Machine quilting

Right now, I'm really enjoying machine quilting. It started with Ethan's train quilt and it continues with my current projects: Janie's star quilt, small silver sashiko project for Chattahoochee Evening Stars - Star Wares (actually NOT machine quilting - it's hand sashiko), and burnt orange Hook 'Em bag.

Shannon

Today many sewers and many others who knew and loved Shannon Gifford mourn the loss of her last night. A light went out. I'm sending prayers up to her and to all who knew and loved her. Pattern Review has posted a lovely tribute.

At left is a picture of her teaching at last year's Perfect Jeans class for ASG Altanta.

Top from a Jacket

And here is the top under the jacket. In order to convert the jacket, I raised the armholes about 1", trimmed about 5/8" from the back neck, pinched out the shoulder seam where the shoulder pad went, decreased the circumference by about 1.5", put the CF line on the fold, fashioned a V neck, raised the hem about 1.5", and inserted a CB zipper.


I covered the edges of the neckline + armholes with fabric cut into bias strips. This fabric is a linen-silk blend from Louise Cutting.

Spring Fling

What's the next best thing to sewing? Spending the day with sewing friends, being inspired by one another's sewing adventures. The Atlanta chapter of the American Sewing Guild hosted Spring Fling today. And, then I came home and sewed some more. That's pretty geeky, I guess. I finished my skirt with the little inserts due to fabric shortage and wore it with my jacket from Pam Howard's tailoring boot camp, as well as the top made from the same patterned (modified significantly). I love that pattern.

This is a test. This is only a test.

Since I now read lots of sewing blogs, I thought it might be fun to try my hand at it. But this is just a test. I may abandon this idea as quickly as it started!

Today I have been working on a skirt pattern. I've never had much luck with skirts - pants, yes, but not skirts. I took a pants fitting class from Cynthia Guffey ( a while back and have a nice pants pattern. Seems like it should be easy enough to convert it into a satisfactory skirt. Previously I tried for A-line. I'm thinking this is a bad look for me. The results were extremely dumpy. Wadders. So today I'm trying a straight skirt. Unsurprisingly my piece of black linen is insufficient. But then I remembered Pam Howard's article in Threads (), "What To Do When Fabric Runs Short (#122)." Thanks, Pam! So here goes. A black skirt with a "design feature" - that little bias cut out on the lower corner of each side.

Here is what I cut off the pattern:

And here is what I plan to insert: