My Brown Jacket -- FINISHED!

As promised last week, here is one of the garments I completed at my recent sewing retreat.  Now, let me just say that I sewed up this jacket five years ago and have been wearing it for all of that time but it never had a closure!  Here's the rest of the story:

I try to not wear black.  I don't succeed in that goal because black is just too convenient, especially for travel.  My leather jacket is black.  I wear black pants and shoes.  I even own a black dress or two.  But I really look better in navy blue or brown.  So a few years ago I decided that I needed a brown outerwear jacket to go with my ever-increasing brown wardrobe.  I found this piece of heavy wool coating at G Street Fabrics.  I bought the buttons there, too, unique wooden ones with a curved shape (they cost more collectively than the fabric did).  I used Louise Cutting's By Popular Demand pattern, a pattern I had used before, but cut a size larger for wearing over street clothes.  I used a satin coat lining with a flannel back for extra warmth.  I added interior pockets and changed the patch pockets from the pattern into a rounded shaped.  I laboriously topstitched every seam.  When it came time to make button holes I balked.  The fabric was much too thick at the center front for a machine-made button hole.  What to do?  Well, for several years I did nothing.  I simply wore the coat open.  I finally decided the answer was large snaps with the buttons sewn on top.  So this past weekend, while I was at my sewing retreat, I sewed on the snaps and buttons.  I like how the shape of the button is mimicked by the pocket.

What I was unprepared for was how warm this jacket is now that it is closeable!  We have been having some extremely cold weather here in DC and this jacket is the best!  I can't believe I waited 5 years before finding out what a useful jacket this is.  And stylish, too.  I'm happy.

Blogging Event

For all of my blogging friends out there, please consider participating in this year's One World, One Heart event beginning January 30th.  You can find all of the details here.  This event brings together bloggers of all sorts and encourages us all to discover and meet new bloggers from around the world.  Each site will be offering a small "door prize" for visiting and commenting during the designated time frame.  This is a great way to discover new blogs as well as a way for others to discover yours.

If you are interested, please make sure that you read all of the details posted by the host, Lisa Swifka, from A Whimsical Bohemian.  And if you don't participate, make sure you check out the list of blogs on the host's website so you can find some new favorites.

Lots of Little Projects

People who sew are the most generous people in the entire world. 

I spent a wonderful two days at a sewing retreat over the weekend:

George Washington Hotel ballroom

• a fine, luxury hotel with a lovely ballroom where we sewed (with floor to ceiling windows and lots of natural light);
• socializing with friends I hadn’t seen in a long time and meeting some new ones, too;
• excellent food (and someone else to wash all of the dishes);
• gracious staff who took care of all of our needs;
• shopping at the local shops and finding some treasures;
• completing some long overdue projects
• inspiration by the truckload;
• mini-classes with lots of fabulous ideas.

One of my favorite parts was the last item on the list.  Various members generously volunteered to share a quick project that they had made and showed the rest of us how we could make our own.  There was a great variety of items. 

Michele showed us how to create fabric covered pattern weights using metal washers and strips of fabric.  You can find this (and other fabulous) projects on her blog Sew Inspirations.

Photo by Michele at Sew Inspirations

My friend Jane came all the way from Florida to attend this retreat and I was so glad to see her.  I follow her blog Lucky Sew and Sew religiously (and you should, too!).  Jane was my very first table mate at my very first sewing retreat years ago.  She showed us how she created gorgeous fabric flowers a la Kenneth King. 

Photo by Jane at Lucky Sew and Sew

You can find Kenneth King’s original directions on the Threads website.

Anne made Studio Kat Designs’ Aeropac, a very clever pouch that stores your travel documents and hangs around your neck.  Studio Kat offers the pattern free on their website.  Anne was so generous that she handed out many of the materials needed for the project so we could all make our own.

Photos by StudioKat Designs

Martha showed us how to make the very popular snap bags that use a metal tape measure as the closure.  She had made several from fabric but also had the brilliant idea of making one from clear vinyl to carry her liquids on airplanes – she reports having no trouble with the bag at security.  There are several blogs that have tutorials for making these bags, and Martha shared those web sites with us.  You can find these tutorials at Tattered Garden and Stash Manicure.

Photo by Samm at Stash Manicure

Grace had made the most adorable little silk bags called Little Japanese Bags that resemble flower blossoms when all tied up.  She showed us step by step with samples she had made just how easily we could create our own.  She had a set of instructions written by Hannelore Nunn which I was not able to find anywhere on the internet.  But I was able to find Hannelore’s email address and sent her a note.  She very graciously emailed me a copy of the instructions for the bags which she tells me are a traditional Japanese design.  We have been emailing back and forth over the last day and she is a warm and generous person, someone I’d like to go to a sewing retreat with.  I'll post some pictures of the process when I make one of these myself.

Photo by Hannelore Nunn

I am working on my own version of a couple of these projects and will post pictures as soon as I’ve completed them.  In the meantime get on over to some of these wonderful sites and make some of these goodies for yourself.

Monkey Tee

This is the day I would normally post a garment picture.  I am not sure that this really qualifies as a "garment" but I am away at a sewing retreat and am missing my little guys back at home so, in a moment of wistfulness, I decided to post this picture of my brown-eyed boy.

This applique monkey design comes from Sew Many Designs who has "sew many" cute things, including a lot of designs for boys.  When I was making this shirt I decided to stitch it onto a background panel instead of the actual t-shirt so it could be removed and stitched to another larger shirt should I want to.  This worked well and also eliminated all of the fiddly parts about embroidering onto knits.  Give it a try.

Today and tomorrow I am living in luxury (alone!) at the George Washington Hotel in Winchester, VA where almost 40 of my favorite sewing friends have gathered for a winter retreat, sponsored by the Northern Virginia Chapter of the American Sewing Guild.  Before my children were born I was a regular attendee of these retreats, though back then I was sleeping on a bunk bed and eating cafeteria food at a 4H Camp.  This year the powers that be decided to move the retreat to somewhere a bit more upscale (that wouldn't have been hard) and picked this lovely, renovated hotel in downtown Winchester.  I am basking in the (deafening) silence of my stately room and will soon go join others in the Ballroom to sew to my heart's content.  I've brought with me a number of UFO's (unfinished objects) as well as a new dress to work on.  If I had had the presence of mind to pack my camera card reader I could have uploaded a new garment hot off the press.  But you will just have to wait until next week for that.

Winter bag for a friend

In August I posted about my friend Cyane and the bag I had created for her using fabric of her own design.  The fabric was printed at Spoonflower, a very cool business that will take your original artwork and turn it into yardage.  Cyane asked if I would make her a bag for the winter with some more of her fabric and this is the result.

My starting point was a fat quarter of quilting weight cotton so I knew I would have to use some ingenuity to create this bag.  My pattern stash turned up Vogue 8099, View B which I used with a couple of modifications.  The first thing I realized was that the fabric would need more body so I began by fusing it to some fusible fleece and channel stitching with topstitching thread between the motifs on the fabric. 

Adding a home dec fabric for the lining (along with some inner pockets) gave the bag plenty of structure.  I also combined the cotton fabric with a pewter gray linen which formed the bottom of the bag and the flap.  The Vogue pattern had only the flap and button as a closure.  Now, I happen to know that my friend Cyane has trouble with the contents of her purse spontaneously leaping out at unplanned moments so I felt that I should add a more secure closure.  I inserted a zipper into the top edge of the purse; the flap is purely decorative and folds over the zipper closure.  I added her monogram to the flap and bound the edge with some of the lining fabric.  The strap is made from the gray linen. 

This was a fun bag to make, and I hear the recipient loves it.  It arrived at her house on her birthday, an unplanned little lagniappe for a creative friend.  You can see other examples of Cyane's creativity at Snazzy Frogs and more of her fabric designs at Spoonflower.