Posted on 18 Comments

I love it when he rips his pants

New skirt

Yep, another knee blown out, another skirt for me. Woo hoo! Neil came home from Capclave Sunday night with the news that he’d worn through the knee on another pair of pants. I’m sorry for his wardrobe’s loss, but I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t good news for my wardrobe. I know I just made one of these skirts, but there are differences. This one is a better fit, but the other one is softer and more broken-in. Colorwise, Neil will tell you this one is light gray and the other is a brownish green. It’s all gray-green to me, frankly, and as such I am thinking of throwing this one in a tub of dye and seeing what comes out. I’m not sure what color I want to try yet, but I’m thinking something absurd like red or purple. I think it would have a neat effect of turning the skirt mostly brown, but with highlights of red or purple where there are faded parts. Rest assured I will keep you posted on what happens there. I wouldn’t want you to lose any sleep over it…

Oh, and if any of you know what causes this highly-frustrating problem when sewing, I’d love some guidance.

New apron

I decided yesterday that I just wasn’t happy with the fall apron I’d designed for myself, and I wanted to go back to the style I love, based on the one in Simple Sewing. It is the first thing I ever sewed and it’s still by far my favorite apron design. You don’t really want to know why I didn’t make one like this in the first place, do you? Or how I came to own two new pieces of Fall Back in Time fabric so that I could make this new apron to match my napkins? I typed it all out and it bored even me. So I’m skipping it, and you can fill in your own interesting back-story, if you’re so inclined.

Anyway, I’m really happy with this new apron – love the colors. And if you were a fan of the old apron, I’ve listed it on Etsy along with three others I’ve decided I won’t be wearing. I’ve got this weird hang-up now that will only let me use an apron that matches my napkins. It’s an illness.

New fabric

Speaking of napkins, I just got the fabric for my last* set, including a little bit extra for the obligatory matching apron, of course!  This is from Moda’s Christmas Past collection.  And I must have had temporary insanity when I bought these, because I accidentally bought twice as many half-yards as I need.  Duh.  A half yard can make 3 napkins, but I usually make two and use the leftover piece for other projects.  Wanting 20 napkins, I bought 20 prints, but I only needed 10!  So now I need this new book so I can figure out how to turn the leftovers into Christmas gifts.  Heh.

* Last set of napkins for my family. I do have a napkin set in the works that will be a gift, and I reserve the right to make a few sets for Etsy, if I so desire.  Heh.

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Posted on 18 Comments

18 thoughts on “I love it when he rips his pants

  1. The skirt looks great and I love that you recycled your husband’s pants to make it. The apron is lovely and that stack of fabric certainly promised some fun ahead.

    1. Thanks – I’m having fun repurposing his cast-offs!

  2. Lisa….adjust your tension. when you sew with different weight materials you will sometimes have to change the tension. Use some scrap material to see which way to adjust it.

    1. That seems to be a consensus. I’ll give it a try next time it happens. Thanks!

  3. Your husband’s loss is certainly your gain!

    The sewing issue you’re having is related to tension and your bobbin. Sometimes if your bobbin isn’t threaded properly in your machine that will happen. When that happens to me, I remove the thread and the bobbin and re-thread my machine. That usually does the trick, but you may need to adjust your tension too.

    And I love your new fabrics, they are great!

    1. I tried changing the needle, rethreading the machine, and finally switching to a different thread before it worked. Frustrating!

  4. Lisa, I am aways amazed with what you do in a day! LOL!! Where do you find the time???? especially with two kiddos!
    Just wanted to pop in and say that I really am enjoying your blog… Find myself smiling a lot when I do pop in!

    1. Where do I find the time? Hmm, well, I have one kid in school almost all day, and another one who is addicted to TV. Plus I don’t bother cleaning my house. LOL!

      In all seriousness, I am a *really* fast worker. I just squeeze it in where I can and I try not to do projects that will take more than an hour, unless it’s a weekend. And I’m afraid I do neglect the housework if I have a really cool project in mind…

  5. How on earth do you DO IT??? I’m in awe, Lisa, I really am. That skirt is the bomb. Ummm, do people still say that? But it is.

    I don’t think I’d fit into anything made out of Karl’s pants these days. Sigh.

    The skirts have been so cool… everything you make is so cool. And of course I thought of you last week when we made the first batch of pumpkin bread, too.

    After posting all about my clothing issues, I went out and bought not one but TWO new black sweaters. I realized that my old cotton ones were now 4 and 5 years old, and they looked it. Plus I’ve gained a bit of weight lately (all that pumpkin bread), and honestly, I needed to go up a size. Now I just need to MAKE some interesting skirts. I’m inspired by your cool clothes.

    Hugs to you.

    1. I find it funny how you, whose to-do list is the longest one I’ve ever heard, can think I do a lot. Seriously! You always amaze me with your ability to do so much in a day. Me? I just do projects that I can whip out in under an hour, and I work in whatever medium I currently have set up in the dining room. Right now my sewing machine and ironing board are out, so I have been able to do a lot of quick sewing projects when I feel creative. At some point, when I have the pasta machine and clay tools out, I’ll get back into making necklaces and earrings when I feel creative 🙂

      Making skirts is SO easy. You should go for it! And with black sweaters, you can pretty much make a skirt in any pattern or color, and it’ll go nicely.

  6. Other stuff that could be causing it:

    Thread coming out of take-up lever.
    Bobbin thread not pulled up through throat plate before beginning to stitch.
    Needle part-way up at beginning of stitch.

    Jamming like that is more likely to be related to one of these than to tension.

    1. Thanks for the suggestions. I’ll file them away for the next time it happens. Having a list of things to look for is so much more productive than the grumbling and cursing I was doing yesterday 😉

      1. Yeah, they don’t tell you these things in the sewing machine manual.

  7. How big do you make your napkins? Do you just hem the edges? You always show pictures of them all nicely folded up.

    If my machine does things like that with the bobbin thread I usually can fix it by re-threading the machine.

    I too am amazed at how much you can get done in a day. I am lucky if I get an hour a day to work on projects. Of course, if I didn’t read all these great blogs I’d have a wee bit more time. 🙂

    1. I made my first napkin out of a scrap and have based the dimensions of all future napkins on that. I cut pieces 18×13.5 and just hem the edges.

      It does look like I am pretty prolific, doesn’t it? I guess I just have a knack for picking quick projects that only take me an hour or less. Minimum effort, maximum impact, LOL! I really do just squeeze it in wherever it’ll fit. And if it means the dishes have to wait an extra day to be washed, well, that *does* happen 😉

  8. Strangely enough, I WILL lose sleep over what happens when you dye your new skirt! Be sure and share. I really enjoy reading about your sewing adventures and I don’t even like to sew!

    1. Heh, well then I guess I’d better hurry up and do something with it 🙂

  9. […] it’s about eight-and-a-half months too late… Last October I bought prints from Moda’s Christmas Past collection to make the above […]

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