Lots of Teaching

I haven’t had a lot to write about lately. The most exciting thing that has happened in the past few days is that I went to Missoula yesterday to teach a serger mastery class. I had five students, all of whom were new owners of the Bernina L890 sergers.

The weather has been great here, so the drive down was uneventful and the scenery was lovely. Traffic was very light. At times, I was the only one on the road for several miles. I didn’t do a lot of shopping either before or after class; immediately after class, I went to MVD Express to renew the registrations on the two of the work trucks. I couldn’t do it through the Flathead County website because there was an issue with the vehicle weights being incorrect. I didn’t want to have to go in to the county office in person because the wait is always so long. MVD Express was able to correct the weights and run the renewals. We now have the option—which I chose—to renew for two years.

I stopped in at Hobby Lobby to get a few more class supplies, then popped in to Barnes and Noble where I picked up this gem:

I have The Sewing Book by the same author and have found it very useful.

And that was it. I didn’t even stop at the Amish store for ice cream on the way home because it was too late.

The husband’s work schedule has been light, so he’s been here doing maintenance on trucks, trailers, and equipment. Of course, when he’s here, he’s a Shiny Toy and I get distracted. He’s going to be out on a jobsite today, which will make it easier for me to concentrate. 🤓

I’m hoping to finish class prep soon. I’d like to be able to make a few new tops or pants to wear to Sew Expo. I am waiting to find out what the weather is going to do that week. Typically, it’s cold and rainy, but this has been a strange winter. My biggest concern is getting over the passes and back. I’m planning to visit DD#1 before Sew Expo and DD#2 after Sew Expo.

The week after Sew Expo marks the beginning of spring in my brain, even if the weather says otherwise. The husband and I need to have a farm meeting soon. I’ve got people asking about pork and we need to make a list of infrastructure projects. I would like to be able to pay better attention to the garden this year. Everything will flow better with planning.

Organized Fabric Cutting

I put my new shelving unit together on Thursday and organized all my Accuquilt dies:

The cutter sits on that table to the left. This will make fabric cutting much more efficient.

The husband and I need to move furniture around today. Some pieces have to go over to the rental house, and he has an old rolltop desk that belonged to his grandfather that we want to put in the living room.

The rental house needs some work, and those projects are on the husband’s list of tasks for the spring. A tree came through the roof last year and into one of the bedrooms, so that ceiling needs to be patched and repainted. The deck also has to come off and be replaced.

I spent the rest of Thursday making class samples for my Sew Expo serger class. I wish they had given me a longer class period, because 90 minutes isn’t going to be long enough to teach everything I want to teach. I am pretty sure I asked for a 2-1/2 hour slot in my class proposal. I am including everything in the handout anyway, with the caveat that if students want to try certain techniques outside of class, they will be able to do so with the materials included in the kit. I will be putting kits together this week. The handout is written.

I taught a class on the Tremont Jacket yesterday. The Tremont was the pink and black plaid jacket that I made from the Ann Maria triple-gauze fabric. I had three students:

We had a fun time. I also left the finished McCall’s 8636 pants at the store. That class is on the calendar for April.

I’ll be heading to Missoula this week to teach a serger mastery class at the Bernina dealer there. Hopefully, I’ll have a chance to stop in at The Confident Stitch, too. It’s been a while since I’ve been to Missoula.

And it’s probably time to order seeds.

People, Places, and Things

I’ve gotten to talk to some really interesting people in the sewing world this week. Yesterday, I did an interview with Tricia Camacho, the guiding force behind Patterncon, which will be held August 1-2, 2026 in Atlanta. I would love to go to Patterncon, but I may not be able to make it happen this year. Kenneth King, Cornelius Quiring, and Saremy Duffy—all of whom have been guests on the podcast—are slated to teach.

Yesterday afternoon, I made a visit to The Making Place in Columbia Falls, MT.

Their board president, Justin Barry, was the guest on this week’s episode of the podcast. The Making Place is a hub for creative people to gather, borrow tools, learn, and create. I told Justin that if he has a wish list of sewing supplies they would like to have, I will be happy to raid my stash for duplicates. I think this is a wonderful program and it has a bright future ahead of it.

I also sent my résumé off to a contact at Bernina. The two Bernina educators who used to teach Bernina events here in the Pacific Northwest are no longer doing so and I have been wondering if that position might be a good fit. I wouldn’t want to travel as much as some of the educators do. Some of them are on the road every weekend to all parts of the country. But I am back and forth to Washington state so much that adding few extra teaching gigs might work. We’ll see.

The husband and I had a conversation the other night about plans for 2026. Two of our employees gave their notice in January because they want to become independent contractors. That leaves the husband with one full-time guy—who is very good—and a high school senior whose availability is hit-and-miss until graduation in June.

Personally, I suspect the two guys may come back asking for jobs again once they realize how much work is involved with being ICs. The husband told one of them that it’s basically the difference between working 40 hours a week for someone else and working 60 hours a week for yourself. And neither of them has a Janet to handle the paperwork end of things.

The husband will continue to build up his concrete-cutting business because he doesn’t need employees for that.

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I finished the McCall’s 8636 pants!

This was a very enjoyable project and I still think it would make a great class.

I made buttonholes for the twill tape tie, which I have to get.

I had 1" twill tape but I need 1/2" tape. I also could have matched the thread a bit more closely to the color of the pants, but I was using what I had on hand.

Today’s tasks include putting together a shelving unit to take the place of the blanket chest in DD#1’s room. I got it to hold all of my Accuquilt cutting supplies. Speaking of Accuquilt, I ordered a 2-1/2" strip die for my Studio cutter back in November when they were on sale. It never arrived and apparently, I forgot I ordered it. The Studio dies went on sale again at the beginning of January, and I thought to myself, “Hmmm, I really should order that 2-1/2" strip die because I need one.” I placed the order, then happened to look at my order history and saw that the November order was still open and marked “processing” so I contacted Accuquilt and asked them to cancel one of the orders.

I got a response saying that they couldn’t do that because they had started working with a new supplier in China, which was the reason the November order hasn’t been filled. So I will be receiving two 2-1/2" strip cutters (eventually). They won’t take a return, either. Their idea of a “refund” is to give me award points equal to the cost of the second die.

I’m not very happy with them right now. I never got any communication about the November order or the reason for the delay. I’ll be able to sell the second die, certainly, but having to do so is a hassle.

Oh, How I Love Deadlines

I am very motivated by deadlines. I prefer the ones that I impose upon myself, but external ones are good, too. Now that the payroll stuff has been filed, getting classes ready for Sew Expo has taken priority over everything else. Two of them are ones I have taught before, but two are new and need samples, handouts, and kits.

I usually start prepping for a new class by doing the sewing version of a literature review. What techniques are already out there and have I mastered them enough to teach them? For my cording foot class, I began with Bernina’s wonderful series of videos on individual presser feet. Doris Brechbühl, a member of Bernina’s European staff, hosts these videos. Doris was at BU in Salt Lake City. I also checked to see if Gail Yellen had done any videos on specific techniques. All of these resources go into a list at the end of the handout.

This process is great for revealing potential pitfalls. I’ve already run into one with the cording foot class. When I searched for “cording foot,” a lot of information came up for piping feet, instead. Bernina and Janome have specific cording feet for their machines, which are separate from their piping feet. BabyLock uses the terms piping and cording interchangeably and—as far as I can tell—they only have a piping foot, not a cording foot, but they call it a cording foot.

No confusion there. I hope that people don’t sign up for this class expecting me to teach them creative ways to do piping. 🫤

The next step, once I’ve identified what I want to cover in the class, is to make samples. This gives the students something to hold and examine, but it also lets me note any tips I want to share. When I did the shoelace class a couple of weeks ago, I made about a dozen shoelaces in the process of figuring out the best way to feed the fabric into the machine on the second pass because the first pass left a point on the fabric that didn’t feed well. (I used a stabilizer.) That helped cut down frustration in class.

Prepping new class materials is a lot of work, but it’s work I rather enjoy.

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My friend Elaine asked me if I would repair a coat for her. It belonged to her dad—I knew him and thought very highly of him—and she wants to keep using it. Save for the hole that needs to be patched, there is nothing wrong with the coat. In fact, it is very heavy and warm. The husband and I were admiring it last night. We think the fleece is real, not synthetic. Too bad no one makes coats like this any longer.

Elaine provided a piece of heavy denim that I will sew over the hole using the Juki industrial. She doesn’t mind if the stitching shows on the outside. Were I a better seamstress with more time, I might consider re-lining the entire coat, but that’s a bigger job than I want to tackle. This is on the list for tomorrow. Today, I am teaching a machine mastery class.

And the husband informed me last night that I need to re-upholster the seat for the golf cart. He bought that golf cart from a neighbor down the road and has completely tricked it out. It has off-road tires, a new clutch cable, a new battery, a complete set of tools for the back (shovel, rake, etc.), and a hitch so I can hook the wagon from my John Deere tractor to it. The seat looks fine from the top, but apparently, the plywood underneath has rotted and took some of the vinyl with it.

I will get some nice marine vinyl from Sailrite and make a new cover. I told him that probably won’t happen until after Sew Expo, however. That’s going to be the kind of project that I have to start and finish in a day or two because he won’t want to be without the golf cart. He likes to drive it around the property. And who knows what I am going to find when I take off the old cover.

Needs Better Camouflage

I spotted Bunny yesterday morning near the herb garden. It wasn’t hard to see him, because his camouflage isn’t working very well:

Poor thing. I think all of the flora and fauna is confused this year. I am hearing reports of people’s flowers blooming. I’ve given up wearing my winter coat because it’s too warm. I’m good in a T-shirt and fleece pullover.

Meanwhile, my sister in North Carolina got 6" of snow yesterday.

I am getting a bit concerned about the coming fire season. The snowpack in the mountains is near or above normal, but we need snow down here. Hopefully, we will get some in February.

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Simplicity has brought back Gunne Sax patterns, like this one:

Gunne Sax prom dresses were all the rage when I was in high school. I will not be making any of these as they aren’t really my style, LOL.

We had a great meeting yesterday morning—church conference members from Alaska, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Montana met via Zoom. There were 10 of us in my living room and we enjoyed homemade scones, soup, zucchini pickles, and fresh salads for lunch. It was almost 3:00 pm when everyone left so I didn’t do any sewing. I cleaned up and put the living room back together.

This is a busy week. I have two classes and a podcast interview, and I need to start working on class samples and kits for my serger class at Sew Expo. I’d like to have those done by the end of next week. I have a feeling that February is going to fly by.

I need to get my seed orders in, too.

Finally, Some Sewing

I had a podcast interview at 10 am yesterday morning, which gave me about two hours of sewing time after breakfast. Before we went to Washington state two weeks ago, I had cut out McCall’s 8636 in anticipation of possibly taking it with me to work on while visiting the kids. Ultimately, I decided against the idea. I would have had to take a serger with me and space in the truck cab was at a premium.

Because it was already cut out, though, I was able to start working on it. I have found that the key to short sewing sessions—anything less than a full morning or afternoon feels “short” to me—is to go into it with no expectations. I am so goal-oriented that I usually begin a sewing session with an idea of what I want to accomplish. I can’t do that when I am sewing in time confetti. I have to break it down into literal baby steps: I will fuse the interfacing to the fabric or I will sew and topstitch one seam.

I started by fusing the interfacing to the fly extension of the pants.

These pants have a faux fly, which makes them a good beginner class.

No, my iron is not broken. The fabric is Kona Crush, which is designed to have those permanent wrinkles in it. It is a great choice for this pattern.

This pattern has many pieces. The fronts consist of a center front, a middle front, and side front/back. I sewed each long seam, finished the edges together on the serger, then topstitched the seam.

I am at the point where I I am ready to add the side pockets. I like how this is coming together and I think it will make a good class. The pattern features some details that elevate the design but aren’t hard to execute.

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My podcast interview was with a young man who lives here in the Flathead Valley and has a business recycling and upcycling textile waste. His company is called Fdes: Functional Design. He is also on the board of The Making Place, a new makerspace in Columbia Falls. We had a great conversation and it will be part of next week’s episode. I am going to visit The Making Place next week.

I also got a lovely e-mail yesterday from Bernina’s manager of national events. When I submitted my class proposals for Sew Expo, I asked to have my serger class and the thread class in the Bernina classrooms. Sew Expo contracts with local sewing machine dealers to bring in machines for the event. After the event, the dealers sell those machines at a discount. It’s a great way to get a lightly-used machine (with a full warranty) for an excellent price. Last year, I taught the thread class in the Brother classroom. Each classroom has a monitor who is there to handle technical issues, but it’s infinitely easier to teach on a machine you know.

The e-mail from the national events manager included an introduction to the regional rep and to the liaison from the store providing the machines. She asked a few questions about supplies and said she hoped we could meet at BU this summer. One of the things I love about Bernina the company is that their staff—even the higher-ups—are so gracious and friendly and make a sincere effort to get to know their dealers and teachers.

Exiting Paperwork Purgatory

I am scraping for interesting blog content this week. The good news is that I did get a big chunk of paperwork done over the past two days. I should be able to finish the rest of it today. It would be lovely if the government could have a functional Social Security website so that it didn’t require dozens of attempts over several days to submit paperwork required by law.

I had a hair appointment first thing yesterday morning, then stopped at the store on my way home. (Hi, Kimberly!) They had received a shipment of 3D-printed accessories for the accessory towers, so I got a few for my serger tower. The towers are made by a guy in Utah. I have the large tower for my 880 and it holds all of my presser feet.

I like the large tower so much that I bought a smaller one for my serger.

I still have to get a few more holders for some of my serger accessories but at least the feet are corralled.

Monday will be a sewing day come hell or high water. That’s the soonest I can get back into my sewing room. I am hosting a church gathering here on Saturday morning—I’ve done this every year for the past four or five years—and I need to get ready for that event. The gathering is for our annual conference-wide Zoom meeting. We discovered that it’s easiest to meet in my living room where I can hook up the TV to my laptop. I make a big pot of soup and everyone else brings sides.

Before sewing, though, I have to organize the upstairs again. When the girls were little, I bought each of them a blanket chest and used it over the years to store school papers and other mementos. We took DD#1’s over to her on our trip, which freed up some space in her bedroom. I have my AccuQuilt cutter set up in that room, but I need to rearrange a few things.

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It has been very cold here over the past few days and the flies have all but disappeared. I have been worried about what the spider is going to eat, so I went to Petco while I was in town and got a couple of small crickets for $0.18 apiece. We fed one to the spider yesterday and the extra went into the freezer. The spider has been subsisting on an average of a fly per week, so a cricket should keep it satiated for a while. The husband makes jokes about the spider becoming obese and falling out of its web.

Yes, hosting a barn spider in my kitchen is weird, but my mother would probably love to regale my blog readers with stories of all the animals I brought home when I was growing up. The spider isn’t hurting anyone and it really is a beautiful creature. Every so often, I catch it re-spinning its web, which is fascinating to watch.

Paperwork Gets in the Way

Sewing content is going to be thin on the ground until I’ve scaled the mountain of paperwork on my desk. I was working on W-2s for the employees yesterday morning but the Social Security website kept giving me “system failure” errors, so I was only able to generate half of them. I am going to try to finish that task as soon as this blog post goes up; I suspect very few people will be logged in this early in the morning.

As much as I hate QuickBooks, there are advantages to having the software run payroll.

The husband and I had eye appointments yesterday afternoon. The eye doctor said my eyes are in excellent shape and I just need to continue taking PreserVision. Macular degeneration runs in my family and I am trying to stay ahead of it. My prescription did change, so I am getting new glasses. I have always had a hard time with corrective lenses. The doctor said that one of my eyes has great close-up vision and the other has better distance vision, which makes anything out to about 18" in front of my face perfectly in focus without glasses. That means that I tend not to wear my glasses when I should, because otherwise I am constantly taking them off and putting them back on. (Watching TV and trying to do handwork is a nightmare.) I have progressive lenses but that doesn’t seem to make a difference.

It is what it is. He recommended against any kind of surgery, which is fine with me.

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One of my classes at Sew Expo—Creative Uses for Your Serger’s Cording Foot—sold out within the first few days, so the organizers added a second session. That was a bit of a surprise because that proposal was a total shot in the dark, but it tells me a lot about the kind of classes students want. My one knitting class on cables has very few students and I suspect it may get canceled. The thread class is almost full and the class on interfacing is half full. I am sure it is a challenge for the organizers to come up with a slate of classes that appeals to all levels of sewing expertise.

My goal is to get paperwork finished by February 1 and off to the accountant so I can devote the first two weeks of the month to getting my class supplies (kits and handouts) ready for Sew Expo. I’m also teaching three classes at the store here in early February.

I got the dates for Bernina University, which will be June 28 to July 1. I am one of those people who likes to have my schedule planned well in advance, and June is always a busy month. I’ll probably fly out of Seattle because Alaska Airlines has a nonstop flight from Sea-Tac to New Orleans and the schedule is good.

Hopefully, I can get some sewing in this week. I don’t like to go too long without working on something, because getting back into the groove after a break always seems to take a while.

This is another pattern in my stash that I’d like to make soon:

It’s the Libby Pullover from Sinclair Patterns. I like their patterns because they come with a Tall option, and this is a raglan AND has princess seams.

Journey Versus Destination

The husband and I went on a trip together, which is a rare occurrence. The husband does not like to travel. He likes to sleep in his own bed. I, on the other hand, get twitchy if I am not on the road every six or eight weeks. The last time we traveled together was for DD#2’s college graduation in 2019.

Now that both girls are living in Washington state, he really has no excuse for not visiting them. And DD#1 and her husband have a new house and need help with some home improvement projects. Who better to help them than someone with the tools and expertise?

We left last Saturday morning. For this trip, we took his work truck with a small U-Haul trailer behind it containing some of the girls’ possessions. Our plan was to spend the night in Ellensburg, depending on traffic and weather, but we ended up driving the entire way in one day, which took us almost exactly 11 hours including three short stops. We pulled in just in time to have dinner with DD#1 and her husband as well as DD#2 and her boyfriend. They had come over from Seattle to spend the long weekend.

Because he was stuck in a vehicle with me for eleven hours each way, the husband was subject to all sorts of commentary on various topics. We (mostly I) talked about traveling. My parents used to take my sister and me on road trips all the time when we were growing up. I didn’t fly on an airplane until I was 11 or 12. For me, traveling is all about the journey, although I knew better than to suggest we stop at some fabric stores along the way. For him, traveling is more about the destination. He wanted to power through and get to DD#1’s house.

I took advantage of the opportunity to do some sightseeing, which I cannot do when I am focused on the road. The weather was stellar in both directions—while the rest of the country is suffering, the PNW was under a high pressure system with abundant sunshine and no precipitation.

The husband spent the week methodically attacking DD#1’s to-do list of house projects. Because our DSIL had Monday off from work, the two of them—with the help of SIL’s dad—enlarged the opening into the attic above the garage and installed some pull-down steps. (The house, as cute as it is, has next-to-no storage.) Over the course of the rest of the week, the husband installed a garbage disposal, finished the siding on the greenhouse, replaced some fixtures, fixed a hinge on a cabinet, and knocked off a few other projects.

I left a sewing machine at DD#1’s house in Ketchikan and it was at the new house when I arrived. I attempted to work on the Laundry Basket Quilts “Alaska” quilt, which I bought as a kit when they moved to Ketchikan—I am a bit behind—but aside from making four of the 49 blocks and hemming a few curtains, I didn’t do much sewing. We spent a fair bit of time running back and forth to hardware stores and Home Depot to get supplies.

On Wednesday, DD#1, her MIL, and I went to Port Townsend, which is a darling little town on the Olympic Peninsula. It is also the home of District Fabric. I had a hard time deciding what I wanted to get because they have so many nice fabrics. In the end, I settled on three yards of a beautiful cornflower blue wool-and polyester coating fabric. That will probably become a Nova Coat.

I also visited A Stitch in Time quilt shop in Sequim and came out with some Kaffe Fabric.

The pink has been sold out at our store. I haven’t seen the green and black print before.

DSIL has a 3D printer. I am fascinated enough with the technology to contemplate getting one, although I don’t need another hobby. He made dryer ball holders for DD#1, her sister, and me:

There are plenty of sewing-related applications for such a printer. 😉

It’s back to work this week. That arctic air mass has sagged far enough south and west that our temps are pretty chilly, but we still don’t have snow. This has been the weirdest winter. I keep thinking that we’re probably going to get slammed in February.

Replacing My Travel Tote

I am getting closer to being able to recreate my 30+ year-old travel tote. Two key parts came together last week:

1. I found this website that has tote bags that match the size. Until now, the tote bags I could find were too small. I ordered the largest canvas tote bag, which is actually a few inches bigger than my travel tote. I intend to take it apart and use the pieces as a pattern.

2. I finally located a similar fabric. Fabric Wholesale Direct carries Ottertex® Waterproof 70D PVC Backed Nylon Taffeta, so I ordered some. The fabric arrived yesterday. It has the same look and feel as the fabric in my bag. (I even got the same color!) This photo shows the selvedge edges, so you can see there is a lightweight nylon taffeta with a coating on it.

I will have to make a couple of prototypes to ensure I have the size and construction order correct. This will be a longer-term project but a good one to work on this summer.

I decided to nix the Burnside Bibs as a class at the store. As cute as the pattern is, it is rather involved. Even if we left some of the details off the muslins, like the patch pockets, it would still be a complicated make. I’ve got the pattern prepped, so I will go ahead and make a pair just for the experience. I multiply the amount of time a project takes me by three to get an estimate of class time, and this would be a minimum of a two-day class.

I think the McCall’s 8636 pants will be a good addition, however. Those are cut out and ready to assemble.

I decided to take one of my large clear totes and put all of the fabric and patterns into it that I want to sew with next. I am hoping this will help to keep me on track. I want to sew everything and I need to keep the queue under control or I won’t get anything done.

Sew Expo registration went live on Tuesday. Yesterday, the education coordinator e-mailed us registration numbers for each of our classes. My class on using the cording foot on the serger only has three spots left. (The class max is 24, which is the number of machines available.) My thread class is over half full, and my interfacing class is almost half full. I am delighted with those numbers. The knitting class has only a couple of students registered, but that doesn’t surprise me. The knitting classes don’t do very well. I am so glad that I’ve been able to pivot over to teaching sewing classes there. And I think that the coordinators are doing a better job with the class schedule this year than in recent years. My sense is that they scheduled fewer classes this year rather than have too many classes with too few students.

I’ve made my Airbnb reservations in Puyallup for those days. I will visit DD#1 before Sew Expo and spend a few days with DD#2 after I am done teaching.

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We had a brilliantly sunny day here yesterday, but when the husband came home, he reported that the valley was absolutely socked in by fog. It was so bad that planes couldn’t land at the airport. Such is the result of high pressure ridges in January and February—the valleys get trapped under heavy inversions.

I am going to run payroll through QuickBooks for the first time today. Wish me luck that it goes smoothly.

Still Needs Some Work

I get the sense that the Big 4/Big 7/whatever they are calling themselves these days are trying very hard to play catch-up. Abbie Small—with her 30+ years of experience at Simplicity—knows her stuff. I suspect she understands that the sewing world is shifting away from printed patterns and toward PDF files and even projector files. Many of the patterns on the Simplicity website now come in PDF format. There are some bugs to work out, however.

I purchased McCall’s 8636 as a PDF file from the Simplicity website because I need to get this class sample made ASAP. I took the A0 file to the local blueprint shop yesterday to have it printed on their large-format machine. They know me there. They’ve printed hundreds of pages of patterns for me over the last several years.

The owner took my thumb drive, popped it into the computer, and pulled up the file. He always looks at the patterns before he prints them, and he immediately spotted an issue. After asking me if it looked correct—it didn’t—he rotated a few pages and we checked again. The pattern appeared to be oriented properly, so he printed it.

I didn’t look at it again until I got home. I am not sure who is laying out the A0 files, but they need to spend some time with an indie pattern designer to learn how to do it properly. (I have never had an issue with printing an A0 file from an indie pattern.)

There was this:

And then there was this:

I almost missed these smaller pieces and would have thrown them into the recycling bin. And they were literally the only pieces printed on their large sheets.

The other issue was that the pants pattern pieces were too long for one sheet, so they spanned two sheets. I had to cut and tape those pattern pieces together. That’s not unusual; I have had to do that with a few other patterns. When that happens, the pattern designer usually puts some kind of alphanumeric marking on both pieces to show that they match and get taped together. It looked like whoever made this layout started to do that—one of the pattern pieces had such a marking—but forgot to do the remainder of them.

This is part of why I make up patterns before I teach them. I spotted these issues right away. A student probably wouldn’t recognize them or know how to fix them.

These pants are a bit more complicated than I anticipated—there are several panels to the pants—but we are making muslins in class and if nothing else, the students will get lots of practice making long, straight seams. I am going to recommend, though, that the students order paper copies of this pattern from the Simplicity website rather than going the PDF route.

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I ordered some Jalie patterns from the Fabric Fairy website, as well as a few swatches of athletic fabrics. Fabric Fairy carries a polyester/spandex fabric that I think will make good work pants for DD#2’s boyfriend. It matches the fiber content on a pair of pants he gave me to mend that were a bit too far gone to fix. I will check with him before I order any. The reason I am making some is 1) I can make them more cheaply than he can purchase them and 2) I am going to make them with a crotch gusset.

I ordered the Karine Cardigan, the Frederic Zip-Up Hoodie—I suspect that would make another good men’s class at the store—and the Gerald Underwear pattern. I still have this idea that I am going to make underwear for the husband. The model on the front of the pattern is wearing some in a pink flowered knit and I had to promise not to use a similar fabric. 🤓

I am getting close to planning a sewing staycation for myself. I need a week where I don’t have to do paperwork or cook and I can just lock myself in my sewing room and sew all day. I could get a lot done.

A Big Day in My Sewing World

The podcast interview with Kenneth D. King is live if you’d like to give it a listen. The podcast is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and on the website.

And registration opens today for Sew Expo:

If any of my podcast listeners are going to be there, please let me know and we can arrange a meet-up!

I wore my brain out yesterday—and the calculator—going through the payroll stuff with a fine-tooth comb to make sure everything that needed to be filed and paid had been done. I had to organize it all in a form that the accountant could understand, too, because the first half of the year had been done in QuickBooks and the second half had been done manually. All of the payroll reports for 2025 have been filed and I think there is a good paper trail for the accountant.

I have not felt like sewing, though, and I know better than to push it. When I get like this, I have a tendency to start fifteen different projects simultaneously. Better to wait until I can focus and drill down. I cleaned the house instead.

Next up, for sure, are the Burnside Bibs and the men’s jogger pants patterns, because I need class samples. I’ll start by tracing those patterns this afternoon. Once they are done, l can make some tops. I succumbed and ordered three yards of this French terry fabric from Nature’s Fabrics the other day because it is just so gorgeous:

I think it will become a Jalie Nathalie top. I have two and they are in constant rotation.

And I want to make a few things on my embroidery machine. March is going to be here before I know it and my sewing time is going to disappear.

Serging Shoelaces

We had such fun in serger class yesterday. I had three students register ahead of time but one didn’t show. A fourth student registered just before class. The store had set up three sergers for me in the classroom. I wanted to do the class in a “round robin” format so that each machine could have a different stitch setting and decorative thread.

Each student owned a serger but had limited experience. I spent the first 30 minutes giving them a very condensed version of my serger mastery class. I have to remember to start out by defining what a looper is and what it does, because even people who own sergers aren’t necessarily familiar with the terminology.

After that, we made scrunchies, shoelaces, and socks. I provided all the material. The students worked well together and we had a lot of fun. I want people to laugh and enjoy themselves in my classes. All three left feeling more comfortable and confident about using their sergers.

I fielded the usual “Why don’t you have your classes on Saturday?” question. If I could have a month full of Saturdays for classes, I would, but I have to share Saturdays with other teachers and events.

******

I am going to be a grumpy old woman now. I suppose all generations do this. My first gripe has to do with the proper etiquette for requests. The husband works as a subcontratcor to many different general contractors in the county. The GCs are required to have a W-9 and a certificate of insurance on file for each of their subs. I can always tell when someone is getting audited by their insurance company because I will get a panicked e-mail asking for documentation.

I keep a scanned copy of the W-9 on the computer so I can send that whenever I get a request. The certificates of insurance have to come from our agent, and the agent requires that I provide a current mailing address for the company requesting the certificate. It’s very helpful if the company requesting the certificate puts that information in the signature line of their e-mail. If not, I sometimes can find it on the company website. Lately, however, the trend seems to be that websites only have a phone number and e-mail and no other contact info. I have had quite a few requests since the first of the year for certificates, but no contact info accompanies it. If you are going to request something from me—especially something that you need in a hurry to avoid getting dinged by your insurance company—don’t make extra work for me by making me hunt down your contact information. I am reminded of the Inigo Montoya Rule for Social Interaction (Princess Bride reference):

"I am Inigo Montoya, you killed my father, prepare to die!"

When communicating with real humans online it is an excellent best practice to do precisely what he does:

1. Introduce yourself without obfuscation or misdirection. (Hi, I am So-and-So General Contractor.)

2. Provide a relevant reason for the connection. (Tom does work for me and I need copies of his insurance documentation.)

3. State your business succinctly and allow them to respond. (Would you please send a certificate of insurance to this address?)

A lot of these guys text the husband to ask for this stuff, so he has been directed to get their contact information or have them e-mail it to me. I am an absolute pain in the ass of an administrative assistant, but our construction company runs like a well-oiled machine.

I run into something similar when asking people to be guests on the podcast. Trying to get some of these younger people to commit to a date and time is like pulling teeth. I’ll send three e-mails and if we haven’t scheduled a date by then, the request goes into the trash.

My other gripe is about the trend I am seeing for people who make one garment or quilt and decide to go into business as a designer. Literally, I saw one reference this morning to a new designer that started out with, “Designer X made a baby blanket last year and decided that sewing should be her full-time occupation!” I am all for people starting businesses from their hobbies because heaven knows I am guilty of that. However, it does everyone a disservice if you, Novice Designer, put out patterns that can’t be made from the instructions. Get yourself a competent pattern drafter and/or technical editor. Likewise, if you don’t understand proper garment construction techniques, don’t set yourself up to do alterations and repairs if you’re just going to make a hash of people’s clothing. I am still learning as I go, even at my age, but I also try to respect my limitations.

</rant over>

We need a photo for today’s post, so here you go. This is from January 2015. What a contrast to this year—we barely have enough snow to cover the grass.

Tune In On Tuesday

Next Tuesday’s podcast episode (January 13) will be a special one. You may remember that in October 2024, I took a trouser drafting class from Kenneth D. King at the Sewing and Design School in Tacoma, WA. The class was terrific. Kenneth is an amazing teacher and I would love to take another class from him.

[My Seattle peeps—because there seem to be so many of you listening to the podcast—Kenneth said he would come out and teach his raglan coat class at the Sewing and Design School if I could get enough people to commit to taking it. If you’re interested, let me know at Janet at JanetSzabo dot com.]

At the trouser class, Kenneth signed my copy of his book Doll Couture:

Doll Couture is the store of Lola, the showgirl in the Barry Manilow song “Copacabana.” The book picks up at the end of the song, when Lola is broken and grieving and in hiding from Rico, the man suspected of killing Lola’s boyfriend, Tony.

[Two items of note here:

1. I was a huge Barry Manilow fan as an adolescent. I had all the records and knew most of the songs by heart.

2. My sister and I had an extensive Barbie doll collection. One year for Christmas, my mother made clothes for them, including a turquoise blue pantsuit of polyester double-knit with gold baby rickrack trim. Our dolls were quite the thing. ]

Doll Couture is not a story book or novel; rather, it weaves in Lola’s story with the creation of 1/6 scale clothing for fashion dolls and introduces a number of additional characters to the story, including Crazy Bella, the Orlof-Volenski Triplets, and others.

Doll Couture: Red Carpet Edition, picks up where Doll Couture left off, with the introduction of even more characters to the story and the creation of some truly spectacular garments.

Kenneth was kind enough to spend some time with me last week talking about the books. I hope you will listen to the episode, and if you are so inclined, buy the books. (We want him to continue the series!) The stories are entertaining and you will marvel at the couture techniques used to make clothing on such a small scale.

******

I finished quilting the baby quilt yesterday. It needs to be trimmed and bound. I also fixed Anna’s skirt properly. I told her that next time, she should just bring her stuff to me.

Today, I am teaching a serger class called Shoelaces, Scrunchies, and Socks. This is going to be a fun class. Next Friday, I am teaching my thread class. That’s always a good one. February will be full of classes, including my Sew Expo classes in Puyallup, WA. Ticket sales go live on Tuesday, January 13.

Baby Stars

I’ve quilted about two-thirds of the baby quilt. I’ll finish it today and get it bound this weekend. I’m doing a combination of free motion meandering and rulerwork stars. Amanda Murphy has a set of star rulers and the smallest one makes a star about 1-1/2" across. I’ve wanted to do this combination on a baby quilt for a while and I love how it looks:

The thread is light yellow on both the front and back.

I had tea with my friend Anna yesterday afternoon and came home with a skirt of hers that she needs to wear to a funeral next week. She had taken it to someone in town to have the elastic replaced and whoever did it made an absolute hash of it. I took it all apart last evening and will replace the elastic properly today for her. I have no desire to get into mending and alterations as a business but I will do work for friends on occasion.

I was unable to find the men’s pants pattern yesterday in town. I stopped by the store on my way home and several of us were commenting on what a huge loss it is to the local sewing community not to have a Joann Fabrics anymore. One woman had made a pair of bib overalls and had to settle for the strap hardware that was at Hobby Lobby, which was the wrong color. Hobby Lobby is really missing out on a stellar opportunity to expand their sewing department. Of course, this is the same company that won’t use scannable bar codes, so their cashiers have to enter every single item by hand, which results in checkout lines 30 people deep during the holiday season. And now they are no longer carrying McCall’s patterns. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that they are unable (or unwilling) to step in and take up the slack now that Joanns is closed. We have a Michaels, but they have not yet expanded their fabric and yarn department and I have no idea if they will or not. It’s a small store. Walmart has some fabric supplies, but they don’t appear to be doing much restocking. Our store has been sold out of interfacing for months.

The quilt store has made a Herculean effort, especially with fabrics, but they can’t carry everything. Garment sewists seem to need more notions than quilters do. Online ordering (ugh) seems to be the only recourse.

I am doing better than most, having amassed the equivalent of a small Joanns store over the past decade, but even I am going to run out of supplies at some point.

Enough whining. I bought fabric for the men’s pants pattern yesterday at the store—Kona Crush, which is wonderful if you haven’t yet seen it—in a lovely deep caramel color. These pants aren’t for me, so I can use a color I normally wouldn’t choose.

******

I host my podcast with Buzzsprout, and every year, they provide a recap of the previous podcasting season. These are some of the stats from 2025:

• I recorded a total of 1586 minutes

• I recorded a total of 43 episodes

• The podcast is listened to in 116 countries (wow)

• The podcast is listened to in 5074 cities

• Seattle has the most listeners (hey people!), followed by Chicago and Sydney, Australia

• There were 69.3K downloads

I find all of that fascinating. I am excited to keep going in 2026. Next week’s podcast will be a great one, with a very special guest. More on that in the next couple of days.

The Men Want Pants, Too

I am really trying to get away from, “Oh look! A squirrel!” with my sewing, which has been difficult, especially when it comes to classes. Someone will see a pattern and say, “Janet should teach a class on this!” and then my schedule goes all to pieces. I tried to counter this by getting a slate of classes on the store calendar for the first half of 2026 so I could get all the class samples made and off my to-do list. We scheduled all of the machine mastery classes, too. I was congratulating myself on having mapped out a plan, and then the store in Missoula called. Would I do a serger mastery class for them? Sure. That’s on the schedule for next month.

I taught the sewing machine mastery class yesterday, which I do on the first Tuesday of every month. This is the class I can’t prepare for because I don’t know who is going to show up with what machine. I had seven students, including one guy. He had called me just after Thanksgiving to ask about the class. His mother passed away last year and he inherited her sewing machine—a Bernina 880 like mine—and her serger.

I said to the husband that having him in the class with that machine was like having a hyena in a class full of bunny rabbits. The 880 is completely different from the other Bernina sewing machines. That didn’t bother me because I also own (and love) one, but it did mean that I had to set the other students to their own tasks—they practiced free motion quilting—while I worked with this guy on the features unique to his machine.

During lunch, he asked what other classes I teach at the store. He’s taking the next serger mastery class. As the owner was telling him about the garment classes, I noted that I didn’t have any classes for men’s garments, an observation which led to, “Janet should teach a class on making men’s pants!” The owner’s son, who is the machine tech, was also eating lunch with us. He said he would take such a class and knew of a couple other guys who might be interested.

Someone catch that squirrel.

It appears that I will be teaching a class on making men’s pants. (Janet B, you and I will have to discuss this tomorrow.) We will be starting simply, with a pair of pull-on joggers. If that goes well, I might consider teaching a more complicated pattern with a fly front.

I am leaning toward either Simplicity 3110:

or McCall’s 8636.

I couldn’t find any indie patterns I liked. The McCall’s pattern is unisex, which might be a better choice, although I think both patterns could be considered unisex, for what that’s worth.

[Unisex only works for a subset of people; most women are going to need some kind of alteration to the pattern because their shapes are so different. When I took the trouser drafting class from Kenneth King last year, there was one young man in the class. He finished his muslin about halfway through the first day of class because he didn’t have to make any alterations to it. Life is not fair. 😑]

One of these pants patterns is now in the sewing queue after the Burnside Bibs. This is fine because I have been kicking around the idea of making some pants for DD#2’s boyfriend. He is a personal trainer and has been having trouble finding pants that don’t fall apart after a few washings. I said that if I could source the appropriate fabric, I would make him some.

The baby quilt top is basted with backing and batting and waiting to be quilted. I’d like to have it on its way by early next week.

No More Sloth Time

Sloth time is officially over. I am teaching two classes this week and have a podcast interview scheduled for tomorrow. I want to run up one more iteration of the Iguazu Top and start the Burnside Bibs. The baby quilt top needs to be quilted and bound and sent off. And I am trying to get myself back into the groove of embroidering in the evenings. I am working on one of Robert Mahar’s anatomical designs:

All of this fitting stuff is still percolating through my brain, too. If I can get my thoughts into some kind of order, this may end up as a class proposal for Sew Expo for next year.

I am probably going to insult someone with the following observation, even though that is not my intention. A few of my friends and I—friends with fitting issues similar to mine—have commented to each other that a lot of the indie pattern companies seem to be owned by petite women with few fitting issues. Their designs tend to reflect their fitting preferences, which only makes sense. If I had a pattern company, I would probably design clothing that fit me. That’s why I joined the Cashmerette Club. Jenny designs for busty and curvy women, so I will have to do a lot less work to get her patterns to fit me than I do patterns designed by someone who is 5'4" tall and wears a 34B bra size.

There can’t be a perfect pattern that fits everyone; the variation in body size and shape is simply too great. I think it’s worth it to try a lot of different pattern companies to find those—hopefully, more than one—that give you a head start on making clothes to fit you. The Love Notions designs are all wonderful, but I have to do way too much work to get them to fit me. I’m finding the same thing to be true with the Itch to Stitch patterns. I’ve actually had the best luck with some of the commercial patterns—Burda 6315 comes to mind.

******

I am making what my mother-in-law used to call a “croak book.” It’s the master list of everything that is in my brain, so if something happens to me, the husband will at least know where to start. This is a good time of year to do it, because I am having to go through files and websites to gather end-of-year documentation for the accountant. I am writing down information as I do that. Also, if something happens to both of us, we want the kids to be able to find things easily.

I am moving an awful lot of paper around these days. 🫤

******

The seed catalogs are starting to arrive but I refuse to look at them. I will wait another month or so. I can’t do anything until the end of March, so why torture myself?

It is weird to be in January, though, with virtually no snow on the ground. We’ll have to see what the next couple of months bring us.

Bigger Does Not Always Mean Bigger

That’s not a typo; you read it correctly.

What pattern drafting knowledge I possess has come to me mostly from fitting myself and from grading knitting patterns. Neither of those methods has been perfect or comprehensive. I do know a few basic principles, though. One of them is that garments do not/should not get proportionally larger when a body gets larger. Certain sections may change at a faster or slower rate than others. (Calculus, anyone?) That variation makes pattern drafting more of an art and less of a science. It’s why you’ll often hear women complain that if they buy (or make) a top that fits their bust measurement, the shoulders are way too large. For sewists, that means choosing a pattern based on their smaller high bust measurement and doing a full bust adjustment (FBA) on the bodice.

And then there are situations where even that doesn’t help.

Yesterday’s task was to make a muslin of the Itch to Stitch Iguazu top. I went into the stash and pulled out a navy blue lightweight rayon French terry which came from the Walmart remnant rack. Even though it was a French terry, the weight was similar to that of a beefy rayon spandex. I read through the instructions, which specified to choose a size based on the full bust measurement and use either the regular bust or full bust pattern pieces, depending on the difference in measurement between the high bust and full bust. Nothing odd there—that is the standard method for determining if a full bust adjustment is necessary. In this case, the full bust adjustment had been provided in the form of an alternative pattern piece.

I traced my size, lengthened it appropriately, cut out the pieces, and ran up the muslin. This is an easy sew, with only half a dozen seams. I did most of it on the serger. And then I put it on.

The top fit well in the bust. However, the cowl style is almost that of a boat neck, and the upper bodice was swimming on me. My bra straps were showing, and if I leaned over, the whole world would get a good look at the rest of it.

Is this a drafting problem? Yes and no. I am trying to be gracious to the designer and to the pattern drafter, because two women could have the same full bust circumference but have very different body shapes, and this is a conundrum I don’t know how to solve. One might carry a lot of extra weight in her arms and shoulders whereas the other doesn’t (think Dolly Parton).

And the fact that this is a top with a self-facing complicates the issue. I took a good hard look at the way the top sat on my body while I contemplated how to fix it. In the end, I added about an inch to the length of the shoulder seam on both the front and the back pattern pieces to bring the neckline in closer to my neck. I made a second muslin:

(My dress form lists to one side. The husband has tried to fix that for me to no avail.)

I am much, much happier with this one. The upper bodice now fits my shoulders well. The front of the cowl doesn’t gape. The cowl drapes a bit differently, but that seems minor to me. It’s a cowl.

[It does beg the question of why most cowl neck patterns seem to be in the form of boat neck styles? The Easton Cowl Tee is very similar. What am I missing?]

This is a wearable muslin. I may make one more iteration, though. The pattern, as presented, has waist shaping. That is problematic for me. I have a defined waist, but I am so short-waisted and have such a high hip curve that my waist comes in and goes right back out again. Tops that follow that line look bizarre on me and also make my bust look even bigger than it is. (Think sausage tied in the middle. I don’t wear belts, either.) I do much better with a silhouette that flares out gently from below the bust, even though I run the risk of it looking like a maternity top. I may eliminate the waist shaping on this pattern and make another version to see what I think. I may also play around with the front facing and make it slightly less deep.

*******

This is a long post, sorry. I have lots to say about fitting today.

Back in October, I was shopping in the Liz Claiborne department at JC Penney. (God bless the Liz Claiborne label because their clothes almost always fit me well.) I pulled a dress off the rack and decided to try it on even though I have a lot of problems finding dresses that fit (see sausage comment, above).

I bought the dress because it looked so flattering on me. I haven’t worn it yet because it’s more of a spring/summer style. It basically looks like Simplicity 8875:

I usually avoid empire-style dresses because of the full bust issue—that empire line sits on top of my bust instead of underneath, where it is supposed to sit. I thought I could probably puzzle out how to do an FBA on the pattern, but now I don’t have to! Whitney, at TomKat Stitchery, did a video a few years ago showing exactly how to make an FBA on this pattern. So this one is getting added to the queue. I think 2026 may end up being the year of the dress.

*******

And lastly, for those of you who may be wondering (coughSarahcough), the barn spider is still living in the corner of my kitchen above the hall tree. I feel an obligation to this poor creature as it has been there for four months now. I am determined to keep it alive until the spring when it can go live outside again. Fortunately, a fly or two shows up every week to provide sustenance.

January Hits the Ground Running

I knocked out a major portion of my to-do list yesterday morning. I write down everything; otherwise, little stuff falls through the cracks, and it’s the little stuff that comes back to bite you. Death by a thousand paper cuts.

QuickBooks payroll appears to be ready to go, or at least that’s what it tells me. I’ll find out for sure when I run payroll for the first time in 2026. One of our employees gave notice the other day. I asked the husband what this guy’s plans were, and he said that he wants to become an independent contractor. I am all for people wanting to work for themselves—another of our (former) employees went out on his own last year—but I don’t think that people always have a good appreciation for what is involved in starting and running a business. The husband and I have a joke that these guys “need a Janet” to handle the administrative end of things, but the husband pointed out that Janets are rather thin on the ground.

[No, I don’t want to start my own business as Administrative-Janet-For-Hire. I have plenty of jobs as it is.]

It isn’t just payroll, which is a huge responsibility, but also contractor registration, insurance, DOT and OSHA compliance, and all the paperwork required by the general contractors we sub to.

The husband and I have an excellent working partnership, which means I don’t tell him how to do concrete and he stays out of my office. 😉

******

It’s already January and I haven’t made any new cool-weather items to add to my wardrobe. At the rate I am going, it will be time to make stuff for spring and summer and I will have missed winter completely. I am still trying to plug holes in my wardrobe, and nothing reveals holes quicker than packing for a trip, which I have done several times recently. I need a few more Jalie Nathalie tops. I also traced this pattern yesterday:

This is the Iguazu Top from Itch to Stitch. I have made a few Easton Cowl-Neck Tees using the pattern from Liesl + Co but I’d like to see how this one compares. The Easton pattern is alphabet sizing with cup sizes whereas the Iguazu pattern is numerical sizing with a full bust pattern piece option.

I had to lengthen the pattern, of course. I am going to try making it in a jersey knit AND in a lightweight sweater knit, both of which were in the suggested fabrics list. If it fits and I like it, I could also see lengthening the pattern into a dress. The pattern comes with four sleeve lengths, which makes it very versatile.

Making dresses is one of my goals for 2026. Using fabrics from my stash is another goal. We shall see what happens.

Happy 2026!

I am starting to think I should open a PO box in Washington state because I spend so much time there. I made another trip over and back, and I managed to do it in between storm systems.

DD#1 and her husband bought a house and moved into it in November. It’s a wonderful house on five acres, but it’s a mile off the county road. That’s a feature, not a bug, for them. Their house in Ketchikan was beseiged by tourists throughout cruise ship season and they wanted privacy. However, privacy comes with a road full of potholes and ruts and DD#1’s 20 year-old Honda Civic wasn’t cutting it. My Jeep fairly glided over the uneven surface, so I decided to sell it to her and get a new one. I loved the BMW, but the Jeep has been a great replacement. Mine had 35,000 miles on it and has had no issues.

Knowing it would be easiest to swap vehicles over there, we called the guy who helped us purchase the husband’s two work trucks. I explained what I wanted and he found it. The new Jeep is basically the same model as the old one with a few more bells and whistles. It’s also red. I asked if they could install running boards and studded snow tires and he said that those would be done by the time I arrived.

I left Sunday after church, because I had to deliver the sermon that day. Also, during the winter, it’s easiest to break the trip up into two days. I spent Sunday night in Spokane, then drove to DD#1’s house on Monday. We went out to dinner that night with her in-laws. On Tuesday morning, she and I headed back to Seattle. When we arrived at the dealer, the new Jeep was ready and waiting for me. Our sales guy was amazing. Not only did he have the Jeep ready for me, but he went over the paperwork for the private sale and had everything appropriately notarized so that DD#1 could make the title transfer easily.

She headed home—with a stop at Ikea—and I headed for Pacific Fabrics. 😇 I bought two more yards of the Hugo Boss deadstock fabric because I have decided to make a longer, lined coat. The store was insanely busy. Usually, there are half a dozen people shopping. That day, there were probably four times that many. I would have liked to linger, but I had a few other errands to do.

DD#2’s boyfriend’s mother has been in Seattle since the middle of December. She is staying at the same Airbnb where I stay when I’m there. (She heads home tomorrow.) I met her and the kids for dinner. She is so much fun. I wish we had had more time to visit.

I left Seattle a bit later than I wanted to on Wednesday because the fog was so thick. I have a healthy respect for freezing fog—I saw one of our neighbors flip his truck in freezing fog—and I am familiar with how Washington drivers do not. I waited until the sun came up and the fog started to burn off. I arrived in Spokane around 1 pm, which gave me plenty of time to do some shopping. I had a list of supplies for my Sew Expo classes and knew I could get most of them there. I also picked up a backing for the baby quilt; my college roommate’s granddaughter arrived a few weeks early, just after Christmas, so I need to finish that project and get it on its way.

Speaking of fog, DD#2 and her boyfriend went to a friend’s apartment for New Year’s Eve so they could watch the fireworks from the Space Needle. The fog was so thick that this was their view:

I drove home yesterday morning. Traffic was virtually nonexistent, which was lovely. The roads were clear and dry. I really did luck out with the weather over the passes in both directions.

And now I need to play catch-up and deal with the end-of-2025 paperwork. I am also hoping that because it is the beginning of 2026, QuickBooks payroll will play nicely. Pray for me. I could continue to do payroll manually, but that is hard to do when I am traveling.

The husband is done slacking and plans to go to work today to prepare for a concrete pour next week.