The Adventures of a Couch Potato

How to Wear an Infinity Dress Modestly

2015-02-24T22:01:00.002-07:00

I think I may have just made my all time favorite dress.

It's fun and twirly, slinky and sexy, flatters my body, and I can wear it about a million different ways.

Plus, it has pockets.

And it was about the fastest dress I have ever sewn.

Infinity dresses have been around for a while, but they tend to show off a lot of skin.

Last year I saw this tutorial on Pinterest and I was hooked. It was so smart to extend the waistband into a bandeau top, I eventually just had to make myself one.

To make this dress you'll need five measurements, some large pieces of paper (wrapping paper of newspaper work well), and anywhere from a yard to two yards of good stretch fabric in a nice pattern or color.

My sewing tutorial doesn't have any pictures, so feel free to hop on over to the original for the instructions

You can do these measurements yourself, but they'll probably be more accurate if you con a friend into helping you out.

(A) Natural waist

(B) Natural waist the the finished length of the skirt

(C) Natural waist to the top hem

(D) Center of the chest to the side seam, going over the fullest part of the bust

(E) Height

There are plenty of instructions for making a circle skirt out there, but I recommend going to this web app, which will do all of the math for you. My dress has a 1/2 circle skirt, because I think it has plenty of twirl and conserves fabric, but you can do any type of skirt really.

Follow the instructions to make yourself a pattern piece, but remember that you're going to want to have two side seams in order to put pockets in.

Trace your hand liberally on the pattern making paper and then trim up the pocket piece. You want to use the angle of the skirt pattern to determine the angle of the top of the pocket. You can also pretty up the bottom if you want, but it's probably not necessary.

This is also when I figured out where a good placement for the pockets would be on the skirt and marked the pattern

Make yourself a rectangle that is 1/2 (A) by (C) be sure to give yourself seam allowances of about 1/4 inch. If you desire to finish the top edge take that into account as well.

You can make a pattern piece of the straps if you want, but I found it was easier just to measure the fabric before cutting and behaving accordingly. The straps need to be one and a half times your height and as wide as your breast measurement (1.5 * (E)) by (D).

So to review, you have a tracing of your hand, a circle skirt pattern piece with two side seams, two rectangles that make up the bandeau top, and two really really long and awkward straps.

Cut out your fabric and pin the pocket pieces to the skirt (right sides facing). Then sew them on.

Now pin your two pocket/skirt pieces together so that the right sides face together again, the pockets should be sticking out. Sew the two sides together, going around the edge of the pocket. This website has a good tutorial on in seam pockets.

Now, arrange the two strap pieces so that they overlap by about five inches. You can sew them together, or just baste them at this point.

Trying to match the centers, pin the conjoined ends of the straps to the top of the skirt and sew it into place.

Now sew the two top pieces into a tube and sew that tube to the top of the skirt, sandwiching the straps between the two layers.

You should now have a dress with two weirdo straps coming out of the belly.

You can finish the edges if you want, but I didn't. I really like the light and airy raw edge look, and knit fabrics shouldn't unravel anyways.

Welcome to happiness. Happiness with pockets.

This dress is already much more modest that the typical infinity dress, but I wanted to take it a step further because as a member of the LDS church I've covenanted to wear garments and be a little more modest than most people.

I've achieved this in three ways so far.

The first way was to simply wrap the dress in such a way that it covered all of me.

Flip the straps over your shoulders, keeping them flat.

Cross the straps high on your back, keeping them flat again,

One at a time, layer the straps over your breasts, this high angle keeps your upper back covered.

You can now start layering the rest of the straps across your belly, it doesn't matter if they bunch up now, but it might look a little thick.

I like to tie my dress in the back, but you can also do this in the front.

As you might be able to see in the picture this did leave little pinpricks in-between the adjacent "x's" that we were making, I solved this by pinning the straps into place where necessary. I wore this look our anniversary date.

I didn't want to be locked into essentially one way of wearing the infinity dress, so when I wore the dress again later that week I pulled out the big guns.

I wore a T-shirt.

Now I know that I lot of people don't like this style. My husband even told me that he thinks women look like insecure preteen girls when they put a shirt under a strappy dress, but it can work if you do it correctly.

First, choose the right shirt. It shouldn't be a thick, unflattering camp shirt, it should be flattering on you and made of approximately the same material as your infinity dress.

Second, choose a good color. Avoid white where possible because white is the color of those infamous preteens. (Although that does go with everything in it's own way). My dress is a nice, warm plum color, so this beige shirt contrasted the dress, while still being complementary to the overall look.

There are major benefits to going with a t-shirt rather than a bolero (the other type of add-on sleeves pictured above.)

First, a bolero will shift around and make you readjust all night long, even when you safety pin it into place. I hate having to worry about my bra-straps and other assorted goods while having a date-night.

A shirt will not move. you can dance, you can climb trees, you can have fun for the entire night without once worrying about whether or not your system of pins, pulleys, and other various hardware is going to stay in place.

Secondly a bolero alters the look of the dress, while an undershirt preserves it. Your dress could have an elegant set of straps or a sexy halter top, but the second you slap a bolero on that baby it just becomes a dress with sleeves on it.

With a t- shirt you can still see the intended style when you where a well chosen t-shirt, and the dress still carries that elegance or sexiness with it.

I like wearing t-shirts under my sleeveless dresses so much that I'm actually planning on making myself a bunch of demi-tees for this express purpose. I'll even post a pattern draft for all of you lovely people.

But first I think I'm going to make myself this dress about a thousand times over.

What do you think? Bolero, t- shirt, or sleeved dress?

Cloth Diapers, Sourdough, and Keeping Busy

2014-11-17T23:22:00.002-07:00

Gwendolyn will be eight months old next week. She loves to pull herself up into a standing position, and enjoys yanking the books off of our shelf. She has even started to try and follow us into other rooms of the house. This is as adorable as you are imagining.

She is generally happy and curious about life. She is smart, and determined, and an all-around easy baby.

It's been hard.

Part of what has been hard is the fact that I am labeled differently in the eyes of others. Before, I was a cute, short girl of dubious age range. Now I'm a mom of dubious age holding a baby, and I get weird looks sometimes. These new sort of looks make me feel anxious, although I imagine I'll be able to get used to it.

It's actually worse at church. Sometimes I feel so anxious that I just can't stay past sacrament. There would be tears and possibly panic.

Josh and I recently moved to Salt Lake City and our ward has a much broader age range. Instead of being all newlyweds we have a large population of men and women over sixty.

Apparently, there's nothing the elderly love more than a fat, happy baby. Every Sunday it's a series of comments about Gwendolyn.

She's cute, and happy, and a joy to sit behind.

And she's so big, and you're so small, I bet no one has ever made this jokey observation before.

It wouldn't be too bad, except that Gwendolyn is the only reason anyone ever talks to me, and she's all that we talk about.

They only see me as a mom, and it's as if I can't be anything else for the next eighteen years.

Anyways, I've been stressed, and occasionally overwhelmed. This box other people are trying to put me has me feeling socially claustrophobic. And the fact that I'm not as free to do as many things anymore occasionally makes me feel stuck.

Even if the things I'm staying home from didn't necessarily interest me.

So, anyways, I've been trying to keep busy with projects.

I made my own sourdough starter following these instructions on a vegan website.* At first, I was super nervous about the bread tasting sour. Which seems like a weird thing to be nervous about when it comes to sourdough, but that's just gross.

The good news is that when I baked some you couldn't even tell that it was sourdough. I really liked keeping the starter, but eventually it fell out of use and I didn't think it was worth resurrecting.

I embroidered the corner of a flour sack towel to cover rising dough with and wrap my bread up with.

I started cloth diapering two or three times.

I read a book about how to spindle and considered trying to make my own yarn.

I sewed myself a skirt, and started a blanket.

I applied to sew from home for somebody else's business, but didn't get a call back.

I got a small group together to apply for a community garden near my house, but then couldn't rouse myself to do more than the first step.

Interests have come and gone faster than is feasibly reasonable.

But, I'm trying to keep busy. And I'm going to be okay.

*I used a different recipe for the bread

Peasant Wrap Skirt Pattern

2014-06-08T22:41:00.000-06:00

Lately, I've been feeling really awkward when I leave the house with my baby. I think it's because the juxtaposition of my youthful appearance with the fact that I'm pushing a stroller makes me feel like I'm being judged for having had a baby.

I think I'm going to try and move my style in a different direction for a bit. I'll probably bench my graphic tees for a few weeks and try to dress with a bit more... Elegance? I'm not sure exactly, mostly I'm just going to find clothes that don't make me feel out of place.

So, I was looking for inspiration on Pinterest when I found this skirt. The seller on Etsy doesn't appear to selling them anymore, although even if she was I couldn't afford forty bucks for a single skirt. Instead, I whipped up a quick pattern to make my own version with.

This pattern is basically just a peasant version of this circle wrap skirt here. If you look at that pattern, you'll see that it's basically a skirt, with two diminishing pieces on either end.

For this skirt you'll need to measure the length of the finished piece as well as the sport you want the skirt to sit. I came up with 29 inches by 31 inches. I decided that I wanted my skirt to have five tiers, so I drafted the following pattern

Let's assume that A is the waistline, and B is 1/5 the length of the finished product.

I added in 1/4 inch seam allowances throughout, as well as an additional inch to the top of the top tier. I didn't add any hem allowance, because I planned on using my serger to finish the edge and then leaving it.

I cut two of each piece.

I used three full yards of a 45 inch wide linen "gauze" fabric that was crinkly. I thought that the effect would lend itself well to the finished product and I am satisfied with how it turned out.

Construction was pretty easy; I simply put all the tiers together on the main body, then put together the two wings, and then attached the wings to the main body. You could also put together all the matching tiers, and then attach the tiers together, whatever is easier for you.

I serged both the top and bottom edges.

Without finishing the 1/4 length ends looked pretty silly, eventually I decided to bring the lower corner up to my waistline and folding over the extra triangle of fabric. You could also gather the unfinished edge, or trim the lower corner so as to not add any extra width to your skirt.

I folded over the top inch of the skirt and sewed it in place. This gives the waistband more strength, and should prevent the wrong kind of stretching.

Originally, I planned on holding all the layers together with a button or two, but the buttons that were small enough so as to not be gaudy didn't really feel like they would be strong enough. So, I ended up improvising a tie out of a small scrap of fabric.

Then I tried the skirt on and marked where I would need to put buttonholes. My sewing machine has a buttonhole function so this last step was super quick and easy.

Altogether, the skirt took three days of naps, three yards of fabric and about twenty dollars. If I were you, I would err on getting too much fabric, because I thought I would have extra when I ended up barely having enough.

The skirt is super comfortable, and I feel pretty when I wear it.

Let me know if you have any questions, and please send me pictures if you end up making this wonderful skirt.

Garden Progress

2014-06-05T21:48:00.001-06:00

Things are either going very well, or quite poorly, in my garden, depending upon which plant you ask.

A good thing?

I was able to get a tomato cage from my awesome sister-in-law and my scarlet Runner Beans are taking to it quite nicely. I've noticed that there seems to be some variation in just the three bean plants I have. One grows super fast, and one grows very slowly in comparison to the other two. They basically have a papa bear, mama bear, baby bear thing going on. I thought about roguing out the slowest plant, but it occurred to me that it is densely filling the trellis in comparison to the faster two. In small spaces such as mine it might be better to have a slower, more space-efficient plant than one that outgrows it's trellis quickly.

In the end, I think that I'll just save seed from all three plants rather than doing any selecting this season. That way I should be able to get a better sense of what's going on.

The strawberries were doing super well, until a couple days ago. At which point, all the leaves flopped over. My guess is that they might be getting too much sun or too little water. I've added another layer of straw on top in hopes that it'll help with water retention and keep the plants cool. I might also pull the entire box a little further away from the edge of my balcony.

The peas and the cucumbers are both doing super poorly. The peas never came up and the cucumbers first looked like they might need a little nitrogen and then all of them but one died over the course of a day. The remaining plant looks pretty pathetic. I broadcast half of my remaining pea seeds and mulched with more straw. If that doest get me some peas I might try pre-soaking.

Hang on Mr. Cucumber! You can do it!

The mint is alive, although it doesn't really seem to be spreading, and the green onions are barely hanging on.

I replanted the nasturtium, although, I was out out nitrogen rich materials so I'll need to find some if it's going to do well. The chamomile is flowering and I've already collected flower to dry for our tea. I really hope that we get quite a bit.

These flowers can probably be harvested tomorrow.

I think home grown tea deserves a really cute teapot. I'm thinking of something long the lines of one of these.

Pinterest Projects

2014-06-01T20:05:00.001-06:00

I recently became a stay-at-home mom. It's really great, but I often find that I simultaneously have a ton of time and absolutely no time on my hands.

Clean the kitchen? Pssh, my baby is refusing to be put down.

Watch endless hours of Netflix and browse the Internet? Now we're talking.

So, I've been spending a lot of time on Pinterest lately.

I finally got around to a couple projects and I'm really excited about both of them.

instructions here

The first is this Mei Tai, which is a baby carrier that doesn't require a few yards of fabric to make. I was able to throw one together from scraps in my fabric stash. It was super easy to put together and Gwendolyn loves it.

Most Mei Tei's available commercially have black straps, so I was worried that mine would look like a ugly, loud spaghetti monster, but I really think that it's cute.

I didn't curve the top and now I'm wishing that I had because I don't think Gwendolyn has enough support.

It also tends to ride down after walking around for a while. I also can't sit down in it or else my baby freaks out. I suspect that both are a matter of practicing my tying.

click here for instructions

The second project is this really cute stone bead bracelet. I made it out of "semi-precious" blue stone beads and black silk cord. It turned much bulkier than I imagined it would, but that might have something to do with my teeny tiny wrists. I was planning on using it as a single part of many layers of bracelets but that simply won't work. I also made it slightly too tight, so it's much more like a cuff than I planned.

Still, I'm really please with it, and I love wearing it.

So that's what I've been up too lately. Next I plan on trying to make a wrapped peasant skirt like this. Of course, I'm not sure that I know how to do that, so it'll be an adventure.

How a Bean Plant Nearly Killed Me

2014-05-26T21:57:00.002-06:00

I only remember having a family garden for one summer when I was a kid; we dug up one third of our front yard and planted all sorts of things. Later, I had a very small vegetable garden and then a flower garden, but they were never as magical as that first year.

That was the year that my sister brought home a bean seedling from school. We stuck it in our garden, and it proceeded to take over everything. The bean was planted on one end and--in just a few weeks--I could sit under the shade of it's massive leaves on the other, and snack on sugar snap peas.

It turned our neat orderly rows into a magical jungle. Or at least, it seemed that way to the very tiny younger version of myself.

I don't know if you know this, but beans have fuzzy leaves. In fact, they would stick like Velcro to a couple of my shirts

I remember one time I was out playing in the garden when I got up to leave, and discovered that I couldn't. I had unknowingly brushed my back against one of the giant leaves and it had snagged on my shirt.

I tried not to panic.

When leaves had stuck to my shirt before, I had just peeled them off. I tried to reach my back to free myself, except that I could only sort of claw at it.

I took a running start but was whipped backwards when I reached the end of my leash.

I knew I could shout for help if needed, but I felt determined to get free by myself. None of my siblings would have been trapped by some stupid plant, so I wasn't going to be stuck there either.

I ran for it again, the vine snagged at me, but then the leaf snapped off of the vine and I was free. Except that the giant leaf was still stuck to my shirt

Stupid plant.

This is the first year that I have grown beans since then. I touched the fuzzy leaves, and for the first time in a long time remembered the magic of the jungle garden, and the giant bean plant with the leaves that sometimes stuck like Velcro.

It feels like I'm really gardening now.

How to Make a Simple Netted Trellis

2014-05-20T15:05:00.001-06:00

I'm growing several vining varieties of plants on my balcony garden, and I needed a couple different trellises to support them all. The Scarlet Runner Beans are just going to get a tomato cage or two, but we made this for the peas and the cucumbers.

It was really simple, so I thought that I would show you how we put it together.

First off, the side supports are built into the box, they are mainly responsible for the structural integrity of this trellis..

We strung a long piece of yarn across the top to act as the primary support.

Then we tied and even number of long strands across the first string at about 11/2 inch intervals. These strands were about 1/3 longer than the we wanted the finished product to be, but I think longer would have been better.

Then we took the long strands and tied them together in pairs about 11/2 half inches down from the top. We used square knots.

Then, skipping the first, we tied the long strands together again another 11/2 inches down.

The rest was simple repetition.

After we got the net as long as we wanted it, Josh secured it to the sides and bottom with more yarn and nails.

I really like how this looks, and it seems strong, so I think it will be a good fit for my garden.

At the end of the season, I will update here about how it worked out.

My Garden Set Up

2014-05-15T19:42:00.001-06:00

This past weekend, I was able to set up my balcony garden for the year. Now I just have to water in good faith and hope everything survives.

Josh (my husband) was kind enough to build me gardening boxes big enough to house the plants I want to grow. Originally, I was intent on doing this mostly by myself, but it took me ten minutes to saw through one board.

No thank you.

Eventually, a neighbor came by with some power tools for us to borrow. This was spectacularly awesome, but soon enough it was time to feed my baby, and settle her in for the night. Josh was able to build the entire box in the time it took me to put her to bed.

He and his friends built the second one the next day.

I used one bale of straw, and 1.5 cubic feet of composted steer manure for two 3' by 1.5' by 1.5' boxes, one plain pallet, and one five gallon bucket. I'm wishing that I had had more manure, but not another bag's worth.

I simply alternated thick layers of straw, with thin layers of the manure, pausing to water each layer until it just barely damp. I finished with a layer of the compost mixed in with the potting soil leftover from last year. I then planted directly into the straw.

Right off the bat, I'm worried about the gaps in the sides of the boxes, I wanted them there so that the organic matter wouldn't get too waterlogged. Now that I actually see the boxes, I'm worried about my planting medium falling out of the sides. I guess it'll depend on how much the straw breaks down over the season.

My back up plan is to wrap tulle around the planters. which will make them sloppy and ugly, and I don't want to take advantage of my neighbors.

I'm also worried about my nitrogen to carbon ratio. The steer manure was more composted than I thought it would be (hello inexperience). I'll just have to wait and see what the plants look like in a couple weeks and go from there.

Strawberries in the background with a bean up front

In one box, I planted strawberries, and my scarlet runner beans. In the other box, I planted a cucumber start and a few sugar snap pea seeds. We hope to make pickles, but I'm guessing that we might have to supplement our cucumbers with some from the farmer's market.

In the pallet in our shady corner, I planted the green onions, and mint. Theoretically, both of these plants have fairly shallow root systems, but I'm not sure the pallet is deep enough for them. It certainly dries out the fastest.

The mint peeking through the straw mulch

I also planted the chamomile in a bucket. The Nasturtium will also go in bucket when it's ready.

It's been a few days, and so far nothing has died. I feel that this deserves a pat on the back

In my next, post I'll give instructions on how to make my super awesome netted trellis.

The Spring Planting Festival

2014-05-11T01:03:00.000-06:00

This weekend marks the last frost date for Provo. All over the city gardeners are setting out there sun loving summer crops and celebrating the official start to the season.

Fittingly, today was the spring planting festival. There were plant starts for sale, free gardening classes, and sheer delight.

I've heard that the good plant starts go really quickly at these things, so Josh and I were sure to get there right at 10 AM, when it opened. Unfortunately, it was clear that we had gotten there a little early, because there were only one or two vendors set up and only a few more shuffling in.

We decided to have a look around anyways, because heirloom strawberry varieties had been specifically advertised, and I was really eager to get a couple of those.

I was feeling really nervous about being there, and it took me a moment to figure out why.

I want to get into this community. I want to go to farmers markets, plant swaps, and gardening classes. Eventually, I want to be a major contributor to these events. So in a sense, this felt like I was finally coming out into my society, "look at me plant people! I'm here, we can be friends now!"

Realizing this didn't make me feel any less awkward, of course. There's just something inherently nerve-wracking about trying to decide if a bunch of green onions is worth three dollars when the man who grew them is standing right next to you. I hope I will become more acclimated to the situation as time goes on.

There were no strawberry starts so Josh and I decided to come back a little later.

I did buy the green onions as well as a little chamomile plant.*

We came back to attend the beekeeping class, which turned out to be disorganized and bumbly, but still entertaining. I noticed that they were filming the lecture, so I'm going to try to get ahold of some of the recordings to watch the other classes.

There still weren't any strawberry starts. Maybe they came and left while we were gone.**

Overall, the spring planting festival was fun, but a little dinky compared to what I was hoping for. I ended up having to go to a commercial nursery for everything I was actually planning on getting.

On the bright side, I learned that there's a Utah seed exchange group. I also learned that there's a small permaculture based farm up in Orem that gives tours every Thursday.

Date night anyone?

*I'm suddenly fostering hopes of growing enough to make tea.

**or maybe whoever brought them last time decided they would rather have another table with nothing but tomato plants.

Easy Peasy Baby Dress

2014-05-08T21:33:00.002-06:00

The other day I decided to throw together a quick little dress for Gwendolyn. I figured that I should go ahead and post the pattern here for those of you who are interested in such things.

It's really, really easy, I promise.

I made it spur of the moment because Josh and I got to talking about how it would be fun to throw a fancy dinner party sometime in the near future. Our plans went from a nice dinner, to a cheese tasting, to a cheese tasting while playing murder mystery game Dreadmore. We plan on making everyone dress up in suits and dresses, and although Gwendolyn does have a lot of cute things she doesn't really have anything that fits that "people are currently trying to murder each other" aesthetic.

I did have leftover dark red satin that I think fits the bill perfectly.

I measured this blue jean dress which is similiar to the style that I had in mind and came up with the following pattern

The dress should theoretically be in the three month old range so feel free to transcribe the pattern for yourself. The measurements don't currently include seam allowances so dont forget to add those when you cut out the fabric.

I ran all the pieces through my awesome new serger to seal all the edges and hopefully prevent fraying. Setting up the serger and rembering how it works was the toughest part of this whole process.

after serging

I obviously need to practice with my serger a little bit more.

I put the dress together in the following steps. I'm sure that you can get it to work in whatever order makes the most sense to you.

1. attatch the front and back bodice pieces together at the seam.

2. gather the sleeves and pin them to the bodice, mess with the gathering until it fits correctly.

3. sew the sleeves to the bodice.

4. sew together the side seams.

5. sew together the panels of the skirt, leave the back seam open.

6. gether the skirt, pin and sew the skirt to the bodice so that the side seams match up

7. sew the plackets and the opposing side under.

8. sew the rest of the skirt together

9. add buttons and hem raw edges.

I haven't done step nine myself because I don't have buttons yet. I also think I might like how the stitching looks on the edges.

... maybe.

kinda pretty?

From here you could add a ribbon around the waist, or gathered tulle to the bottom of the skirt, I played with doing both, but the simple way the dress looks now is winning me over.

Give the pattern a try, it's a super quick project. I think I finished in three hours. You could get any feel you want based on fabric type and where the buttons are.

If you do try the pattern be sure to critique my instructions. I'll never improve if no one tells me what I'm doing wrong.

Do you like the contrasting stitching?

"JulieAnny's Stained Glass Afghan Square" Pattern Review

2014-05-05T00:09:00.001-06:00

A little over a month ago I gave birth to our first daughter. Her name is Gwendolyn, and as far as babies go, she is pretty darn awesome.

For a long time I tried to write a blog post about my experiences going through labor. The story is pretty interesting after all; it has plans gone awry, an emergency induction, drug induced confusion, loss of hope, and just a sprinkling of high fever to top it all off. However, as hard as I try I just can't seem to form a cohesive narrative.

I had a baby, she's great. My husband is funny.

I'm just going to move on for now.

Almost as soon as we learned that we were having a girl I knew that I wanted to make a blanket for Gwendolyn. Since I'm not terribly good at quilting it made sense to go with crochet. I went over to Raverly and decided immediately on this square by the incredibly talented Julie Yeager.

Click here to go to the pattern

The individual squares are super pretty I love the bold look of the bright colors accompanied by the black outilne. I think it looks beautiful and just like stained glass as the name suggests. I wanted to capture the same feeling with my squares so I went with an elegant pink/gray/black combination.

The pattern itself is super easy to follow. There's even a picture guide linked on the Raverly information page which was a wonderful aid on the first run through of the pattern. That being said each square did take quite a bit of time. I think on average I took three to four hours to finish each piece. The effort was worth it though, because this is the most impressive afghan square I've ever made.

The blanket did end up a little more stiff than I originally thought it would, but I haven't washed it yet, so it might loosen up appreciably. The only other con to this pattern is that now that I've had the finished item around for a couple days I can't help but feel that it looks like my old basement carpet. I think this effect would be mitigated if you used a variety of squares.

Said carpet

In fact I had originally planned on making a larger blanket with another of Julie's squares mixed in, but then Gwendolyn received quite a few glorious blankets from friends and relatives, two of which were large crocheted ones. I figured she didn't need a third.

Plus, I didn't have the energy to finish the project, so downsizing was fine by me.

If you like the pattern I suggest going for it. It's really worth a couple dollars to make something this beautiful.

In fact I think I may have figured out a way to make this square into a really awesome hat.

... I just haven't tried it yet, so we'll have to see.

Gardening Books that Have Changed Me

2014-05-01T02:11:00.000-06:00

I know I've mentioned my life plans on this blog before, but it bears mentioning again. I want to have a homestead where I keep chickens, bees, and maybe sheep. I want to produce a wide range of perennial fruits, and vegetables and preserve the excess. I hope to feed my family, and I hope to do it sustainably, using permaculture.

This dream is important to me. However, this hasn't always been my plan. In fact, when my brother in law kept chickens for one summer a couple years ago I thought it was slightly interesting, but a little too weird for me.

If he did the same thing this summer I think I would die of excitement. I just want to keep chickens so badly.

These are the books that nurtured this dream in me. If you are interested in sustainable living, or wondering what the heck is going on inside this hippie's head, I highly reccamend them.

The Omnivore's Dilemma isn't actually a gardening book. However, it is the first book that truly interested me in where my food comes from. Through an enticing narrative following four meals Micheal Pollan examines the ecological consequences of our food production system in America. He goes over the industrialized system and its problems then details alternatives. It was this book that made me want to make ecologically conscious decisions in the supermarket. Later on, it was also this book that helped me decide that I was okay with breeding and slaughtering my own animals.

Gaia's Garden is an extremely obtainable guide on how to do what I want to do. If the Omnivore's Dilemma piqued my interest and inspired me, than Gaia's garden gave me the tools. It's very clear,
and explains the science behind it's instructions. If you garden at all I recommend you look at this book. The common sense methods will help anyone produce more food, or conserve more resources. It was after reading Gaia's Garden that I started to form my plans for the future, although my ideas were more modest in the beginning

These two books are ones that I currently own. The next two are still on my to-buy list, although I have read both thanks to my school's library*.

This two volume set is the most expensive on the list, topping out at nearly ninety dollars at the time of this writing. It goes over the same material as Gaia's garden but in a more detailed and scientific manner. Its perfect logic and thorough explanations have kinda of ruined me for other, plainer gardening books. In comparison to Edible Forest Gardens those other books leave me without any proper scientific explanations. These books bother to answer my questions, which is something I have come to appreciate in a book. This set is closer to a college level of reading, the books certainly heft like textbooks, but worthy of a try if sustainability is something that you are interested in. I know that when Josh and I get land it will be edible forest gardens that will be my primary guide.

Breed Your Own Vegetable Varieties is simply fantastic. It's scientific, but still passionate. Carol Deppe thoughtfully goes over how to breed vegetables, whether you have a specific goal in mind or simply want to save your own seed without your varieties falling apart after a couple generations. Every gardener that saves seed is breeding their own varieties of vegetables, Deepe simply shows us how to do it intentionally. Her passion and conviction has inspired me, and I want to garden intentionally and thoughtfully. I even have a couple ideas for breeding projects, but they'll have to wait until I can successfully make it past the first generation.

This is a reality TV Series where historians and archaeologist live on a historically accurate victorian age farm. This is about gardening, but clearly not a book. It gets a honory spot on my list because while I was reading and pondering food related plans my husband wasn't too certain about some of the weirder aspects. It was while watching this documentary that he got excited about keeping chicken and bees, and even suggested keeping sheep as well. This series makes me long for the future when I can try some of these things out for myself. It's really well done and extremely interesting. I suggest taking a look.

I often feel like I am not explaining my reasons behind my plans and experiments properly. I hope to get better at this, but in the meantime take a look at these fantastic sources. They certainly do a better job than I am.

* I will be incredibly sad to leave BYU, but only because of this library.

New Experiments In Gardening

2014-04-27T01:13:00.002-06:00

As you may recall last year I tried to tweak the three-sister's guild of plants into something that I would actually enjoy eating. It was a little less than successful, but I think the concept is still sound.   I did learn a few important things about gardening though. One lesson was, "don't dig the soil when it's wet, or else it will turn into cement and all your plants will die". Another important lesson I learned was "don't buy cheap starts late into the season, they will suck and half of them will die."*

I want to be good at gardening, hopefully a couple rather obvious insights a year will help me to be passable by the time I'm a grandmother.

Josh and I weren't exactly sure if we'd still be in provo over the summer, so I didn't sign up for the community garden this year. I also don't really plan on having a lot of time on my hands this summer **. At first I didn't plan on having a garden at all, but a couple days ago I realized that having plants is important to me.

So here I am, a little too late to start seeds, no money budgeted for this project and a hair-brained scheme which may or may not fail based on my lack of experience alone. My poor husband is left trying to balance encouraging me and cautioning me not set myself up for failure.

To be fair, he puts me in the same position at least as often.

Before I fill you in on my experiment let me give you some background information.

Straw bale gardening is a method where you fertilize a bale of straw, allow it to decompose for a few weeks, and then plant directly into it. This way the bale serves as both planting medium and container. The straw decomposes over the season and all your plants benefit from the releasing nutrients. It's suppose to be equally effective on the earth or on the concrete of somebody's balcony.

This method is appealing because of it's apparent ease, however, it does have some drawbacks. First, to fertilize a straw bale organically (with bone and blood meal) would be prohibitively expensive. Second, as the season wears on a decomposing straw bale becomes butt ugly. This second thing is only a problem because I care too much about appearances. If I were to try this method out this season, I would just stick the bales in a container.

Sheet mulching is a a way of preparing a garden bed with very little effort.   You essentially pile on the components of a compost pile in layers and then let worms, micro-organisms and fungi do the rest. You can plant immediately, but the bed is most fertile the second year onwards.

Both of these methods deal with planting in undigested compost, so I'm going to take that theme and run with it. At first I thought I would just do the straw bale method, except that I would stick it in a container. Then it occurred to me that I wouldn't need to keep the bale intact, and so I could use other sources of nutrients besides the blood and bone meal.

I plan on layering alternating layers of nitrogen and carbon rich materials in a container and then planting directly into it. So, basically sheet mulching in a container. I plan on using straw as my main carbon rich material because, according to the book on the straw bale method, it's suppose to remain light and fluffy throughout the season.

I'm most worried about my plants becoming water-logged by all of the organic matter. Just because either parent method doesn't have a problem with root rot doesn't mean it wont be a problem in a container.***

In the interest of pretending that this is a scientific endeavor here is a hypothesis for the season: Sheet mulching in a container is an effective and affordable means of gardening. In fact, it's awesome. All of my plants survive and I suddenly become a gardening goddess.

On my balcony I'm going to try and grow: strawberries, cantaloupe, sugar snap peas, scarlet runner beans, and a couple different flowers. I started seeds today.

I really want to make this container for both the strawberries and the cantaloupe. Unfortunately that's dependent upon me finding free wooden pallets.   I would try and construct them from regular ol' lumber, but I'm trying to do this on the cheap.

Go here for instructions

I have less-ideal plastic crates that I can reuse anyways.

In other news, I have a couple friends who offered to let me come play in their garden this summer. So it looks like I'll get some "normal" gardening experience this year as well. I'm really excited, and I hope it all works out.

It's good to have a scheme again.

*These two might actually be confounding variables
**I had a baby, I may tell you about it later
*** containers suck that way.

Lessons Learned

2013-07-24T12:20:00.002-06:00

I've had a couple really good learning experiences in the garden this year. This is honestly just a nice way of saying that I killed a lot of plants.

To start with, the community garden was fed by a drip irrigation system; the first mistake that I made was to assume that this irrigation system was efficient enough to reach every corner of my raised bed.

It wasn't. As a result, some of the corn I planted didn't germinate because I had shoved them into the corner.

In addition to this assumption, I completely forgot to check to see where the irrigation system was actually dripping. So, I had some plants that struggled with being over-watered and some that were under-watered.

I also assumed that the soil wouldn't have as much clay as typical Utah soil. My thought process was that if I was constructing a bunch of raised beds I would use the Lasagna method to build up the soil with plenty of organic matter. However, I think that the administrators of the garden simply bought some topsoil and filled the beds with it.

This assumption was a problem for me because when I planted transplants, a few of them drowned in their own soil, while water pooled around them and wouldn't diffuse into the surrounding clay. In fact, I wasn't able to get the cantaloupe going at all, because of this issue.

These two problems of mine lead to a rather spotty and sad looking garden with only a few living plants.

If you remember, I was really excited about using an altered version of the three sisters method in my garden. I planted peas as soon as I planted the corn and the pepper transplants. This meant that the peas sprouted before the larger plants were established, and most of them didn't grow up their supports at all.

I guess I just got too excited.

I also used substandard seed and transplants, which I'm sure only added to the problem, since everyone else's plants seem to be much bigger than mine.

Next year, I'll add organic matter to the bed immediately. I'll also play more attention to the micro-environments in my little plot, and put things where they would be watered the proper amount. I'll also do things in the right time-frame and get better starts.

In other news, I was able to get one good handful of sugar snap peas from my garden last week. I'm really happy about this.

Honestly, it was barely enough for a snack for myself but I'm still really pleased.

I grew these!

My goal for the season was to grow some of my own food, and I've officially done just that. Of course, I still have the peppers and the corn to go, so maybe I'll even get up to a single pound of food for myself and my husband.

Maybe in a few years I'll be up to a hundred pounds, or a thousand.

I'm not very good at this yet, but I like gardening, and the idea of sustainability way too much not to be good at this someday.

Garden Update

2013-05-12T12:38:00.000-06:00

I'm really good at growing weeds...

The seedlings were doing pretty well up until two weeks ago, when finals happened and I got pretty sick.

Now there are four left.

Two of them are little bitty bell pepper plants, one is a cantaloupe seedling and the last is a moonflower. I don't think the peppers were started early enough to go into the garden but maybe I'll stick them in pots on my patio as a consolation prize.

I also finally got to work in my little garden plot today. I've changed up my plans a little bit since I last blathered about it, in order to incorporate some of what I've learned about gardening in the last month.

I've read this book as well as a couple others on permaculture which were really exciting. It's all about how through proper gardening techniques you can contribute to the health of the soil, provide a proper habitat, and nurture yourself from your landscape.

They mainly deal with perennial plants but some of the same principles can still be applied to my more temporary situation.

So, instead of having homogenized blocks of plants I'll be doing a variation on the "three sisters" tradition.

As I'm sure many of you know, the "three sisters" refers to the Native American practice of planting corn, beans, and squash together. The attributes of these three types of plants work together to provide themselves a better growing environment. The Legumes are nitrogen fixers, making the soil healthier for the other plants. The corn acts a trellis for the legumes and provides some shade to the more delicate plants. The squash is a good ground cover and inhibits the growth of weeds, as well as conserving water.

This is a system that has proven itself over thousands of years and works by providing the needs of some plants through the natural qualities of others.

I'm going to mess with it and hope that it still works.

As you can see, I'm letting the weeds mulch in place.

The main change that I'll be making is to the squash. I don't specifically remember ever trying squash and I don't really want to plant a lot of something that I wouldn't know what to do with. Instead I'll be using cantaloupe which is actually a relative of squash, so I think that It should work just fine.

The second change I'll be making is to use pepper plants in half the plots, instead of corn. Although not quite as tall as the original component, I think that the peppers should provide a good trellis for the legumes.

For the legumes I'm using sugar snap peas, mostly because they're a variety I recognize.

Although, it occurs to me that I should check to make sure that they're a vining variety rather than a bush type.

Yesterday I planted the corn, peas and cantaloupe seeds in little round mounds. Although I'm not entirely certain that they will be enough time for the cantaloupe to produce fruit and ripen properly.

Is there such a thing as cantaloupe starts?

I'll wait another week or so before putting the peppers in, mostly because I will have the money to buy the starts then.

I also might try to find some nasturtium seeds, which is a type of edible flower that I'm interested in trying. If I understand it correctly it's also another type of ground cover which should also attract insects.

Free Food and Bad Ideas

2013-04-10T10:31:00.000-06:00

When Josh and I went to pay our gardening fee last Friday, the lovely woman in charge pulled out two giant bags full of donated seeds and told us to take what we wanted.

I made off with basil seeds, a couple varieties of bell pepper, cantaloupe, and plenty of lettuce for our balcony. I think it's technecholy too late to start seeds but I thought I'd give it a try just in case.

I made paper cups out of spare notebook paper, and then filled them with soil from the bottom of our stairs.

I'm sure you know this, but every gardening source ever will tell you not to use garden dirt when starting seeds, or in containers in general.

It has dormant seeds, germs, and the soil settles differently in the container. In addition to this the soil I used felt like it had altogether too much clay in it.

Here's the thing; it was free dirt.

The seeds were free, and the paper was free, and the water will be free, and I just didn't feel like paying for planting medium this time around.

If this works then it'll be awesome, and if it doesn't, then I budgeted to get plants from the nursery anyways.

I also put a couple seeds from each variety in plastic bags with damp toilet paper. I usually prefer to do things this way, as I like seeing the seeds germinate.

Who knows, maybe by the time these babies wake up I'll feel like buying some planting medium for them after all.

The cantaloupe and the basil plants should be poking through with in a week. The bell peppers should follow the week after.

Here's hoping for the best!

Prospective Gardens

2013-04-07T13:44:00.000-06:00

In twenty years, I want to have a beautiful, sprawling garden.

There will be bounteous fruit trees, berry bushes and raised vegetable patches that help sustain my family and beautify our backyard. We'll to contribute to the health of the soil by gardening organically using the some of the concepts of permaculture.

As part of this system we would have a few chickens, and maybe bees if we're feeling adventurous enough.

So, secretly I'm a little hippie.

Of course, I don't know how to run a garden like that, I don't know how to grow anything really, and I'm told raising chickens is way harder than the books make it seem like.

Of course, I have twenty years to get to that point. So I think I can manage it.

As my first real baby step, I'm going to be a part of the local community garden this year.* My goal is mainly just to try gardening for real this time.

The space I have is somewhat small, only about 3 1/2 feet by 10 feet, so I'm going to focus on a few key plants that I love eating and that I think will be interesting to grow.

<- north

We'll mainly have bell pepper plants, and then strawberries interlaced with basil. Although I might throw a cantaloupe plant in there as well.

I don't get these delicious fruits too often because they tend to be slightly more expensive, which is why I'm growing strawberries and bell peppers instead of a ton of potatoes and parsnips.

At the same time I think I'll try to grow some salad greens on my balcony, where it's going to be nice and shady.

What interesting things are you doing this summer?

*really this time, we paid the fee and everything.

A Thought Experiment in Bread

2013-04-01T11:02:00.000-06:00

Since Josh and I have been married, I have cooked all the bread in our house from scratch.

It's not actually as impressive as it sounds, seeing as how my coverage as been spotty at best, and I think that we've only had bread twice in the last month or so.

On top of that, I'm using the whitest of the white bread recipes, so it's not even healthier than the store bought stuff.

The problem is that we eat about a loaf or two day once it's fresh out of the oven, but our desire to eat it slacks off exponentially once it's cooled down.

So, I've been making about three or four loafs occasionally and either running out too quickly or throwing some of it away. It was starting to feel like a wasteful chore.

So, on wednesday I made enough bread dough for six smallish loaves. I cooked one to eat that day, and one to give my sister-in-law, then I put the rest in the freezer.

Every night since I've taken a loaf out and put it in the fridge. Then in the morning, I cook it as part of breakfast. Or alternatively, to be breakfast as I run out the door.

So, far it's turned out to be a pretty good program for our bread needs. It doesnt take too long to bake a loaf of bread, my kitchen is ruined only once a week, and we can experience some portion control.

The only real problem so far is that I planned my first real day of making bread on Easter Sunday.

Ovarian Cysts

2013-03-22T10:50:00.000-06:00

Two days before my wedding, I woke up with a very slight pain in the crook of my left hip. At first I brushed it off as nothing and figured it would go away soon enough, but after a couple hours it intensified and I developed a fever and severe nausea.

Josh and I had been staying at my mother-in-law's house for a couple weeks by this point so I camped out on her couch and read a book as I tried to ignore my body. There were still plans to be made and a little bit of moving left but I couldn't quite process how we were going to do them.

Josh was wonderful. He brought me anti-nausea medication and held back my hair when I threw up. I laid in his lap and he scratched my back as we talked.

Eventually, I admitted to myself that the pain I was experiencing wouldn't go away on it's own, and was probably important. I told Josh about it, and he went to talk to his mom.

From my descriptions and Rebecca's experience, we figured out that I probably had an ovarian cyst.

According the various internet sources ovarian cysts usually go away on their own, and doctors only get involved when surgery needs to be done. I thought about waiting my body out, as had been my plan from the beginning, but I couldn't quite cope with the idea that nothing could be done for me.

We went to the emergency room.

There they gave me fluids and then tested my urine. This allowed them to factor out the idea of a kidney stone. Then they performed a slightly awkward ultra sound and told us that I had two cysts on my left ovary.

The doctor told us exactly what we had learned from our own research and then sent us away with high grade nausea and pain medications.

If I wasn't better by the third day* then I needed to come back in and we would discuss our options.

I spent that day--and the next--somewhat delirious. I couldn't keep the medications down reliably, and I was having just as much trouble eating or drinking.

It held up surprisingly well.

My reception was the next night.

I had been planning on wearing my wedding dress to the reception, but instead I ended up camped out on the couch in my pajamas. The room swelled with my friends and family, and I tried to focus on how awesome and beautiful everything was.

It was a uphill battle, and I ended up giving up and going to sleep in the basement after half an hour.

I didn't look at the food, and we didn't cut my beautiful cake until several weeks later.

It was miserable, I haven't gained the weight back, we're still paying back the hospital bill, and my hormones are uncharacteristically out of wack when my still-irregular period rears its head.

Still, I'm sincerely grateful for this experience.

Being this sick allowed others to care for me, and to reassure me. In my head I knew that my new relatives loved me, but it was something altogether different to feel it so drastically.

Up until that point, even though we had been staying in the same house for a little while, Josh and I had been sleeping in different rooms on different floors** but when I was sick I slept on the couch and he slept on the ground near me.

He was there when I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn't get back to sleep because of the pain. He helped me to the bathroom when I didn't think I could walk all that way myself. He distracted me with talk when I took my meds and had to fight my body to keep them down.

He was there the night before we got married and we were able to talk quietly in the dark about how nervous and excited we were.

It was a really precious experience to me.

I'm also grateful for the timing of my illness; it was slightly inconvenient, but the fact of the matter is that if it had started to hurt a day later, then I would have had a very hard time getting married. And if I managed that little detail, we wouldn't have been able to go on our non-refundable cruise.

The lingering bad things will fad and this experience will turn into an interesting story to tell our kids. And I'll always be grateful for those precious experiences, and for the fact that my wedding wasn't actually ruined.

*the first day of our cruise
**obviously.

Video Weekend

2013-03-05T11:54:00.001-07:00

This past weekend Josh filmed his application to the film program. It was a little last minute but a lot of fun.

One of the many wonderful things about being married is that we get to share in eachother's creativity. I really enjoy watching as Josh has inspiration for an idea, and then expands it to tell a story. It's happened several times but the most applicable is in this video.

I had left my wedding ring box in an old purse that I wanted to use, so I took the box out and set it on the table.*

When I got home Josh mentioned that it was a striking image.

Over the next weeks I saw him create a story that ended with this image. We spent evenings discussing the ins and outs of the tale, and it was a lot of fun.

I think that I'm going to find any movie he makes 150% more touching than anyone else.

*the result of moving sometime in the last couple months.

All the Exciting Things!

2013-02-28T19:39:00.001-07:00

I got the Job!

It's as awesome as I thought it would be. The work is super fun and everyone I work with is really nice. I'm really grateful for the opportunity, and I hope to prove myself as a worthy employee there.

There a ton of exciting things going on around me right now. Here are some of the more exciting ones.

My sister in law had her second baby last Thursday.

I haven't been able to meet her yet because it's flu season and I haven't had my shot yet, but I'm truly eager to.

Mike and Rachel are amazing people, they're some of my role models for what a good marriage should look like. I'm so happy for them, and I'm prepared to bask in awe as they go on this new adventure together. When it's our turn to have kids I hope to do as well as they have.

Elizabeth has this really neat project going on that you can read about here. The jist of it is that she's collecting works by kids for kids. She's going to take these works and compile them into a book for children in hospitals. I really hope it works out, because I think it's an incredible idea

My darling husband has his own really neat project that he's working on right now. He's hosting a summer workshop for high school students who are interested in all aspects of movie making. During this workshop the students will be able to work with professional grade equipment and make two short films. It's a really great opportunity for the students and for us.

Here's Josh's website. Check it out, and then tell everyone you know about these awesome projects.*

*dont tell everyone you know about my job, that might be weird if they don't know me.

Some of My Designs

2013-02-18T23:43:00.000-07:00

I've grown to truly love sewing garments over the past couple years. There's just something magnificent and fulfilling about taking clothe, and making it into more than the sum of its parts.

Unfortunately, my sewing projects are rather few and far between.

In the meantime I've been scheming up potential designs. I hope to make most of these someday, so that I can get better at drafting and sewing.

This design has been kicking around for a while. It would be a fun coat for me that I didn't have to get out of the kids section. It would be grey, with dull metallic buttons and belt buckle. The skirt portion would have wide pleats in it to add a little bit of fun. It's the kind of in-style coat that you see everywhere, but with more of me in it.

This is a second coat that I drew in reaction to my first day of wintery weather last fall. I went outside and was almost in shock about all the dark colors. Nearly everyone was wearing black, grey, or dark blue. I honestly thought that something awful had happened and I hadn't gotten the news yet. This coat would be red, and have an appropriate hood to go with the color.

The front is rather plain, but the back will have this fun little detail.

More pleats, because pleats are awesome. This should come across as a fun mix of a bomber jacket with a flair of militant coats from the early 1800's.

The only problem with this design is that I would have no idea what color to make the buttons. Contrasting colors just don't look good in my head, while more similar ones just look -blah-. If you have an idea tell me in the comments. I would love your feedback.

In December my (then) future sisters in law and I visited the mall while another relative was getting married in the Salt Lake Temple. We visited the Disney store which provided a remarkable amount of entertainment for our age range. Bethany and Elizabeth both exclaimed on how they would like to have the amazing princess dresses, but in their own size.

These are the resulting designs.

This dress is mainly based off of Bell's princess dress, she's Bethany's favorite princess so I figured it would be a good place to start. The concept is similar to this dress on pinterest but with brighter colors. I'm envisioning it in a deep red, but obviously that would be up to Bethany if it ever comes to pass.

I see this dress would be in soft blues and whites and is based off of a Disney play wedding dress*. It was drawn with Elizabeth in mind since that was the play dress she liked the most. It's origin is the reason behind the pinned up train on the back. These are suppose to be outlandish princess dresses after all, there's plenty of room for fun.

Lastly I designed this dress for my friend Stephanie when she told me that she wasn't planning on getting a wedding dress.   Her reason for this being that she didn't really want a dress that she would only wear once, and just couldn't see spending that kind of money. I figured that if this dress became a reality then we could just remove the second layer after the wedding. This would transform it from wedding spectacular to "something that she could wear to church".

Of course, I haven't shown any of theses lovely women the dress designs I made with them in mind. As these doodles were were entirely for my own amusment. Meaning that I could be completely off base on what they would like.

Still, if any of you are interested call me. Mmkay? You can pay for the fabric and I'll do all the fun parts.

On a slightly rambly side note I'm thinking about marketing myself as a cheap seamstress around the BYU bubble.   It would be something that I would really enjoy and it would allow the young woman around here to have the approximate wedding or random formal dress of their dreams.   At the same time it would allow me to get better at this awesome talent.

I'm a little nervous about it though because I continue to make small sloppy mistakes** on each project. I'd hate to do that to someone on their special day. I also wouldn't be able to do any beading which is the big fad right now.

Without putting much thought into it I would probably charge two to three hundred dollars for each formal gown, plus material costs.   This is way cheaper than any wedding dress out there, and incredibly cheap for a custom made dress. I think it could be a viable idea if I really worked for it.

Thoughts?

*which I can no longer find online
**see my previous post

Red Shirt Woes

2013-02-16T14:02:00.000-07:00

I've had this one red shirt hanging out in the back of my closet for as long as I can remember. The body is inexplicably wide while still managing to have sleeves that are just a little bit too short on me.

I wore it quite a bit when I was younger, but a couple years ago I put it away with the intent of adjusting it so it would fit me nicely.

you know... later.

before

after

That day has finally come.

I used this tutorial online by Carly of Chic Steals which was very clear and made the project seem approachable.

However, I didn't give myself enough ease of fit so now the shirt is way too tight.

Of course, I had edited this particular shirt just in time to go to a job interview so I ended up wearing it anyways.

While sitting through the interview I had to pull at the bottom of my shirt to keep the buttons from schrunching together and providing helpful windows into my abdomen. This is particularly funny when you consider the fact that the listing specifically stated that tight clothes would be inappropriate for this job.

We also spent some time in the interview discussing the same fact.

Still, I'm anxious to try this method out again since I think I just need more practice.*

The rest of the interview went well, and I think I'm a good candidate for the job. It would really be a blessing to me because the hours are more consistant (and there are more of them) than the job I have now. It's also less heavy lifting for the same amount of pay.

It's also happens to be at a bookstore**, and two minutes away from my house. Both of these facts rocket this listing into my hopes and dreams for my near future.

*once I get another button-up shirt
** I'm nearly done with my bachelor's degree and one of my ideal jobs is still working at a bookstore,

Bitty Baby Dress Pattern Review

2013-02-12T10:25:00.004-07:00

Last weekend I went to my sister -in -law's baby shower. She's having a baby girl later this month and we're all really happy for her.

I made this dress for the occasion, from my fabric stash. I bought the red floral cotton forever ago in Portland. The satin lining and piping were left over from my wedding dress.

I think it only took about 1/2 a yard of each, so it was totally doable from what I had already.

Click here for the pattern.

I did add a lining to the skirt as well as the bodice, but that wasn't too hard of a modification.

The pattern was really easy to follow, and it only took an afternoon to make.

The only tricky part was sewing the lining to the curvy part of the bodice, I had a hard time keeping my seam allowances even and following the curve on my machine. It was the first time I'd done anything free-form so take that into consideration.

I would give the pattern 5/5 for clarity, and 4/5 for ease. I would recommend it if you're interested.*

*and have an adorable baby to give it to.

My Wedding Dress

2013-02-10T18:13:00.001-07:00

I got married last month. Everything about it was awesome, except for the ovarian cysts, but I suppose that's another story.

Josh and I were mainly able to afford our wedding because of the generous donations of our relatives and other loved ones. I am extremely grateful to them, they made our beautiful day possible.

We were still on a budget though, and in order to go on a honeymoon we couldn't really afford a wedding dress.

So I made my own!

I started out by going dress shopping with various groups of friends. For some reason this was more awkward than I expected. The first thing any employee at a wedding dress shop does is ask you what your price range is. My real life price range was actually about one hundred dollars, but I couldn't actually say that or I would be laughed out of the store.

I settled on the white lie of about 1000 dollars instead. I felt that my skill range for making my own very special knock off was about equal to a 1000 dollar dress. It was still a lie, and that on it's own felt kinda weird.

I also browsed the internet on a variety of sites to get ideas.

Here is the design that I came up with. It is largely inspired by this dress from a relatively cheap knock off site.*

I really like this design because it's fun and flirty. The skirt has the perfect amount of poof to feel special with out drowning me, the bodice is simple but form fitting, and the neckline wasn't square like every other modest wedding dress in the world.

Josh will tell you that I labeled this design the "ballerina fairy princess dress" in my notebook, which quite effectively gets across what I was trying to do with this permutation. Although I only titled it that because I had already drawn a ballerina dress, a princess design, and a fairy-esque dress.**

This was my first time making a pattern from scratch so I checked this book out of the library. I couldn't recommend it highly enough. This book did ninety percent of the work for me, and all that I had to figure out on my own were little leaps in logic.

The dress itself is made up of a simple bodice from the book, there are no darts or anything even slightly complicated like that. The underskirt is exactly the same level of complexity.

The only only interesting bits of the dress are the sleeves and the skirt, both of which were actually really easy once I figured out how I wanted to do them.

Traditional sleeves are shaped like this. I knew that in order to add a little bit of interest to the otherwise plain bodice that I wanted to gather the outer edge of the sleeve. To accomplish this I simply inverted the variables of the shoulder curve, so that the seam would be on the outside.

This is a regular sleeve

This will put the seam on the outside.

To actually do that I simply sliced the pattern in half and then taped it back together the wrong way.

That allowed me to do a gathered seam for the sleeves that turned out way better than I thought they would.

The skirt is actually made up of four layers of tulle, each layer has six panels shaped approximately like this.

The top is 1/5 the size of the Waistline, plus seam allowance

The bottom two layers are the same size, the upper two being progressively shorter. I put them together using french seams, which I think is my new favorite thing with semi-sheer material.

I cannot recommend designing and sewing your own stuff enough. The hardest thing about sewing is figuring out what you need to do.

When you sew your own stuff you can get exactly what you want without having to make any compromises. Every dress I tried on was floor length, had capped sleeves, and a square neckline. My dress didn't have any of those details and I didn't want any of them. My dress was me, it was only that way because I made it.

If you are even thinking about this do it! This is the first time I have sewn a zipper. That should tell you about what skill level I am at.

My dress cost me about two weeks of my time from conception to finish and seventy dollars. In real life this wouldn't have covered alteration costs, or a knock of dress from China.

*so I suppose you could say that I knocked off a knock off dress.
** Why settle for one?