Well, we're not Russian but...

We are shaped like peasants. It's genetic.

There are about fifty things in the 4-2009 issue of Ottobre that I would like to make. I especially like the Russian Peasant section, but then I've always been a sucker for Eastern European stuff (you know... vodka, borscht, that guy named Boris that I dated for a few weeks).



I started with pattern #21 "Anemone Stripes" tunic. This isn't a great photo, but it's what I have.



I made two versions of this t-shirt for TLo several weeks ago. I have to say, I'm really pleased with this pattern. I wasn't totally convinced about the sort of faux layered look from the magazine photos. But this shirt is just cute! It has a very nice shape and the faux layering thing isn't as tacky as I thought it might be. I know, I know... I should never have doubted the great Hepola design instinct.



Version 1 was made with that stripey black fabric as the main body and then two different scraps of orange and peach/orange knit. I wish that part showed up better in photos, I really like the subtlety of the two oranges. The peach is the bib and sleeve fabric and the orange is the sleeve and neck binding-- the picture above shows it a little bit better. Since I apparently have acres of the black stripey fabric on hand from a three-year-old FabricMart purchase, you could say this entire shirt was made from stash scraps. I still have acres of that fabric.



I like this t-shirt so much I'm tempted to make a few more, although it's sort of a very obvious look. I don't suppose you can really have too many of these in one wardrobe. Too bad, because the style fits TLo especially well (not that you can tell from the bad photo above), but it looks pretty good on The Big One too. She's worn version 2 twice already. Speaking of which:

Here's version 2.



I did a sort of fake triple coverstitch on the hem (despite the fact that I have an actual triple coverstitch machine). This is because my first pass at the hem missed about 75% of the actual hemline. Doh! So I just ran over it again. This actually gave the hem a nice weight, the shirt hangs nicely now. The fabric is really heavy and has a lot of lycra in it so it could take the extra stitching.




I think that's about all I have the strength for tonight, I'm off to bed. I am so glad it's Friday tomorrow. Although Saturday would, I suppose, be even better.

Yo Mama ('s Shoes) Revisited

Yes. I know you are all just so interested in my footwear. I mean, who wouldn't be?

So I got the votes in on the shoe thing, which appears to be unanimous (spelling is not my strong suit, so I'm just assuming that's correct). Either people who didn't like these shoes didn't vote out of sheer horror or these are very cute shoes. I'm going with "very cute shoes".


(note: clicking will take you to Zappos.com)

And then, I turned around and didn't buy them. Doh! See, the Clarks at Zappos.com that I thought were really cute were completely sold out in all sizes but 5 and 10. I'm taking that to mean they're popular. But then it occurred to me that I had a $65.00 credit at Dillard's. I went in and Lo! and Behold! There they were in my size. So I bought them instead. Since they were only $69.00 (compared to the $100.00 Zappos was asking) and I had a $65.00 credit... well, heck! It was practically like free shoes!

No really. It was like FREE SHOES. It does not matter that I had already paid that $65.00 last summer. Seriously. That's how it works. The shoes were free. Lalalalala... I can't hear you saying that I already paid that money last summer... Lalalallalala. Free shoes!




(note: clicking will take you to Zappos.com)

So anyway, I have shoes.



And thanks for all your votes! I am soooo excited about my free shoes!

Oh and they are super comfortable, if anyone needs some "I have to stand around on my feet in 2-inch heels all day" shoes. I can't guarantee you'll get them for free, of course, but....



update: later that night
I happened to click on the link to make sure it worked... and thought "hmmm... I wonder how many they have left now?" Apparently the stock has been replenished, they now have a bunch of sizes. Go figure. Still, mine were free!

Polo or rugby... what's the difference?

My husband would say "The difference between tw**s and Real Men".

(You can't see it, but I'm rolling my eyes. )

Honestly though, this is the most difficult question to find an answer for on the internet. No one seems to have devoted any bandwidth to this issue. Is it really as simple as solid vs. stripe? Maybe so.

Whatever. Here's my fourth polo/rugby shirt.



This one was made using the same pattern as the last, which I wrote about in this post.

There wasn't much difference in this one, except instead of cuting it from an adult-sized t-shirt I cut it from an adult-sized polo shirt . Which meant I had an adult-sized polo collar on hand. Neato! Time to experiment with adapting a large knit collar to a smaller size pattern. I find making collars out of knits unsatisfactory for the most part. They're usually bulky and awkward. But knit collars aren't always easy to come by, especially in the right color.

So, how to make a collar smaller? I dismembered the original shirt including trimming the collar away from the neckline. After cutting out and starting construction on the new shirt, I resized the collar. In this case I decided to have the collar meet up at the edge of the placket rather than offset the way it was in the red shirt. To scale the collar to my new shirt, I measured how long I wanted it to be by pinning it to the neckline starting at the front and marking the center of the neckline on the collar. Next I drew a straight line at the center marking on the collar and added a seam allowance. I cut the collar at the seam allowance and then laid the resized piece over the remaining piece. I trimmed this to match so I had two equal pieces.



I seamed it back up with a straight stitch, pressed the heck out of it and there you have it: kid-sized collar.



The rest of the construction was as usual. Piece of cake!

Mmmm... cake.