new skirt for the new school year!

a new school year demands the production of a new skirt! i had been dying to try a pattern from wenlan chia's pattern book "twinkle sews," as her patterns are whimsical, youthful, and unstuffy, unlike most sewing patterns these days. (fyi: she's wenlan from the clothing line "twinkle by wenlan.") the pattern i selected, called "little black skirt" was rated as easy. it has 2 pockets in the front, along with pleats attached to the bottom hem:

i happen to have 2 little black skirts already, so i decided to use this paisley from "knitt'n kitt'n" of portland, oregon and this navy silk for the trim:

the pattern was an absolute nuisance to put together. it was printed onto 40 pieces of printer paper, which i 1st had to tape together...

cut, then pin to the fabric.

bunks got bored.

real bored. he took to nesting on the fabric, deciding that i wasn't paying him enough attention!

the pattern called for the pockets to be sewn on parallel to the waistband, but i purposely tilted each for a more fun look. the pockets themselves were cut from the fabric so that it exactly matched the pattern of the paisley underneath! i know, i'm crazy. the effect was pretty

awesome though! you can HARDLY see that there's a pocket, except for the flaps:

the pocket flaps were made from doubled layers of the navy silk. sewing silk is less than fun, particularly for the super skinny trim along the bottom of the waistband!

i happened to have a massive bundle of vintage chinese "cheong-sam" material from my days of running the "project runway" club at the school at which i taught in dc. i personally cannot stand this material! (it has chinese characters woven into the fabric- gag!)

so, i used some to make the smooth lining of the skirt! look at the pop of brightness inside! (note: the pleats hadn't been attached yet at this point. no worries, i know to make the lining much shorter than the skirt itself!)

the 1st two days of school were rather rainy, so i waited until friday to wear the skirt to school! i love it! it's currently my favorite item that i've ever made!!

hurricane irene celebrates mom's bday!

hurricane irene graciously celebrated mom's bday by making landfall the day before and knocking out the power in ct for 5 days! poor mom had to spend her bday in the dark! down in philly, bunks and i were lucky to have light, although outside, dark stormy clouds loomed!

i made myself a turkey and apple meatloaf in case i'd be stuck without food, but thankfully, all was well.

during the hurricane, i finished up mom's bday shirt for this year (only a week late this time!). the fabric is this cream cotton with little red flowers all over. i got it 2 years ago when i visited erin in durham, nc!

i used the same pattern as last year's bday shirt, but this time i added a collar and made half-length sleeves with less of a poof (i drafted patterns for both!!). also, i didn't want to make her another ruffled shirt, so i made 2 panels of 1/4 inch pleats on both sides of the button placket. surprisingly not difficult to do, although very tedious. i love the result though. they come out so neat!

mom, modeling the final product:

she asked me to chop off a view of her head. hehehe. here's the back:

she's going to wear it for her first day of school tomorrow with new earrings that i got her in boston!! meanwhile, poor bunks has started shedding (it always starts at his nose!), thus resulting in many restless episodes of mischief-making. i set him loose on my barrel of fabric scraps to keep him away from this project so that i could actually finish it. he spent hours atop this barrel digging for buried treasure about which only he knew, hehehehe

home trip

mom often asks why i don't go home to visit that often. 1) the rents always come to philly. 2) bunks hates the car ride. here he is hating on me:

3) i get exploited for child labor!! 2 weekends ago, dad ripped out the light blue carpeting in the master bedroom, and he and i installed new oak hardwood flooring! my job was to lay out a random pattern and to hammer the boards in place while he followed with the nail gun. this world needs "28-year-old" child labor laws! isn't the floor pretty though??

squash soup

i'm quite the fan of soup, in particular squash soup. mom left me a massive acorn squash,

so i decided to make myself some squash soup! i garnished it with some of bunks' parsley!(these pics are actually from this past winter... darn teaching! it takes over my life!)

a summery peach pie

sadye (sarah from high school's other name- we will use this for her from now on, so that you don't think i'm talking about wee sarah from brown!) invited me over for dinner 2 weeks ago so i brought dessert! a basic peach pie!

the perfect blend of tart and sweet! i carved bunks' name on top, since carving "helen" would seem narcissistic! i forgot to take a pic of the finished product. oops.

happy 4th bday, bunks!

bunks turns 4 today!!

may you have many more years of mischief-making!

jimmy's xmas socks

oops, i never posted a pic of the finished product! unfortunately the 2 balls of yarn didn't knit out in the same sequence of colors, although they're from the same color batch. hehe. jimmy looks like he has duck feet!

pittsburgh and a new dress!

this sunday we went to pittsburgh to visit the jimster. jimmy took us on a bike tour through ridiculous hills for 2 hours, we went out for really authentic thai food, and jimmy gifted bunks a mini carrot from the garden he started in his backyard. i often bake jimmy some goodies when i see him, so this time, he got black bottom cupcakes!

mom wore her bday shirt from her bday last year (although, as you may recall, i only got around to finishing it for this year's mother's day). it was hard to snap a pic of her front-on as she is wildly impatient.

here she is, looking not too thrilled that i succeeded! cute outfit isn't it?

the dress that i wore to pittsburgh actually was cut out a year ago; i was dreading the completion of the project because it is from the same pattern as lan's dress from last year, although i used a different neckline. not really a fan of repeat projects!

i got the fabric from my visit to durham last year: it is a thicker coral fabric with japanese flowers scattered throughout. i made a grey pleated trim for the midsection to break up the coral and to pick up on the grey flowers.

emily and sarah consulted on whether i should line the pockets with trim (yes, this dress has pockets! see above!): both agreed that i should not.

even bunks joined in on the process by messing with the fabric on the mannequin while i handsewed on the trim! bad boy!

the inside is lined, as the coral fabric feels a little scratchy.

here's the final result! thrilled it's finally done!!!

2 new patterns!

julia, my former roommie in dc, was in town a couple weeks ago to check out wedding venues and to compete in a sprint triathlon. oh, and to visit me. while here, we trekked to joann fabrics to hunt down sewing patterns. i snagged these 2 for $3 each!

can't wait to start them! today also happens to be julia's bday. how appropriate! happy bday jules!

mia's visit

jimmy and his gigantic bunny-muncher, mia, came to visit the bunks. they had a face-off.

bunks escaped, unharmed.

i baked jimmy some cupcakes to celebrate his visit. brown velvet cupcakes with the rest of the raspberry frosting leftover from the cupcakes i made for my summer school students for quiz 1.

the inside!

bunny: 1, doggie: 0

breads?

banana bread for hs sarah's kid, mason! it's his first time tasting it!

and orange bread for sarah and my road trip to the jersey shore! i had never been before. it was awesome!

now would you consider banana bread and orange bread, breads? they are awfully sweet and cakelike in my opinion!

molten chocolate lava cakes!

recipe from joy of cooking! slightly crispy on outside, very moist on inside. this may be my favorite dessert! round 1: dessert for dinner at sarah's house. sarah is a friend from home who now lives in philly as well! yay for old friends! (i'm not sure why the bottom of the pic never loaded. however, i don't feel like reloading it, so you'll just have to deal!)

round 2: dessert for mom's visit to philly while i drowned in summer school work. she was wonderful, cooking me meals and taking care of the bunks. i'm so lucky to have such a wonderful chocolate-loving mom!

chapter 2 quiz treats

quiz: equations, inequalities, and graphs of lines

treat: chocolate chip crisps

zzzzzzzzzz...

bunks, while i'm teaching at summer school...

challah french toast

and homemade blueberry sauce!

michelle, a good friend from my brown univ. days, and i treated ourselves to a lavish breakfast when she visited a couple weekends ago. we actually made it 2 mornings in a row; it was that good!

happy 4th!

2 more rounds of cupcakes!

for easter, i made the math dept cupcakes! white cake with lemon icing! this was the last one left. oops.

and now, summer school has started. it's more intense than the regular school year because we meet for 4 hours a day, 5 days a week (even more than my teaching load during school!!). so, don't be surprised if my attention to this blog continues to be limited. i will be done july 22 though! i'm teaching algebra 1, which is a nice change from the intense calculus teaching load that i had during the school year. the kids are HILARIOUS. naturally i had to bake them a treat since i had to subject them to the torture of a quiz on thursday. cocoa devil's food cupcakes with raspberry frosting!

mommy's bday present!

mom's bday is actually in august, 4 days after mine. i've been so so swamped this year that although i started this shirt for her last august, i never got around to finishing it until mother's day this year. sigh.

m.a.t.h...i.s...t.a.k.i.n.g...o.v.e.r...m.y...l.i.f.e.

anyhoo, so around front, the shirt has a mandarin collar and 3 rows of ruffles on both sides of the button placket.

here's a view of the back.

the pattern is for the jj blouse over at burdastyle.com.

happy very belated birthday, mommy! thanks for being so patient! i should probably get started on her bday present now for this year, seeing as i work soooooo slowly.

lan and robert's xmas presents

well, i finally met up with lan and robert over the memorial day weekend at their beach house in delaware. their christmas presents were held hostage in my evil clutches, but after 6 months, i decided that flannel pj pants were totally appropriate for the summer. hehe. robert's had a tesselation of cars!

here's a closeup of the faux-drawstring ties.lan's had sweet peas all over. here are her faux drawstring ties:unfortunately it didn't fit her, so mom gets another pair of flannel pj pants! she currently owns the most helen-made pj pants out of anyone! hehe. i'll make lan another pair after the major black friday flannel sale at joann's this november. maybe i'll get them to her in 2 years, if she's lucky...