May's End of the Month Randomness

It is the last day of May. The calendar slides into June tomorrow but since I have been home all week it doesn't really feel like the month is changing ~ more like its just Thursday and I only have three more days of furlough! *LOL*

First let me thank everyone for the birthday wishes both on my blog and through personal emails. All of your kind wishes made the day very, very special! So thanks again!

Next, I have no pics to share. I am working on the chocolate eyelet fabric that I bought from Metro Textiles. This was originally slated to become a trench coat but since I also have a really nice black eyelet, I decided to make something else from this piece.

I am making the jacket from Butterick 4980.

The fabric is cut out but I have been debating how to finish the seams. I think I am going to bind them but need to make a sample before I proceed with the jacket. I liked how the black tank dress looked with the wearable muslin jacket so I cut the remaining eyelet fabric out in that tank dress style. This sewing vaca has definitely been all about the dress.

Speaking of dresses, the blue cotton paisley from SewMamaSew arrived today. It is now in the washing machine being prewashed. I would hate for the back of the dress to shrink at a different rate than the rest of the dress! So as soon as I finish up the chocolate eyelet pieces I will probably pick this up and finish it off especially since all of the pieces are cut out and just waiting to be sewn together. I even have a great blue summer sweater knit that I got from Textile Studios last year that would work with this dress. That would give me 4 new dresses to wear next week.

Some stats:

I constructed six garments this month and that is primarily because of this week's sewing vaca! Otherwise, I only made a dress earlier this month (pictures to come soon) and this lack of productivity was definitely due to the sewing machine problems I was experiencing.

I bought another 34.5 yards of fabric and I used 18 yards in the pieces that I have made. I am no where near using as much fabric as I am buying. And after a week at home, I realize that I stress buy fabric - but that is for another post!

A few thoughts that I had while I was sewing this week:

~Prewashing sucks! Primarily because when I get an idea and the time to sew - prewashing and the subsequent time spent pressing the fabric out seems to drain such a large amount of time from the actual act of sewing. I realized this week that normally I do prewashing of fabric during the week so that it seems like I am sewing and that I reserve weekends for strictly cutting out and sewing. So to spend an entire day pretreating the cottons from SewMamaSew was eye-opening.

~I am always amazed at the number of pattern alterations that I perform. Whenever I pull a pattern out of folder that I haven't used in awhile, it is interesting to note the changes I have made to the pattern. Gone are the days when I could pull a new pattern from the envelope, plop it down on the fabric, cut it out, sew it up and have a good-fitting outfit. Or maybe my perspective has changed...maybe good is just not good enough anymore! *smile*

More tomorrow...as the sewing vaca winds down!