happy valentine's day!

i've never been that big of a fan of valentine's day, but this year, i was a lucky gal!  eric surprised me with homemade chocolate chip pancakes, 

a pouch of 100 small leather hearts that he punched out himself (!!!), and really fine houndstooth wool from italy!  it's got a slight sheen to it in the black.  we all know that i heart shiny like the best raccoon!!

i think i want to make a classy suspendered pencil skirt with it…  we shall see.  tonight i made homemade chocolate chip cookies with the rest of the chocolate nuggets that eric bought for the pancakes.  soooo yummy!

happy valentine's day!

from a gala to parent teacher conferences

at the end of january, eric's aunt was being recognized at a big retirement dinner at the really posh pierre hotel in manhattan.  after fretting about "what to wear," i decided i wanted to make a dress for the event, as eric's immediate and extended family would be there, and what better audience would there be for my sewing??  i chose "view a" of butterick 5520, the dress all the way to the right on the envelope below:

i paired a deep purple velvet with this cream boxy-woven wool from shirley.  (do note that "from shirley" means luxe... real luxe... girl has some amazing taste in fabric!)  i didn't want to be a drab new yorker dressed in all black.  here i am using my me-built table to cut fabric!  i figured that cutting cream wool on the floor would get it all dirty.

i ended up lining the velvet shoulders with a thin green and red plaid wool that i had in my stash of fabric scraps because the velvet was much flowier than the wool, and attaching the velvet on top of the cream wool would make it too thick and stiff.

i wish i had a good pic of the purpleness of the velvet.  i love it.  it's just the slightest hint of purple.  

this was where i ended by the time the dinner came around: the bottom had to be hemmed still and the zipper in the back was not installed yet.  =(  i felt like i had lost on project runway.  it was upsetting.  i worked until 30 mins before i had to start getting ready for the event, but eventually came to terms with the fact that i just wouldn't be done in time.  i ended up wearing a black jacquard strapless dress by theory with a black blazer.  #drabnewyorker  =(

last night, i finally finished!  yes, on feb 11...  all but 2 seam lines/darts match perfectly!!

here's why the dress took so long: the shoulders were very mooshy because of the wool lining, the silk lining, and the velvet, so i had to handstitch it all down so that it flowed like one piece of fabric.  so tedious!  and yes, i lined this entire dress with my silk-egyptian cotton blend bedsheet!  i figured the luxe outside warranted a luxe inside...

the back of the skirt had a slit!  i've never made a skirt with a slit before because the way one has to attach the lining to the skirt around a slit can get complicated.  this one wasn't so bad:

look how narrow my shoulders are!  the purple velvet sleeves are SO close together.  i took it in by 4 inches across the back.  this pattern was intended for a linebacker!

i'm going to wear this dress to parent teacher conferences in 2 weeks, dressed down with black opaque tights and knee length boots.  i'm also going to break up all the cream with a thin black patent leather belt.  eric promised me we'd go on a fancy date as well, so i can wear it to a fancy event.  i'll post pics of both!

how's bunks doing?  he's good... making friends with large cats and bossing them around.  he's taken to chasing them instead of letting them chase him.  are you surprised?

take me out to the ballgame

i made this shirt right after the grey t shirt was done.  eric chose navy 3/4 sleeves and a navy collar after an old shirt of his that has since fallen to pieces.  i think he saw aaron and jacob's little picture day shirts and wanted one too, hehe!

while the arms are not topstitched all that well, by the time i got to the collar, my topstitching was impressively straight and even.  the toughest part was figuring out what tension to use since the navy fabric was much thinner than the grey jersey knit.  

he loved the shirt!  yay!  i have so many projects backed up in my cue that i'm not even sure what i'm trying to tackle next.  sigh.  but for now, must finish 19 report cards by next tuesday!

xmas stocking for me!

in my office, we hang socks before winter break and everyone leaves each other little treats to help us make it to the long break.  those last couple weeks are tough!  since i don't have any socks to spare, i decided to quilt myself a stocking.  i had made similar ones for a coworker liz and for mia, jimmy's dog, 2 years ago.  this stocking was actually started at the same time, but then school and torn acl's got in the way, so i only got a chance to finish it this november.

so not a fan of quilting.  i do find these stockings to be kinda fun-looking though.  i'm just so glad to be done with it finally.  'round back:

i lost my back panel in that green fabric.  really don't know where i put it.  so, i used more of the green striped shirting fabric.  here's the stocking hung up at work!  it got a bit soaked in the snow that seeped into my backpack!

prelims

the boys took a practice pic!!

sibling photo day

my friend amanda's kids go to a school that has separate photo days for individual portraits and sibling portraits.  how cute is that?  the older son aaron (age 7) is passionate about fashion and insisted that he and his younger brother (age 5) coordinate their outfits for sibling photo day.  aaron and jacob both had birthdays several weeks ago, and since i was late in making them gifts (as in i still hadn't made them yet), here was my chance to redeem myself!  for aaron, the bow tie fanatic:

how cute is that little bow tie?  it's attached to the shirt.  i used more of shirley's grey cotton jersey knit and some navy jersey knit.

jacob, the little guy, is less into fashion, but i wanted him to have his own design rather than making 2 bow tie shirts.  he gets a shirt with a necktie sewn onto it:

here's the necktie stitched down.  i swear it's not that asymmetrical!

not sure if you can see it, but i topstitched 2 sets of 3 pairs of diagonal stripes on the necktie to help secure the tie to the shirt and for visual interest.  i also topstitched the bottom hems and jacob's cuffs with navy thread.

happy very belated bday, boys!

foray into t-shirts

in all my years of sewing, i have never made a t-shirt.  i only started sewing with knits 2 years ago and have only made 4 knit garments ever.  knits scare me.  my serger scares me.  however, fear not, i have begun my foray into t-shirts!

here is my first t-shirt ever!  the pattern is the "strathcona henley" pattern from thread theory designs, the pattern i used for dad's and shirley's wool strathcona henley sweaters.  the pdf pattern came with a t-shirt crewneck option as well.  the sleeves are a bit long... not a fan.  'round back:

i then lopped off about an inch from each sleeve.  much better!

the neckline features some kickass topstitching!  look how straight!

unfortunately my intended guinea pig was a smidge too broad-shouldered for this t-shirt, so dad will be getting it for christmas!  whoo!  first christmas present, done!  

look at my nugget!!!  i love him!!!

houndstooth sweatshirt

remember when i said i was going to make myself a sweatshirt for my bday with this orange and pink houndstooth poly knit?  well, it's now november and my bday is in august... so don't think i'm only late on gifts for others.  "do to others as you would have them do to you."  

this project was rather unpleasant; i should have figured as much given that the instructions said it was advanced.  there was much topstitching.  here is the back yoke.  i did my best to line up the little houndstooth (houndsteeth? hehe):

the pattern called for buttons along the front yoke.  i wasn't sure whether to do fabric-covered buttons or pale pink ones.  since the houndstooth is so loud, i opted for pink ones that mom got for me ages ago at a dollar store.  thanks, mom!

the color is actually ridiculously bright, identical to in the first picture.  this last one and the next one are from my phone as it was dying (and thus the flash would not turn on).  front view:

a good fit was rather difficult to achieve.  i'm very short and narrow, and thus i had to lop a lot off the sides and bottom.  i had to try it on a million times, even in my blue striped pj pants, hehe.

i first wore the top on sunday on an excursion to storm king, the sculpture garden in rockland county.  i was rather proud of how i styled the top: black skinny jeans, low grey boots, black puffy vest.  i subjected eric to a hell of a photoshoot, hehe.  (pretend i'm smiling like a normal person here, as i sit atop the storm king wall, probs illegally...)

of course i wore a similar outfit to school on monday, but with different jeans.  my friend amanda tried her best to snap a flattering pic of me, but alas, failure:

the camera lens on my phone had a fingerprint on it.  we tried for another pic.  failure again:

i'm just not skilled at posing.  i also need a haircut.  on the bunks front, he's really been into these dance parties to which i subject him.  hehe.  here he is wondering when i'm going to pick him up:

happy belated bday to me!

rubber duckie, you're the one

you make bathtime lots of fun!  yup, i decided to be a rubber duckie for halloween this year.  here is my sketch for the design.  i used the jacket pattern from mom's and dad's fleece jackets for the body, drafted a hood pattern from an icebreaker hoodie that jimmy got me for a birthday, and used the pj pants pattern from my kenya pants for the bottoms.  the yellow fabric was another fleece blanket. (at one point i had 5 of these fleece blankets in my apartment!)

first up, the hood:

i might have worn the hood the whole time that i was sewing the rest of the costume...

for those that think i am a master sewer, fear not!  i make a ton of mistakes.  here i sewed the left half of the costume correctly and the right side was sewn inside out.  oops!

i sewed flaps between the bottom of the sleeve seams and the bodice side seams for wings:

the whole costume was utterly ridiculous, but so much fun to sew up!

without the tail or beak yet.  i resembled a yellow speedskater at this point, hehe.

the beak is my favorite part.  i made it from orange canvas that i got at jem fabric warehouse in manhattan.  unfortunately it closed, but it had a ton of awesome fabric for decently cheap.  i was worried that the stiffness of the woven canvas would not work well with the stretchiness of the fleece.  it ended up not being a problem at all.  (i'm wearing a me-made dress while trying on the duck beak!)

my coworker brian captured the best picture of the costume.  the duck tail was attached to my lower back and was stuffed with polyfill and fleece scraps.  the eyes were made of scraps from dad's navy fleece outfit.  my algebra 2 students and i had a long planning session about whether the eyes should be just blue or whether i should include whites above it: they determined that whites were a necessity.  i bought orange tights at ricky's to finish out the costume.  the tights cost $7.99!!!  more than the cost of the rest of the costume!  the blue zipper was a random one i found in my stash.  i believe it was from an old pillowcase.  my coworker erika is to the right.  she was a cootie queen, a costume she made herself as well!

hope everyone had a fun halloween!

perfection

it was my friend amanda's bday sept 6.  she's also lucky enough to sit next to me at work!  hehe.  since my oven can only bake 20 minute goods, cupcakes were in order.  unfortunately i ran out of sugar, so i had to use pink decoration sugar as a substitute!

the butter and sugar mixture were already pink before i added the food coloring!

i made a half batch to assist with portion control.  

topped with cream cheese frosting... perfection!

other signs of perfection: using vintage sewing machines to decorate stores!  (all saints, one of my fav stores)

AND, bunks' first day of school portrait.

ain't he CUTE!??!?!?!??!