homemade french toast with hot strawberry sauce!

was. so. good.

tiny star jar for jenny

after all these years, i still love making star jars.  this little one was for jenny, my welcoming colleague last year at my new school.  she was awesome, and has since moved to baltimore (along with my friend stef)!  when she was in town to visit at the beginning of october, i made her a jar of stars to thank her for the year of guidance.

love the colors!

other new news... i tore my acl, while playing touch football because i am a beast.  hahahahha  =(

hopefully surgery in early december.  here's hoping i recover quickly.  i will be taking off 2 weeks from school (and then will have the 2 weeks of winter break).  SEWING PARTY!!!!

tank for the goose

adrea, one of my oldest friends, saw the posting on the tank i made for georgia and noted that she would buy one had she seen something like it in a store.  lucky for her, i still have a lot of the cotton gauze from the kenya pants (though none in burgundy) and just enough of the vintage indian gold trim.  the perfect trappings to make her one of the tanks!

adrea is known as goose in my household.  at some point, her screen name was turbogoose.  thus, "goose" stuck.  seeing as this was the 4th rendition of the tank, her peter pan collar edges are now at an appropriate distance apart.  (in case you forgot, georgia's 2 collar edges were too far apart...)

around back.  goose preferred the deep v.  she loves a little scandal, that goose.  i JUST ran out of the gold trim, so this is the last of these tanks!  she promised me some pics of her donning this tank for this blog.  stay tuned!

i caught bunks in the goofiest sleeping position when i was working on this shirt a couple of weekends ago.  usually he sleeps stretched out or curled up in a ball.  here he is on his side with his right hind leg stiff and up in the air.  i've never actually seen him sleep like this before.  silly boy!

steaming baked goods

for a hot second this weekend, i thought my oven was dead.  it was letting out gas.  i feared for bunks's life.  in a panic, i called the gas company to come take a look.  the gas guy said no deal, the gas valve is dead.  my life flashed before my eyes: a life of no more sweets?  this could not be.  i had already mixed a batch of banana bread batter and didn't want it to go to waste, so i tried my hand at steaming the banana bread.  in 6 itty bitty ramikins.  best. idea. ever.

i mean, how cute are they?  and automatic portion control!

as you may know, asian peeps steam their breads.  think cha siu bao, or bbq pork buns.  here i was, channeling my inner asian.  the good news is that the super came to fix my oven.  it's now working!  my baking career has not ended!

on the bunks front, he has been shedding all his hair for the fall.  this weekend i vacuumed enough hair to cover 12 bunnies.  so gross.  here's a bald spot on his forehead, hehe.

vacuum cover?

for my bday this year, mom and dad got me a new vacuum.  trust me, this sucker was much needed.  my last vacuum was a hand-me-down from jimmy, and while its suction was super powerful, i somehow broke the lock that kept it standing upright, so it would often collapse and pummel me as it fell.  SO ANNOYING!  also, my new apartment has much less storage space than the last one, so i was in dire need of a vacuum that had a small base.  mom and dad got me a shark:

tiny and swively!  the only problem is that the tube on the bottom left is a prime "bunny chew toy" (in bunks' eyes, obvi not in mine!) as is the coil of wire above that.  my solution?  a vacuum cover!

who sews bags for their vacuums??  hehe.  i'm also on a kick to bust my stash of fabric, as storage is, again, such a problem.  the purple handle is actually of my smuffet.  oh, you're wondering what a smuffet is, are you?  according to mom's own personal urban dictionary, a smuffet is what she calls a "swiffer duster."  smuffet is both a noun and a verb.  here is a commonly heard usage of the verb form:  "helen!  don't forget to smuffet the floor with 'mop and shine.'" ("mop and shine" is mom's fav cleaning agent.  i'd call the company and recommend her to star in their ads, but i'm afraid the rest of the world is unfamiliar with her smuffet terminology.)  but, let's go back to the vacuum and smuffet cover.  check out the nice top stitching along the drawstring casing and the vintage grosgrain ribbon drawstring:

here it is, neatly stored in my packed closet:

thanks for the vacuum, mom and dad!

birthday twins!!

mom and i have almost the same birthday.  for her bday, i wanted to test out the pattern that i used for the burgundy kenya top, but with a full back instead.  obviously, mom is more modest than my teenager students.  i used this ghanian cotton gauze that one of my senior students from this year gave me, along with my beloved silk-cotton blend bedsheet as the lining.

the cotton gauze was very thin, thus making this combo an ideal concoction for summer-wear.  the front had a peter pan collar like the burgundy top.  check out the symmetry of the 2 sides!

on the back, even though there was a seam straight up the middle in the back, i cut the left and right halves so that the pattern continued!  **pats myself on the back for the even sewing**

oh wait, what's that?  i made myself one too??

mom's was so cute and i was able to squeeze out one for myself too from the leftover fabric.  i wore mine on my trip to sorrento and capri with shirley for my bday!  (i'll post pics of my italian debut of the top once shirley gets a chance to upload them.)  i might have worn the top out to the bars with friends on my actual bday as well, hehe.  aren't mom and i adorable??  bday twinsies!

in other news, the bunks has moved into my new apartment!  reunited!!  i've spent the entire summer separated from him.  thanks to mom and dad for taking good care of the bunny.  happy bday to mom and me!!!

now you see it...

(how embarassing!)

and now you don't!

once i get my white bedspread back from ct, the green will look sharper with the white.  i also built a table and chair set this weekend:

no more eating while sitting on the floor!  i also made mom's bday present... early!  how do you like that?  however, no pics until she opens it!

indian kenya top?

so, i'm a sucker.  georgia, one of my students who went to kenya with me, had a birthday while there.  she asked, i.e. BEGGED, me to make her a garment for her bday.  sweet kid, built similarly to me but much taller, hmmm, she could be a guinea pig for a tops pattern for me!  so, i made simplicity 1614 "view b", a tank top with a top yoke and a cross strap in the back.  i was intrigued by the cross strap, and knowing that mom would never wear something with that cross strap, this was the perfect pattern to test out on georgia.

i used the rest of the burgundy cotton gauze from the pair of kenya pants.  georgia chose it because she loved my kenya pants and i had JUST enough.  she really liked the navy sleeveless parent-teacher conference dress i made earlier this year, particularly the collar, and asked that i include a collar on whatever i ended up making her.  so, i drafted my own pattern for a peter pan collar, since the pattern didn't have one.  here's the top, bare, without any decoration yet.  unfortunately, i didn't account for seam allowances on the collars' edges, and thus the tips are a bit far apart... oops.

the color is duller than reality because of the camera flash.  the remaining pictures more accurately depict the burgundy.  here's the back:

to be honest, i'm not a fan of the back at all.  also, my shoulders are so narrow that the cross-strap didn't lay flat.  ugh.  not for me.  glad i made a guinea pig version of this pattern so that i didn't waste any fabric on a version for myself!  because the cotton gauze was so plain, i decided to trim the collar and the cross-strap.  this vintage gold indian trim (gifted from a former student many years ago) was perfect.

guess what i used to use it for... as a tie to hold open the shutters that close off my bedroom from my living room in my current apartment.  hahahahhahahah!!!  i'm so innovative, i know!

i was able to hand stitch it on so easily!  i'm surprised by how much i love the look!  when i first got the trim, i was certain i'd never use it on a garment.  ha!

cute, right?  here's the top, done!

and around back:

i'm going to mail it to her, as the kid is traipsing thailand and cambodia right now (oh, to be a kid again!!), and i don't want it to get lost in all my boxes as i have to pack up my apartment.  that's right, i'm moving!  ugh.  not thrilled, yet, slightly excited at the same time.  landlord is forcing everyone out of the building, so here's my chance to move somewhere quieter, but in the same neighborhood!

this was my attempt at packing this weekend, while working on a final project for my doctoral class.  that's right, i packed and sewed instead of working on the project... tsk tsk tsk.  when i came here, i packed my life into 41 boxes.  here are 7 so far.  the new apartment has space for a dining table!  hurray!  no more eating on the ground!  now i get to have a table for cutting fabric, i mean eating, again!

kenya pants!!

worried that i didn't make it back from kenya?  fear not!  i returned safely!  currently drowning in doctoral work.  class started 3 days after i returned from kenya!  (ask me how i was the only one who showed to class that monday...)  i had a presentation yesterday (meh) and i have a paper due tuesday.  what better time than to update the blog?

i thought of giving away the 3 pairs of pants that i made to the dear masai girlies who attended the school where we built the library foundation.  how cool would it be to go back to the village, say even in a couple years, and see people donning my handmade clothing??  however, then i got practical and realized i actually lack lounge pants in ny, seeing as i took apart my favorite pair of pj pants to serve as a pattern for these pants, so selfish me, i kept all 3.  this red pair became my primary pair of work pants at the site.  cotton gauze is amazing in scorching hot kenyan weather!  here i am, using a pickax to break up rocks that were impeding our laying down of the library walls.  pickaxes are heavy!

i made 2 pairs of grey-green pants as well.  here was the first pair, also filthy from much manual labor.  i'm wearing mom's floppy orange beach hat that i bought her in honolulu to protect me from the sun.  the kids all wore safari hats.  i, of course, had to be unique (and goofier-looking!).  hahhahahaha

there are the library walls and foundation.  those rocks that form the wall were HEAVY!  think 50 pounds or more!  that's half my weight!  the experience was amazing though.  i loved working with the masai kids on their math and playing soccer with our boys and their boys after construction every day.  this last picture is from our safari drive.  it's part of a group picture, so i cut everyone else out (hehe, gotta maintain the spotlight, yo!).  conveniently, i'm in the front (i mean, where else would i be? the back?), so you have a good shot of my pants.  all 3 pairs actually have functioning drawstrings (look carefully below), which as you may know, are not often features of my handmade pj pants!

that's right, i traipsed through nairobi and the masai mara in glorified pj pants!  holla!

week of 2 tiered cakes!

on my 30 before 30 list, i had "make a proper 2 tiered cake" as one of my bucket list items to accomplish before my 30th bday.  i did make a 2 layer cake when my friends sonija and bernardo visited me in philly, however the presentation was really lacking.  for last thursday's math and science teacher social at my school, i made a 2 tier banana cake with a layer of bananas in between each tier and topped with cream cheese frosting and strawberries.  it was delicious and a beauty.  i wish i had snapped a picture of it after it was cut so you could see the inside.

then this saturday i went to a wine tasting event at my friend's apt and caught this fantastic view of manhattan from the subway station:

sunday, my football team had a reunion bbq and i baked a purple velvet cake with strawberries and cream cheese frosting in between each layer and on top as well.  think red velvet, but with a little blue food coloring!  my football team donned purple uniforms.

this cake was delicious, although i had a really hard time making the frosting stick to the cake because the cake was baked on the same day that i put on the frosting and thus it was a little too warm.  there were little purple cake bits all over the frosting.  to mask this, i sprinkled coconut flakes on top.  with the banana cake, i had baked the cake the day before and refrigerated it so that it was not as soft and crumbly.  oh well!  lessons for next time!

uygur top!!

a sweet student of mine from my 2 year stint in philly (lucky girl was stuck with me for 2 years in a row!) brought me back this beautiful print from xinjiang province in western china, land of the uygur people.  i'd love to go there one day.  anyhoo, determined to tweak butterick 5608 (view c) from mom's mother's day top to my size, i set off with a hell of a lot of pins and tape and revamped the pattern to fit my goofily proportioned build!

it took a while, but i did it.  it finally fits!  the print is bold... very bold.  i wish i had centered the inner facing of the back so that when it hangs on a hanger, the inside looks neat and symmetric.  oh well, it's just the inside...

on the side, i created a button and loop closure like i did on mom's.  the buttons are vintage, from carin, my coworker!  i swear i will have enough vintage buttons to last my lifetime!

around back:

i wanted to get someone to snap a pic of me in the top today while at work, but alas, the day was hectic and i forgot.  here's my best attempt at a self-pic.  a little sketchy, i know.

pretty cute, right?  

off to sew some pants for chaperoning a field trip to kenya.  i leave june 22!  ahh!!!  we're going to be doing lots of manual labor...  in equatorial heat...  yet we were told to wear long pants (cargo-pocket work slacks in particular, but come on, slacks in EQUATORIAL HEAT?)...  i'm going to make myself a couple pairs of thin cotton gauze beachy lounge pants!!!

memorial day 2013

gotta love long weekends.  i kicked mine off right by 1st hanging with shirley on saturday, who was in town for the weekend!!!  yippee!!!  she was so sweet and got me some chevron-like fabric while she was in seattle for a wedding!  i love it!  it will be used to make a summer dress for our visit to capri this summer!  whee!! 

of course, i had to finish a garment in time for my reunion with shirley, hehe.  i used the rest of that lotus leaf fabric from mom's mother's day top to make myself a peplum top!  the lining was my beloved silk and egyptian cotton bedsheet.  

i used the pattern from my oregon beach dress to make the bodice.  for the peplum skirt, i had hoped to make a cute short half-circle skirt.  however, i had very little fabric left after making the bodice, and thus i cut out 2 long rectangles, stitched them together lengthwise, and made a gathered peplum skirt.  i'm actually happy i went this route because now the top looks quite different from my oregon beach dress!

around back, i had an invisible zipper (this one being my 3rd attempt because the 1st 2 were each too short and thus i could not fit my shoulders past the tiny waist part of the top!!), along with 3 button and loop closures above the zipper.  they were leftover from mom's top, and it would have been a shame to not use such perfectly matching buttons on this garment!

on sunday, alex, an old friend from grade school, threw a barbecue in prospect park.  the day was beautiful.  i let him pick what i should bake for the event, and he chose strawberry rhubarb pie, of course... rhubarb is not always easy to find.  i successfully hunted down 3 stalks!  here are the strawberry and rhubarb before sugar and other sweet wonderfulness was added.  the color was so vibrant:

i squeaked out 2 small pies... on which i cut out pi symbols as vents, of course!  once a math teacher, always a math teacher!  

transporting the pies was no small feat.  i went to the small grocery store next to my apartment and asked for a box big enough to carry 2 pies.  they gave me a small box in which i could only stack the pies, so i asked them for the lid of another box so that i could create a divider.  genius, no??  the pies were still hot, so it was imperative that they sat on flat surfaces so that they would not fold and drip everywhere.  this looks like a mini-oven!

here's me in the lotus top again (you know i'm going to wear it to school this week too... just you wait!), on alex's friend's rooftop as we were waiting to catch views of the sunset. my friend ryan took the pic... as i was yelling at him to hurry up because he was so slowwwwww.

bunks was up to no good all weekend, making messes on my new west elm couch!!!  what nerve!  his entry has been banned onto the couch unless i am home to monitor him... so i lined the edge of the couch with tins of sewing thread.  i'm such an innovative thinker, i know.

happy long weekend to all and to all a goodnight!