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.

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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.

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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. 😉

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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.

Laid Back

The husband and I have been sloths this week. We have slept in every day—for him, that means 9 o’clock and for me, that means 6 o’clock 😇—and although we’re still working on projects, we’ve slowed our roll a bit and take lots of breaks. I doubt that either of us could stand a steady diet of this routine. For a few days, though, it’s a nice break.

I made a baby quilt this week using this fat quarter bundle of baby prints from The Quilting Bee in Spokane. This is Rainbow Dreams by Jenny Faw for Wilmington.

I had exactly enough fabric—I think I had one 2-1/2" strip left over when I was done piecing. I did a simple rail fence quilt because the prints were so cute that I didn’t want to cut them up too much. Also, the baby is due soon.

I’ll get a backing and batting and finish this one this week.

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I made a master list of priorities for January and February, broken down into the categories of Teaching, Construction Company, Church, Podcast, General Sewing, and Continuing Education (mine). I’ll refine those further in the coming days, but I wanted to make sure the time-sensitive ones were on my radar. I need to order supplies for my Sew Expo classes and that has to be done during the first week of 2026.

One of my friends showed me her bullet journal a few weeks ago and I think I might try keeping one of my own. It would be nice to have all of my lists in one central location.

One of the girls who works at the store wants to make another quilted jacket for Bernina University in June. She made one for BU this year from Tula Pink fabric with some custom embroidery and other fun touches. It was accepted into the fashion show in Salt Lake City. She received many compliments on it from other attendees. When I took my finished Tamarack into the store the other day, she tried it on to check the fit and sizing. The size I made fits her reasonably well, but it needs a few alterations specific to her shape. I am going to make those changes to the pattern and run up a muslin. The alterations I think she needs are ones I haven’t tried yet, so this will be a learning experience for both of us.

*****

I will leave you with something funny to watch. The husband found this video on YouTube the other day. Be aware that it is an AI-generated video with some obvious errors. However, the girls and I have been laughing about it because it’s like it was made about him. (Especially the part about it being a good day when no one talks to him and the part about pulling stranded vehicles out of ditches. We have never watched Yellowstone.) He even looks and dresses like the guy in the video. And his wife is familiar with jackets that have been mended many times . . .

Twilight Zone

We have now entered that week between Christmas and New Year’s when no one knows what day it is and we’re all eating leftovers. Personally, I like this time. I do a lot of cleaning and organizing and preparing for the new year. My 2026 planner is on my desk and already filling up with color-coded highlighted dates. I have a stack of lists with items ready to be checked off.

The Tamarack Jacket has buttons. I spent several hours on Tuesday driving around Kalispell attempting to find suitable turquoise buttons, to no avail. Finally, I ended up back at Hobby Lobby where I purchased blanks to make covered button 7/8" buttons. I was able to scrounge enough scraps of the binding fabric to make five buttons to match:

And then I had to make buttonholes . . .

That took me the rest of Tuesday and half of Wednesday. I know why sewists will do just about anything to avoid buttonholes. I calibrated my buttonhole foot. I tested—several times—on scrap pieces of quilted fabric. The test buttonholes looked great. I measured. I re-measured. I tested again. The first jacket buttonhole turned out beautifully. Excited to finish, I tried to make the second buttonhole, and the machine decided to make it half the length of the original buttonhole. I took out the thread and tried again. Same result. I tested on the scrap piece of quilted fabric again. The buttonhole came out perfect. I tried again on the jacket. Same result. I put up the extension on the back of my sewing table to support the weight of the jacket. I tried embroidery stabilizer. No luck.

It went like that, over and over, until I was afraid that all that unpicking would destroy the integrity of the fabric, so I set everything aside until Wednesday morning. Finally, I was able to get five buttonholes that were within a few millimeters of the correct length and I called it good.

Really, it shouldn’t be that hard. I probably should have made manual buttonholes instead of relying on the machine’s automatic buttonholes, but I have had good success with the automatic ones in the past.

I have almost completed a Toaster Sweater shop sample. I wish I had remembered to take a photo of the end of the bolt so I knew the name of this fabric. It is an absolutely heavenly sweatshirt fleece.

I know the store has it in this burgundy and also in a taupe color. I have to sew on the bottom band and the turtleneck and it will be done. Both this and the Tamarack Jacket will go to the store today.

I want to get my errands done today because we are supposed to get a back door cold front overnight. We may get a few inches of snow and some wind. We may get nothing. Who knows anymore?

If I have time to play around in the sewing room today, I think I will work on a baby quilt.

No More Quilted Jackets

It is time to move on to another project. I am a bit tired of making quilted jackets.

The Tamarack Jacket is done save for the closures. I have not yet decided on buttons or snaps. (I am leaning toward turquoise buttons.) You may be able to see the yellow thread tailor’s tacks in the photo marking their position:

This one fits me well; I did lengthen it by about 2-1/2". I also shaved a total of about 3" off the back at the sides below the armscye after comparing the back pattern piece to the back pattern piece of my BU jacket. The larger sizes of this pattern, especially, have more way ease at the hip than I want or need. (I used the D-cup range with the bust dart.)

I did patch pockets this time instead of the (very fussy) welt pockets and I like these better. The binding came from my stash. I had a hard time finding a binding fabric that would work with both the outer and lining fabrics. This binding fabric coordinated with both and I had just enough.

I stitched the binding down by hand on the inside.

That meant that I had to sit and sew for about an hour and a half yesterday afternoon, which I don’t usually do. I prefer to leave my hand sewing for after dinner, but I was motivated to finish this jacket.

Of all the quilted jackets I’ve made, I still like the fit and style of my BU jacket best. (That one used the McCall’s 8560 pattern.) The Tamarack is probably my second favorite, although I definitely need the extra length.

The Toaster Sweater and the Burnside Bibs are the last two class samples on my list. The Toaster Sweater can be made in an afternoon. The Burnside Bibs will take a bit longer. And I found out yesterday that my college roommate and her husband will welcome their first grandchild in 2026 (how exciting!) so I need to make a baby quilt.

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This has been a difficult week in the personnel department. I always told my kids that it was more important to watch what people do than listen to what they say. People will tell you whatever they think you want to hear. I try very hard to be straight in my dealings with others and I am often disappointed when I don’t get the same behavior in return. The husband teases me that I wake up every morning with my faith in humanity restored, only to have it destroyed in about five minutes. 😩 I’ve had a couple of encounters this week that just left me shaking my head.

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The weather forecasters in Washington state are currently beside themselves. The forecast models are showing a possible very strong windstorm on Christmas Eve, but those same models cannot seem to converge on a consistent forecast, even from model run to model run. The model solutions have ranged from “nothingburger” to “Armageddon.” I hope that the storm fizzles out before it gets there, because Washington certainly doesn’t need any further battering.

Tamarack Jacket in Progress

I was able to finish quilting the yardage for the Tamarack Jacket yesterday. All of the pieces have been cut:

I was hoping to make the bias binding and serge the edges of all the pieces, too, but I ran out of time before having to be at a Christmas caroling event. Those tasks will be on today’s to-do list. I cut my bias binding strips on my Accuquilt cutter and it doesn’t take long at all. Hopefully, I will be able to assemble the jacket this week. This version is getting the much simpler patch pockets, not the welt pockets.

I am happy to be moving projects through the pipeline. I’m at the point where I almost (almost) don’t care what I am making as long as I am creating something and learning in the process. Makers often sort themselves into one of two camps: process or product. Even as a knitter, I tended to lean toward process, although it is nice to have a finished object to show for all that work. I enjoyed the process of quilting the yardage for this jacket. Rather than being tedious, it was the quiet meditation time I needed after a week of wild weather.

Speaking of weather, I am not sure when I’ll be able to get over to Seattle to swap vehicles with DD#1. It looks like almost constant winter storms will be hammering the passes between now and the first of the year. I will have to keep an eye on the forecast to see if there are a few days when I can thread the needle—no pun intended.

I had to laugh at myself yesterday for being annoyed that it was sunny. (I know, I just complained about the wild weather.) For some reason, I associate sunshine with needing to be working outside in the garden—not sewing—and even though it was 30F and I can’t work in the garden even if I wanted to, I still preferred the gray and gloomy weather I’ve come to associate with sewing time.

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I joined the Cashmerette Club this year. Many indie pattern companies have similar subscription programs, but this is the one that made the most sense for me. I have enjoyed the extra content very much. One of the patterns on my wish list to make in 2026 is the Vernon Button-Up Shirt.

I want to make this for two reasons: 1) I’ve never made a button-up shirt and I need to learn these techniques, and 2) I know this will be a button-up shirt that actually fits over the real estate without gaping. And then there is the Marston Raincoat . . .

Another Windstorm?

I am awake and listening to the winds ramp up again, although the worst of this storm may track further south of us. We had a few inches of snow yesterday afternoon followed by warmer temps. The snow melted overnight and now it’s raining. Temps are supposed to fall again later today.

I can’t keep up.

Elaine and her brother and his wife—my traveling companions from last weekend—have been without power for about 48 hours, as has our church. The electric co-op is doing its best to repair the lines but it is slow going.

I didn’t get a lot of sewing done yesterday but I did finish quilting some of the yardage for another quilted jacket. This will be a Grainline Studio Tamarack Jacket. I made that pattern earlier this year. It is a popular pattern, although I’m quilting the yardage before cutting out the pieces. The pattern instructions have you cut the pattern pieces and THEN quilt them, which results in smaller pattern pieces because of shrinkage due to quilting. That makes it harder to get the sizing correct. There is a bit of waste using my method, but I can always make small zipper pouches out of the leftover quilted pieces.

This is the outside fabric (Glaze by Libs Elliot for Andover):

I did 60-degree diamond quilting using Fabulux, a variegated trilobal polyester thread from Wonderfil. This is such a simple quilting pattern but so effective.

The inside fabric is Besties by Tula Pink:

I have never been much of a Tula fan, but for some reason, I had to use this fabric. And it coordinates so well with the Glaze.

I have almost finished quilting enough yardage to cut out the back and both fronts. I’d like to quilt the last piece of yardage today—for the sleeves—so I can put the jacket together. Once I make the class sample for the Burnside Bibs, I’ll be done with my class samples for a while.

While we’re on the subject of quilted jackets, Anna Maria has designed the Rosebud Jacket Pattern:

I like shawl collars, but this one may be a bit too much of a statement for me. This a great pattern for color blocking/mixing and matching fabrics, though. I might be persuaded to break into some of my precious Tim Holtz fabric stash to make this one.

I have learned a lot about quilted jackets this year. I‘ve made roughly half a dozen versions—that includes muslins—and I think my BU jacket has been the most successful one to date. I’ve made patterns designed by garment sewists who weren’t quilters and patterns by quilters who weren’t garment sewists. I have moments when I think I should design a jacket myself because I am both a quilter and a garment sewist, but then I hit myself with a virtual 2x4 and come to my senses. The world does not need another quilted jacket pattern.

And the Wind Blew

Yesterday was one for the record books, I think. The storm that pummeled Seattle on Monday and Tuesday arrived around 9 am yesterday morning. Here at our house, we were spared the worst of it because the front was coming out of the west. The bad cold fronts for our location are the ones that drop down from Canada from east to west over the Continental Divide. Still, we got some significant wind gusts. We had another tree come down on our property (you can see we have almost no snow):

The Flathead Valley took the brunt of the storm. I was listening to scanner calls and there were trees and power lines down all over the county. Much of Kalispell was without power for most of the day. A semi blew over on Hwy 93 south of town. There was a 96 mph wind gust recorded at Mount Aeneas, which is the highest peak just above our house in the Swan Range.

The lights flickered occasionally but we did not lose power. I spent the morning finishing up class samples. I’m doing a class in January on three serger projects. The first are these shoelaces, which are adorable but surprisingly tricky to make:

We’ll also make scrunchies:

And a pair of socks. These are from swimsuit fabric. I’ve also made them from microfleece.

I chose Valentine-themed fabrics for this set.

After lunch, I began quilting yardage for another quilted jacket project. I needed to do something meditative for a while because the schedule has had a lot of wrenches lobbed at it lately. Once I get the yardage quilted, this particular project should go together quickly. Despite having a lot of sewing projects in the queue, I am trying not to rush through them. I don’t work in a factory and I think sewing should be a mindful activity.

Practice Makes Good Class Samples

I spent yesterday working on class samples. It was not a straightforward process. It rarely is. I can’t just wave a magic wand and create samples out of thin air. I made several iterations of each sample to make sure I understand the process and—more importantly—can teach it to others. I experimented with fabric and threads and made refinements to the techniques. All of that takes a surprising amount of time. It’s time well spent, because I am learning as I go, but that time doesn’t always get factored into “teaching.”

I don’t have any photos yet. I want to get all the samples made, first. I plan to drop them off at the store on Thursday.

On our travels this past weekend, we stopped at a travel plaza halfway between home and Coeur d’Alene. The gift store had a lot of this kind of loungewear made in very cushy fabrics:

I have no desire to make these—although the cardigan isn’t bad—but it’s fascinating to me to spot trends in the wild.

I skipped out on the sewing group Christmas party yesterday because I am a bit peopled-out from this past weekend and because I am trying to keep ahead of my to-do list. December sometimes attacks me when I am not looking. I have a meeting this morning and then I am heading to town to run errands before windy weather moves in tomorrow. The wind is supposed to come out of the south-southwest, which doesn’t hit us as badly as the wind from the back door cold fronts coming from the east, but we could still lose power or a few trees.

Washington State is a mess. Two lanes of I-90 eastbound on the way up to Snoqualmie Pass from the west side have been closed because the embankment is washing out underneath. Parts of Highway 2 are washed out. The Hood Canal bridge was closed to traffic for a few hours yesterday due to high winds. There have been two levee breaches southeast of Seattle. Residents are being evacuated and parts of state route 167 have been closed. That is a very busy highway. Weather equipment clocked a 92 mph gust at Snoqualmie Summit yesterday afternoon. The town of Concrete even had a 2.9 magnitude earrthquake yesterday morning. 😳

A Musical Trip

I went on a road trip but I got to be a passenger this time instead of the driver. That was a pleasant change. My friend Elaine’s niece is a senior at a private college in Moscow, Idaho. Elaine and I went to her niece’s Christmas concert last year and had a wonderful time. (Niece sings with the concert choir.) We planned to go again this year, as did Elaine’s brother, Steve, and his wife. The four of us left Friday morning for the five-hour journey. We rode in Steve’s truck, which has a crew cab, so Elaine and I were very comfortable in the back seat. We knitted and played word games and visited. I finished three more möbius cowls. Elaine made winter hats to donate to local organizations.

We met Steve and Elaine’s sister, Alice, and her family at the Airbnb around 2 pm. They live in Seattle and had driven over on Thursday. Alice made dinner for all of us and then we headed to a nearby church. The concert was amazing. This college has a small but high-caliber conservatory program and the director does not shy away from difficult pieces. Alice and her husband have a solid grounding in music—as does their entire extended family—so afterward, we had a good discussion about the pieces that were included in the program.

We would have loved to have stayed for the entire weekend, but I am pianist and Steve is song leader and Elaine is the Zoom host, so all three of us had to be back for church this morning. We left Moscow at noon yesterday and were home by 7 pm. The weather and roads were clear in both directions. The four of us are the core of the worship planning team, so we also had an impromptu meeting about what we need to accomplish going forward.

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I am hoping for some dedicated sewing time through the end of the year. On Thursday, the other Janet and I put half a dozen classes on the calendar for early 2026. I need to make those class samples. I also need to start working on handouts and class samples for Sew Expo.

One of the classes we’re going to offer at the store is the Burnside Bibs from Sew House Seven:

These aren’t something I would wear, so I am going to make the sample to fit one of the girls that works at the store. She chose the fabric but I will make a muslin first to make sure they fit and to familiarize myself with the pattern.

*****

Another atmospheric river is heading into Seattle and will reach us around mid-week, but this time, we’re going to get snow instead of rain. Right now, it looks and feels more like March than December.

I am getting a new Jeep. I hatched this plan over Thanksgiving because DD#1 needs a better vehicle. The house they just purchased is about a mile off the county road and her current Honda Civic isn’t cutting it on the gravel road to their house. She had been thinking about getting another vehicle anyway and test drove a few last spring. I offered to sell her my current Jeep Grand Cherokee at a good price. It is a solid, safe vehicle and I have had zero problems with it. (A welcome change after owning The Diva for nine years.) I like it enough that I want another one. The husband contacted the fleet manager in the Seattle area who helped him with his work trucks and that guy found one for me. At some point, we’ll deliver my Jeep to her and pick up the new one.

A Tremont Jacket

I try not to get too invested in a project, especially one that is an impulse make. That way, I won’t be disappointed if it doesn’t work out. I’m making garments to learn techniques and to work with different fabrics. The Tremont Jacket, though, is one I will make again. I absolutely love the way this turned out:

It looks good on me, the fabric is soft and cozy, the fit is close to perfect (could be longer), and it went together easily even in this fussy fabric. My only quibble with the pattern is that it doesn’t specify a vertical or a horizontal buttonhole. Help a girl out! I split the difference and went with one at an angle. And I found the perfect fabric-covered button in my vintage button stash:

This goes to the store today. The pattern goes into the tried-and-true pile, although the next time I make it, I will make a couple of changes: I will lengthen it (of course), and I might make two long fronts instead of one long and one short front. A reviewer on the Sewing Pattern Review website did that to make a version that was more of a coat than a jacket.

[On Monday, the other Janet and I were looking around the store for fabric for her Tamarack Jacket. The other Janet makes many of her own clothes and is not afraid of bold prints, but not in retina-burning colors. I’ve decided that I am not the right person to help people choose fabric for their garments—unless they have the same coloring as me and aren’t afraid to dress like a parrot—because I was pulling some really riotous fabrics. 🤪 I like the combination she chose.]

I did not make the cuffed sleeves on this version because the sleeves would have ended near my elbow and I wanted longer ones. I’d have to lengthen the sleeves if I want to cuff them. I also thought the fabric was too soft to hold a cuff well.

The rest of yesterday was spent on paperwork. The husband has done residential work for most of the last 30 years. Working for commercial contractors is another ball of wax. Even if the job is less than $1000 (which many of the concrete cutting jobs are), they want a mountain of documentation—some of it notarized—and invoices have to be submitted in specific ways. One company wanted a specific kind of documentation from Montana State Fund, which administers our work comp policy, and even our insurance agent was unfamiliar with what they were requesting. I’ve learned a lot, but all this paper shuffling takes time.

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Western Washington is getting hammered by these atmospheric rivers. Some areas are experiencing 10,000-year flooding. A section of I-90 eastbound east of Seattle is closed because of a landslide that took out three vehicles yesterday. Traffic is being diverted around the closure. Our kids are not affected, but I can’t imagine what some residents are having to go through right now.

The arctic air dropping down into the northern plains will not make it to our side of the Continental Divide, so we’re still getting rain. I’ve been making lots of soups for dinner.

Parties and Presser Feet

It has been a busy couple of days. I was invited to the staff Christmas party at the quilt store on Monday, which was great fun. (The store is closed on Mondays.) We all brought projects to sew and spent the day eating and visiting. I worked on patterns. There is one pattern in particular that a few of us have been wrestling with. Marci, who works at the store, was trained as a professional patternmaker and brought her tools and knowledge with her to the party. She and I traced and measured and tried to come up with a solution. Ultimately, we concluded that this pattern needs more work than either of us wants to give it.

One of the other women who works at the store has this old Nancy Zieman coat pattern (princess seams!) and I am trying to decide if I want to add it to the queue. It’s out of print, but she would let me borrow it and trace it.

The pattern is designed for ponte and other stable knits. I’m not crazy about the collar, but I could change it.

The additional yard of the triple gauze fabric has been washed and dried and is waiting for me to finish the Tremont Jacket. I also took apart and altered both sleeve caps on the Chloe Coat and put the coat back together. That was easier than it sounds. I didn’t have to disassemble the coat; I just turned it inside out through the lining and worked on it. The fit and appearance is much better now.

Yesterday was my machine mastery class with five students. That class exhausts me. I never know who is going to show up, with what machine, or what they are going to want to learn. I have to be on my toes thinking of what to teach them next. We talked about presser feet for part of the class, because I am a bit of a presser foot junkie. Bernina has 107 different presser feet for its machines. I don’t have all of them, but I have quite a few. Yesterday, we all found out that we could use the #71 flat-fell foot for sewing on binding. My mind was blown. This video explains how:

I’m going to try this on the next set of potholders I make. I think it will neaten and simplify the binding process tremendously. I prefer to sew down my quilt bindings by hand, though.

[BTW, if you Bernina owners out there haven’t discovered the Bernina of Naperville channel, I highly recommend it. Gail does some top-notch videos on all things Bernina.]

We spent the afternoon session of class working on machine embroidery. That also exhausts me because there is still so much I don’t know, although the store owner is more than willing to come back to the classroom and help with tough questions. I am hoping to be able to devote some time over Christmas break to do some embroidery.

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We have to talk about the weather. Western Washington is getting slammed with precipitation from repeated atmospheric rivers—which are supposed to continue though the end of the month—and is experiencing flood emergencies. Some of that moisture is making it inland to us, but it’s falling as rain instead of snow because the cold air is stuck in Canada. We are also under a flood watch here. (Our elevation is such that we aren’t in danger, but locations in the valley are.) I really think that if it were cold enough to snow, the amount of precipitation we’re getting would result in another winter like 1996-97, when we got so much snow that our dogs were walking on the roof of the garage.

It feels more like March than December right now, but the husband reminded me that we have plenty of opportunities for snow—and a lot of it—yet this winter.

Fabric Distractions

I am proof that marketing works. Ashlee sent out an e-mail a few days ago about the new Anna Maria line of fabric that arrived at the store, so of course I had to go in and see it. Anna Maria Parry is a force of nature. She is an artist and fabric designer who has designed for Free Spirit and currently works as the Design Director for Anna Maria Textiles, a division of Northcott. Her daughter, Juliana Horner, has also designed fabric. I still have some of Juliana’s fabric line from Joanns, back when Joanns carried Tim Holtz, Susan Winget, and some other heavy hitters. If you’d like to learn more about Anna Maria, I recommend this interview on the Craft Industry Alliance podcast.

[Does anyone else remember where they were when listening to podcast episodes? Maybe it’s just me because I listen while driving. I was first introduced to Mimi G on a podcast while driving through Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve in Idaho. I listened to the Anna Maria interview on the last leg of a trip home from Seattle.]

Did I also mention that Anna Maria is the mother of seven children? I wonder if she ever sleeps.

Her new line is called Narrative and includes a selection of nine woven triple gauze fabrics. Some of you may be familiar with double gauze. It is exactly what it sounds like—two layers of cotton gauze—and is often used for lightweight garments and baby items. Triple gauze is three layers, woven in such a way that the layers are anchored together and form a positive/negative pattern on the front and back of the fabric.

I was seduced by the colorway called “Licorice,” which is a plaid comprised of black, red, and hot pink. (It was the hot pink that did it.) I brought it home, washed it on delicate and tumbled it dry on low because I wanted any shrinkage to happen before I started working with it. Triple gauze also frays like nobody’s business. It starts to disintegrate the second you cut into it, so the edges of the yardage had to be serged before washing.

[Triple gauze looks almost like a polyester double knit, although it is much less stable.]

Because of the need for careful handling, triple gauze wants simple patterns. I chose the Tremont Jacket from the Sewing Workshop.

I am not a flowy, unstructured jacket type of person, but this is about the fabric, not about adding more clothing to my closet. This design is perfect for handwoven-type fabrics, and triple gauze falls into that category.

I laid out the fabric on the floor of my bedroom to cut the pattern pieces and realized that I needed another yard for the second sleeve. (Extra fabric may be required to match stripes or plaids.) The store is holding it for me.

The fronts are asymmetrical and have 1-5/8" deep double-fold hems. The sides have a 5/8" seam allowance/hem. The front band is a self-fabric facing. On about page 3 of the pattern, I began to wonder if I had bitten off more than I could chew. The body pieces have mitered corners—mitered corners on acute angles where one side of the miter is a double-fold hem and one side is a single-fold hem. I understood what needed to happen but couldn’t figure out how to do it using the pattern instructions, so I puzzled it out a different way. I am pretty happy with my mitered corners:

You’ll note that I serged ALL the edges before I did anything else.

Once I got past those mitered corners, everything else went together smoothly. As of last night, I had sewn the body together at the shoulders and stitched down the neckline facing.

All that is left now is to sew in the sleeves, sew the side seams, and make the single buttonhole at the center front. This likely will be another shop sample. I like this design and could be convinced to try it again using a much-less-fussy-and-not-plaid handwoven-type fabric. This was a detour I hadn’t intended to take but I am glad I did. I feel very accomplished having sewn successfully with such a tricky fabric.

I would show you the Chloe Coat but I have decided to undo the sleeve caps and shave them down by half an inch. Poufy sleeve caps look funny on my broad shoulders and decidedly funny in corduroy fabric. I was counting on the shoulder pads to fill them out and that didn’t happen. Oh, well. After all that work, I want something I can wear, and I love the jacket otherwise.

Close to a Coat

I am very glad that I decided to make a muslin of the Chloe Coat pattern before cutting into my good fabric even though the coat has been relatively easy to make. Putting in the lining—”bagging the lining”—was an exercise in spatial perception skills that left my brain feeling like it had been mugged in a back alley. I watched a lot of YouTube videos. All that is left is the hem and the closures. The pattern calls for snaps, or “poppers” as the Brits say, but I may do buttons. I haven’t yet decided.

Fortunately, this will be a wearable muslin, something I throw on over jeans in the spring and fall when it’s cool. I like the flannel lining. On the second iteration, I will shave down the sleeve cap so it isn’t so poufy and possibly grade out to a slightly larger size at the hips. I need just a scooch more room there.

I hope to have a reveal photo for you by the end of the weekend.

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On my way to Seattle before Thanksgiving, I stopped in Post Falls, Idaho, to see the new Shabby Fabrics showroom. Post Falls is between Coeur d’Alene and Spokane, and has been the headquarters of Shabby Fabrics for a number of years. If you’re not familiar, Shabby Fabrics is an online quilting store. Jennifer, the owner, also has a wonderful YouTube channel.

The showroom is in the front of the (enormous) warehouse, which is a short drive off of I-90 and easy to find.

The showroom isn’t really set up as a regular store. Rather, there are themed booths—by holiday, etc.—with carefully-arranged displays of finished items with numbers next to them. Shabby Fabrics sells a lot of kits. If you see a finished item for which a kit is available, you write down the number on a sheet and clipboard provided as you enter the store. When you’re ready to check out, someone takes your sheet to the warehouse and pulls the items you want. A small selection of non-kit items, such as tools and notions, are also on display and available for purchase. If you order anything from the website, you can ask to have the items held for pickup, which would be convenient for someone like me.

It was late on a Saturday afternoon and I was the only one in the store, so I had a nice visit with Jennifer and her family. If you are anywhere near the showroom, make an effort to stop in.

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Once this Chloe Coat is done, I’d like to run up another muslin of the princess seam dress pattern just to check a few things. I should probably figure out what I am wearing for Christmas Eve and whether that decision involves making something. 🧐

A Finished Bella Quilt Coat

I should have done paperwork yesterday afternoon, but by the time I got home from town—I went to our new Costco (see below)—I didn’t feel like sitting at the computer. Two hours was all it took to insert the zipper and sew the lining to the body of the Bella Quilt Coat, and now it is finished:

Eh. I have mixed feelings about this pattern. The size range goes from 1 to 10, or bust measurements of 33" to 51". I made the size 5 for the shop sample. If I were going to make this for myself, I would make a size 8 and lengthen the jacket by at least 3". This pattern is not near the top of my personal sewing queue, however. I have some quibbles with the way the upper bodice and sleeves are drafted, and I would prefer that the contrast yoke extend down a few more inches.

[I’m not crazy about that pink zipper, either, but it was the best color match of the zipper colors offered.]

The coat is going to the shop today. I also got the sleeves put into the lining of the Chloe Coat yesterday morning before I left for town. That coat is almost ready to assemble. Some time this weekend, I need to sit down and prioritize my current project list so I don’t get distracted by new fabric and patterns.

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A package was waiting for me when I arrived home on Tuesday. I have spent many wonderful hours with my college roommate’s family over the past 40 years. Her mom—affectionately known as “Mom Louise”—sent me this beautiful ornament, but I plan to hang it in my sewing room where I can see it all year and think of her:

I was known as the “tall, dark-haired girl” (my roommate was shorter than me and blonde), although that dark hair has some gray in it now. 😉 Thank you, “Mom Louise!”

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Kalispell is now on its third Costco in 30 years. The first one opened even before DD#2 was born, in 1997. We outgrew it AND the second one. The third one is located a few miles north of our previous store and it is huge. I think it’s probably four times the size of the original Costco.

I was a bit disoriented while shopping there. It’s laid out like the ones in Seattle, so I wasn’t completely lost, but I kept thinking I was at the Shoreline or Alderwood stores where I shop when I visit DD#2.

Work to Do

I am home again after spending my birthday and Thanksgiving in Seattle, followed by a few days in Port Angeles at DD#1 and DSIL’s new house. Travel was uneventful, although I timed the drive on both ends to avoid traffic and bad weather (and thus, bad drivers).

My birthday gift to myself was a four-hour session with Ryliss Bod at the Sewing and Design School in Tacoma. Ryliss helped me to fit a dress pattern with princess seams, which is one style I like but did not want to try to fit myself. We used Simplicity 1586, part of their Amazing Fit line. That pattern came in cup sizes as well as Slim, Standard, and Curvy fit. Ryliss measured me and we determined that I needed the Slim fit in my size with the DD cup pattern pieces. We also shortened the torso from neck to waist by 1-1/2" and lengthened the lower half of the dress by 3".

[Yes, I typically lengthen bodices on my patterns, but I was not surprised that we had to raise the waistline on this one. I am short from my neck to my waist, but long from my waist to my crotch. I also have high hip curves. The combination of all these changes was why I needed help fitting this style of dress.]

I made up a muslin. Ryliss made some fitting refinements to the test garment—the back had to be taken in about an inch—that we then transferred to the pattern. The front fit well with no changes. I came home with a muslin that fits me properly and the pattern to make an actual dress. Spending time with Ryliss is always so much fun, and I learned more about pattern fitting in those four hours than I could have learned in a week reading a book or watching YouTube videos.

I feel like a whole new world of pattern ideas has opened up. I am eager to go through my pattern library to see what tops and dresses I can make now that I have a princess seam pattern that fits.

I also made a stop at Pacific Fabrics and bought four yards of the Hugo Boss deadstock fabric that I looked at last month. I used my birthday coupon. The photo doesn’t do it justice—it is more vibrant in person:

This will become a coat, I think.

I also picked up two fat quarter bundles of the Tim Holtz Multi line, which is the last monthly release in his year-long Palette collection.

But now I am home and have work to do. The first order of business is to scale the mountain of paperwork on my desk. After that, I have to corral Christmas music before it attacks me—both Advent prelude music and music for the Christmas Eve service. Once all of that is handled, I can finish the Bella Quilt Coat sample for the shop and my Chloe Coat wearable muslin.

I’ll have more to share tomorrow.

Plenty of Potholders

All of the potholders have been finished. This is what is left; the rest have been disbursed to recipients.

I use Insul-Bright and leftover cotton quilt batting on the insides of my potholders. I round the corners and bind them with bias strips so I don’t have to miter them. No, I don’t do hanging loops. Everyone I know keeps their potholders in a drawer.

I worked a bit more on the Chloe Coat yesterday afternoon. The flannel part of the lining is assembled except for setting in the sleeves. The facings have been sewn together.

That is a Northcott flannel and it feels heavenly. It is very soft and silky.

Burda dropped their Fall pattern collection and I spotted this coat pattern:

At some point, I want to make a raglan sleeve coat. (Shall we start a betting pool on how many coats I make this winter? 🧐) I would line this one, though, if I make it.

I need to stop looking at new patterns. I’m also going to need to start making some winter tops.

Fitting a Dress Pattern

I signed up for a private lesson with Ryliss Bod at the Sewing and Design School for the next time I am in Seattle. Ryliss is an amazing teacher—I interviewed her on the podcast about a year ago—and we’re going to spend a few hours fitting a dress pattern to me. I don’t have the patience to do it through trial and error. I chose Simplicity 1586, with Ryliss’s approval, although she said she also has some patterns that might work:

A good sheath dress is a wardrobe staple. My problem is that if I can find one that fits in the bust, the hips are too big and if it fits in the hips, the bust is too tight. This pattern includes cup sizes, so I’m hopeful that I can come out of this session with something wearable and a pattern that can be extrapolated to other garments, like the Cashmerette Upton Dress. Or Vogue 1983, which I love (the view on the right) but have nowhere to wear. 🤷🏻‍♀️

I don’t care. I can make garments even if I’ll never wear them, just for the experience and pleasure of making them.

My wool herringbone fabric has been dry cleaned. That coat pattern will be next up, I think, after the Chloe Coat. The 50" separating zipper arrived, too, so I can finish the Bella Quilt Coat.

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One of our community members passed away last weekend. He was principal of the local elementary school when my kids were there and also taught DD#1’s driver’s ed class. He said to me one time that he thought it was important to teach kids how to put their cars into a ditch on icy roads because it was almost inevitable that it would happen and they needed to know how to do it safely. (I knew what he meant.) When DD#2 was in kindergarten, he personally escorted her class to the field across the road from the school to watch a bald eagle feeding on some road kill. He used to come to our church when his wife was out of town and gave the sermon on at least one occasion. Their house was a regular stop on our Christmas caroling route. Even after he retired, he would ask about the girls whenever I ran into him in town. I have never met a gentler, kinder man, and I am sure his funeral service will be well attended this weekend.

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I spent yesterday binding potholders. It seemed like a good project for another cold, rainy day. I didn’t get all of them done, but I made a dent in the pile.

Dopamine Hacks

People always ask me how I get so much done. I used to think that was an odd question until I realized that the husband and I look weird to normal people. It is a standing joke that the husband works, relaxes by working some more, then finally relaxes by watching videos of other people working. When people ask me if he has any hobbies, I say that work is his hobby. I have hobbies, but I also have this annoying tendency to turn my hobbies into businesses, which make them less about relaxation and more about work. We are two peas in a pod. Sometimes that is a good thing and sometimes it is not.

This is the question that pops up most frequently with regard to sewing, too. People either ask me how I get so much done, or they ask how I maintain motivation through a long sewing project. After running across an article on dopamine hacking a few days ago, I had an epiphany: I’ve developed my own system of dopamine hacking over the years, without knowing that was what it was called.

[I suspected the husband had a similar system, although when I asked him about it, he seemed dumbfounded that someone gave his approach an actual name.]

Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that plays a key role in the brain's reward system. It helps to regulate feelings of pleasure, motivation, and reinforcement of behaviors. It also influences various functions such as movement, mood, learning, and attention. You may have heard of “dopamine dressing,” which is a fashion trend that emphasizes wearing clothes to boost your mood and happiness, often through bright colors. (Know anyone who dresses like a parrot?)

This is going to be a podcast episode at some point, but I thought I’d put some of this down on paper in case it helps anyone else. These are many of the dopamine hacks I use to keep myself going through my week. This list is specific to sewing, but it applies to other projects, too.

• Break project into micro-tasks and check them off—I adore lists.

• Take before/after photos at each step—I do this regularly because I chronicle projects here and on Instagram.

• Tidy workspace before starting—I can’t work in a messy kitchen and the same goes for my sewing space.

• Prep the next step (tools, pieces, layout)—These are good activities for short periods of time.

• Pair tedious steps with enjoyable activities (podcast, tea)—I work while listening to podcasts or YouTube videos.

• Use the 10-minute rule to get started—Ten minutes seems to be the magical amount of time for dopamine to kick in.

• Switch tasks before motivation crashes—Thankfully, in sewing, we’re rarely doing the same task for hours.

• Introduce novelty (alternate projects or new techniques)—Work on something difficult when you’re fresh, then switch to something quick and easy later on.

• Keep visual anchors (pattern envelope, fabric inspiration)—Some people use mood boards for this.

• End each session with a 'done for today' ritual—Clean up, set out supplies for the next step, etc.

• Celebrate each milestone (zipper, fit, hemming, sleeves)—Reward yourself with a piece of chocolate, cup of tea, 10 minutes of a computer game, or whatever gives you a little pat on the back.

The husband noted that rewarding oneself with chocolate might lead to the practice of identifying everything as a milestone—and this is coming from the man who discovered my secret stash of Trader Joe’s one-pound chocolate bars and helped himself. 🧐

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One of my podcast listeners—thank you, Franci!—sent me a birthday present:

She picked them up at her American Sewing Guild local chapter’s annual meeting. I will have to figure out a special project to showcase these—maybe a luxurious knitted cowl?