Talking FABRIC.
FEEL FREE TO SKIP THIS IF SEWING BORES YOU TO TEARS!
Last week seemed to be the week for me to find lots of really nice dress fabric. (Apparently the local Goodwill stores don't want to fool around with measuring material out at the cash registers anymore so they've taken to putting odd lots of fabric into clear plastic bags. If you're careful, you can get really good deals on fabric buying their grab bags.)
It started off with me finding this one grab bag with nearly ten yards of this really soft baby twill fabric in a deep green which is more of a deep emerald green rather than an olive drab green the way deep greens so often are. (I'm in love with it!)
Also in this same grab bag of fabric was a shorter length of a paler green with flowers on it and another piece of black fabric of equal length. Both of these fabrics were of the same lighter weight as the deep green and all three reminded me a lot of challis fabric. I paid five dollars for this first bag and also in it were a bunch of quilter's scraps and some knit fabric which I only lately figured out a use for.
Grab bag number two yielded a ten yard length of a medium blue challis-like fabric and two one yard woven cotton fabrics that I like well enough to stick into my scrap blouse pile.
Later in the week I laid hands on some deep green suede cloth that looks as though it will match some patterned suede cloth I already have. It washed up really well; all I need to do now is find where I hid that other suede cloth!
My all cotton flat sheet collection continues to grow. I found two navy blues, a pearl gray, and a brown. (The navy blues are destined to become pillowcase dress-style mu-mu's for next summer.)
My skill with the serger continues to grow!
This week I attempted to sew myself some of what they used to call "tap pants" and sometimes now call "boy shorts". They are also what my mother would narrow up her eyes at and call "bloomers" with a disdainful snort. (LOL!)
I expected this first pair to give me nothing but trouble--especially when it came time to sew the crotch gusset. Actually even that went in easily. It wasn't until later that I realized that I'd put the crotch gusset in at the east-west setting rather than the north-south setting that it should have been put in at. Even so, I had to admire how neatly that infernal gusset had gone in!
Luckily I won't mind throwing this trial pair of tap pants into the trash once I'm done messing with them. Sewing knit fabrics is a good bit different to sewing woven fabrics, so you are going to make mistakes during the learning process no matter how carefully you proceed.
And now it's time for bed--good night!