pingu

Do you guys remember pingu from your childhood?

(claymation : pingu is great, but I have to admit that I prefer when there is dialogue...like Wallace and Gromit)

I'm not even sure if it came to the States, or if I only ever saw it in Canada (insert Canada joke here). This is what I thought of as I worked on my latest sewing project:

(look! I'm a penguin!)

(Now I have little orange feet, finally, I can stand on my own!)

(Maybe if Alina had any small black buttons I would have real eyes, alas-hand stitched it is)

So he's a little sloppy (mostly because I didn't take a whole lot of time to hand stitch the closing on the wings, or the back. And I didn't leave a large enough seam allowance, I was just trying to see what result I would get, and, well, I was lazy. Unfortunately, this means that I can see some of the stitching (done with black thread...gasp!), and also that his belly could open up at any moment.

(Yes, he did get tagged...)

(So did this robot skirt: For my sister, not for me...sadly)

C'est tout.
alina

Yay!

 I have tags/labels!

I realize I've only been sewing for umm, two months? But after much perusal online, my jealousy of other peoples labels got to me. Obviously I did not order actual tags because those cost hundreds of dollars and you have to order HUNDREDS of tags, which I most certainly have no need for. Instead, I did a custom designed fabric at spoonflower, and now I have little framboise labels to put on everything!

(oooooooh.)

(I handstitched it...and made it purposely "hand made" looking. Oh wait, it is handmade)

(I thought I would make this card holder a little bit more professional by sticking to black and gray...until I added a bright pink button that is)

(One last view from behind)

Oh, so about the fabric: I bought just a fat quarter of a repeating pattern with my label, but it gave me over a hundred little labels for $10!! All I have to do is fold the edges back, press on some fusible interfacing, and sew it on! so fun.

I feel like I need to start sewing several projects a day now, just so I can put labels on more things!

alina

Chips

Not the kind that are deep fried and packed into noisy bags which sit on the grocery shelves for months(ew)
Also not the kind that are referred to as "french fries" by Americans. (really? french? not that "freedom" was any better...but still?)

Paint chips.

(paint chip boxes. pinterest, how did I ever waste time before you?)

Taking a large stack of paint chips from Lowe's is completely legal; it is also a little bit less socially acceptable. I must say that I felt red in the face and sweaty as I stocked up on literally tens of paint chips last week. I also felt like I was stealing as I stealthily placed them in my bag. I kept trying to tell myself that they are there so that you can take them. Annnnd, who knows, maybe I will use them to help pick out a future paint color. In the future (far far future). But no. I felt awful, I also felt like the paint department people were looking at me like a crazy person.

Speaking of which: that seems to be a common theme lately.

Hm. I'm ok with that.

Back to what I was trying to say. Those paint chips were for a purpose. I think most people who use paint chips for other projects are looking for a way to use up paint chips they already have...I'm special. I didn't have any paint chips, wanted to do a paint chip project, and so did the unacceptable. gasp.

But look at the awesome result:

(clearly only a small percentage of the chips I actually took...woops)

It was so easy (apart from all of the emotional distress), and looks cool! I have to admit that I was particularly lazy about cutting the chips, and so had a lot of not quite square little boxes. If you see (even though it is a particularly poor quality photo) that they are not evenly spaced: SHHHH! I did them in a completely non-technical and non-measured way. I eye-balled it. Apparently I am wonky. Or at least my eyes are?

What do you think?

alina

Unzipped

Hmm, where to start.

I have huge news!

(ooooh....rainbow...)

I can sew zippers!!!

This may not sound very exciting to my non-sewing friends, but I could hardly contain my excitement. Seriously, I feel like this has opened up the doors to the million sewing projects that are out there and require zips. Any truly self-respecting piece of clothing (or just skirt or dress) has a zipper. Well, maybe not every piece of clothing, but the nice-fitting, slightly more formal looking clothes do.

I hope this skill will catapult my sewing projects to a completely new level. It is VERY exciting. (Thank you to anyone who understands my excitement. Shep looked at me like I might be running a dangerously high fever...)

Unfortunately, the timing of this newly learned skill could not be worse. I sewed my first zipper yesterday evening, and this morning the spring semester started. I wish I could say my grown up attitude of really wanting to get an education and understanding the importance of my education has given me a great positive approach to returning to class after break, but alas, I wish I were still on vacation.

Why is winter break so long? I think it would have been much better had I only been given a week of vacation. Instead I had five weeks off to get adjusted to sleeping in, sewing all day, cooking extravagant meals, and forgetting all about studying and writing. Woops. Well, one day down?

Going back to school (and my composition course) reminded me of my original intentions in wanting to write a blog. I just wanted to write.

My first semester back in school (yes, this past fall) reminded me of how much I enjoy the act of writing. It also reminded me that I write pretty well, when I put some effort into it. The whole idea of starting a blog was so that I would have an outlet for my writing. Instead I've been focusing on other creative outlets. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad to have found sewing! I'm really lucky to have found more than one way to express creative ideas, but I'd like to push the direction of this blog a little more into the writing. Particularly since I will most likely have less time to create a new project to share here everyday. (sad, I know)

I will continue to share experiences, projects, food things, and other stories, I just hope to put a little bit more focus on the quality of writing (as much as I enjoy putting random comments in parentheses...)

That being said, tomorrow I start a modern dance class! I don't know which scares me more: my first dance class or my first calculus class (which also starts tomorrow).

My apologies for the general lack of witty comments and pictures. As a part of my apology, a taste of what I was up to this weekend (hence explaining my unusual hiatus from blogland):

(cookie monster cupcakes...cute and delicious!)

(flower buttons. pinterest is so good at giving me ideas for projects to do while babysitting)

If only...

...I had my own business!

Then I would have business cards to put into the nifty little card holder I sewed up today.

(blue and green dots- back to the old "me" colors)

(ooh! a different blue and green fabric...I see a trend)

(seriously, so cute. )

It was SO easy to put this little friend together. I stole a button from a pair of pants that refuse to fit nicely, found a hair thing to use as the elastic, and then just cut little bitty pieces of a few fabrics I had on hand. And voila!

I originally found this project on pinterest. (Thank you pinterest for turning me into a crafty domestic lady?) And was a bit intimidated because it required difficult techniques like turning things inside out and topstitching and lining. Little did I know that these crafty sewing skills are actually...ummm...easy? I used this really helpful tutorial, and I think it turned out soooo nicely.

I might make a few more. Anyone need a cardholder?

alina

monster

My younger brother got jealous of all the things I was sewing- unfortunately I don't know how to sew anything for boys. So I bought some fill and made him:

(garrrr, I'm a scary monster)

Yes, my brother is a bit old for stuffed toys, but even I kind of want one like this...

alina

practice makes perfect

In order to help get past my fears of "messing up" everything I sew...I bought several yards of cheap cotton at joann fabric this week. I have wasted too much time just staring (and drooling) over beautiful new fabrics, but I've been too scared of cutting and sewing them, because I have ZERO technical knowledge.

This way, I can cut, sew, mess up, throw out, experiment, and try again, without feeling bad about wasting so much money. So I took on a challenge: re-creating one of my favorite pieces of clothing: a navy high waist skirt from Zara (while we're on that topic: why is there no Zara here in uh-merica??).

Still working on it, but I've integrated a lot of new sewing techniques/skills:

(front of skirt: pocket)

(back of skirt: shirring)

(close up: the shirring...my new favorite sewing technique)

Not bad for someone who doesn't know how to sew, eh?

The fabric isn't quite right for this project, it's a little bit too light to hold the 'pattern' correctly, but again, this was mostly just to try out my ideas and not feel bad about ruining expensive fabrics...so even if it isn't perfect, it's doing its job.

alina