oh my goodness.

 I'm in love.  Meet Cecil and Kobo.

 

garbo hat

I tried to take pictures that didn't include my face, but that's difficult with a hat. 

This is the Garbo Hat, a tutorial by annekata.  Look, we used the same fabric! [I think] This tutorial was super easy - I used a 12" frying pan to trace my circle.  I love hats, but I really don't like most trendy ones, so this one was perfect.  I can't pull it off like Garbo herself, but I still like it!

It's lined with one of my favorite linens, but truthfully I'm not crazy about it as the lining.  I did sort of a blind stitch at the upper brim seam to keep the lining in place because it kept peeking out.

So, I have to say at this point my lack of ironing has become a personal trademark.  Sometimes I'm lazy or sometimes I iron but then sit down - but a wrinkled hat?  That's just impressive.

chloe

The reason I've been AWOL:

I've talked about pushing myself more with sewing, both with technique and trying new colors and designs.  Soo... a fully lined princess seam dress with pockets!  The pattern is Chloe and the fabric choice was a result of roaming around G Street fabrics in mid-July with a $50 Groupon that was going to expire in a matter of days and the fabric selection was WIPED OUT.  I loved this gray wool and the combination of red and gray, but I don't have anything remotely like this in my closet.  Tights, shoes, cardigan - I have no idea how I'm going to style this one.

The whole time I was a little insecure about the color combination but I felt like I should go for it because something drew me to it in the first place.  I was worried it would be a little too Judy Jetson (what is with me and the Hanna-Barbera throwbacks?) but I like it.

Notes:

• I used the lining as my muslin (aHA!  Yet another muslin avoided!) and learned that I needed a bigger size in the hips.  For the shell (this is crazy), I taped the little sliver of the size 8 back on the hips, and tapered it back up to the size 6 at the waist.  This thing fits perfectly.

• Uh, I need to remember that you are 5'10" and I need to remember before I cut the pattern.  I only hemmed an inch and did my grandmother's technique of sewing on a strip of seam tape and then hand stitching that as an extension of the hem.  It's a little short (!)

• I left off the buttons. There were supposed to be three along each seam line on the chest, and one on each pocket welt.

• I LOVE how the pockets are sewn on (attached to each garment piece separately, and then sewn together as one continuous seam when the garment pieces are stitched together)  I realize this is probably how all pockets are sewn, but I never knew that!  This is why I'm trying to learn new things.

I've never made a princess seam dress before, I love it, but it is a little constricting because it is so fitted.  I am really pleased with Victory Patterns and they just released a bunch of new patterns - sign me up!

 And now this is going in my fall wardobe stash...

sometimes i make other things

Knitting and sewing top the list, but I think I like making things in general.

Now, to call my gardening making things might be a little egotistical, but I did help the little guys out, planting, watering, talking, ogling.  I get a little obsessed with the garden.  We've gotten some good stuff this year!

A melon?! We didn't know what would happen with these.

 Isn't his little face cute?

33 little tomatoes! These and the basil behind them were homemade sauce tonight. I make sauce too!

 These suckers were even bigger than they look in this picture!  One became zucchini bread tonight.

A few other things homemade this summer...

pasta from scratch...

a haircut...

and a failed attempt to make liquid soap from a bar of soap...

Speaking of my recent compulsion to confess my failures - I was super-excited because Tessuti Fabrics asked to post my kooky gabby on their blog!  And I kept checking and checking (I'm not even going to lie and say I tried to play it cool) and I never saw it.  Turns out they posted a link on their facebook page, and it came and went.  Oh well.  I guess not a failure, I should be glad it was facebook-worthy (although I hate facebook?), but I was kind of bummed.
[Update:  Guess what!  Tessuti did post my dress!!  Check it out here!]

let's pretend...

...it's fall.

I'm all set with summer. I don't hate summer, but I love fall the most and the heat has overstayed it's welcome. 

Soo... I'll start with Muir, which I started a year and a half ago! This was kind of an in-between projects project and I'm going to miss knitting it.

I used three skeins of  DROPS Alpaca, CO 93 st instead of 125, doing 2 pattern repeats instead of 3, and only 8 repeats of the whole chart - this is much smaller than the original pattern.  For the BO I was running out of yarn, so I BO 3 st between each picot instead of 2. I still ran out of yarn and had to snip a tail from another end to do the last dozen stitches or so!  I really have a knack for taking it to the last inch of yarn.



So, there it is, you will be seeing no more summer productions from me. Truthfully, I have always disliked most summer clothes and I LOVE fall clothes, the colors, sweaters, jeans, boots, scarves, all of it [add:  LAYERS!  I love layers.  My favorite part of fall clothes].  

And you know what I'm going to do? As I make each piece, I'm going to pack it away, one by one, in a nice little box and I'm not going to look at it again. Come October (because we all know September is not fall down here) it will be like a birthday present/Christmas/fall shopping surprise! Oh my goodness. I can't wait.

[A commenter made me think of a tip for anyone knitting this project - to be able to find where I left off, I placed a safety pin on the first picot of every chart repeat, that way I could just count picots to where I left off]

Note to self when blocking lace: keep it pretty wet because by the time you've got all the wires and pins set up, it is dry and still scrunched up.