Well then. Here we are.

So I obviously (OBVIOUSLY) failed at keeping up this blog for almost the last year. I will give you some good reasons:

• December got busy even though I wasn't rehearsing for or performing in anything.
• I got a stomach bug right after Christmas.
• I came down with a second bout of bronchitis in January, which was accompanied by a day of abdominal spasms so bad I cried in pain and then couldn't eat for a week because everything hurt too much. I'm not kidding--I could feel the connective tissue between my ribs, and it HURT. And it lasted a month.
• And then I was sewing and packing and crocheting for my two-week trip to Japan in March, and five days after I got back from Japan via Oakland, I rented a car and drove to Phoenix for a symposium. 
• And then I looked for work and went on many interviews, and finally got a part-time gig at Michael's.

I'm still looking for full-time work and trying my best to actually do stuff, but it's discouraging. I'm carrying around some extra weight (still, but I think it's finally coming off) and I have so many projects in the works that it's hard for me to actually sit down and finish ANYTHING.

Here is what I need to finish:

• So many hats. So many.
• Crocheting a billion little hearts for the kids at church.
• My niece's afghan.
• My sister's friend's jaunty tam to wear during chemo.
• So much mending and altering. So much.
• A crocheted kitty for one of the neighborhood children.
• A granny square pillow for my youngest nephew.
• Sewing for me in general (still discouraging because of the weight gain--my good winter coat doesn't fit, and I spent GOOD money on it, so I'm even more annoyed).
• Curtains for my sister-in-law.
• Slip cover for my new little storage bench--it's a pretty dark red, but that doesn't match my bedroom.

I look at the unfinished things around me and get really discouraged, so I end up not doing anything, and then I get frustrated that nothing is done, and then I look at the list, and get discouraged. It's a vicious cycle. Also, I'm not as good at knitting as I am at crocheting, and that gets me in a discouragement loop, too. I know I'd be better at knitting if I did more of it, but then I think about how hard to read the patterns can be for me, and I think about all the pretty yarn I have that I don't want to ruin (hi, I bought some gorgeous merino yarn in Japan and I'm terrified to make anything out of it), and I think about how awkward my fingers feel with the knitting still, and I shut down and don't do it. But I keep buying yarn because I have such a good employee discount and there is some pretty great yarn on clearance at work right now. And then I have too much yarn to store properly, and I don't know what to make out of it, and Henry the Giant Kitten may or may not have eaten a little yarn heart and...

You see? You see how annoying and frustrating this all is? BLAR.

That's where I am. I just need to jump start something. I need to stop feeling sorry for myself and get away from the computer and outside in this really lovely late-summer weather we've been having (between the heavy rainstorms, of course). I need to DO SOMETHING. Every day. Even if it's a little crocheted heart that Henry the Giant Kitten will try to eat. Maybe that will get these creative juices going again. I hope.

Snow!

It started snowing some time early this morning, and hasn't really let up yet.  One of my neighbors said that her kids measured nine inches in their yard, and I'm not at all surprised.  I'm grateful for the snow, but I wish I could justify new tires...living on severance and paying for a trip to Japan means that I don't feel like I can justify an expense like that until I have a job.  Interview on Thursday!  Keep your fingers crossed!

Yesterday I didn't get a lot done because I was watching my niece and nephew in the morning and then went to Temple Square with their family in the evening.  By the time I got home, it was too late to get anything started.  This morning, I was out of bed by 7:15 (yay me!) and in the sewing room by 8.

I cut out all of Laresa's costume, stabilized the stretch velvet she chose for one of the bodice panels, and cut strips of iridescent organza for embellishment while I watched "When Harry Met Sally."  Then I dug my Christmas boxes out of my dad's shed so I could decorate a table for a church Christmas party.  I got home at 9, after helping clean up and deliver extra food to neighbors who need it, and then I put all the dishes in the dishwasher and packed my Christmas things and the music box I used back into their boxes.  I'll try to remember to get the pictures off my phone, because my table turned out really pretty!

Tomorrow:
Watch my baby nephew
Sew
See my chiropractor so I can keep sewing (I jacked up my back and it hurts to walk, which is always fun)
Put Christmas boxes back in the shed

My goal tomorrow is to have Laresa's costume put together, if not totally finished with the trim, and have mine cut out.  Mine is much less complicated:  I have to make a bustle from two panels of fabric, some bloomers (to wear over leggings), and a bolero.  I just need to brave the icy roads to see if JoAnn has black sequin trim and decide if I want a skirt or just the bloomers and bustle.

It's going to get really cold out here for the weekend; I just hope they can keep the roads pretty clear.  I'd wanted (BADLY) to see "White Christmas" on the big screen in Draper tomorrow, but with my back like this and the weather (and being behind on sewing) I'm not going to make it, which makes me sad.  Maybe Cinemark will do their classic series again next year.

Well hey...

A year and a half since I've posted here.  Thank goodness I'm not one of those craft blogger ladies who have monetized!  Yikes.

Anyhoo, since I missed NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) in November, I told my two favorite friends that I'd post every day in December.  And I almost missed today because I forgot!

Yeesh.

I've been unemployed since August, and you'd THINK I'd have a lot of projects done, but no.  Let me tell you a story about lack of confidence, illness, malaise, and general...well, let's just call it "enjoying my time of very few obligations," because it sounds better than laziness. :)

Quite honestly, I'm pretty sure I've been battling some mild residual depression from the last several months at my most recent job, so motivation has been hard to come by.  Also, I don't use this blog to impress anyone or to make money or to post tutorials, so it's easy to let it slide.  (Ok, I SORT OF use it to impress people...like how I made 6 pies for Thanksgiving and they all turned out really good except the lemon meringue got a tiny bit watery and the cherry custard pie didn't have quite the flavor it would have had I used the Grand Marnier it called for or some kind of reasonable substitute...but that's beside the point.)

I have a major project that needs to be done by Friday:  masquerade costumes for me and my sister.  Her company throws a massive Christmas party every year, and this year's theme is a masquerade.  They've even hired a great band and one of the best DJs in the state, and rented a local (new) convention center, so you know they mean business.  If they mean business, so do we.  I mean, we could have rented some pretty great costumes at the theater near our house, but NO.  We had to design and make our own.  Really, they shouldn't be too tricky to do--mine involves very minimal sewing, and hers is an easy pattern--but we waited to get the fabric on sale and it took me forever to decide my costume, so he we are, less than a week away, and nothing has even been cut out.

I'm going to pound out as much as I can tomorrow before going to Temple Square to see the Christmas lights, and Tuesday hope to be done with at least one costume before I have to set up and decorate a table for a church Christmas party.

Wish me luck...I could use it.

I serge standing up.

Maybe all my posts should be labeled "Progress", because I don't do a whole lot in the sewing room lately.  I've been busy, but last weekend I got some mending and hemming done.  Yay!  I also cut out a dress.  I won't have time to sew it until Sunday, probably, but I was able to serge the raw edges last night between dinner and rehearsal.

And I did it standing up.

Booyah.

Cushions

I actually DID do some clothing remodeling like I said I would in my previous post, but didn't take pictures.  I cut the bodice off a shirt-dress that didn't EVER fit right, hemmed it, gave it to the thrift store because maybe someone could use it as a shirt albeit more of a cropped style.  Then I cut the button placket off the skirt that was left, sewed up a seam instead, put a zipper in the back, added side pockets and a waistband, and called it good.  New stripey skirt:  check!  Get rid of a dress that never ever fit:  check!  I don't know if reusing the elastic from a pair of worn-out pajama pants counts, but did that too.  In a new pair of pajama pants.  Bright pink pajama pants!  I had considered trying to alter a shirt, but decided it would be too much of a pain so I just gave it away.  But, with all of this "make-do and mend" stuff in mind, I bought a skirt two sizes too big because it was A) pretty and B) $6.50 on sale.  I will unpick the waistband and take the side seams in by about two inches and have a pretty coral and brown nubbly skirt for winter.

My friend Amanda pointed me to this blog post (warning:  language) about altering and tailoring.  I must say I wasn't very surprised, in retrospect, by the idea that People With Money have all their clothes custom tailored, but I WAS surprised (and a little shocked) that I hadn't really thought of it that way.  I'm pretty sure I could teach myself some better alteration techniques and get more mileage out of my shopping that way, especially when one of my favorite brands has pants long enough but too big in the waist (I suppose I should be grateful for that but it's a PAIN IN THE NECK I TELL YOU).

Anyway.  To the cushions part of this.  I have my grandmother's cedar chest that was manufactured during WWII--it's a Lane and has a little card explaining that the metal latch and key normally installed in the cedar chest has been left out so all extra metal can go to the war effort.  It has a nifty, optimistic sentence that says "when Victory is ours, please write to the Lane Co. for your key and replacement latch".  I love it so much.  My mom spent DAYS refinishing it after my grandma died, and when it was done, she felt very strongly that it should go to me.  It is one of my treasures.  Because it sits against the wall of my room, instead of in front of my bed (as would be ideal), I'm thinking of using it as a bench/sofa.  In order to do that, I should make a cushion, right?  I think I'd like a REALLY BIG floral or pretty stripe (in pink, of course); it shouldn't be too hard to do if I get some 3" or 4" foam, cover it with muslin, and make a removable cover in a heavy cotton.  I'd probably need some piping and a heavy-duty zipper--if all goes as planned, it should only take a few hours to do everything.

Now.  To find the perfect fabric, which we all know doesn't really exist.  ha.

Make & Mend 2011

Yes, I'm participating!  I'm not sure how to do something like this, because I've never done it before, but I figure it's worth a try.  Besides, it will get me into the sewing room, right?  That's the theory, anyway. ;)

Weird sizing at JC Penney

So I ordered some stuff from Penney's last Wednesday night on their Thanksgiving sale.  Normally, I'd probably go into the store and buy stuff, but these came in tall sizes so I got them online.  Problems:  they sent a large sweater instead of the medium I ordered, and the medium t-shirt I got is larger than my Eddie Bauer mediums.  More problems:  when I took them back to the catalog department, I discovered I can't get them in a smaller size in the talls.  So now I'm faced with the possibility of either not having a light blue sweater, or of altering a sweater.

My life is so complicated.

The sweater alteration shouldn't be too bad, and I've finally come to grips with the idea that I will probably have to alter stuff to get it to fit right anyway, but MAN.  I didn't expect to be swimming in mediums, and I know that this anomaly has nothing to do with weight loss.  I guess they've revamped some sizing and that's ok, but it's frustrating.  I guess I'll go ahead and order the medium tall and use one of my other sweaters as a template for the alteration.  It shouldn't be too bad, right?  I'll baste it first and try it on before committing to a shorter stitch.  It's worth it to have the extra length...I hope.

Days 29 and 30

I'll tell you what, it's hard to blog at work, and then it's hard to blog when you get home and don't turn on your computer OR you don't remember to blog until after you're almost asleep and have to be up in a few short hours.  So, you know, I do feel a little like I should apologize, but I'm not out to make any big statement or anything with this, so I'm ok not apologizing. :)

If anything, this little experiment, focusing entirely on my creativity blog, has reminded me that I do have a lot of hobbies and genuine talents.  That's pretty cool.  The frustrating thing, though, is not knowing what to do with it all, besides not having time or money to pursue these hobbies as much as I want to.  I take comfort in knowing that I have an aptitude for craft and a passion for learning--it helps keep me going when I'm discouraged and frustrated by it all.

In any case, I plan to remember this little blog of mine a little more from now on, and actually post pictures of things I've made or talk about things that have been on my mind.  It's been fun.  Thanks for reading, and I'll see you in December!

Day 28

Just a quick update on a couple of things.  I bought the most beautiful (to me, anyway) corduroy last year (see above!), intending to make a dress using Vogue 8411, but after reading several reviews on PatternReview.com, I decided that maybe corduroy may not be my best option for this dress even though I can see it in my mind.  There are too many things I'd have to mess with around the neckline.  I got some good inspiration from Boden, though, and plan to go through my patterns to see what I can use/alter/smoosh together.  Thoughts, anyone?

Today, I worked out an arrangement of "O Little Town of Bethlehem" for my ward choir--it still needs some tweaking and a transition (I'm starting with the British version, to the tune of "I Saw a Mighty Angel Fly", and going into the American version for the third verse) but it's coming along pretty well.  I am also within about 4 rows of finishing an afghan for a friend's baby and should have that totally done by the end of the week!  I'm excited!  Considering the baby was born in August!  ha ha!

Anyway, I feel sufficiently motivated to cross a lot of things off my huge project list.  It's a great feeling!

Days 26 and 27 part two

I burned my thumb while getting pies out of the oven on Thanksgiving morning--the pot-holder slipped and I grabbed the oven rack with my bare thumb instead of the pot-holder.  I got it on my ear pretty quickly (really, it works!) to cool it down enough to get the pies out, and then, as soon as I had the pies out of the way, I held it under cold running water until it was numb.  Painfully numb.  Almost unbearably numb.  Because of that, I don't have two big blisters covering the pad of my thumb at lovely right angles; I have two big rough spots instead.  I'm really glad I was near the sink and I did the ear trick (my dad picked that one up in Korea when he was in his 20s, and it really does work for some reason), and I'm really glad it didn't blister.  If it HAD blistered up, I'd be almost useless to sew or knit or crochet.

One more thing to be thankful about. :)

Days 26 and 27

Just an update, because my stomach is hurting and I need to find food soon or it will just get worse.  Hooray for acid reflux...

I did a few mending things today, and I feel good about reducing that pile finally!

Gray pants
Cream-colored sweater
Blue pajama pants
Black and white striped skirt

So I've been productive, in between trying to figure out how to hook up my cable to my TV and my TV to my DVD/VCR which has proven impossible.  I can get sound out of the DVD player, but no picture.  Maddening.  Dad and I know there's a way to hook it all up together, but can't figure it out.  It would be easier if my TV has an S-Video slot, which it DOES NOT.  ugh.

Well, small things to gripe about, really.  I think tomorrow I'll do a muslin of at least the bodice of a dress that has a wide-ish neckline I'm concerned about.  I downloaded a couple of hat patterns from Ravelry that I can't wait to try out, but I'm determined to finish at least one baby afghan before making hats for myself.  If I go fast, I should have one done by tomorrow night.

Don't you hate it when you buy a lovely piece of fabric and have the perfect plans for it, and then it sits in a drawer for a couple of years and your plans change or you're no longer sure what to do with it?  I have some really pretty wool plaids that have been haunting me for at least two years (one of them for close to 10...eep) and I can't decide if I want to do a skirt with kick pleats or an A-line or a pencil skirt or if it should be mid-calf or just below my knee or ankle-length, and I'm worried that I'll cut into that pretty fabric, sew something, and end up hating it.  It's happened before, sadly, and so I sit on fabric for years and years because I'm afraid of hating it when it's sewn, and I won't have any extra to fix it or remake it.  It drives me NUTS.  And this is why I have so much fabric just sitting around in drawers and piles and boxes.

Sigh.

Day 25--Thanksgiving

Today seems to be the day, so here goes. :)

I'm thankful for:
Parents who encourage, support, and love me
Sisters who are talented, loving, smart, and good
A sister-in-law who is one of the best mothers I've ever seen, BESIDES being talented, loving, smart, and good
A brother who works hard for his family and is one of my best friends
Cousins who are so inspiring
A living grandmother who I not only adore, but who also makes me want to be a better person
Deceased grandparents I can hardly wait to see again
Cats
Dogs
The sky, the glorious sunsets here, the stars, the clouds, the moon
Nature in general
Mountains
So many friends who are inspiring, whether they know it or not!  Too many to list!
Amanda
Lisa
Emily
Julie
Julie
Mel
Becky/Rebecca
Jeremy and Lauren
Katie
Rob
Tiffany and Dave
Tina and Chad
Cindy and Brett
Hailey
Jenny
Amy
Janet
Mindi
Marilee
Lizzy and Spencer
Taylor and Drew
Erin
DeShawn
My talents
My faith
My mind
My body

I'm so grateful to be so blessed.  It's pretty amazing!

Days 23 and 24

This blogging daily thing is hard, especially when all my pictures are on my home computer and, when I get home, I don't always turn it on.  Sigh.  BUT.  I refuse to think of this as failure!  I absolutely refuse! 

So, for today's (and yesterday's) post, I will give you a brief preview of something I've been thinking about for the last couple of days, and also pictures of the yarn I spun with a drop spindle and a spinning wheel.

Preview:  On Monday, I was talking about my degree (BS in Integrated Studies, emphasizing History and Psychology, 2006) and how hard and fun it was.  The person I was talking to stared at me when I said I'd been studying the history and psychology of clothing and appearance for over 20 years.  That reaction is pretty standard, and it usually has to do with perceptions of my age, so I said "oh, I'm 35--older than I look--and I started reading about all this when I was 12 or 13."  He replied, "it's not the age, it's that I feel sorry for you.  You really spent over 20 years learning all that?  WHY?!"  I laughed it off ("Well, I can extrapolate the history of suspenders, and not many people can say THAT!" I told him...), but he really seemed appalled that someone would spend so much time and energy on something he thought was pointless.  I've been formulating my thoughts about that since then; I hope they've percolated and gelled enough that they make sense when I try to write them down later.

Yarn:

 

Wheel in action!  When I was a little girl, I thought that the yarn somehow went around the wheel.  Turns out the wheel is just a gear to facilitate the spinning of the spindle and the twisting of the yarn.  Cool. 

Isn't it sad how I can't decide if I should caption things at the top or at the bottom?  Maybe I just can't remember from post to post...

 

Lumpy yarn.  Lumpy, lumpy (Rustic!  Homespun!) yarn.  Also, isn't that orange carpet just the best?  This is the upstairs classroom at Heindselman's.  It makes me happy.  Also it makes me want to get rid of the useless old computer parts up there.

This handy thing is called a niddy-noddy.  It's used to wind yarn into a figure-eight kind of configuration after it's spun and plied.  (Look at that yellow chair!  Sort of reminds me of the brown vinyl chairs in my grandparents' kitchen.)

Here you get a better idea of how the niddy-noddy is built.  There's a rhythm to using it that's pretty fun, and it keeps your yarn nice and neat if you don't have a ball-winder or if you're selling it in hanks like this.

This is my finished hank of yarn.  I figure it's not as pretty as someone more experienced would have spun it, but I'm quite proud of it.  Besides, it'll make a great hat or a felted pot-holder that NOTHING would get through.  It's warm and soft and I did the majority of the work myself.  That's nothing to sneeze at!  My instructor told me that someone said "once you've spun your first pound, you'll be an expert".  Well, my first pound hasn't been spun all the way yet, and I'm probably terribly rusty, but the whole experience was so therapeutic that I'm going to save up for my own spinning wheel.  The mental health benefits will more than make up for the cost, I think.  It's a lovely craft and I want to learn and do so much more!

Days 21 and 22

I realized yesterday that I could have written a blog on Saturday and scheduled it to post on Sunday, which is the day I decided not to turn my computer on.  Oh well. :) I don't have access to my pictures on my work computer (I refuse to put much personal information on here at all) so I'm not even sure what to write about.  I might do a list of things I want to make for my niblings for Christmas/birthdays, though.  That's a good idea.

Charlotte--a pink stuffed horse with pink mane and tail for her birthday, and a doll with light brown hair and dark brown eyes for Christmas

Ila--a stuffed kitty for Christmas, not sure what to do for her birthday

Nicole--a hat for Christmas, and a doll for her birthday (in May)

Isaac--no idea yet, but he loves cats and machines

So there you go.  Things to get busy on right away!  I hope I have enough stuffing for everything...

Day 20

Where was I when we left off?  Oh yes.  Rolags.  And vomiting.

The third class, I had a pretty nice sack of rolags, but I'd been feeling queasy all day.  I think I'd thrown up earlier at work or something, but I was doing ok--Sprite and soda crackers at my desk were helping, but when I got to Heindselman's, I knew something was very wrong.  I learned something that day:  much as I (and my stomach) might want to, I can't throw up in public.  I can't.  I TRIED, because my stomach sure wanted to rid itself of its contents, but I couldn't.  So I figured I'd just ask where the bathroom was when I needed it.  I made my way upstairs to our class and I really must have looked awful, because my classmates asked if I was ok.  I explained a little what had been going on and apologized in advance if I had to leave suddenly.  Which I had to, about 40 minutes in.  Afterward, I felt MUCH better and was able to practice pretty well on a spinning wheel.

When I say "practice pretty well", I mean I didn't fall over or throw up again.  You can see how awful my so-called yarn is, but I practiced and I got better!

This is the Schacht Ladybug model.  Apparently Schacht makes some of the best spinning wheels in the world and I got to use this lightweight, collapsible, portable one.  It's cute, but I ended up liking an all-wood one better.  Again, you can see how lumpy my yarn is.  I'll tell you, though, spinning is MIGHTY soothing, especially when one's stomach has been trying to kill oneself all day.

It's interesting--as soon as I really convince myself that it was TOTALLY FINE to not be really good at this right away, I immediately got better at it.   Just letting go of that expectation let me focus on learning the craft and letting my body remember.  It was pretty cool. 

Next blog, I'll show you some much better yarn and a fun tool called a niddy-noddy. :)

Day 19

I really should have been in bed an hour ago, but I've been too tired to sleep.  I hate that game.  Tonight's will truly be short because I'm going to try good old melatonin soon.

After letting all that wool dry, we had to card it.  We were lent cards by our teacher and our next homework assignment was to get it all carded and made into rolags so we could spin it.  We'd already been working with our drop spindles and a little bit with spinning wheels, but our teacher wanted us to learn the whole process from the beginning.  The class we spun our rolags (our third time, I think), I was stricken with some weird stomach bug and looked like death, along with vomiting every hour or so.  THAT was a fun class...I got to know the Heinselman's bathroom a little too well that night.  Anyway, during our second class and during the week before our third class, we carded wool and made it into rolags.

Wool before carding.  It's lumpy and you can still see plant matter in it.  In the third picture, you can see how I changed my hand position to make it more comfortable.  These cards were lovely to use, but it's still hard work.  My hands hurt when I was done.

Wool during carding.  You have to be careful not to load up the cards too much, or they won't work properly.  You can see on the towel some of the plant matter that's come out as I've carded.

Oooo!  Much less plant stuffs in this!  It's almost ready to roll up.  You kind of catch it with the other card, ease it off the teeth, and roll it up into a nice little bundle that's easy to spin.  You can buy roving, basically long strips of carded wool or fiber, that's been processed by a mill or by someone much more experienced than I, and spin from that too.

Finished rolag.  Not very pretty, but you can see the idea.  I got better as I went along.

Day 18

I remembered to blog before turning this off and going to bed!  Yay!

Today will be pictures again.  I thought I'd do some posts about the spinning class I took at Heindselman's in March, and I'll start off with what we had to do for our "homework"--picking and washing the wool.  We were each given a grocery bag full of raw fleece from a sheep at the end of our first lesson, and we were to take it home, pick as much vegetation out by hand as we could, and then wash it.  Picking out the plant stuff was a little icky at first, because it turns your hands positively black from the dirt the sheep picked up wandering around for months without a shower, and the natural lanolin of the fiber.  It smelled a little, too, but my hands were soft after doing it and the dirt washed right off with no problem, probably because of the lanolin. 

(I don't have any pictures of the raw wool, so I'll link here, but keep in mind that the wool I had was much dirtier than the picture at that link!)


After picking it, I had to wash it in hot water.  The trick to washing raw fiber without felting it is to NOT AGITATE it.  There are natural barbs on the individual hairs, and if you agitate it (sometimes called fulling), the barbs hook to each other.  This is why you never wash your wool sweaters in the washer with the towels unless they've been pretreated somehow.  I filled up my bathroom sink with hot water (the plug for the kitchen sink didn't work right), put some wool in, and GENTLY pressed down until it was saturated.  I let it soak for a while, then came back, rinsed it, and filled up the sink again.  I did this until the wool was almost white and then laid it out to dry.

First soaking.  The water was darker than it looks here.

Second soaking.

Third soaking.

Last soaking.

Gently squeezed dry.  You can see some of the vegetation still--it's nearly impossible to get it all out by hand-picking, so you figure most of the rest of it will come out as it's carded and spun.

When the wool was completely dry, which took a few days, I put it back in the grocery bag and took it to my next class, where we learned how to card it and make rolags.

Lumpily laid out and ready to dry.

Days 16 and 17 part 2

I told you I'd talk about how I bagged the lining for Emily's wedding gown.  I was so worried about doing a beautiful job that it literally took me weeks to cut the darn thing out after I'd altered the muslin, and when it came time to put the lining in, it was even worse.  I mean, it's pretty easy to sew a lining to the neckline and zipper seam, but actually finishing a dress/coat without having ANY seams showing was daunting at best.  I really wanted her dress to be as perfect as possible and I read a couple of tutorials (one of which may actually have been in a book) about the bagging technique and puzzled my way through it in my brain until the proverbial lightbulb clicked on and it suddenly made sense.  Basically, you sew the completed lining and dress together as much as you can (neckline and down the zipper for this one), get it all wrong sides together, make a slit in one of the longer lining seams (I used the skirt back), reach in with your hand, pull the fabric out through the slit so it's right sides together, and stitch all your hems.  Sounds easy, right?  Making it make SENSE physically is the hard part.

Here's what it looked like as I was sewing it:

Big, tangled, off-white, silk mess, right?

But when I finished and fixed the sagging problem, it was beautiful and perfect.  I hand-sewed the slit in the lining closed while I was at Emily's apartment to deliver it to her.

You can't really see the dress details in this particular picture, but trust me:  Emily was gorgeous, and it wasn't just the dress. :) It was a privilege to sew it for her!

Days 16 and 17

So yesterday was a weird day at work and I didn't do much when I got home after spending 45 minutes trying on jeans at Gap and running errands for another hour or so.  Then I came home and did dishes and generally cleaned things up before playing a stupid time-wasting computer game that turned out to be very therapeutic. 

I actually had a blog idea but by the time I remembered it, I'd already turned off my computer and really didn't want to turn it back on because my power supply is wonky.  Oh well.

I'll do another post later tonight about how I figured out how to do the bag-lining technique, which is not just about lining bags.  It's complicated to explain but I managed to make it make sense to my brain while finishing up my dear friend Emily's wedding gown last summer.  It's one of those things I know how to do but would have a devil of a time teaching someone else to do because it's just that weird, but I'm glad I figured it out!

Day 15

I didn't do anything creative today, but I DID change my bed to flannel sheets!  And I DID go to Heindselman's, where I ran into one of my wildly creative friends.  She's quite amazing and very talented, and I sometimes wish I were unemployed so I could spend my time finishing projects and practicing my spinning...which is actually a pipe dream.  If I were unemployed right now I'd start going crazy after about a week because I would feel like such a burden on my family, not to mention the guilt at not being able to contribute to household expenses.

Quite honestly, today had a depressing start, and when I was finishing up my errands I realized that I'd been dreading going to work tomorrow.  I'm glad I have a job, and there are aspects of it I really enjoy, but I can feel myself getting brain- and soul-sick there.  If I didn't feel like I have to prove something every time I walk in that door, I'd be more creative in my clothing/shoes/accessories.  As it is, I feel like I can't wear anything too far to the wrong side of conservative or I'll risk someone being annoyed by it.  Colorful tights?  Relegated to their drawer.  Funky necklaces?  Still in the jewelry box.  Plaid shoes?  On the closet floor, and don't even get me started about my shiny shoes or beaded cardigans!  I'm so afraid of saying or doing the wrong thing and having it set something off that I've been lying pretty low.  The most interesting thing I've worn lately was a long orange sleeveless cardigan over a long-sleeved orange t-shirt and gray plaid pants, and even in that I was subconsciously worried that someone wouldn't take me seriously enough even though I know my job better than the people who wrote the job description.

There's a part of me that wants to wear red shoes and striped socks and purple sweaters all the time, but I am, like I said, nervous about it.  It's highly tempting to try to go back to retail, where at least I'd feel a little less weird about wearing striped tights.

It is hard to have the desire to create and to have it stifled, but maybe I'm just overreacting, which seems to be a theme this month. :)