the sewing room

We live in a two bedroom apartment, so the second bedroom serves double duty as the sewing room and the office. Storage space is at a premium in there! Most of the furniture in the room came from Ikea. Here's a basic floorplan of the room:

The sewing machines are on a rolling desk, which let me move it forward into the computer area when I need more room, and backwards into the sewing area when I haven't had time to sew for a while or my husband needs more room on the other side. This desk was definitely the best option for our small space.

Here's a view of the sewing half of the room, seen from the closet area. The corner of the computer table is just visible at the right side of the photo. I keep my serger and my regular machine side by side on the desk, making it easy to switch back and forth. I can slide either out of the way if I need more room for the other (and I can move the desk away from the cutting table if needed), but it's rare that such adjustments are needed. You can't see it, but my dress form is just to the left of the ironing board. Hanging on the wall is a quilt made by my Aunt Candy, a gift for my college graduation. I love to look at this quilt while I'm working.

On the cutting table, I keep my Gingher rotary mat, the accessory box for my sewing machine, and my embroidery machine (it's under a vinyl cover in the picture). There are two lights over this table, which are adjustable and provide a huge amount of light. I have a pegboard to the right and a tool rack in front of this table. Between the two, I hold all of my rulers, scissors, tools, and marking utensils. Under the table, visible in the next picture, are two Ikea drawer units and an old rolling cart. I keep pattern paper, interfacing, hair canvas, and stabilizer on top of the drawer units, which house thread, ironing supplies, buttons, zippers, works-in-progress, and decent sized fabric remnants. The cart holds mostly fiberfill and batting.

Next up is the shelving unit between the closet and the door to the room. There are four shelves attached to the wall, hanging over a sewing cabinet that I made in college. I keep completed projects that don't have other homes (such as portfolio pieces) inside the cabinet. On top of it, there are two crates that house my stash of patterns, slopers, and Threads magazines. The shelves face a window, so I keep them covered with a piece of draped fabric to prevent fading. On top of the shelves but not visible in the picture, I store my embroidery thread set and a bin of trim.

Here's an image of the shelves with the drape pulled up. I fold the fabric into uniform piles by wrapping each piece around my 6" ruler. These shelves aren't really organized by type, but it's not a hindrance for me when I'm choosing fabrics for a project. I swatch all of the fabrics before storing them, and I constantly refer back to that notebook when I'm planning something new.

The closet is awkwardly designed, in that there's a lot of width mostly inaccessable given the size of the door. To make the most of the space, I have shelves and a hanging storage unit in there. The shelves hold "other" craft supplies including a light desk, my husband's Speedball kit, cross stitch supplies, tissue paper, and small remnants of fabric. There's also a "need to mend" bin. The hanging storage includes clothing items that are waiting to be altered into something new, and some towels that will be embroidered at some point in time.

Finally, the bookcase holds all of my craft books, as well as my husband's computer books and boxes of office supplies. My books are organized by subject. I used cut-up manilla folders and neon green labels as dividers; these are just visible in the picture.

long overdue update

It's hard to believe that it's been two years since I last updated this blog! I finished my MA in September, and have spent the last several months focused on submitting PhD applications and reacquanting myself with my husband. An awful lot of my time has been devoted to sewing costumes in the past two years, but little to none has been spent on sewing for myself. It's time for that to change!

First, a couple of my recent projects.

One of my dear friends had a baby boy last month, and it seemed like a fine time to break out the sewing machines and use up some of the baby flannels in my stash, not to mention go shopping for more fabric. I sent her a set, two double-sided flannel receiving blankets, four curved burp cloths, and a bear "rug." The burb cloths were based on this tutorial: Shaped Burp Cloth, although I adjusted it a bit given the size of my remnants, and I edged it with my overlock machine rather than sewing and turning. I did the same for the receiving blankets.

The bear is from the Cotton Ginnys "Animal Blankets" pattern. I stitched the eyes and nose in embroidery floss rather than applying pieces of felt so that it would be safe for a baby, and only the head is stuffed. I love this series of patterns; there is an elephant, a hippo, and a bear in the kit. I made the hippo several years ago for another friend.

Next is a purse which I made for myself this weekend. It's a nice change to sew something for me instead of a costume for someone else! This is from Burda #8560, the same pattern that I used for the blue paisley purse which I gave to a friend in 2007. I've been in love with this pattern ever since, as it has a nice shape and is a great size (15" across and 11" tall at the center front). This time, I used a chocolate corduroy and a pastel swirled heavy-duty woven fabric. It closes with a magnetic snap. It's been so long since I sewed the first purse that I'd forgotten the major problem with this pattern: the lack of lining in the original design. It calls for interfacing, but leaves the inside bare below the facing line. I again chose to add a lining to the bag so that it is finished. I used a coordinating peach cotton fabric. The best part of this one is that all three fabrics and the interfacing came out of my stash, so it was effectively a free project.

That's all for now. I'm going to be posting images from some of my sewing and craft-related school projects over the next few weeks, as well as tackling a few new ones. Next on my list is trying my hand at machine embroidery. I bought an embroidery machine for as a graduation present for myself, and my parents gave me Embird Basic and Studio for birthday and Christmas last year. I'm working my way through Carolyn Keber's tutorials, and am so excited to get started with creating designs of my own.

embroidered towel

Changing pace a bit from sewing to embroidery, this is a towel that I finished last month to give to my mother for Christmas. I found the towel at Joanns - it's the size of a kitchen or hand towel, terry cloth except for a panel of embroidery fabric at one end. The fabric is tricky. Traditional aida is more stiff than the towel, and the fibers tend to hold their place unless the thread is pulled too tight. The towel had a much looser weave, and I had to be extra careful not to pull any of the stitches because any stress on the fabric greatly enlarged the size of the holes.



The pattern is an example of Assisi embroidery. I learned about Assisi work from a book that I found at the library sale last year. According to the book, the designs were originally based on the stonework around Assisi. The blue stitching is Holbein rather than the more common backstitch, which means that the outlines are stitched in two sets of running stitch (leaving every other stitch empty the first time around, then filling them in on a second pass). This allowed the detail to appear quickly, and halved the time spent studying the chart. The yellow stitching is cross stich, and took significantly more time than I was expecting for a piece of this size, because all of the background was filled in.

blue purse

I haven't had much time to sew for fun since starting graduate school, but did manage to squeeze in a few projects in December.



This purse is from Burda #8560. I made it for an undergraduate work study in the costume shop; I drew her name for the Secret Santa gift exchange. I love the pattern and the fabrics chosen, and was highly tempted to keep the purse for myself when I finished it!

I had a more difficult time choosing fabrics than I expected, especially because I don't know the recipient very well and didn't want to give her a purse she would never use. I knew I wanted to use a corduroy for one half, but had a lot of trouble finding an appropriate pair. The paisley fabric was suggested to me at a store on Fabric Row, and luckily they also had a matching corduroy.

As written, the pattern calls for two coordinating fabrics on the outside, and the facing of the same two fabrics but reversed so that the print has a solid facing and vice-versa. I didn't learn the pattern's major defect until I brought it home: the facing stops a few inches down on the inside, and the white interfacing is visible for the lower 2/3rds of the bag. Yuck! I added two lining pieces to the lower ends of the facing pieces so that the bag would be fully lined, and I understitched these to keep the seams neat.



The interfacing that I chose is a fusible interfacing designed for shirt collars and cuffs. It worked really well with the fabrics, holding firmly and providing adequate structure to the bag without causing it to appear bulky. To finish, I used a magnetic snap and edgestitched all the way around the top of the bag and the strap.

apron

I finished this apron about a week ago but have been occupied with school stuff in the meantime. For Christmas 2005, I bought a retro apron pattern by Simplicity so that I could make an apron for Laura. It turned out really cute - a full apron in blue cotton with all the borders in a orange and white check with spiders (a Halloween fabric that year that actually looked more picnicky than spooky). I'd been wanting to make an apron for myself since then. The orange and blue flowered cotton that I used is apparently a favorite of mine - when I was inventorying my stash I discovered that I'd actually purchased it twice!



I was supposed to use bias tape around the edges with a row of rickrack just inside that, but with the busy-ness of the fabric I thought that might get to be too much for the apron. Instead, I found a 5/8" aqua satin ribbon at Joanns. I folded it in half so that it was the same width as the bias tape called for in the pattern.

I love how the apron turned out - the shininess of the ribbon gives a nice contrast to the fabric, and it's comfortable to wear. The pockets are purposefully not flush at the top so that you can get your hand into them, which makes it a useable apron.

Craft fair and current sewing project

Daniel and I drove to Wilmington today for a craft fair hosted by the PA Guild of Craftsmen. This was a juried show, something that was obvious in the work displayed - there were some really stunning booths. My favorite of the day was something called Sculptured Papercutting created by Sue Keefer. From a distance it looked similar to quilling (interestingly, the only booth that I recognized today that I visited at the Kutztown festival last month was Paper Petites quilling), but up close it's entirely different. She uses a combination of painting, cut work, lifting, and shaping to create 3-D work from a single sheet of paper, and her work is beautiful. Unfortunately she has no website and we didn't have the money today to spend on artwork since I start school next month, but I hope to see her again at local festivals.

There wasn't a lot of needlework available at today's show - one booth of full size quilts, one of really lovely miniature quilts, and this woman, who creates fabric pictures through the use of applique and decorative machine stitching. Up close, her work had a really amazing amount of detail in it. The rest of the fiber artists were mostly weavers or selling clothing or purses; there was no needlepoint, cross stitch, or embroidery at all which was a bit disappointing. Daniel did find several glass booths to browse, though, so it was fun for both.

Over the past several days I've been working on a long coat for which I cut the pieces my freshman year of college, but that I'd never gotten around to stitching. I don't remember why I laid it aside; it's too bad that I've taken this long as I love the pattern and the fabric combination (a red felted fabric with a gray lining and a gray tussled-looking faux fur trim) and it is cut to fit the freshman me rather than the me of today. But I needed something to work on earlier this week and I thought it would be nice to clear out the space in my sewing cabinet while finally seeing this coat sewn, so I pulled it out. Right now the outer coat is assembled and I've begun to add the trim and sew the lining. I love having the serger here as it's making seam finishing much quicker, particularly on the easy-to-fray lining. I'm not sure exactly what to do about a closure for the front of the coat but otherwise it should be complete later this week after which I'll post some pictures.

Serger class, Wild Ginger, and an Etsy project

Monday night's serger class at my sewing store was great. The teacher - daughter of the store's owner - has been working with sergers since they became available for home use many years ago. There were only about nine students in the class versus the 20 that were in my last sewing class at the store, and one of her sisters helped out so that everyone was able to receive individual attention when needed. It is not nearly as difficult to thread this machine as it first appears and we learned several cool tricks for serging. I also picked up a book that came highly recommended on http://sewing.patternreview.com, The Ultimate Serger Answer Guide.

On Tuesday I took the plunge and purchased the pattern drafting software that I have been eyeing for a while, Wild Ginger's PatternMaster Boutique. Daniel helped measure me and I constructed a dress sloper based on my measurements to test it out. The sloper is complete other than the zipper which will have to wait for this weekend's trip to Joann's. I think there's going to be some adjustments needed to the measurements but it's hard to tell for certain until the zipper is in place.

Lastly, I've been working out some plans for a small bifold wallet. I traced some credit cards and cash in my notebook drawing the wallet around it, and then constructed a 1/2 size mock-up in muslin. It has a vinyl sleeve for an ID plus five credit card slots and two pockets for cash - I'm still uncertain on what closure to use or if I should just let it go without. I think it will do well as a first item for my Etsy store, though I'm having some trouble deciding on fabric. It looks like a guy's wallet to me and most of my fabric stash is littered with flowers or girly paisley. I think some more fabric hunting may be in order.

Fun with sergers

I'm signed up for the serger basics class at my sewing store next Monday evening, the same day that we return from our vacation. The timing on this is perfect - I'll pick up my sewing machine and take the class the same day, and it means I'll spend less time unsure of what to do with my serger.

I've been reading through the owner's manual that came with the machine - the reviewers online were not exaggerating the problems in this manual. It took me a while to puzzle through the stitch settings for the machine, but I compared the manual to the Bernina Feetures book and was able to test out all of the 3-thread settings on the machine. As a trial project, I created a quick business card case out of some cotton fabric. I like how it came out - it's large enough to hold 20-30 cards depending on their thickness, and I added a pearl snap to the front.




I think it's going to take some time for me to get used to the counterintuitive features of this machine - several of my sewing habits won't work when serging. For example, I pick up the foot a lot as I'm working to turn corners, and I'm normally really diligent about backstitching to secure all my work. Neither of those would work on the serger. I also use the stitch guides on the sewing machine plate a lot, and while there are guides on the serger they don't work in the same way. For my trial project I actually drew the cutting line on the fabric so that I would know where to line it up - I'm hoping the class will give me some better ways to handle that situation. Overall, I really like the machine. It's not nearly as daunting as it first seemed at the store, and I think I'm going to get a lot of use out of it.

All Good flag

One of the problems with music festivals is finding one's campsite among the sea of tents. Daniel and I always tend to use other people's stuff as markers - last year someone brought in a giant weather balloon that was great as a point of reference. At least it *was* great until the night it poured and the balloon's line became twisted on something at ground level. We got soaked as we wandered around trying to find the balloon and our site, and we heard many other festival-goers complaining about the same thing.

This year Daniel decided to make our own flag for our campsite. The design of this was entirely his - he modeled it after 1960s concert posters, and used my profile from one of our wedding photos for the face. He wanted the flag to be viewable from two sides but face towards the pole on each side, so he reversed the design for the back and adjusted the shape of the lettering so that it would appear correctly against the hair.




After creating the design on his computer he handpainted the lettering and the face, and traced in pencil the hair's shape on some really cool cotton fabric that we found at Joann's. I outlined the hair on my sewing machine with black thread in a short zigzag stitch. Given the flag's 18"x24" size and its height at the campsite, we decided that a satin stitch wasn't necessary - it would have eaten thread and taken forever. There was no interfacing or stabilizer between the flag and hair layers as I sewed and it didn't pucker very much. I pinned well around the outside and used a few pieces of Stitch Witchery within the shape to hold everything together. Once the hair was completely stitched I trimmed all the excess fabric from around the stitching.

After both flag sides were sewn and ironed I added a piece of medium weight sew-in interfacing to the flag and finished by sewing and edgestitching all four edges. The flag will be attached to a 10' pole through the 6 metal eyelets on the top and side edge of the flag. Daniel's constructing the pole right now - it is of PVC pipe and is in four sections so that we can stow it in the car and assemble it at the campsite.

This is officially the last project for the festival. Now all we have to do is pack.

My new serger :-)

Having gone through some serious serger envy lately, I've spent a lot of time researching serger features and particular models online. PatternReview.com has been particularly helpful in this regard, as many members have posted extensive reviews of their machines. It took me a bit of time to overcome my fear of threading and determine just what I plan to *do* with the serger, but eventually I narrowed my list of desired features to 2/3/4 thread capability, differential feed, and rolled hem - preferably one that did not require replacing the stitch plate.

The goal was to find a machine that I wouldn't outgrow in the next several years, but definitely not one that would cost in the thousands and have more features than I would probably ever use. Also, I decided to shop for a used machine rather than a new one so that I could get a better quality serger in the same price range. My favorite local sewing store always has several used sergers available and the owner thoroughly inspects each machine before selling it, so I headed over there today. My sewing machine was due for its yearly inspection and there was a Bernina foot sale this weekend anyway, so it was a good day to go serger shopping.

The first reconditioned serger on the shelf was a Bernina 800DL, which is the make and model that I'd been most heavily leaning toward while reviewing machines online. The price was great as well - roughly $100 less than I expected a used 800DL to cost me although I wasn't expecting to find a used one at all. This machine has exactly the features that I wanted (not to mention that I was really hoping to find another Bernina - I love my sewing machine). After some quick discussion we decided to purchase it, and it came home with us today. I'm thrilled :-)



This sewing store has a 2 hour basic serger class the week of the 16th which will cost a fee since I purchased my machine used (free classes came with my sewing machine since it was new), but would definitely be a great way to become more acquanted with my machine. If they're already booked for the class I also found two serger classes at another local Bernina dealer that would occur before the start of school next month. I'm going to call on Monday and see which date is available.

needlepoint project and bellbottoms

My office was closed two days this week, so I've had plenty of time to sew and do some other handicrafts.

The first picture is of a needlepoint project that I finished on Monday. It was a 5"x5" kit from Joanns - I'd never done any needlepoint before and wanted to see what I thought of it. Most of my hand needlework experience is in counted cross stitch - this was less similar than I expected it to be. First of all, the canvas wasn't woven like most cross stitch fabrics are, and it was much stiffer than I was expecting. Also, while the symbol and lettering were charted the background image was printed directly on the canvas.



The stitch is also very different than cross stitch - while it looks like a half cross stitch on the front side, it's called a "basketweave stitch" for the pattern that it makes on the reverse. Instead of starting in the upper left corner and working horizontal rows, this stitch starts in the upper right corner and works in diagonal rows. It took a bit of adjusting for me to get used to seeing the charted design in that way. I like how the finished project turned out and enjoyed stitching it - I'm debating on starting another needlepoint project in the future. I've been wanting to create stockings for Daniel and me from two of Howard Finster's Christmas paintings, and needlepoint might be a good way to go with that.

Also on Monday I finished my jeans for the All Good festival. These were from the Goodwill - they were missing all four buttons at the top of the jeans, but otherwise were in good condition and they fit well. I sewed new buttons on the top and added the belt and the flares.

The belt was a trim from Joanns - it's a mix of velveteen ribbon and hemp with accents in embroidery, paint, and some sequins. I tacked it in place behind each belt loop and finished the two front edges by hand. The button is decorative only - I didn't want to risk the trim falling apart if I tried to put a buttonhole in it, so the belt attaches at the front with a hidden hook and eye. It also covers the four buttons at the top of the jeans.





The flares are from a green/blue/purple varigated eyelet fabric. I added a 8" wide flare to the inside and outside of each leg and sewed them by machine. The last time I made bellbottoms I did it by hand - this was much quicker! Overall I like how these jeans turned out.

Two new projects

Daniel and I are heading to the All Good festival in two weeks and so I've been hard at work on a new shirt and a messenger bag to take to the festival. I still have a pair of jeans to finish altering, but otherwise I'm now set for the trip to WV. I can't wait!

First, the shirt. This was from a Simplicity pattern. I bought the fabric months ago and searched for a while to find a pattern that I wanted to pair with it. I love the combination of the fabric and the fuzzy zigzag trim. This was my first venture altering the bustline of a commercial pattern to better fit me - I added a dart from the side seam that helped allow for more fullness in the top. It fits me much better than it does my dressform - I haven't quite perfected the padding on the model yet.

I handstitched the trim so that the sewing line would be invisible, and there's a zipper in the back of the shirt. The only tedious part of this shirt was the hem on all the handkerchief sections. It was a narrow hem: iron 1/4" under, edgestitch, trim close to stitching, fold under and iron again, edgestitch again. The fabric has a loose weave which meant I couldn't trim it quickly after the initial stitching for fear of the scissors cutting both layers - it gave the shirt a clean finished look but took several evenings to accomplish.





Next is the messenger bag, also from a Simplicity pattern. Daniel and I wanted a bag that either of us could wear and that would work well hanging in the front or back. We headed down to Fabric Row for the fabric - it's a home decor canvas called "Spirograph" that we both love. The bag is fully self-lined and I used bias tape for the edges which I stitched twice rather than just basting as called for in the instructions. I also used a securing stitch on the straps to reinforce them. I added a loop inside for a keychain, but there are no extra pockets inside the bag. If I were to make this again I think I would extend the strap a bit (it's adjustable with velcro and fits both of us, but I tend to wear messenger bags a little lower) and possibly add an interior pocket.



This is the view of the strap from above. The visible velcro rectangles are on the portion of the strap that attaches to the side of the bag - the other strap attaches to the top of the bag.

New sewing blog

It's about time that I have a blog dedicated to my sewing projects, rather than just keeping a list in a notebook as I've been doing. My bulleted list avoids any project details and includes only the month finished, which doesn't really help me when I look back on finished projects.

As a start, here are some of the sewing projects that I included in my portfolio for my graduate school interview:

The corset and the shirt were for my undergrad advanced costuming class. Both were constructed from period patterns, reproduced in historical fashion books. The corset was done by machine except for the arrows over the boning, which I did by hand. The blouse took forever - I had no idea how labor intensive gathered pleats was going to be before I started!

This is the purse that I made for my wedding - it was from a Butterick pattern. I had to sew it all by hand because it was a sheer fabric with glued beading that jammed my old sewing machine every time I tried to use it. My favorite part of this was the trim and the hand-sewn buttonholes for the gathering ribbon.

Next is my current wallet - I love this wallet, as it lets me carry a lot of cards without additional bulk in my purse. The embroidery on the corduroy was part of the fabric, not my own. Both of the fabrics were bought as remnants, which is too bad as I really like the combination.

Last are two messenger bags that I've made for myself since graduating - the red one is of a denim fabric, and large/sturdy enough to hold a couple of full 1.5" binders. The basic shape is from a Butterick pattern, but it was a plain front so i added the design on the flap. I love the flower fabric on the outide - it's also lined with this fabric and it has a couple of pockets inside.

The grey bag is slightly smaller than the other and is from a Vogue pattern. It is constructed from wool suiting, a charcoal pinstripe for the outside and a lighter grey for the inside. I love that the lines on this one are more angular than the other bag. This bag is edgestitched in contrast with the understitching on the red bag - I think the edgestitching gives a much cleaner look to the finished product.