Label it

Quickie post. Last week I got my very first order of Fairy Dust Bin clothing labels (and size tabs) printed by Jennifer's Jewels. They are beautiful!

Now you can see which kid sizes I make most often!

Eventually I'll have to find someone to draw me a logo for my blog/labels/whatever else. Maybe business cards eventually? But as they are, they work great.

First thing to get a label, so it's for me in case I screwed it up.

The top photo is the Day Tripper Top from the Pattern Anthology Just Add Jeans Collection, which will get its own post soon. The bottom photo is the Julia Womens Cardigan and Lullaby Line Pants. The cardigan and pants have gone off to live with my best friend and her adorable son.

Racing Cape

Today is for this lovely racing cape I've been working on for my husband's coworker.

Yes, that's a Honda logo. It's a car racing cape, in black and Baltimore Ravens purple, with a seriously oversized hood. The cloak is made with raw silk, and I hand dyed the purple. It didn't come out as even as I'd have liked, but I was able to cut around the splochiest parts and make the others less visible. 'Tis the nature of hand dyed fabric though. The logo is appliquéd in silver lamé, and was my first ever machine embroidery to satin stitch around the edges. It's not perfect, but I'm pretty pleased with the results.

More importantly, so is the recipient!

Presentation of the cape.

Wearing a cape - you're doin' it wrong.

Let me fix it.

Hug of gratitude.

So, this one is a pretty good example of the general day. Yeah.

And a gratuitous photo of Cyrus. He had the helmet and keys (to Ata's car behind him, that everyone was posing in front of), and it was pretty exciting

At least 10 more years, kiddo!

Overall, it was a good day, and worth the trip.

Happy racing!

All About Cate

This week has been a bit of a whirlwind. Patrick just returned from France (Woohoo!!!) and I've had several projects to finish. You'll get to see the rest of them in due time, but today is for my Cate Shoulder Bag* for the Swoon Patterns"All About Me" swap.

It took me forever to decide on fabric for this bag. How do you choose which pieces of yourself to express, and then how do you figure out what fabric to use? Admittedly I have a tendency to overthink these things. I went through a half dozen combos before I finally settled on one. Because of all of this last minute stuff, all of the fabrics were found locally at my local JoAnn's Fabric and Crafts. 

Discarded fabric combos. I may have bought enough to make about three bags. Oops.

I changed it twice more while I was working. But she's done!

 

 

All About Kate Cate

I love her and now I don't want to give her away. That's the down side of making a bag about yourself, I guess, that you put so much of you into it that you get attached and it's hard to let go. I hope my swappee likes it. I am excited to get my Cate about someone else. Of course, I couldn't make it simply as the pattern directed, so I used this tutorial to make those lovely front pockets. Sincerely Jen Cate Pockets Tutorial

I still need to write a letter explaining my choices - I'm pretty sure that will be easier than making said choices in the first place. It really has to be! Here's the short version: The green outer fabric has cooking words on it, because I like to cook. The exposed pocket linings on the front have Irish Claddaghs because both my husband and I are Irish, and our wedding rings are Claddagh rings. I'm a musician, so the lining above the zipper has treble clefs. The main lining is purple, just because it's my favorite color. The inside pockets are a dictionary print and teacups. I love words and tea, and I fussy cut the pieces to show the definition for "curiosity", and the tea cup with the chai tea bag.

Closer look at inner pockets, before it was all sewn together.

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Swooning for Rosie and Cate

Clearly I've had a bit of a hard time getting into the swing of blogging. I also have really done much sewing to blog about in the last 6 weeks. I did test the Surfer Shorts by Rabbit Rabbit Creations. I'll try to remember to upload photos and blog about that soon, since I'm only about 2 months late for that one! It's a great summer pattern for kids though, so you should check it out.

Right now I'm being terribly undecided on fabric. I wasn't going to do any more swaps until I got done with the projects with deadlines looming, but I just couldn't help myself. I joined a bag swap last November for Swoon Patterns* and we all sewed up a Rosie Crossbody Bag to send along. It was definitely different from the garment sewing that I'm used to, but it was fun! I sewed up this one

and got this one in return.

Yeah, I think I got the best bag in the swap. ;) Excuse the used look of the Tardis bag, it has been my everyday bag for the last 3 months.

This month, the swap is for the Cate Shoulder Bag, and this time instead of having preferences from your swap buddy, you sew a bag to a theme. That theme? "All about me". I couldn't help it. How could I not do a Cate that's all about Kate? The problem, of course, is that a person is far too complex to be summed up in 4-5 fabric choices, plus a zipper pull if you get more creative. How, though, do you find all of the just right fabrics to say what you want to say about yourself? I know I'm over thinking, but it's quite the dilemma. There's music, family, books, cooking, nature, games, obsessions, other interests... And then balancing what I want to say with what fabric I can find that goes reasonably well together.

Two trips to JoAnns later, and I'm still not happy with my fabric, but I'll have to choose a combo and get sewing since the deadline is March 19th!

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