On Anna's recommendation, I bought a copy of The Sewing Machine Attachment Handbook, which turns out to have been the book I've been looking for all my sewing life. Did your sewing machine come with a box of tiny, weirdly-shaped feet? Then you need this book. There are clear instructions for guides, hemmers, rufflers, binding and cording feet, sequin feet, walking feet … and on and on. If you can screw, bolt, strap or clip it to your sewing machine, I think this book covers it.

My favorite guideline for judging sewing books is by whether or not they make you want to sew — and this book makes me really, really want to sew. I think the hemming foot instructions alone are going to make my sewing life better.

It's also kindled in me a deep and painful longing for something called a "bias cutting guide" — a doodad that clips to the end of your scissors so that you can cut bias tape without all that painful marking. I wants one, I do. Couldn't turn one up on eBay, though; does anyone have any leads?

(Also, if you buy it from the link above, the author, Charlene Phillips, will sign your copy. That's always nice!)

Labels: books, reviews, sewing_machines, sewing_tools

Cadets at LouAnne's House of Beauty and Space Hostess Training relax in two of the six approved Space Hostess Poses before their three-day comprehensive exams, which start tomorrow.

The exams determine not only vocational placements for each cadet but also the hairstyles, makeup, and clothing the cadets will be allowed to wear throughout their five-year probational service in the International Space Transit program. The exams are daylong ordeals of drink-serving, emergency procedures, and hair setting and waving. Cadets are allowed one four hour watch in every twenty-four to refresh their makeup and watch uplifting in-flight movies.

Graduates of LouAnne's are considered leaders in the Space Hostess field, and are assured their choice of the placements they qualify for, including the prestigious São Paulo-Marsport run.

This pattern courtesy of Sheila at Out of the Ashes, who is offering an extra 15% off through the end of today (Monday the 15th).

Labels: patternstories, Vogue_7542

As promised, here's the crossword fabric available at Spoonflower:

A few notes:

— the blacks (and other dark colors) tend to wash out & fade really quickly on digitally printed fabric. I don't know how to fix this — anyone have hints for keeping them dark?

— this design is optimized for the upholstery-weight fabric. I haven't tested it on other weights. (That fabric is slightly off-white, too.)

— this fabric was designed for me by Beth Keller. She's awesome. You can check out her Etsy site, KellerDesigning. I don't know if she's taking commissions now, but you could always ask …

Enjoy!

Labels: crosswords, fabric, fabric_design, spoonflower

So I just could not let go of the Liberty Heidi idea, so I grabbed a couple of hours late Friday night and early Saturday and threw this together.

This is not one of my favorite Liberty prints — I thought it was called "Bourton," but googling "Liberty Bourton" showed me something different, so who knows which one this is. It was, however, a perfect choice for a muslin, being 1) exactly the right weight, 2) something I would wear if the experiment worked, yet 3) not something I would be very sad to lose if I ended up throwing it away. I'm pretty sure I bought this on eBay from someone who was de-stashing, so it was also cheap.

I ended up adding about 4.5 inches to the center pieces of the front skirt and to the back — they're both cut on the fold, so it wasn't hard.

I ended up not lining it at all — I finished the bodice with bias binding cut from the same fabric, using the Dread Pirate Rodgers' excellent instructions. (The only difficulty was that the Liberty lawn is very slippery, so it's hard to mark with a pencil — the pencil drags the fabric along. I ended up using chalk, which tends to brush off. Suboptimal, all around.)

I'm not sure why I'm showing you the side view, as this is such a busy print you probably can't even see the waist seam!

Somehow I managed to get the gathers off-center on the back; I'll wear it once and decide whether I like the way the dress works with the gathers before I rip it out and re-do it:

Problems: aside from getting the gathers off-center in the back, I also didn't gather the entire center front piece of the skirt — I only gathered between the pleat markings. I think it would look better with the entire section gathered.

I'm going to try to wear this dress this week, weather permitting (ah, who am I kidding, I live in California now, it's the most permissive weather on the planet), and we'll see how it works. If it works, this is going to be great — it takes SO LITTLE fabric, comparatively, that it opens up a lot of Liberty and novelty-print possibilities …

Labels: erin_sewing, experiments, Heidi, Liberty

Carla: Well, well. What have we here?

Darla: Looks like someone here is unclear on how things are run in this town, boss.

Marla: [raises chin, menacingly.]

Carla: You mean someone doesn't know that this is OUR department store, Darla?

Darla: Looks that way, boss.

[Marla's silence, is, if anything, more unnerving than the rough voices of Carla and Darla.]

Carla: I'm sure these … girls … didn't mean any harm. And I'm sure they feel so terrible about trespassing that they'd like to make it up to us, don't you think so, Darla?

Darla: Makes sense to me, boss.

Carla: So if these ladies just hand over their new lipsticks, I think we'll call it a simple misunderstanding, right, Darla?

Darla: I'm sure they'll agree, boss.

[Marla starts humming under her breath. It may or may not be the Toreador song from Carmen.]

Carla: [examines lipsticks.] Very, very nice, ladies. I commend your excellent taste, if not your senses of direction. Have a lovely day.

Today's pattern is from Sheila, at Out of the Ashes — and she's running a spring sale! Get 15% off starting tomorrow morning, April 8, with the coupon code SPRING. (All paid orders will ship Wednesday or Thursday 4/14 or 4/15.)

Labels: patternstories, sales, Simplicity_5662, whatsthestory

I knew when I first saw these that I HAD to have them, even though they are 1) intended for fifteen-year-olds, and 2) patently ridiculous. But aren't they just AWESOME? They are. Don't try to deny it. They're Cynthia Rowley for Roxy, and I'm only slightly embarrassed to say I saw them in Lucky. (Remind me to go into my rant about the Lucky-fication of American Fashion, or perhaps you can just read my latest column in the Boston Globe, here.)

They are also quite comfortable and make people on the street (at least in New Orleans, where I was recently) say "Damn, girl, those are some cute shoes." Your street-interactions may vary, but only in the choice of positive adjective. I promise.

They also come in black and white gingham. What's not to love? I ask you. But I'm not listening.

Labels: Cynthia_Rowley, Roxy, shoes

Since I started making multiple iterations of the BurdaStyle Heidi dress, I've gotten lots of email about it. Some folks want advice on lining it, others want to know about fit issues, and still others are worried about the printing-it-out-and-taping-it-together part (don't worry about that, it's easy). No one, however, has written to me to say, "Erin, that's a nice dress and all, but you really need to ADD MORE FISH."

However, I knew that was what was in all of your hearts, so, behold:

I've had this fabric for more than THREE YEARS. Obviously, it was biding its time, waiting for me to meet the dress that would be its destiny. And what a destiny that is:

I love the pixilated, dappled look of this fabric. Several folks did not even notice the fish, when I wore it. So here, have a fish closeup:

And in case you were wondering, yes, this fabric IS nearly impossible to match to anything … I have four pairs of pink shoes (yeah, that's a topic for another post) and NONE of them matched. (And I made this for a wedding — if you can't wear pink shoes to a wedding, where can you wear pink shoes?) But I don't care, because: FISH.

Labels: BurdaStyle, erin_sewing, fish, Heidi, prints

Jessica found this incredibly steampunk Norman pattern and wonders if anyone has information they can share about Mrs. N.R. Norman, inventress. This is Centennial Pattern No. 8, for those keeping score at home, and is from the 1890s. It may be a St. Louis company — it's marked St. Louis. Any information? Please leave a comment! (Here's a bigger image.)

Speaking of comments, Becky O. left one on Friday pointing us to this WONDERFUL writeup by TrueUp about the different on-demand fabric printers. Exhaustive and well-researched, definitely worth checking out.

Kate found the button-top (not dress) I was thinking of. Great for Rolling Stones fans!

Kristen sent this link to dresses knitted from trash. So cool. (Although probably itchy.)

Anna sent me a link to The Sewing Machine Attachment book. (It's a book about different attachments FOR your machine, not about fostering your attachment TO your machine.) I have purchased mine, will review when I get it!

Lucy (who is the person behind Home Movie Day London) sent this link to a digitised (British spelling, in Lucy's honour) film of 1930s fashions. Lovely!

A few self-promoty links:

If you like words, and are on Facebook, might you not consider being a fan of Wordnik on Facebook? Our fan page is here. If you're not a Facebooker but still want Wordnik words of the day, that link is here. But the only place you can see the Wordnik LIST of the day (a collection of related words) is on Twitter:@wordnik. [If you're looking for me on Twitter, I'm @emckean for word-type stuff, @FakeErinMcKean for "what-I-had-for-lunch" type stuff.] (Whew! That's a lot of social media in one place …)

Labels: blatant_self_promotion, linkgasm, Norman_patterns

For reasons that should be painfully obvious, I have wanted more of this fabric for years. I bought some the moment I saw it, and made a big circle skirt, which I have altered at least a couple of times. But it's quilting cotton, which means it's not especially sturdy, and the skirt was beginning to look a little sad. Which made me more than a little sad. (That's one of the downsides of sewing — even if something you make costs less than the $20 throwaway item from H&M or Target, it costs more in time and emotional investment, so you get madder when it wears out/rips/gets spilled on.)

And unfortunately, with fabric, even if you know the manufacturer's name and the fabric name, you can't rely on the seller knowing either of those pieces of information. So the only thing you can do is hit eBay at regular intervals and think "if I didn't know anything about this fabric, how would I describe it?"

Which is what I did, and now FOUR YARDS are on their merry way to me. Woo! With a bonus Hoo!

Do I know what I will sew with this yet? Not especially. But I know I will love it and hug it and squeeze it and call it George.

Labels: alphabet_prints, ebay, fabric, fonts

Pros:

Shawl collar (love!)
Pockets (duh, love!)

Labels: sales, Simplicity_2959