Vintage Pledge Mid-Year Wrap Up

I fully admit that this post is the blog equivalent of TV reruns. Hopefully not as bad as rewatching that LOST episode about Paulo and Nikki. It's been almost 6 years guys and I'm still put out about that particular weekly installment.  Who cares about the diamonds? NOBODY! Anyway, we've tarried overlong talking about old TV.  Let's talk about my Vintage Pledge progress instead.

Back in February my vintage pledge was to sew 5 vintage patterns for 2016. There was also a post in January which listed a few specific patterns I wanted to finally make.  Knowing my aversion to planning and squirrel like sewing tendencies one might expect the worst.  However I've had my efficiency boss, Froggie, take a look at the blog/sewing basket and he has reported back the following...

- I've already sewn and blogged 5 vintage patterns this year.

- Two more vintage patterns have been sewn and are in the "to blog" queue.  In addition to that there are another 2 patterns that have had the muslining process finished.  These may for may not find their way to finished garment status. I'm waiting for the right fabric to come along and might get distracted by new patterns.

- From my "two sew" pattern list there is only Advance 4227 left to make.

Froggie says he'll give me an A on my sewing report card with the caveat that summer took a long time to get here. Otherwise he'd deduct points for not having Advance 4227 traced.  Wow how about that? Maybe being married to a man that plans everything is finally rubbing off on me. However if you find me setting up an Access database then you'll know I've been replaced with a pod person. BEWARE!

Here's a brief recap of the vintage pledge makes.

Pattern #1 - Hollywood 1032

Still one of my favorite makes this year.  Thanks to the cold Spring I wore this well into May.  The blouse goes with at least 3 of my hats and the skirt goes with everything.  In fact I love this pattern so much that I went and bought a similar style, Hollywood 1412. You'll be sewing that one about 2 weeks from now.

Pattern #2 - Simplicity 4958

This is the make I wear the least. It feels too fancy for every day and I have a large rotation of fancy church dresses. Still like it but it isn't as practical as some of my other makes.

Pattern #3 - DuBarry 5510

I like this a lot, but really do need to sew a pair of black high waisted trousers to go with it. Then I can wear my man-ish Miss L Fire Willlamsburg loafers and have a great rainy day outfit. Believe me it was highly annoying not to have this outfit ready to throw on this Spring.

P.S. - Just noticed this week that Evadress.com has recently released this pattern as one of their multi-size offerings.  Now you can grab a copy without much trouble. Hooray!

Pattern #4 - Advance 3740

You'll probably remember that this one was a total hassle to sew. Thank god I got through it because this is another top make.  Oddly I don't find this pattern too fancy to wear everyday so it gets a lot more use.  It's also Desmond's favorite dress and he's always asking me to wear it.

Pattern #5 - McCalls 4265

Still a great blouse and I want a closet full of them. Hmmm maybe I'll wear this tomorrow.


Since my vintage pledge is already complete froggie tells me that it's time to make another one.  You know so we have proper paperwork. So here goes,

I, Heather Beckley, pledge to sew another 5 vintage patterns for a total of 10 for the year. 

Here are a couple of contenders in the pattern stash.

1. Weldon's 7383 - A nice little summer blouse that should be quick to make if I don't get distracted by some fancy dress pattern.

2. McCall's 6815 - Oh no a fancy dress pattern! What ever should I do? Drop everything and make it, right?  Right.

3. Hollywood 1093 - Or I could sew up the top half of this pattern to get more use out of a RTW dress that shows too much cleavage. If only there were late night sewing elves to double my output.

4. Hollywood 1214 - This might get pushed to 2017, but who could say no is such a great looking coat.

So those are some of the things currently being juggled in my mental sewing queue. We'll have to wait and see how it all shakes out for the rest of the year.  Froggie says just go sew the fancy dress and then buy some new patterns to sew.  Excellent advice Frog, now I remember why I keep you around.

Stashes, Pledges and Whatnot

It's January so it's time for well meaning pledges which we may or may not follow through with. Woo hooo, zero blog accountability!

All jokes aside, I did make a stash busting pledge last year and did really well with it. Yes I still bought plenty of fabric, *cough* 154 yards *cough*.  However I sewed up/give away/trashed a lot more then that.  Thanks to my trusty excel spread sheet, I can confirm that my stash is now 97.5 yards lighter than it was at the beginning of the year.  Cue balloon drop and the donning of party hats. Froggie has cake for everyone on the side board and you can also admire the 2014 purchase of a Bernina 350 sewing machine.  (Big thanks to my immediate family who also contributed a good chunk of the sewing machine money.)

But now it's time to wipe the cake crumbs from my mouth and commit to another year of stash busting. Yes the stash is lighter, but somehow uses up the same amount of storage space.  At least I don't have to sit on the rubber maids bins to get them to lock anymore. They're "only" filled to the brim now. Baby steps, baby steps. Good news for me is that the Stash Busting Sew-a-long is in it's 3rd year and we have a great bunch of ladies in the facebook group. So without further ado here is my stash busting pledge for 2015

I, Heather Beckley, commit to stash busting enough fabric so that one of these containers can be removed from the floor of my bedroom.

This is not the main stash, it is the larger satellite stash. Which should not be confused with the smaller satellite stash down stairs next to the sewing machine.  I know, I know, big time hoarding. How many yards of fabric are in one of those bins?   Ummm lots?  Am I going to go measure the fabric lengths to find out?  God No! Instead I'm going to try and limit my purchases and sew up a bunch of stuff I've already got. Amorphous goals totally work people.

Froggie felt this whole plan needed his expert help, so he jumped in and asked me a few questions.

"What is your plan this month to sew up stash?"  
Right now I'm sewing all the garments that were planned in November/December. News flash Heather, there's no time to sew all those red/plaid/Christmas print garments in December. If you want to theme dress you've got to get beat your sewing elves into productivity right now! In December they run off to bake cookies. Stupid elf union.

"How are you going to limit purchasing pretty new fabric?"
Well thanks to the snazzy excel spread sheet,  I now know that my monthly sewing average is around 12 yards.  I'm going to try to buy less than what I can sew in a month. You should also change my paypal password when my back is turned.

"What types of fabric will you buy with abandon, conveniently forgetting your stash
busting pledge?"
Florals on black back grounds, anything with a fruit on it and probably any sort of red solid.  Snow leopard of course, cause that's a neutral and lobster prints, lots of lobsters. Oh and frog fabric, you are the top animal in the house.

"Sometimes that guy you married tells you that you have enough fabric. Does this help with stash busting?"
No, I then go spite buy fabric. I'm a horrible person.

"Will I be able to sleep in/eat cake on any fabric that arrives in the mail?"
You are more than welcome to make a frog nest in any fabric.  I would ask that you restrict cake eating to on top of the sewing patterns. I can't fault you about that cause I'm doing it too.

"How can I convince you to spend your fabric money on frog shoes instead?"
What do this shoes look like? Are they red with white polka dots? Can I also get a new pair of human sized shoes? If so we might have a deal.

"I think I hear the oven timer. Can we go eat some cake now?"
Yes, yes we can.

P.S. The Stash busting facebook group is a closed group only because we didn't want to clog up our main FB feeds.  We'll happily accept any new members who want to join the stash busting effort.

Spring Clean Swap Meet and Quarterly Stash Busting Totals

Here it is almost April and I'm having one of my old lady, "My stars, time sure is moving fast," moments.  Seems like a good time to take stock and see how those self proposed stash busting goals are going.  I've got a spread sheet and everything!

Quarter One Totals
Yardage sewn up - 46.5 yards.  Thanks to ye old spread sheet I've found that my monthly yardage average is about 15 yards.  Good thing to keep in mind when I start filling my virtual carts with yards and yards of fabric.

Given away or trashed - 38.25 yards.  The Stash Diet group helped me out a lot by finding new homes for fabric that I'd fallen out of love with.  I also fessed up to myself that a few UFOS laying around were actually wadders and could not be salvaged. Don't worry, I wouldn't throw away lovelies any of you could use.

Purchased - 30.5 yards.  My January and March acquisitions were modest (3 and 6 yards respectively) but I went a little crazy in February.  Waechters Fabrics retirement liquidation and the sneaky way Fat Quarters up your yardage where the main culprits.

Total yardage down........54.25!  Woot, Woot!  Now I've got to remember that fabric given away totals will be low next quarter and pray no more fabric stores go out of business.

Time for a Giveaway
The Stash Diet group announced that it's having a Spring Clean Swap Meet this weekend and I decided to go prune the pattern stash and offer a group of 6 as a giveaway. All of these patterns are uncut and some are still in their factory folds.

In row one - Colette Jasmine, Colette Ginger and Amy Butler Mini dress tunic and tops.

In row 2 - Simplicity 2925, Simplicity 2614 and New Look 6130.  The Simplicity patterns are in the 6-14 size range.  Comment with your email if you'd like to enter the giveaway.  I'll pick a winner on Wednesday April 2nd and mail you the goods.  Patterns precious, patterns.

Pay no attention to the women on your sidewalk

Well Hello there, were you all concerned that I'd finally been buried alive in my fabric stash? It's really just a question of when it's going to happen. Maybe we should set up some Vegas odds so someone can make a little extra pattern money.

Instead of death by fabric avalanche, I was conspired against by my cover stitch machine. It decided to spontaneously break cause I forgot to engage the lower looper before stomping on the pedal.  As frog is my witness I've done this before without negative affects. Me thinks the machine just wanted some extra spa time away from my sweat shop. Alright you little diva, go have your vacation. I'll just sit here and stew about my secret PJ plans being thwarted....and sew out of season dresses.

Old man winter was all, "Oh you're sewing summer dresses? Enjoy some more snow then. Muhaaaa!!" Dude is a real piece of work.  While I'm willing to totter around the snow drifts in 3" heels, I have to draw the line at open toed sandals. You understand I'm sure, unless you're a Nihilist looking for a toe. 

This is me looking pretty incredulous about Walter's claims that he can get a toe, "There are ways."  Bitch Please, what's mine is mine.

Beside I'm rocking a whole Dorthy in the Wizard of Oz look here and I'm pretty sure these shoes are a one way ticket back to Kansas.  Maybe with a layover cause I skimped on the glitter.

In case you've forgotten this is Simplicity 2444, my first #sewdollyclackett dress. In true Dolly style I'm going to christen it with a snappy name.  May I present my "Gingham is for the birds" dress.  Eh, eh, see what I did there?  The birds look like gingham from far away? OK, I'll stop explaining my "cleverness" to you. Enjoy some pics in front of my neighbors fence. Traaa laa laaa there's no place like your fence.

I've gone down a Simplicity dress size so the pattern needed to be retraced and altered again. All the same pattern adjustments were made as before with the addition of a 1/4" hollow chest adjustment. This took care of the slight gaping of the neckline my original dress had. Who hollowed out my chest while I wasn't looking!

To pick up the bit of pink on the birds and add to my "learning new techniques" goal, I stole an idea from Gertie and put pipping in at the neckline and sleeve hems.  I just want you all to know that I suck at piping and made frog finish it for me.  He does tidy sewing work for baked goods.

The neckline has a facing but the sleeves are finished with the piping as a facing technique Gertie recently blogged.  

See someone catch stitched with white when they should have used pink.  Frog points a paw squarely at me. He will not have his good name sullied. He also wants to know where his Toto costume is.

My love for Simplicity 2444 has not waned.  The pleated skirt, the pockets, the fun darts on the bodice, it's full of win! I might find myself with a closet full of them with matching shoes....and OMG have I turned into our sew-a-long muse Dolly Clackett? Wait am I... Ginger? Frog says, "No you're just sort of brown."  Awww I wanted to be ginger, I've never been ginger! Though I seem to have acquired a Scarecrow and Tin Man.  Get out of my frame you two! At least the Lion knows how to work a camera.  

Well I must be hitting the old yellow brick road, there is a dress with giant poppies on it waiting for a hem.  I'll leave you with this shot that adds nothing except that I'm being slightly goofy and the caption amuses me. Come on froggie, we got a date with a wizard.

Witch is sending a flock of flying monkeys for my shoes? Has she never heard of Amazon Prime?

Leveling up on my stash busting pledge

Back in January I joined the stashbusting-sewalong and pledged to use up 12 pieces of fabric.  Well after sewing 100% from stash in the first quarter of the year I've used up 23 pieces of fabric.  Yikes, even I'm surprised.

Seems like it's high time to update that pledge so here goes...
I Heather B, rabid sewcialist pledge/buyer of too many shoes, pledge to use up 40, yes 40 pieces of stashed fabric by the end of the year.   Honestly that would only put the most minor of dents in the stash and technically I'm already half way there.

Right now my sewing table seems to be in a blue phase, Spring is making me want to sew bright colors.

Half of these blue fabric blobs are already finished. There will be fun new FO's to show you but I'm waiting for shoes, always waiting for shoes.