Thoughts

Just Me

Rachel — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 08:37:20 GMT

I know it’s been a very long time since I’ve written a post. There has been a lot of traveling going on of late. I’m leaving in two days to go to NJ where my family lives for the next four weeks so things will be pretty quiet here again. I have a lot of ideas and plans for Mamma Made when I return (including a new and improved blog/website!) and hopefully I will be able to start to sell some of my sewing kits. Fun fun. I thought that this post could be a little catch up about me and I am going to share some pictures of what’s been going on.

After going to England with Danielson and playing All Tomorrow’s Parties I had a couple weeks to recuperate, finish up school with the girls, and my parents came out. Here is my Dad with the girls before we left.

They stayed for 2 weeks and watched the kids so that Jon and I could go to Copenhagen, Denmark. It was one of the most fantastic trips I have ever been on. I absolutely love Denmark and the people are so incredibly nice and helpful. It is one of the quietest cities I have ever been to because most of the people ride bicycles around instead of cars. This is because to buy a car you have to pay 180% tax. Crazy, eh? But, quiet city!

Handsome husband.

On one of our last days we took a boat tour through the canals and it was put together by the conference Jon spoke at. It was on All Summer Eve which is the longest day of the year and historically that was the day they would burn their witches. I made a joke asking if they waited until the longest day because they had so many witches to take care of. They said that everyone burned witches back then but the only difference was that they would send theirs back to Germany where they came from. (Ouch!) I can jest because I have some German blood in me!!! :) This is what we saw along the canal ride.

After Denmark we stopped in New York City for a long weekend and I met up with my sister Megan and her son Peter. He is the cutest little boy! Who can resist this face?

I had a blast with my little sister and we walked the town and got to see Wicked on Broadway. I did take pictures but most of them turned out really blurry. Here’s one at the show, but don’t say I didn’t warn you. Blurry.

And yes, my beautiful little sister is pregnant!

After getting back from our trips and sending my parents back East I have been resting. It’s been a great summer so far and I’ve actually tried to sew a couple things for myself! I haven’t been inspired to do that for a really long time. The problem with that is that you spend money on fabric, patterns, and notions, spend the time to make the garments and at the end of the day, will you really wear them? Do they really look that great on you? I don’t know about you, but I can try on a million dresses before I find the perfect one. So who’s to say that just because you sew it, it will be the perfect one????

I wanted to make a quick throw on cotton jersey dress for the summer because I will be spending a week at Lake George and a week in Ocean City so comfort will be key. I rarely work with stretch fabrics even though I would love to get into the habit because they are so comfortable! I saw this pattern Simplicity 2647 and I thought that the short version would be perfect.

It was easy to cut out and once I got the sewing technique down it was pretty easy. The problem was that they had you attach the straps in the worst place! I ended up ripping them out (which after you sew/serge is quite a task) and fixing the bodice so that I didn’t feel like I was falling out of it. Now that it is finished and I am comfortable wearing it out of the house there is another problem. It just feels too dressy. This is not a “hang out by the beach” jersey dress. So all that time, effort…wasted???? It’s the big sewing debate.

So I whip up another dress that is definitely more casual, but not very comfortable. I wouldn’t wear this either.

(Ran out of time to finish this before I leave…so I’m just posting it. See you in some weeks!)

Love,

Snooping

Rachel — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 19:33:19 GMT

Now that the kids are older I have them clean their own rooms and organize their own stuff. Today, however, we are having a new friend come over and as I walked into Rosemary’s room…well, let’s say I could barely walk. I started folding laundry and putting toys to one side and I saw this.

There were scraps of fabric everywhere, thread knotted up, pins scattered and a needle just waiting to be stepped on. I saw a little book nearby and I just had to flip through.

My daughter, the secret designer! I have to say, as I sat in the middle of her mess, tears of pride came to my eyes.

Sometimes you have to sit back and ignore the mess around you to be able to see the gem right in front of your eyes. Have a fantastic day.

Love,

Frustrated

Rachel — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 22:44:19 GMT

I’m going to post about the drapes I’ve been trying to make…notice I say trying. I bought fabric from Spoonflower to make them and when it arrived I was very excited. The fabric looks great. I’m extremely happy with the design and the printing.

I ordered 5 yards because each panel needs 2 1/2 yards. The first thing I needed to adjust and figure is that the printing starts at the left side and however it ends on the right side with the repeating is just how it is. This caused a slight problem in that when you put both cut panels together, they aren’t uniform. The right side of panel A is the drifting repeat pattern and the left side of panel B is the clear starting pattern. Does that make sense? I needed to cut the fabric down so that both panels look uniform when they hang next to each other on the rod. Cutting down the fabric makes it necessary for me to use another fabric to make the panels wider to fit our windows.

The next challenge is that I need to use sun-blocking lining which for any of you that have used it know that it’s a pain to work with. It’s thick and rubbery and it so difficult to keep smooth. We have a projector screen TV and it’s important for optimum movie viewing to have the light completely blocked.

The final challenge is that my husband thought it would look nice to have a solid red border around the 3 edges of each panel to bring out the red flowers and I agreed with him. However, this third fabric is yet another weight and all three of the fabrics are fighting against each other and look just horrible. Yesterday I was so frustrated I took the drapes down and folded them into a pile in my office with intentions to just start over with something else.

THEY ARE JUST STUPID RECTANGLES! WHAT IS THE DEAL???????

Drapes open. Right drape is not finished on bottom because the sides are already pulling.

Left panel drape with side pulling and bringing left corner up off the floor. I measured the hem with them hanging and the length should have brought the corner right to the floor.

“Oh, why don’t you just bite the bullet, pick it out, smooth all the layers and put it back together again? They could look really nice and you already put so much time into it.”

I DID!!!! This is what it looks like after I picked it out, laid it on the floor, put a million pins in it to keep it in place, and then sewed it back together.

So, now you can see why I haven’t posted and what my latest endeavor has been. I did finally decide today that it’s actually human to show the projects you work on that just look like CRAP.

Love,

I Want One

Rachel — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 01:59:45 GMT

Esther might steal it though.

Love,

All Is Beautiful In California Land

Rachel — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:24:52 GMT

Hello everyone! C’est moi, Rachel! Just a quick little blog post to let you know that all is well. We have sold our house and have been living in limbo for almost 2 months now. Our first house fell through and we are currently in Escrow in a new house WHICH IS EVEN BETTER! Is that even possible? Ahhhh…the life of living with no permanence really gets your priorities in order. We have relatively no stuff because it’s all in storage and it’s amazing how freeing that feeling is. Just you and a couple of clothes on your back that you wear over and over again.

Living each day as Today and not looking for happiness in tomorrow is quite a challenge, but it’s been an amazing time of stretching and growth as people. I can honestly say that in my (almost) eleven years of marriage this entire experience has brought me the closest to my husband than we’ve ever been. You can fight it, or go with the flow. Since we don’t really have a lot of control over things, I thought going with the flow was the best option.

Miss you guys and I miss all my projects which will resume in due time. The ideas keep piling up in my head, but for now I just need to store them neatly away in my brain. Oh, and by the way, my new sewing school/studio is going to be 3 times the size as it was in the old house! So, no crying for me…I am only laughing with joy.

Love,

Amy Butler "Birdie Sling Bag" Review - Just Read It

Rachel — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 02:28:50 GMT

Well, it’s done and I really like this bag. It’s just CUTE! How can you not like a cute bag? I’m expecting my sister Megan to send some fabric my way asking for one of these for herself. But down to business. In this post I’m going to go through my experience making this bag, point out things I really liked, and things I decided to change.

All in all, I give this bag a thumbs up.

Pattern

First of all, I really like the weight of the paper they used for this pattern. It can be used countless times without the annoying rips and tears. Since this is a bag pattern and there is no need for fittings (yay!) I would hope that the paper would be nice. Well, it is.

Materials

The materials to make this bag cost about $43.00. I had to buy the pattern which was $13 so the fabrics and interfacings were about $30. That does not include the magnetic snap that I added which was another $5.00. I need to get all the pattern pieces together and lay them out, but I do feel that they asked you to get way more material than you actually need. I ended up with a lot of waste. If your fabric is $8/yard, having an extra half yard here and there is really wasteful. Like I said, I need to lay out the pieces to be more accurate with that opinion. That being said, is this $48 bag plus time worth the effort? Hmmmm…you could really get something cute from Macys on sale for that money. Just sayin’.

Directions

This pattern has been said that it is a great one for beginners. I agree and disagree. Sometimes I feel that patterns which are catered for beginners spell things out in such an exaggerated way that it’s actually a bit more complicated to follow. I feel that this happened for me in several places. Since I’m not a beginner, I don’t know if the manner of instruction is actually helpful for people just learning how to sew. I liked that they did have some very clear illustrations to show some steps that may cause someone to think twice. Sometimes those drawings are more confusing than anything else. In this case, they were helpful.

Things I Changed In The Pattern

There were several things that I changed in the making of this bag. I probably would have made it as they suggested, but I saw/felt/wore a pre-made bag and thus made some mental changes as I tried it on. I felt that the bottom of the strap was too wide and caused the mouth of the bag to gape open. I narrowed it down 3” total on each side and as you can see in the pictures, it’s still pretty substantial. There also was not a closure for this bag, so I decided to add a magnetic snap. The weight of the bag was a bit heavy and stiff for my taste so I altered the interfacings around a bit. I did interface the lining with the suggested fusible fleece, but I interfaced the outer shell with an extremely light-weight fusible and interfaced the strap and the band with a heavier weight fusible but on one side only. On the lining side I did interface where the magnetic snap went to give it some stability. I also changed the depth of the pockets making them custom for my phone and my GPS. Not huge changes, but enough to make this bag absolutely perfect for me.

Level Of Difficulty

I think that this bag is one that anyone can conquer if you take your time. However, it isn’t one that you can whip up in an hour. The prepping of the bag includes cutting your fabrics, interfacings, and fusing them together; this can take an hour or two. The actual sewing will go a bit quicker, but with the curves and gussets be patient and take your time. I also recommend not getting hung up on edges that don’t perfectly match as you go along. As I was sewing, I ended up truing the edges and seams to make things go together smoothly. I did think that the pattern could have been tightened up a bit. But, just go with the flow even if things aren’t perfect—it is just a bag after all!

Irene of Mushroom Villagers gives a review of this bag on Sew Mama Sew and talks about this very thing:

There's something funky with the pleated main panel not matching the top band well. (The main panel is wider than the top band piece.) Each time it hasn't matched up well and the pattern instructs you to pivot at the joint, but it looks funny. I recommend trimming the main panel to fit the top band and sewing a straight seam instead.

At the end of this bag making process when you are attaching your outer shell to the lining, take your time because the bulk could frustrate you as you finish your final top-stitching. I recommend smoothing out the fabric and pinning carefully so that you can be confident as you sew that you won’t be getting any other parts stuck where they shouldn’t be.

Will I Sew This Bag Again?

You know, I probably will. It’s a fun bag, I like the pleating details and the large interior for all my junk. It would be a really great gift to give to someone too. As to the cost of materials and if it’s worth it, well, it is a personal creation and people spend money foolishly on all sorts of stuff. It’s gotta go somewhere, right? And you have a wonderful sense of self-satisfaction that you created something you love and hopefully will use.

Love The Bag But Don’t Want To Make It?

Well, you are in luck because I saw this bag on Etsy and you can buy it. Just type in “Amy Butler Birdie Sling” and a plethora of them will be at your disposal. I’m not sure how that works exactly because on the pattern it states:

This pattern is for personal home use. Projects are not to be produced for commercial purposes, nor are they to be made into items for sale.

Well, happy sewing and happy buying! Buy at your own risk!

Love,

I Love Alexander Henry

Rachel — Thu, 28 May 2009 23:21:03 GMT

Alexander Henry

Love,

Dittany Tights

Rachel — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 01:02:39 GMT

Ever want to make a dress around a pair of tights? I’m totally going to!

Tights by Dittany.

Love,

Parasol Magazine

Rachel — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 17:09:52 GMT

Just thought I would share this with you. It’s really really cool.

Yasmine of A Print A Day has started an online free magazine called “Parasol” that you can download. Here is a description of it in her words:

Parasol is a downloadable pdf magazine dedicated to featuring established and emerging designers and artists as well as segments on creative lifestyles and small business owners. I am SO excited about this project as it’s given me the opportunity to get to know such wonderful creative individuals who are VERY passionate about their work.

I enjoyed it immensely.

Love,

Outside Inspiration

Rachel — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 16:30:14 GMT

It’s fun to browse the internet and see what other people are doing. Especially because my sewing machine is currently packed away! So strange. Here are some cool things:

Chairs covered by DanielleLovesColor and the fabric on the right is designed by Mary Brewer of Royal Forest. Here is some amazing Spoonflower fabric that her husband designed.

One Red Robin and the Society Toy Drop.

I’m IN LOVE with the Wonderland Fabric by MoMo. See the full line HERE.

Do you like to crochet? Head on over to Thornberry and be prepared to shake your head in amazement.

Ever have patternmaking questions? Head on over to Pattern-Making.com and get your answers. Really a great site.

Do you LOVE to sew bags? Pick your perfect pattern out at Nicole Mallalieu Designs.

The COOLEST dress in the world make by Jodie of Ric Rac and it is completely made out of selvedge. This dress is INSANE! I’m imagining the man hours put into this thing.

And now I leave you with the coolest picture of my sister Megan. Don’t ask.

Love,