Sew Wrong

Happy Birthday To Me!


Namaste Cali Bag, originally uploaded by sewwrong.

My birthday gift to myself (heh, which I do every year) came early in the mail yesterday, but I decided to wait and post it until today. Isn’t it gorgeous?? It’s the new Namaste Cali Bag, which came out earlier this year, I believe. I had to wait a little bit for it since Dreamweaver Yarns was completely sold out, but it came just in time for the big day. I absolutely adore the lime color, and it’s so roomy! I only have my Somewhat Cowl knitting project in it in this photo, as well as a couple balls of RYC Cashsoft DK.

Oh, and the photo? Taken with my new digital camera, a gift from the bf 🙂

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Knitting in Biology 101

Had to share this awesome item I found on Etsy yesterday. For those who are too squeamish for dissection:

From CraftyHedgehog

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Kimono Dress

Kimono Dress


Pattern: Simplicity 4072
Size Made: 10 – 14
Fabric: Polyester

Oh Threads, another great pattern from you. It went together ok I guess, but I got really hung up on the midriff band and the directions on how to attach the facing. Made no sense at all, so I omitted it, but I might sew it in my hand if I change my mind. Not only did that bother me, but the ties were made in the most inefficient and time-consuming way possible: hey, let’s press and turn under 1/4″ seam allowance along all the edges and stitch them down. Wtf? It would have been much better to sew two tie pieces together RSF, turn the tie right side out and voila. The tie would be done. And I should have altered the pattern to raise the neckline since it’s a bit revealing, meaning you can see inside. But oh well, I just wear a cami underneath it instead.

I wore it out today and it was so nice to not have to fuss with a strapless bra, like I usually do with most of my spring/summer dresses.

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The Dress is Dead?

Article from the New York Times (might have to sign up to view)

While the big-shots of the fashion world have declared that as of the end of August the dress will be “out”, (And pants will be the new “it” item. How exciting.) I will still be parading around in my dresses, like many of the girls I see on campus on a daily basis. What’s funny is that there are quotes from retail analysts and consultants saying that they believed 2007 to be the year of the dress, and that sales of dresses have been growing steadily since then. I know when I was an intern last summer at Big National Department Store Chain, the dress department in our store always performed the best in terms of sales in the entire Women’s division, even performing better than all the stores in our district. When the first warm day of the year rolled around last week, if you were on campus or downtown didn’t have a dress on, you stuck out.

I think women are having fun with the dress, and I don’t see them letting go anytime soon for a pair of boring, masculine trousers. Sure, pants are great for fall and winter, since it’s usually too cool to bare one’s legs to the elements and probably when it gets too cold my dresses will go to the back of my closet. But for now, I’m savoring my dressesl

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Mini Wardrobe Contest

So the sewing bug has bitten me pretty hard lately. I’ve always been an on-again-off-again sewer, only sewing when the need for something I couldn’t find in the store struck me (or when I went through my LOTR costume phase in high school, eep). Honestly, I’ll blame this newfound love for sewing on Project Runway. This season inspired me so much more than the previous seasons, probably because the designers were of a higher caliber, the clothes were better, and the winner is the exact same age as me. And now that I finally have my machine up at school with me (and I have absolutely no work to do for my final semester of college), I’ve been stitching up a storm. Which brings me to the Pattern Review Mini Wardrobe Contest for May.


The contest is simple: create two tops and two bottoms/three tops and a bottom/two tops, a dress, and a bottom between May 1 and May 31. So far, I’ve narrowed down my color palette. I originally wanted to do a blue and white palette for this challenge, but I had a really hard time finiding any blues that I liked. So, I’m doing a coral, white, and black palette instead, with all the fabric swatches above from Gorgeous Fabrics. I’m not 100% committed to all of the fabrics since they’re a little on the pricey side.

I’ve narrowed my pieces down to three possible pieces I want to do. The dress is Simplicity 3678, the top and pants are from Simplicity 2925 (I’m working on the dress from that pattern as we speak). That just leaves that lonely little flower knit. The dress is already a knit, and I’ve never worked with knits before, so I don’t know if undertaking two knit projects is do-able. I love the flower pattern, but the dotty one looks better with the other two fabrics. So I’ll either find another pattern for a knit top, or switch that fabric out and get a solid black fabric to do a jacket or another top. Or scrap the dress, use the dotty fabric for a knit top and whip up a pair of flowy black pants. Decisions decisions!

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