It’s the beauty and the bane of every sewist’s existence: managing our fabric stash.
We all buy way more fabric than we actually need (and in my case, more than I can store). And we all end up purchasing some fabric that we look at later and say, “What the heck was I thinking?!” Continue reading
No, I’m not giving up on the pants fitting project. But I did purchase a brand-new sewing machine over two months ago, and I’ve basically been using it to sew pants muslins with a basting stitch ever since I got it. It would be nice to have a project that doesn’t involve fitting at all, one where I can just sew.
My day job, for better for worse, has me taking the occasional 1 or 2-day business trip. Not being a traveler, I have little in the way of luggage. A bag that could accommodate necessities for an overnight trip would be a handy thing to have.
I spotted the Craftsy course, Sew Better Bags: The Weekend Duffel about a month ago. When Craftsy had another $19.95 sale on all classes around Christmas, I went for it. The bag pattern, by instructor Betz White, is well thought-out and has lots of nice details that give it a professional appearance. Here’s a model photo I stole from Craftsy’s website.
Since my last article on the Vogue 8940 pants muslin, I’ve been taking an online course in pants fitting which has been really helpful.
PatternReview.com was offering its online course “Fun with Fitting: Pants” on sale over the holidays. It’s taught by Sarah Veblen, a fitting expert who is author of the book The Complete Photo Guide To Perfect Fitting (Amazon link). Reader David Coffin suggested it to me, and I’m glad I followed up on it.
What I really like about the class is that it takes a conceptual approach, rather than a “spot this problem, apply canned solution” approach. A big problem I’ve had with fitting is that I invariably wind up with a situation that doesn’t match anything depicted in the reference I’m working from.
In the course, Sarah urges you to watch through all the videos, and read through all the printed material, even for the models and fitting situations that don’t necessarily match yours. Over the course of the fitting examples, she explains the principles behind her fitting assessment and explains why she’s making the correction she’s chosen. The idea is to enable you to visualize the problem and solution in your own head, so you can reason through fitting situations on your own. Continue reading
