making her a Christmas stocking. I got the pattern here. I've skipped the applique in favour of embroidering her name on it. I've wanted to get better at embroidery, so I tackled stem stitch, split stitch, and French knots. Being geeks, we named our daughter after one of Tolkien's minor characters, so the cuff has her name in Sindarin embroidered on it with stem stitch and French knots, and the stocking leg has her name in English using split stitch. I'll stick up a picture once we have a good quality one.

In the meantime, E.'s finally dozed off. Time to see if she'll let me set her down in the crib so I, too, may sleep.

Checking Off: Buttonholes

I finally braved the buttonhole setting on my sewing machine and made a couple of wonky buttonholes. I don't have pictures of them (black fabric, black thread, not the best subject), but I do have a picture of E. in her finished outfit. Not the best fit, but I'm new to this pattern-drafting thing.

E. likes her jumper, but finds the camera flash startling.

Basically, the straps don't fit as well as I'd like. But she has a jumper made out of Space Invaders flannel! When I bought the material at the fabric store, the woman looked at me and said, "You aren't putting that cute little girl in this, are you?" I replied, "It's for a blanket," neglecting to mention that I was planning a jumper as well. And shoes. I didn't really feel like arguing about gender stereotypes with a complete stranger.

I have plans for a baby dress that will require more buttonholes, so I will do pictures of that when it's done. My machine makes it easy, although the last time I'd done buttonholes on it, I'd been supervised by my grandmother and I wasn't much older than ten. Of course, this is what the manual is for.

a brief discourse on bras and some sewing

Well, the "making a new dress to wear to the wedding" didn't work out. I got it to a trying-on stage, tried it on, and realized it wasn't going to fit around the baby. If I'd been working with jersey knit, this wouldn't have been a problem, but woven fabric just doesn't have the same kind of stretch. So I went to the closet and found a dress in jersey that still fits me right now. It's chocolate brown and I like it very much (there may be pictures in a day or two, since J. wants to bring our fancy camera along tomorrow), but because I don't own a regular strapless bra (I do own a longline strapless bra, which isn't an option right now--it's not unlike a corset and babies and corsets just don't go together, despite what the fashions of the 1890s had to say about that), I have to go braless. Fortunately the bodice has some kind of reinforcing so I don't have to worry about making people too uncomfortable.

I'm going to be breastfeeding in about a month, so I'll probably be more comfortable leaving my bra off in about six weeks, but as of right now, this isn't something I do often (except at home, either alone or when J. is around, but never around other people). Hopefully I can refrain from adjusting things and drawing too much attention to myself tomorrow. I doubt I'll be the kind of breastfeeding mother who happily breastfeeds in public without covering up. In private, yes. In public, well, I've got a couple fancy cover-ups that were given to me, and we have so many baby blankets it's absurd. There are two mounds of baby blankets in the spare room right now.

I have managed to find some knit fabric that I can experiment with. That shirt pattern I picked up last week has a number of variations. I think I'm going with the short-sleeved scoop neck to start. Four pattern pieces, so only half a dozen seams and four hems to contend with. I'm still a little leery of knit fabric because I don't have a serger, but the only way to deal with this fear is to actually grit my teeth and give it a go. Plus it'll check off the "sewing with knits" goal.

In the meantime, I need to go to bed. It's only just past 9:30 and it's a Friday night, but I'm exhausted, which seems to be typical at this stage of pregnancy. Eight months. Tomorrow is officially one month out from my due date.

strangers try to determine the baby's gender by the shape of my stomach

I wandered into a local thrift store yesterday that always seems to be having a major sale (50% off!) and ending up spending 50 cents total on two sewing patterns. I also had a conversation with two of the volunteers about the baby, wherein I got to hear what I'm pretty sure the medical community classifies as "rubbish" about how to determine gender.

First I got the, "How far along are you?" question, followed by the, "Wow, you're small" comment. Yes, I know. I'm small, the baby's small, I'm not gaining weight like the chart says I'm supposed to, but I'm eating something like half a dozen times a day, not unlike a hobbit (elevenses, anyone?).

Then they asked if I knew what it was, I said a girl, and one of them proceeded to tell me about how her daughter was supposed to have a girl, she'd had several ultrasounds, all telling them it was a girl, and it turned out a boy. Then they told me that I'm carrying like it's a boy because my stomach looks like I've swallowed a football (American) rather than a basketball, like some women do. Then they asked what the heartrate was. I certainly don't remember; I just know that the doctor's happy with it. Apparently a faster heartrate equals a boy, and a slower heartrate equals a girl.

These methods sound a bit better than the old dangling the wedding ring on a string above the stomach trick, but I'm fairly sure they don't mean much. My guess is that the way I'm carrying has more to do with my body type and build than with the baby's gender, for example. I'm still fairly certain that the ultrasound, and the subsequent one, were correct. As we didn't need an amniocentesis or anything like that, we can't be 100% certain until she's out of me, but that's okay.

But those sewing patterns look like they'll be useful. Neither has been used--the pattern pieces aren't cut out and the instructions don't appear to have been unfolded. Both are from Simplicity. The dress is Simplicity 2889 and the shirt is Simplicity 4076. I'm thinking of making the dress next week, actually, for a wedding we're attending next Saturday. The gathers beneath the bodice should make the dress fit over my stomach. It's not the best-written pattern in the world, but it's a fairly simple construction.

The shirt pattern is part of my quest to learn to sew with knit fabrics without fear. I like most of the style options. The pattern is, again, a little more poorly-written than I would prefer, but the patterns aren't too complex, so I should be able to muddle through. We'll see how it goes.

okay, so I did get excited after all

Little girl dress!

Yeah, so my bit earlier today about maybe cutting out a baby dress tomorrow? The above is what happened. Not the book in the corner--I've just been re-reading that a lot lately. The dress.

I got the pattern from Made by Rae, which is a fantastic sewing blog. The dress is her Itty Bitty Baby Dress, which is one of her free patterns. I'm planning on buying her Washi Dress (which is sized for grown-ups) sometime in the next month, to make one for the summer, but this was a nice one to make in the meantime. The pattern just has one piece to print out and tape together, since the front and the back of the bodice are the same, and the skirt is made of two rectangles. It's not hard to put together, and the result makes me very happy. It's sized fairly small, although there is a second size available. Since it's looking like Munchkin will be on the small side, I went with the smaller version. August and September are usually quite warm here, so she should be able to wear it for maybe a month unless she grows really fast or we have a bout of wet weather.

The bodice of this dress is lined, so you get to turn it right-side out and poke the straps through (I used a chopstick). I'd never done piping before, so that was a new thing, and I love the way it looks around the waist. It's not quite as even as I would like, but it's good for a first try. I also decided to do French seams, another new-to-me technique. They're easy, and the finish is very satisfying. The waist isn't French-seamed, but I zig-zag stitched it after I took the gathering threads out to keep unravelling at a minimum.

Now that I've taken a picture, the dress is in the laundry basket. Everything in this dress is machine-washable, so Munchkin can drool all over it without there being too many consequences.

It strikes me that small items of clothing are good to practice new techniques on. Before I make the Washi Dress, I'll probably do a child's dress with shirring so I know what I'm doing. I also need to re-learn how to do buttonholes. I think it's been almost 15 years since I did buttonholes on the machine, and my grandma was supervising at the time. As she is several hundred miles away, and my webcam doesn't have the best focus, I'll have to do it on my own with the sewing machine manual at my side. If a buttonhole's a bit wonky, the baby won't mind like I would if it was my dress.

So, new plans for tomorrow: writing, going to the grocery store, and starting the baby sweater (but in the evening, so I get stuff done during the day).

Getting excited, but not making things yet

 Well, the last week has been semi-productive, but now I have more things I want to make. Sometimes, this is my motto:

It's a magnet, so my fridge reminds me to make stuff.

I made the mistake of finding a bunch of baby things to sew and now I really want to start cutting out fabric. I finished a dress for my SIL last week (no picture, but she's quite happy with it), and am in-between sewing projects. There's a wrap skirt I need to convert into something that actually fits and doesn't trail on the ground, and now there are baby dresses that don't use lots of fabric, so I can use some of the bits floating around in the fabric stash. And we need heavier curtains on our bedroom windows, because the morning light keeps waking me up too early.

I did finish this on Friday. It's been in progress for a while, because I would knit a chunk of it, get bored, set it aside, and then pick it up again. Plus I had to pull out about six inches of the back after I'd cast on because I realized I need to move it up a size.

My Fireside Cardigan: Finished at last!

 The pattern is Fireside, by Amber Allison. It's available on Ravelry for $5 US, and it's a lovely sweater. I did change a couple things, as usual. The closure on the front was done with an applied i-cord, rather than buttonholes, because I didn't want the buttonholes interrupting the cables. I seamed the arms, instead of working them in the round, because I wanted an easier time putting the sleeve caps in. Otherwise, it's knit pretty much as instructed. I used Knitpicks Wool of the Andes, which I have mixed feelings about (it tears rather more easily than expected: I've already had to darn the sweater). I have a whopping 5 1/2 balls of the yarn left, since the pattern's yarn requirements and the amount I knit up didn't match up. So Munchkin will be getting a sweater in the same yarn. And possibly a hat. And maybe mittens.

 The influx of items from my knitting friends has begun! This is the first knitted baby gift:

The first knitted thing for the baby from a friend

My friend Sophie, whom I've recently christened the Sweater Demon, since she's knit something like 4 or 5 sweaters in the last month and a half, made these. They are both adorable and machine-washable. I have that line from The Incredibles stuck in my head now: "And machine washable, dahling. That's a new feature."

When I've knit baby things for other people, the easily washable yarns have definitely been my first choice. Despite this, the baby cardigan out of the leftovers from Fireside will not be machine-washable. The yarn's there in my stash, and it suits the pattern I have in mind. Hand-washing isn't hard, but I don't plan to do too many hand-wash only pieces for the baby. Munchkin, if she's like most babies, will probably spit up on them immediately.

I'm casting on the next baby sweater tomorrow sometime, and we'll see how it goes. I might cut out pieces for a baby dress, too.

Tailor's Chalk Tea

Tea and my design notebook; yarn bowl and soan papdi in background

 When one has no car, while living in a city designed around cars as a primary means of transport, one becomes accustomed to public transit, occasional rides from friends, and long walks. Today was a long walk. The florescent lights in our kitchen all decided to go at once--all three of them--so we walked to Home Depot in the pouring rain carrying one 2-foot and two 4-foot glass tubes, to match sizes and to recycle the old ones. We stopped in at Canadian Tire on the way, reasoning that they might have lightbulb recycling. They don't. Not for another couple of months. We got to Home Depot to discover that they'd discontinued their lightbulb recycling and we'd have to go to London Drugs. Fortunately, another person with the same dilemma offered to take ours over, since they were driving, and we were drenched.

After procuring more lightbulbs, since after wandering around town feeling like Jedi warriors, we couldn't possibly stop now (not to mention I'm tired of cooking in the dark), we wandered into the liquor store, where I finally found kirsch liqueur. I've been looking for it all over the place. Now we can do Black Forest cake properly.

In line at the register, the man in front of us took one look at me, and accused me of being seventeen. While handing the cashier my ID, I informed him that I was on the wrong side of twenty-five for that. I know I'm short, and I have a round-ish face. But do I really look like a teenager? Last time I checked, I had to look at least 20. Oh, well. Maybe if I develop grey hair at some point people will stop accusing me of being a teenager.

J. and I got pretty close to completely soaked from the rain on the rest of the walk home. While he put the lightbulbs in (he's the designated tall person in the marriage), I dried off and put the kettle on. Steaming hot tea always makes me feel warmer and happier after a long chilly walk.

I finally got around to drafting a pattern based on one of my skirts this evening. I found some really fabulous wool fabric at the thrift store, enough for a skirt, and I've based the pattern off of my favourite pleated skirt. I've changed things, of course. It has this weird appliqued side pocket, which I appreciate it because it is a pocket, but I'm just doing side-seam pockets. And the buttoned straps on the hips are gone, too.

Fabric, newspaper pattern, rotary wheel

I traced the yoke portion of the skirt onto newspaper, and then drew the skirt piece based on measurements from the skirt. You cut the yoke on the fold and one half of the skirt on the fold and the other half as two pieces, for the zipper. A back zipper lets me do pockets more easily. Plus that's what the original skirt has. The original has knife pleats which I've made a bit shallower here (not enough material), and a box pleat beneath the zipper which I haven't figured out how to replicate yet without essentially adding a gusset.

I'm not a professional at this by any means. In tightening up this version so I could fit the pieces onto the fabric, I managed to cut the skirt pieces short a bit in width (whoops!). I'm adding a couple strips along the zipper to fix it. There's enough in the scraps for that. It's not going to be super noticeable--it'll blend in with the pleats and the zipper line--but it is a bit silly of me to think that would work. I have a blue-and-white houndstooth that I'll probably do in this pattern too, and I won't have to worry about having enough there. I probably have enough for a dress and a skirt out of that one.

The fabric is a plain weave wool plaid, but the colours are subtle, and have almost a dark rainbow feel to them. I'm lining the skirt, of course, since this is the sort of wool fabric that has a scratchy feel to it. Gorgeous stuff, but not against my skin.

While marking the pattern onto the fabric, I managed to toss my tailor's chalk into my cup of tea. That's right. So, there went that last of that tea, and that piece of chalk. Whoops.

thinking about a year-long project...

In a discussion with my friend Emily recently, I mentioned my growing desire to spin, weave, and hand-sew an entire outfit. She said that it would be a good year-long blog project. Now it's in my head.

Of course, I don't have a loom. The project would have to wait until I did. But I can muse over it until then.

First, I considered the prospect of using flax. Then I thought about how to get that much flax, how I'd have to order it online, since the closest thing I seem able to get around here is hemp fibre, and how much that would then cost. Should I go with combed top or line fiber or strick? I have no idea. It's not completely off the list, but it's much easier to get a fleece. I know a sheep-shearer with a garage full of fleeces, and I have acquaintances who own sheep. Wool is easy to prepare, and easy to spin. I know what I'm doing when it comes to wool.

Second, there's the question of what to use for spinning. Do I go old-school and use a drop spindle, or do I pick the easier option of the spinning wheel? If I pick the drop spindle option, which of my spindles do I use? Since I want to weave this, I'll have to pick something that I can spin finer weight yarn on, which means my favourite spindle, the Turkish one, is out. Or I could just go with the spinning wheel. That'd be easier, but less "authentic," since what I'm going for is the experience of what it was like back in the days when people had to prepare the fibre, and then spin and weave and sew it by hand. I'd have to spin it fine enough to get away with hand-spun thread for sewing it, as well as for weaving, too.

Third: The colour question. Do I dye the fibre before I spin it, after it's spun up, or after I weave it? Would I go with the natural dyes option, or just pick iDye or Jacquard? Would I do more than one colour (thereby affecting what I would weave), or just do a single shade? In this case, I'd probably do the natural dyes, since that would be more in keeping with what I want here, but I have no idea about single versus multiple colours at this point.

Fourth: The loom. I don't have one. I have friends who weave and have looms, but borrowing one for a year isn't a terribly great idea, because we don't have a lot of space. A friend has a line on a (potentially) inexpensive beginners' loom that I might be able to get cheap, but it's not a guarantee. The limitations of that are that it would be a narrow loom--maybe 20 inches, which would then affect the sewing. I'd have to do a lot of panels. But this would be a table loom, so I would have room for it. At this point, I'd have to do basic weaving, since I haven't actually woven anything before. Although...if I did multiple colours, I could weave plaid. And that would just be awesome.

Fifth: The sewing. Easy enough. I've hand-sewn an entire quilt before. I can do that. I'd have to pick a pattern or draft my own, and decide on the style. Given what I'm thinking about, it'd end up being medieval in style, and then I could wear it to the Renaissance Faire.

That's just the short list. This would involve a lot of sampling and swatching, too, before I could get going properly. But it's certainly something to think about doing once I do have a loom.

One fleece, one wheel (or one spindle), one loom, one year. One outfit. Thoughts?

sewing to prevent yarn over-saturation

Tomorrow (or rather, today) is the day I start making the rounds of the yarn shops for Yarn Harvest. I'm really excited about this, but definitely considering that I may be quite, quite sick of yarn by the end of July. So, to stave off the yarn overdosages, I've been doing some sewing. When I get proper pictures done, I'll try to post them up here, but it's hard to really show off a dress unless you're wearing it (or have a dress model, which I don't possess).

Mostly I've been working with McCall's patterns, which are easy to follow. Next week I'm branching out to making an outfit without a proper pattern. We're planning on going to the BC Renaissance Festival in a couple weeks, and I want to dress up. So I'm going for a simple medieval-style outfit. I'm not terribly comfortable with the whole concept of the general "wench" ensemble, so mine is based off of something earlier than the Renaissance, more medieval. It's also simpler to put together; I don't have to figure out eyelets for a corset-top thing (whatever those are called). It's just a chemise and then a short-sleeved surcoat with a belt that ties around the waist.

The current dress-in-progress (DIP, if you want to do acronyms) uses a fabric printed with Superman comics. It won't be subtly bad-ass like my knitting dress (yes, that's how someone described it recently--what can I say? it has skeletons on it), but it will be quirky and hopefully fun. I'm going to the Yarn Harlot's lecture ("This is your brain on knitting") next week in Vancouver, and I'm torn between the knitting dress and the Superman dress. It'll probably be the knitting dress, but Superman's quite tempting. Might wear that on Sunday to church, just to see people's reactions.