It would seem that I am not the only one in the massive sewing blogosphere who has had a serious drop in sewing mojo recently. This happens to me from time to time, and I can’t help but get angry when I realize I’ve spent the past 3 nights vegging out on my couch instead of working on awesome crafty things. Not even knitting! MEH!
Part of what caused this standstill is my current work on the Pastille dress from the Colette Sewing Handbook. I swear this stupid dress has given me nothing but a headache (and thinning hair from where I pulled the rest of it out in total frustration). For starters, I cut my pattern out in a size 2 and added my normal FBA since the bust size for the 2 is only 34.5″, and my measurements are a couple inches bigger than that. Lo & behind, when I made up my first muslin… the bust was too big. I ended up not needing a FBA at all! WTF? I actually did recheck my measurements, and indeed my bust has not shrank down to a 34.5″ so I’m assuming there is a misprint with the finished measurements. By the way, do you know how hard it is to correct a FBA back to flat when you’ve already hacked & taped the pattern pieces (no, I don’t trace – but maybe I should start! It’s a SIGN)? I mean, assuming you’re one of those weirdos (aka: me) who would rather pull the tape off & try to smush everything back together instead of just putting the scissors to it again.
Anyway, muslin #2 revealed that this pattern gives me a swayback. WTF v2.0? I don’t have a swayback and I feel like I would have noticed this prior – especially considering the Quasimodo-proportions I got in my muslin. Unfgh. Upon lurking the site forum, this is not unusual for this pattern (before anyone gets terrified & swears off sewing the Pastille, let me point out that I’ve seen many of these dresses made up and most people did not seem to experience the weird swayback – I think it’s just the way some women’s bodies are shaped. Boo that it had to be mine!). My adjustment was very simple – I cut horizontal line through the back piece, at the ‘lengthen or shorten here’ line, and overlapped the pieces at an angle so they were 3/4″ at the center back, tapering to nothing at the side seams. I made one more muslin and the problem appears to be fixed. Fingers crossed.
I am making the dress up in this sweet little printed fabric – it’s a lovely cotton/rayon blend, and the print reminds me of a feedsack. Not entirely my style, but hey, I’m open to branching out! I like the tiny yellow flowers. I’m really into yellow right now, if you can’t tell.
I made a big mess of self-bias tape and initially planned on finishing the sleeves & neckline with that instead of facings. Folks… I don’t think this pattern can be faced with bias tape. There are too many curvy lines for the tape to lay properly flat. Believe me, I tried. But hey, on the bright side – I have lots of pretty bias tape for some other project! Haha!
So now we’re at the point where I haven’t touched the damn thing since Monday. To be frank, I haven’t even walked into my sewing room since Monday. When I get too frustrated, it’s better for me to dump everything in a pile & just ignore it for a few days until the steam lets off. That, or hide it in the UFO box 🙂 I kid, I kid!
On the knitting front, I had a bit of turmoil when I finally started my sweater sleeves. I think this is the part of the pattern that the writer was referring to when she called this an intermediate to advanced knit – that shit is hard! Talk about total concentration! Not only am I knitting in the round (which, despite a few cozies, is still a relatively new skill for me), I have to follow a lace pattern *and* I’m working a bunch of short rows. And then the instructions dropped and just told me to “continue working short rows until you reach the marker,” meaning I have to either count or actually recognize what a short row looks like. Nope, no ma’am!
It’s times like these when I’m glad I have Mika to save my desperate ass every time I reach a confusing point in the pattern & suddenly turn stupid. Poor girl has gotten a lot of frantic emails from me, but she’s been super super helpful & I definitely would not have made it past the swatch stage without her guidance.
Anyway, sewing & knitting frustrations aside, I made an apple cozy over the weekend:
It is completely unnecessary & ridiculous, so obviously I love it a lot.
Who else is having a bummer of a week? Alternatively, who is having a GREAT week & would like to rub it in?
LLADYBIRD 