slow and steady is the mood

well.  y'all had some excellent suggestions on getting the sewjo mojo back, many of which i implemented to get this dress past the "folded up and staring accusingly at me" stage.  in fact, there were so many great ideas i'll be doing a little credited wrap up on le blog later, a mojo-maker, if you will.  (oh now come on, if that isn't a cocktail waiting to be made i don't know what is.  must get ruggy on that.)

speaking of ruggy, my reluctant photographer was unavailable this weekend, so i had to go all self timer on these shots.  wanting some natural light, i turned to that old standby, the alley of my building.  you don't go teetering around manhattan by yourself and expect your camera perched several feet away to remain where you intended. or expect to be left alone in a snazzy getup like this.

speaking of get ups.  this is one of victory pattern's latest releases, the nicola dress.  I LOVE THIS PATTERN.  the pattern itself is as beautiful as the story behind it.  it's a deliciously forgiving wrap dress, with six darts at bodice front, two in the back, and simple tucks on the skirt portion.  if, say, you happened to grade from a 6 to an 8 at hips, and really should have cut a straight 8, well then, you could just rip a dart n' a tuck out and give yourself a little more wiggle room.  but of course one could avoid that problem by MAKING A MUSLIN.

if i'm not going to get behind a muslin when i'm working with fabric like this, i'm truly never going to get behind it. but i did tissue fit the pattern (read: hold it up to myself and call it good) and tried it on multiple times during the process.  the carnival spiral staircase in our apartment got a workout on this ride, our one full length mirror being below ground.

speaking of below ground.  at this point, i'm glancing up the alleyway stairwell at four men getting ready to move many large pieces of furniture directly onto my camera.

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaand in i go.  had to get a last shot of the back for you, i'm in love with it (and no, not just because i am a cheerleader for my badonaka booty).  behold: no center back seam!  mount crackatoa doesn't stand a chance!  smooth as a baby's bottom.  you'll forgive the pun.  

   

as for the precious yardage: i knew this fabric was not going to be a stroll in the park.  but i fell in love with it immediately.  in a previous post, i dubbed it burnout velvet, but i think it's a laser cut.  i think.  i really should listen more, because the lovely peeps at mood LA certainly told me what it was.  sheer as a moth's wing.  little furry velvet patches flecked with gold.  my floors look three hundred fairies went crazy with sparkly dust.  

i cut the fabric on my twenty dollar ikea low pile carpet to keep it from shifting around, magazines holding it in place.  look, when you don't have fancy pattern weights, you do what you gotta.  there were a few wonky cuts i had to deal with on the large skirt panels, but as it turned out i tapered the skirt in anyways.  this does not bode well for me, as really i need to just get some good pattern weights.  i don't need any more encouragement in the "do it wrong and make it right" department. 

but i'm learning.  just a few months ago i would have made this jammie up out of the sheer fashion fabric only, and thrown a slip on under it.  in fact i struggled with that decision here.  taking the time to do it right, instead of do it quick, is something i have to constantly pummel myself into.  i think that years of buying cheaply made, inexpensive RTW produces a need for immediate gratification.  why go for quick now, when i have control of the wheel?  i may want to cut a dress saturday morning and have it ready by happy hour, but i'm always happier with the outcome when i take a more leisurely drive.   

sunday driver oona won, and i decided to underline it with a satin i had in my stash.  but i did forgo a lining, since i didn't want to add any more bulk.  instead i serged the seams in a complimentary shade.  sleeves were left sheer, with a gold open weave ribbon as sleeve binding.  the bodice is attached to skirt at waist, snap closures.  i considered upping my sunday drive with buttonholes... but i'm a belt girl anyway. 

(and i do believe i will always be race car oona in the case of buttonholes.  but hey, i've been wrong before.)

how bout you?  speed racer, or sight see-er?

this velvety wrap was made using my monthly fabric "allowance" as part of the Mood Sewing Network.

three first world problems concerning mojo

it's been a month since i've sewn anything other than a baby hem and i'm feeling loooooooow. that's kind of a lie, i basted the blue basement dress together, even serged up her edges with ellie, and i swear, it's like she was made for me, but the funk i felt clearly pointed me to PUT THE SCISSORS DOWN and pour a glass of wine.

perhaps that was my mistake in the first place? my right hand is not complete without a glass of something delicious.  easily remedied.  but the real reasons for my missing mojo, not so much.

1.  I HATE MY STASH

after being away from it for eight months, i was pretty excited to paw through it again.  it had been banished to some bags in a storage closet, to make room for other people's shite.  when i pulled it out, i thought, surely these are my scraps, man did i save a lot of scraps, and after another annoying hour of looking for it, i announced to ruggy: i had lost my stash.  GONE.  evaporated into thin air.  that, or our gentleman friend staying in our apartment suddenly got a hankering to sew up a very bright wardrobe.  it all looks crazy and fun on the screen.  in real life, it's chemical-tastic stuff that will most certainly go all pill-y or plain evaporate after one wash.

there were some gems, mostly from our debimegoonamena meetup last year, and some swap beauties.  the duds were picked with my very own hand.  a hand that was most certainly free of a delicious glass of something, as garment district shopping hours are a little early.

again, drinkless: maybe a mistake.

2. SEASONAL CHANGES MAKE MY HEAD HURT

if you happen to live in a changing climate, you know the change in the air effects many parts of day to day life. shorts are exchanged for pants, tank tops for cardigans, chardonnay for shiraz.  but now i'm wondering if the seasonal shift affects sewing mojo.  especially for those of us who don't sew a season ahead of time. (WHATEVER, WARDROBE PLANNERS. AREN'T YOU SMART.)  when the days are not hot but not cool, i have no idea what to wear, and since i sew for the season i'm in, i therefore have no idea what to sew.

luckily there is always an appropriate alcohol.

3.  I AM SPOILED

this has always been true, but add to the list of brattiness: i hate my sewing space.  it kind of sucks.  i didn't think this before we spent several months in a bona fide house complete with stunt sewing pool.  at first i gave myself permission to use one of the four desks in the house.  then i decided the dining room shelves could hold a bit of fabric.  by the end of it, anything that wasn't sewing related was relegated to a spare bedroom, and i had control over a small country's worth of space.  how am i supposed to get my brain back into the postage stamp i have in reality?  my stash is ALL THE WAY ACROSS THE LIVING ROOM BEHIND CLOSED DOORS FOR GODSAKES.

and let's not get into the maniacal rattle of my ellie as i race through a seam.  i used to think it was so nice that ruggy and i worked right next to each other with our matching old school drafting desks.  now i realize i'm subjecting him to nonstop brain jarring noise.  and i'm not even sewing anything for him.

IN CONCLUSION

i've been delusional about my stash, spoiled in my sewing space, and my seasonal switches are shorted out. when i lose my mojo, i pour something stiff and cut into something pretty.  as the only Something Pretty i had on hand was the mood velvet deliciousness, i stopped by chic and paron and picked up some new pretty, in the form of three silks and two wovens.  and ruggy made me up a new cocktail (for now, dubbed the Autumn In New York. WHAT.  how else am i expected to cut into the velvet of awesomeness?)

what do you do to get your mojo back?

distracted explanations

Oh, the precious. The pretty, pretty precious.

I started to unpack, I really did, and then my hands fell on this yardage of velvet burnout, picked out at Mood's LA locale for my next network make. Which reminded me: in my excitement over all the announcing yesterday (seriously, my head almost flew off) I realized I didn't actually let you in on the details of the Mood Sewing Network. You see, I've been periodically (read: every 15 minutes) yelling at Rob I'M A MOOD SEWING NETWORK BLOGGER ever since the second I found out, so I do tend to forget that you haven't heard it from my rather large mouth until yesterday.

When Meg at mood (our Tim Gunn-- a Tim Gunn who sews her own fabulous stuff daily) contacted me about this new adventure, I responded within minutes. knowing it could look desperate, and not caring. Peeps who've been around here awhile know I'm a two dollar a yard mystery fabric sort of girl... but you also know a recent fateful trip to FIDM's designer section (with incorrectly marked dollar a yard prices) spoiled me completely. When Meg contacted me, I'd already been to Mood's LA locale, and surprised myself by falling swiftly in love with the staff, the remnants boxes, and the manageable size of the store. Before I ever knew I'd get a golden ticket, I was plunking down 25 bucks a yard for an Anna Sui print. (No, not that one. Miss Sui, she floats my boat.) Dude. It's nice to have nice fabric. It's nice to know what that nice fabric IS, and how to work with it. 

And it was a shock to be asked! So before they could realize the err of their ways, I immediately responded with a resounding YES, and waited with baited breath...

...and then I saw the company I'd keep. Holy cow. If you don't know them already, the lovely, talented ladies of the Mood Sewing Network are: Amanda's Adventures in Sewing, Diary of a Sewing Fanatic, Erica B's DIY Style, Frabjous Couture, Ginger Makes, Goodbye Valentino, Miss Celie's Pants, and Sew Well. These are ladies I've admired from afar for quite some time.

(Yes, I photoshopped my pic background periwinkle. That house really needs to be periwinkle.)

Lest you think the lot of us are allowed to walk in the joint and rob the place, we get a set monthly allowance for fabric. No cashola. We're allowed to choose what we want, and make what we want, and we are meant to post our failures as well as our successes, whether it's due to the fabric or the sewist. (This could prove problematic for me, as I always succeed. What, you don't believe me?) Online shopping is encouraged as well, and necessary for a good portion of us spread across the country. I was lucky to still be in LA for my last mood make, and the crew was excited to hear the news. (You'll be meeting them soon, I went a little crazy with pictures. Swatch ain't got nuthin on Oscar.) But it won't be all Mood all the time here. I'll still be tromping in to Chic, and Paron, and forcing you to listen to jazz, and yelling about all manner of things. (And drinking. Oh yes, drinking.)

I am so honored to be a part of this uber-talented network. But for real, I'm honored to be part of the sewing blogisphere in its entirety. It's a supportive community of endless inspiration, and I hope we all continue to contribute to that.

Now. How do I distract myself from that lavender yardage long enough to unpack?