bird mobiles

at the school, i was selected to be the welcoming colleague for a year for a new hire both last year and this coming year.  my job is to make sure she fits in well to the community, knows who to go to for xy and z, has a familiar face, etc.  it's a great program.  i still keep in touch with my welcoming colleague jenny.  anyhoo, esinam, the woman for whom i was a welcoming colleague this past year, is having a baby boy in september, and kelly, a woman who started with me at my school, is having a kid in july.  time for some baby gifts...  i started by sewing 19 birdies. (an extra one was for my coworker jess who hosted kelly's shower.  jess loves birds.)

i kept the theme black, silver, and red.  19 birdies are a lot, let me tell you.  making them assembly line style sped things up quite a bit.  esinam got a special ghanaian fabric birdy in celebration of her ghanaian heritage.  (you may remember the cream fabric from the twinsies tank tops i made mom and me for our birthdays 2 summers ago!)  i then picked up some dowels from the hardware store, which eric helped me saw down, and a key ring.  i miraculously had twine in my work desk.  the set creator for our school's theater department (i'm not sure what his exact title is) helped me hot glue the birds down and the twine in place so that the birdies didn't look like they were clinging for dear life under each branch, hehe.

side view:

these were photos of kelly's mobile.  i was an idiot and forgot to photograph esinam's.  oops.

congrats, ladies!  now, onto mom's mother's day gift hehehhee.  oh wait, it's father's day that's coming up??  :)

first pair of zip fly pants!!

i finally finished my first pair of zip fly pants.  this project took at least 2 months!  the material was so thick that the needle punched a bunch of dents on the plate because it kept misaligning.  however, i finally hemmed the bottom up and finished the belt loops this weekend!

the belt loops sucked.  after everything was all folded up and tucked under, there ended up being SO many layers.  my machine would get very angry at me.  very.  angry.  in total there were 6 belt loops.

eric was very anxious to try them on.  here he is testing them without the jeans button hammered in or the rivets.  i modeled them after carhartt work pants.  they have a reinforced knee and thigh.

i am definitely most proud of this garment.  the back is even better:

they fit SO WELL!!!  AHHH!!!  i'm going into his factory later this week to help him put in the jeans button and the rivets.  those are his areas of expertise!

poor bunks had an eye infection 2 weeks ago.  little guy wouldn't open his left eye.  it was so goopy and pink.  it was so terrible to witness.

he's now healed, after a week of antibiotic eye drops.  back to mischief!  bunks turns 8 this summer.  can't believe it.  he still acts like a mischievous youngun'.

zip fly pants attempt

for all the numerous garments that i have made in the 6+ years that i have been sewing, i still have yet to sew a pair of zip fly pants.  zip flies scare me.  a lot.  i've sewn many zippers before; however, the idea of origami with zipper installation does not appeal to me at all.  i decided to try out thread theory's jutland pants.  eric is my guinea pig since boys don't wear close-fitting pants anyway.  he wanted me to try to replicate his carhartt carpenter work pants.  we used 14 oz duck canvas (or 16... i forget...).  this stuff is thick!

mom and dad got me a new singer heavy duty sewing machine for christmas.  it plowed through this material quite easily, though at times i had to handcrank the needle through the many-ply thick parts.  sewing the pant leg was a nightmare.  look how impossible it was to see:

last night i got myself up to the zip fly part.  shudder.  tonight i attempt the zip fly.  i've studied the instructions through and through, but i am not excited!

with this warmer weather, i've been dragging bunks out to run around a bit.  he'd much rather eat the lawn or torture the cats.  squeeks is relatively patient with him.  here they are canoodling:

wish me luck tonight with the zipper.  hopefully i get it on the first try!

lawnmower

bunks experienced the outdoors for the first time yesterday.  it was 75 degrees in brooklyn and super sunny.  he was rather hesitant and creeped around, sniffing everything in the backyard.  

today, a little bolder, bunks interchanged exploring nature with eating his breakfast.  lots of sprinting and skipping occurred.

then, after the meal was done, he started mowing the lawn.  mmm fresh grass

i had quite the time trying to get him to come back in.  he kept hopping away.  nothing a little carrot bribery couldn't fix, hehe

parent teacher conferences outfit 2

this might be my new favorite skirt.  i got so many compliments on it today (haha, i sound like i grovel for compliments...) and it's comfy.  not too short, no chance of a wardrobe malfunction, and shinyyyyy

amanda took the pics for me at work, between conferences.  she accused me of not looking fun.  so, here's what i think looking fun is like:

my only wish is that i had sewn the pockets closer to the center of the skirt so that the gold pocket flap was not so close to the gold zipper.  boo!

i'm currently working on neckties.  quick little projects.  pics to come soon!

parent teacher conferences outfit 1

the cream and purple dress has made its debut!!  i had a student take pics for me before the parents and their children rolled in.  here i am mid-sentence hehe:

not liking my derpy face here, but whatevs, at least i now see that i need to get my hair cut!

so, funny story: this morning, while walking to work, i noticed in my reflection in windows and doors that the slit in the back was quite high.  like scandalously high.  upon arriving at school, i rushed to my friend amanda's room and made her help me stitch down a bit of the slit.  phew.  fashion emergency resolved!

too bad you can't really see that the sleeves are actually a deep deep purple velvet.  looks more luxe than a black velvet would be.  i've gotten so many compliments on this dress today, from coworkers and parents!  yay!!

sgt pepper skirt

i bought this orange tweed ages ago from my fav fabric store in the dc area.  there was only a yard, as it was a fabric sample.  this whole time i had planned to make a skirt with it but was just more inspired by newer patterns so i never started this one (which would be based on a pattern from my twinkle sews book that i have used twice already).  however, this christmas, shirley got me a gold zip, which i had been envisioning as an exposed zipper for a skirt... and thus, my sgt pepper skirt was born.  

shirley came up with the name, sigh.  i rather like it (the skirt) though.  we all know i heart shiny like the best raccoon, again, hehe.

i could rotate the pic if i reloaded it to blogger, but eh, just turn your head to view it.  the gold is this gold metallic woven fabric that i got from carin, my former colleague with the german tailor mom.  shirley was using it to make me a new pillowcase while she stayed at my place over winter break... one day, she will finish it for me hehe.  i lined the inside with a cream satiny pillowcase that i found in my closet.  

not exactly sure whose pillowcase it is... i certainly didn't buy it.  i caution all of you against leaving fabric around my apartment.  you might not get it back.  it might be sewn into my garments hehe.  around back:

like my monkey flannel pj pants and rei hiking socks?  =)

bunks had quite the weekend:  bunny roasting by the open fireeeeeee (sing this to the tune of "chestnuts roasting by the open fireeeee")

he and squeaks have become best friends.  we caught squeaks grooming bunks yesterday!!  so cute!  at night, squeaks will lay by bunks' cage:  "why is my buddy spending the night in jail again??"  virgil, eric's other kitty, still isn't amused by the bunny yet.  

i'm going to be wearing this skirt and the cream dress i just finished to parent teacher conferences this week.  stay tuned for pics!

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!