Pant Skirt

Tube Spant by Y-3 brand

Remember gauchos?  Or culottes...maybe palazzo pants?  All variations on a hybrid pant/skirtish thing.  Wonder what the au current terminology is... 

Anyway, I had some, have some, and remade them into a longer version.  Mine were very comfy and draped well  - a stretch jersey that recovers its shape instantaneously.  I added an extra 6 inches in length using a paisley lace-like suede fabric from my stash.  Now they almost look like hippy bell-bottoms, but thankfully, not quite.  I think I'll call them...skants!

Motherboarding to Kimono Flannel

design by Alexander McQueen

(Ahhhh... Motherboard is back, better than evah.  Seems she had run out of power.  Now I hear she's got double what she had before.  Speed and photoshop are back in business, among other things.  Life is good.)


Speaking of mothers, we're visiting mine over Thanksgiving weekend, so... I sewed up a new nightgown for the occasion.  And to make it all the cozier, I used my old flannel sheets from my old double bed.  Tweaking my design a bit, I used the Kimono Style Dress pattern from before.

It's so comfy, I have it on now!

Stitch n' Bitch

woodblock print by Hashiguchi Goyo.

OMG The motherboard of our home computer simply slipped into a dark and quiet place one day this past week. Life is not the same with a netbook. No no no. I know, thank goodness we had everything pretty much backed up and all my photos are in the cloud on picasa... However, the netbook is soooooo slowwwwwww. And doesn't have photoshop. I've been trying to figure out how to manage everything on this tiny thing and download photos from the camera, edit them, etc. for an entry here this afternoon and it's taken me 3 hours so far!!! So the end of blogging for awhile as this is no fun, no fun at all.  Now from bitching to some stitching action.

I was very excited to get a Japanese Pattern Book in the mail and figure out how to create my own pattern from the diagrams as well as grade the size to fit.  I made some deviations along the way which you can see in the pix.  It's called Kimono Style Dress.

Pump Up the Plaid, People!

image from Very Glossy@wordpress

It all started with a hand-me-down flannel shirt.  I love flannel shirts.  So soft and comfy and warm.  But not so fashionable, shall we say, for out and about.  I wanted to do something with them and finally thought of...pants.  Tried one on to see if it might work and yea, the sleeves fit as legs, the cuffs fit my ankles so off to the races we went.

Although I was off to a great start, I stalled soon enough when I came up with some unique engineering challenges.  Eventually (after the usual trial and error, and aha moments) my flannel shirt pants came to fruition - using every bit of fabric except the collar!  (I'll use it for something...hmmm)

Not Your Everyday Ladies Boots

Five WACs cleaning boots from archives.gov

I've been running accessories for immediate gratification whilst working on a major re-construction project (or two) that involves more brain power than I can steadily pump out.  Some might call it procrastination, but I prefer a more upbeat attitude.

Never Say Never, or A Rose Is A Rose...

painting by Salvador Dali

Mom donated a sweatshirt that I was not gonna wear - full of roses.  But, lo and behold, I did cut a couple of the flowers out and use them as appliques - for a pair of stained black suede shoes.  I spilled spaghetti sauce on one of them.  or was it salsa... 

I had been saving the shoes for a very long time wondering what to do with them, trying different stuff on them, but nothing seemed to work really.  Until, one day, the Mom sweatshirt popped up into consciousness.  Snip, snip, glue, pin.  done and done.


Cute as a button, or a pin cushion.