2008 - A Retrospective

I've been thinking about my 2008 recap for the last couple of weeks...especially since LindseyT posted her amazing graphics filled retrospective! However, my review will be considerably lower tech! In 2008 there were five categories that I believe captured the essence of my sewing.

1. Dresses

I started the year off making a dress and hopefully I will end the year making a dress. The fabric and pattern are laying on the cutting table waiting for me right now.

As I've stated previously, I LOVE a good dress! Dresses work so well in my professional life and make getting dressed in the morning a breeze. This year I made 15 dresses and even I'm amazed at this accomplishment!

2. Vintage Patterns

I fell in love with 60's modern and Jackie Kennedy style vintage patterns this year. I fell in love with the details in the garments, the instruction sheets that were full of sewing information and techniques and with the sophisticated styling. I know I did a post a couple of days ago about my vintage pattern collection but after digging around some more I realize that I have over 80 patterns!!!

I managed to use them - two of my garments were inspired by vintage patterns. I captured the details of the pattern by using my TNT patterns for the construction. The two garments were my Easter Suit

and the pleated polka dot dress

I even made a dress using one of my vintage Simplicity patterns...a modern interpretation of a 60s style.

One of my goals for 2009 is to use more of them...especially since I've amassed a pretty respectable collection of plus size vintage patterns.

3. Completing the June Capsule Contest

Last spring Stitchers Guild sponsored a contest to make a mini wardrobe in 30 days. Now I've done SWAP contests before but what intrigued me about this contest was that you had to make the 4 pieces that worked together in 30 days...EXACTLY 30 days! Now there were prizes awarded but I wanted to challenge myself to see if I could actually plan, sew and put together a wearable mini-wardrobe that would fit into my corporate lifestyle. After a month of frantic sewing...I did meet the challenge and got some wonderful new pieces out of the deal!

Items 4 and 5 are very similar...

4. I used New Look patterns

Now this might not seem like a big deal but New Look's pattern line typically only goes up to a size 18. But last spring they issued several patterns in the plus size range. New Look has some very cute and trendy styles but I didn't look at them much because of their lack of size depth...so it was really kewl to get a dress and a pantsuit from these patterns.

New Look 6779

New Look 6778

5. Use more new patterns

My main goal for 2008 was to use more new patterns instead of relying so heavily upon my TNT patterns. This was a huge commitment for me because each new pattern pulled out of the envelope must have major alterations performed on it to fit my body! It is one of the main challenges of plus size sewing...and many times the deterrent to plus size women sewing more! It is also the reason why after a pattern becomes a TNT that I work it so hard!

The list of new patterns used:

Butterick ~ 5194, 5179, 5247, 5399 (OOP)

New Look ~ 6779, 6788

Simplicity ~ 8160 (vintage)

Vogue ~ 7433, 7994 (OOP) 8137, 8209, 9904 (OOP)

I think I met this goal handily!!!!

Finally, as of today, I've finished 47 garments and used 90 yards of fabric. I even managed not to purchase fabric during two 1-month spans...but I definitely stimulated the economy by purchasing 231 yards of fabric...at least...to add to my fabric collection.

Now there have been quite a few year end reviews written by other bloggers and it has been interesting to read about each sewist's progress, likes and dislikes and goals for 2009.

I will address my goals for 2009 in another post. However, I am crowning 2008 the "Year of the Dress" because that's what I sewed the most!