In the Summer Dresses e-course right now, we’re making the Drawstring Shift, and using continuous bias tape  to finish off the armholes and neckline.  While I was preparing a video to guide them through applying their bias tape, I thought I’d shoot some video of the CBT–that’s Continuous Bias Tape–method I use and share that with all of you!  This is a longer video than I almost ever make, but I wanted to be sure to go into detail and really walk you through not just HOW to make it, but WHY it works and WHAT to look out for as you’re walking through the steps.  Hope you love it!

I’ve been planning an all-yellow Scrappy Trip-Along since I was about…oh, I don’t know…three blocks into my first Scrappy Trip-Along.  And it has begun!  I’m doing as little editing as my controlling brain will permit, and am hoping for a lovely outcome.  It’s hard for me to not think about what fabric will touch what other fabric and then pick and choose, but I’m doing my summertime darndest.  The yellow itself–all the shades that will appear in the finished quilt–is so lemony delicious, and makes me want to be outside with cool breezes.  We just ordered a yellow umbrella for the back deck, to go over the picnic table and protect my skin and the skin of my pasty children; I’m hoping that I’ll be able to use this out there and have the two complement one another in a very Martha way.  It’ll be like a sunny explosion on warm evenings when we’re waiting for the fireflies to come out.

I’ve been planning drapes for the master bedroom, on the other hand, since before we moved into this house, which if you’re keeping track is about 19 months now.  And my poor husband all but begged me to bump them up the list and make them sooner, as the lack of privacy (despite the fact that our bedroom windows face out onto a private yard surrounded by tall bushes and trees and can be visible to absolutely no one other than Google and the government) was really harshing his mellow.  I had a PLAN, y’all.  I knew just what I wanted them to be.  And so, just in time for his birthday, I did the only thing a loving wife could possibly do: I went to Ikea and bought them.  Yes, I did.  Not because I don’t want the drapes to be just what I envisioned, but because sometimes the greater act of love is knowing when to say, “Enough already, I’d rather you be happy than I be right.”  Happy birthday, honey.

I spent an absurd amount of time this week–read: close to two full days–doing nothing but culling my fabric shelves and organizing the dining-room-now-studio where I’m working these days.  Part of that meant pulling fat quarter and half yard bundles off these shelves that have been waiting their turn too long and packing them in a box to head downstairs.  I think the sheer volume of fabric was making me feel overwhelmed, and so I wasn’t sewing ANYTHING because there were just too many things that were waiting to be sewn.  I’m thinking, if I work through what’s on the shelves right now, whatever I haven’t gotten to in a year can probably be sold or donated.  Who knows?  Maybe some of it will skyrocket in value like old Heather Ross prints on eBay.  For now, I’ve made a basket of yardage destined to be garments this summer and given them eye-level placement on the shelf nearest my sewing machine, to encourage me to think of them and work my way to the bottom of the basket.  (If I’d been smart, I would have hidden a $50 bill down there and gone to get shoes when I finish–or a hot massage.)

As I was sewing samples for my Summer Dresses e-course, I made this one from Robert Kaufman chambray in a maxi version.  It is very possibly my favorite dress to wear that I have ever made.  I know this because I have worn it no fewer than seven times in the two weeks since I put the hem in place.  Right this very second, it is waiting to be washed and pressed (yes, I will press it! because love means pressing!) and then worn yet again with the sandals I bought at Target the day before I made this and to which I purposely matched the fabric for the drawstring casing.  Hello, summer.  You’re a dress.

Wow.  I can’t wait to see what next week brings, y’all.

A little randomly, at some point over the past year I decided to challenge myself and see how long I could go sewing with only white thread.  I know: that really goes beyond nerdy and gets into “slightly weird” territory.  Still, I was curious and thought it would be a funny goal to set for myself.  I didn’t keep strict, scientific track, but I know I went a solid six weeks-ish without swapping out my bobbin for another color.  Somehow, it felt like a victory.  I sewed quilts, mostly, but some garments and tote bags and home dec, too.  I think white or cream is always my default for piecing, so the quilts aren’t really a surprise, but even I was startled by how often white would work for interior seams on a garment or even hemming and topstitching–maybe I was just using a lot of light fabrics.

Some might call this lazy.  I don’t think I was being lazy–it wasn’t about being unwilling to wind a bobbin or thread the machine, since I had to do that, anyway, when I re-loaded with more white.  (It isn’t as though I made an entire spool last that long, after all.)  Some might call it irresponsible, saying that a “good seamstress” would always, always, always take the time to load the machine with matching thread.  I must not be a “good” seamstress, then, because I know for a stone cold fact that I haven’t used anything but white in my serger for years.  Plural.

I think it’s fun to mix things up here and there, which maybe this is.  I also think that it’s completely acceptable to break rules so long as you know why the rule is there in the first place.  I have always argued that the most important thing a teacher can communicate to students is WHY you do things, rather than simply WHAT you do.  If there isn’t a firm reason for me to sew with a thread color other than white, why should I bother?  Honestly, I buy white in spools of 1000 yards, so I really do always have it on hand.  Might as well, right?

Not every day is perfect.  Not every sewing project is perfect.  Not every season of our lives feels perfect, and frequently, we feel as though nothing we will ever do will get us one step closer to being perfect people.  There was something rebellious in sewing with only white thread for a while, something that made me feel like I was saying, “Fine, then!  I won’t BE perfect!”  A little Huck Finn going to hell, if you will.

And now, sewing with a matching thread, taking spools out into the light to match the colors exactly, I don’t feel that I’m on a hamster wheel, struggling to keep up and prove that I’m a “good” seamstress or doing it “right.”  I feel more like, because I have my teeny little rebellion under my belt, I am doing it because I choose to.  That my feet are on a path of wanting, not having to.  And the sewing is that much sweeter, like summer blooms wafting by on the breeze.  All hail the simple power of white thread.

Peaceful and relaxed.  That driving was insane, so many hours and so much frustration and so much SITTING STILL.  I did the math the other day and I have been driving an 8-mile-plus school run twice a day for the past FIVE years, which amounts to an average of two hours a day, 190 days a year, or a total of 1900 HOURS of driving back and forth.  Last year, it was so bad that I didn’t even think a daily schedule that looked like this was all that unusual.  I have since changed my mind.  I’m ready for a New Normal.

We are in full summer mode over here, and I am feeling the healing seeping in.  Something about having more time makes all the best ideas come to the surface, and I love, love, love the freedom to get a wild hair and go chasing after it, just to see what magical thing will arise.  That’s how I’ll be spending most of my summer, y’all–soaking in the sun and letting ideas percolate.  Getting the balance back.  More recreation.  More pretty dresses.  Better housekeeping.  More love.  Looking people in the eye and making new friends.  Hosting cook-outs and learning to be a better neighbor.  Sewing up a storm and not worrying if it takes a few tries to tweak it just right.  Folding and re-folding my fabrics, and then finally cutting into the ones I’ve been saving for the perfect time.

The perfect time is always today, you guys.  Today is rocking out.

There are still just a few spots left!  And I’m so pooped from the travel and the unpacking that I haven’t bothered to adjust the Early Bird price back up to the regular price.  If you hop on over and register today, you’ll probably slip in under the wire.  I really, really hope you’ll be part of the class–I am over the moon excited about these patterns, and have made some cool updates to the class interface that are going to make this the best online class I’ve taught so far!  All the details and the button for registration are on the Summer Dresses e-course page.  Can’t wait to see what you’ll make!

Details: Robert Kaufman Essex linen in natural (NOT the wide, because I wanted a seam in this one).  Seams set off asymmetrically, one low down the quilt, the other off to the right.  Twin-size bed quilt for our son.  Back is pieced strips in shades of blue.  Will be hand-quilted in navy #8 pearl cotton.  I’ll be working on this while the littlest has her tumbling camp this summer, in part because the camp is held in a freeeezing cold gymnasium, and in part because I am terrified of some freaky neck injury to my three-year-old.  Which is hugely statistically unlikely, but we’re all a little crazy about something.

Check back on this project in three months–am hoping this beauty will be done by then!

In order for the baby to move out of her bed, our boy had to move up from the toddler bed.  It went something like this: boy from toddler bed to big boy bed; baby from crib to toddler bed; crib to Goodwill.  We’re all growing up around here.  I left for Quilt Market last week, and our son decided I was going away to get his Big Boy Bed.  I did not disabuse him of this idea, since it made him much more willing to let me head out of town–but getting that mattress into the overhead bin was a bear, I’ll tell you what.

His room has needed a little more transformation since we moved into this house than some of the others.  When we first bought, it was remarkably ugly:

All the bedrooms had full carpet–which was at a bare minimum a solid 35 years old and seriously skanky.  There was a single room in the entire house that didn’t have wallpaper or bifold doors or both; this room, regrettably, had both.

Based on the decor, I can only infer that this was meant to be a boys’ room in the early 1980s.  The trim is all glossy, GLOSSY navy blue, the wallpaper is accompanied by a “masculine” floral border, and there is RIBBON glued where the two meet.  RIBBON.

See it there, below the floral border?  My mother and I started taking it off, and it was nearly one continuous piece of ribbon around the entire room.  GLUED ON.  Heaven help us.

Before we moved in, we painted over the wallpaper, as we did in every other room in the house--we tried to remove the wallpaper in one room, but it appears to have been glued directly to the wallboard, and there was no way on this planet it was ever coming off.  So: two coats of oil-based primer followed by three coats of paint.  But that first winter, there was this really odd smell coming from that one room–sort of mildew-y, sort of chemical-y, something undefinable.  We didn’t smell anything remotely like it in any other room, and it made me nervous–like, I didn’t let my son sleep there with the door closed, nervous.  Since we knew there was some mold issue somewhere in the house, and that we’d discovered some discolored wood in the flooring beneath the carpet when we removed it, we suspected the wall between the bedroom and the jack-and-jill bathroom might have some mold damage, we decided to take that wall out.  Which made sense, since that’s where we put the pocket door to make the bathroom bigger.  All this to say: we also took the walls in his bedroom down to studs and replaced the drywall throughout:

We never did find an obvious source for the odor, but it completely went away, so it must have been lurking there somewhere.

After the walls were re-done and the bathroom completed, we re-painted the same awesome jalapeno pepper green that we’d done before–along with the sky blue ceiling that I thought he’d enjoy during his little boy years.

This was his room before I “went to Portland” to get his big boy bed.  The same toddler bed his sister used, along with the Ikea changing table/dresser that we bought for the baby when we lived in our last house and she slept in the closet.

He also has his train table–purchased as his only Christmas gift two years ago from Craig’s List, along with a huge selection of trains and tracks, for $100–and a play rug from Ikea.  There’s a bookcase in the corner that was my husband’s in college.

When we planned to bring in a new bed, I knew I needed to update a number of things, and now we’re at the starting end of that list.  Here’s what’s left to do:

We already have the new dresser, along with a matching bed side table, waiting in the garage to paint. I’m going with a linen natural color, and his new quilt will be natural linen, as well, with some sashiko quilting a la the whole quilt project in Stitch Savvy and the work of Folk Fibers. The book nook in the closet will get a smaller bookcase from his sisters’ room (they’ll swap with him) and a Rollie Pollie using Dana’s pattern. The bed skirt will be Kona pacific, which is what I thought I’d use to extend the drapes, but I want to avoid anything being too matchy-matchy, so I’m currently hunting the perfect yellow-orange-but-not-too-orange school bus solid cotton to add as a pop throughout the room, including as a skinny border on the curtains and Roman shade. We already have a collection of vintage travel postcards sent back by my husband’s grandparents from when they traveled in the 60s and 70s, which will go in frames on one side of his wall.

Now it’s just a matter of finding the time! Hubs will split a gut if I do a lick of work in this room before sewing some drapes for the master bedroom–it’s only been 18 months, I really don’t know what he’s all worked up about. So expect an update on that room before we move the bus on this one, y’all. Wish me luck!

On my cutting table right now.  I am back from Quilt Market (photos on my Instagram) and working on a sample of the Modern Babydoll Dress for my Summer Dresses e-course.  I’m working my way through all the variations I’ve dreamed up so I can share them with my class, and it’s giving me an excuse to cut into some fabrics I would otherwise have hoarded for…oh, I don’t know, FOREVER.  Like this double-gauze, which is delicious like butter.  I’m getting ready to add the bias tape treatment to the neckline, using a really obnoxious yellow quilting cotton that just happens to match flawlessly.

Almost every version of this dress I have made so far has all French seams, and they are so fun to play with.  In a fabric with this weight, they’re such a perfect option, since it ravels so easily and is so lightweight.  Just perfect for summer.  And making me so glad I didn’t try to stuff this fabric into my (already overflowing) cabinet and never ever use it–so much funner to sew with it and get to show it off by wearing it, rather than keeping it locked up and forgotten.

What fabric have you been hoarding shamelessly all this time, wanting to cut into it but not quite being able to bring yourself to do it?  What would it take for you to finally take the plunge?  It would be totally fun to jump off the cliff together and have a gorgeous *something* to show for it later!

Hooray!!  Registration is finally OPEN for the Summer Dresses online class.  I am beside myself, I am so digging on these dresses and everything I have planned.  These are three original patterns that I have been working on for months now–and I can’t wait to sew them with you!  Three very different shapes: a babydoll dress with a slightly raised waist and a V-neck in the back, all over a gathered skirt; an A-line with a yoked collar that buttons on the side; and a racerback shift with a drawstring that looks great in any fabric.  I love them ALL and will be showcasing more details of each one over the coming weeks–lots of variations and fun ideas of things to do with these patterns!

In the meantime, get yourself over to the Summer Dresses e-course page and get registered.  I am thrilled and flattered to say that lots of folks have already told me they’re really excited to join the class, and I’d love to see you there before it fills up!  Need some added incentive?  I’m bringing back the Early Bird Discount: just $99 before May 25.  See you soon!

I have been on an insane cross stitch kick lately. It all started with this one, which was a gift to me from a friend. We’d had this conversation on the Twitters, and she tweeted the quote above, and I replied, “I’m going to need that on a cross stitch.” And she said she’d make it for me! Which is awesome and is totally the way that Twitter works–it let me meet Tony Danza, it has allowed me to keep in touch with some of my dear friends who I see only once or twice a year, and now it got me a cross stitch, custom made. Woot! But I didn’t want to let her do something for me and do nothing in return, so I offered to do a trade. I had already gone on a shopping binge over at Kitschy Digitals and picked up a number of fabulously nerdy cross stitch designs, and mentioned I had a Star Wars one. Reply: “Done.”

So I’ve been working on this one for a few weeks:

How great is that, right?  My husband is more than a little perturbed that this isn’t for him and his Mantuary (never mind that the Mantuary will be in the basement which is currently on the schedule to be finished in 2020).  He and I both also think that I should make one for his dad, whose call sign when he was a pilot in Vietnam was Skywalker, and who now owns a shaggy yellow lab named Wookie.  But this one is very specially ear-marked for Al, and I am soooo excited to see it nearing completion.

Like all good obsessions, though, I couldn’t settle for just one.  I’ve accumulated a number of very most favorite cross stitch pattern shops in the past weeks (see links below), and have started to sew out the designs that are calling me the loudest.  Like this one:

Can you stand it??  Sherlock is my Holmes boy!  On an oatmeal-colored 14 count Aida, with the text and border in navy.  I love this one, but made it for my friend Amanda, who took me with her to meet Tony Danza (via Twitter).  She offered me the chance of a lifetime, the least I could do was a little cross stitch!  I put a photo up on Instagram and someone commented that she would never finish a cross stitch–but this one really WAS easy.  Lots of simple, straight filling in, very clear pattern, uncomplicated shape.  I did this off and on one weekend while I was under the weather with a pollen-induced sinus headache–and if I can knock this out under those circumstances, baby, ANYONE can.

I’ve spent some time playing with various sizes of base cloth, too, and with how many strands of floss to use.  The Star Wars is done with all six strands of floss held together, and I really love the knobby texture that gives, but I won’t pretend that it hasn’t slowed me down–notice it was the first I started and still is incomplete.  So for the Sherlock piece, I went down to three strands held together, with two strands for the backstitch (on the smaller text and on the skinnier border).  Both are done on the same 14 count Aida cloth, so it was really cool to note the difference in how they turned out.  Then, on this fabulously obliquely-referencing-Doctor-Who one, I got the pattern and was a little disappointed with how small the finished product was going to be.  At first I thought, “Crap, now I’m going to have to blow the whole thing up and make it bigger if I want a pillow.”  But then I realized I could just sew it out on a larger-scale Aida.  So this is done on 6 count Aida, the largest scale I could find.  The “count” is the number of squares per inch in the fabric–so the 14 count is very small spacing between the Xs you’re stitching, and the 6 is naturally much larger:

I went ahead and used all six strands held together on this one, too, because I like my Xs to really fill up that box and have some presence.  With something this huge, that would’ve been tough with only two or three strands.  I also used a slightly larger needle, and varied my technique a bit–on the 14 count, I have to put the needle in the fabric, then reach around from behind the hoop and pull it through.  On this giant 6 count, I was able to put the tip of the needle in one opening, then out the destination opening, all from the front of the fabric and with no hoop–the larger squares made the surface more flexible and easier to work with that way.  I’m not sure which is the “correct” way to cross stitch–my lessons with Grandma Miriam amounted to making all my slashes in the same direction across a row and then working back going the opposite direction, and after that I was on my own–but I enjoyed playing with more than one technique.

And how fun are these patterns?  I realize now that I’m assembling all the images together that they’re ALL nerd-centric, but I own that, with no apology.  Love me some Doctor Who and Sherlock and Star Wars.  And Harry Potter:

This one is a graduation gift for my oldest, who is finishing up her final year of high school THIS MONTH.  Have I mentioned that?  Yes, I think I have.  Sigh.  They grow up so fast.

She and I both love Harry Potter, and “Lumos!” seems like an appropriate message for a girl heading off to her new intellectual life on a college campus.  Or at least, a hope from a mother that her child will walk into the light while she’s on that college campus.  Oy.

Plus!  This one’s done in glow-in-the-dark floss!  Which is totally cool:

And it really does glow, too.  Pretty well.  It’s a BEAR to work with, and tangles easily and is hard to thread through the eye of the needle–and makes a lot of my stitches less tidy than I would like–but when I take it into the closet and close the door to check that it really does do what it says it will do, it DOES.  This one will be a pillow for her to put on her bed in her dorm–which I think she will.  She and I both believe in separating the wheat from the chaff when it comes to friends, and any kid who doesn’t think a Harry Potter pillow that glows in the dark is cool probably won’t make the cut.  Fair enough.

Should you be looking for some cross stitch designs of your own, check out these fabulous shops–I have purchased one or more designs from each of them over the past six weeks and been really pleased with the quality and speed of delivery:

And for supplies, I’ve had great success with Everything Cross Stitch.  Their patterns are a good bit more matronly and traditional than what I would probably stitch up, but their pricing on floss, needles, and accessories is great and they ship really quickly.  For a hoop, like the one in the Lumos project above, I use the Q-snap frame, like Anna Maria does.  You can get one from your local quilt shop (lots of them carry these frames for hand quilting–I use the 17″ x 17″ for that), or from Amazon, CrossStitchers.com or CreateForLess–I’m using the 11″ x 11″ in these photos, but the 8″ x 8″ is a great size, too.

Have fun cross stitching, y’all!  I’m off to see if I can’t get R2D2 some lights going…