Monday, June 15, 2015

Making recycled t-shirts look good since... well, whenever.




I love being able to sew ! Discovered a tear in Dearest Son’s much-loved comforter, of course only after I washed it. But I wrestled the full-size wet blanket under the needle and fixed it, then into the dryer it went. Funny. I never thought that Cars comforter – that I had to hunt like heck to buy for Christmas ’06 – would still be a favorite today. Then again, I'm wearing a shirt our location won for Snow White VHS sales back when I worked at Disney Store in 1994. . .


I did get to see our firefly visitor again – watched him walk aaallll the way up the ribbon to the still-floating Mother’s Day ‘bouquet’ balloon, glowing faintly. He clung to that for a while, then I saw him hanging out on Luna’s shoulder for a bit, on his way to her scintillating left wing. Haven’t seen him since, a shame because I wanted to get him back outside. Fireflies don’t fare well inside houses, and such a valiant little thing deserves a chance at progeny. 


As you may have guessed from the comforter story, today was Laundry Day. Hoo boy, was it ! It, like the kitchen, has been neglected, so I pretty much spent the day washing and drying, and sorting the freshly washed and the small mountain of last Laundry Day, and getting it all put away. Dearest Son will fold, hang, and store his own if I can get it sorted for him, and he was happy to see some of his hamper-buried favorites again. Pretty much wore m’self out, and after taking the last load upstairs, lay down for a minute – and fell asleep for a little over an hour. After that, I felt better, and we had a nice night and a good dinner. 


Something was still missing, though. After Beloved Hubby – who’d also had a long, tiring day – started to nod at Netflix, I slipped away to my Arena, and decided to try out that Barbie pattern I redrafted yesterday. Thanks to Jen Wrenne’s Summer Sew Along, I’m much more confident with knits, that’s for sure ! That collar piece is smaller than a Christmas postage stamp. 


Whooof. It was amazingly tight and indecently short. And that’s with me widening the seam allowance, adding a bit to the hem, and not sewing the darts ! In fact, when I cut it out, it was so tight-looking, I cut out two, thinking maybe it called for one front, one back, I didn’t know for sure ‘cause the pattern’s in German, on a Spanish site. Sewed up just one, though, then cut, hemmed, and gathered a quick rectangle of ruffle, picked apart the back seam, and added it. Still tight, even with a much smaller than ¼” seam allowance, but at least it was a keeper now. Belle can sit without showing off Broadway, even though you can see how stretched it is. If I’d have gone with the purple fabric, it probably would be less obvious. I actually like the pattern, so after re-drafting it tomorrow, I’ll sew it again. Gotta do something with the twin I cut out first, though. I’m getting quite a lot out of this shirt – a hand-me-down from MIL’s old neighbors – and there’s still much to use there. Haven’t touched the sleeves or the pretty heart-shaped pearly buttons yet !

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