I had grand plans for this week.  I’m staying with my family and I thought with so many hands around, my hands wouldn’t always be full of children.  But my kids went and got pink eye and ear infections, so I’ve been tending to their sickness and trying to quiet the whining all day.  Then collapsing on the couch with flickr for most of the evening. Which isn’t such a bad thing, really. After sewing one dress for me and one for my daughter, garment making is pretty much all I can think about. So I thought I’d share all these amazing clothes I found with you.  And maybe when everyone is well again I’ll go home and fire up the sewing machine.

1. front closeup, 2. linen_1.jpg, 3. striped sailor boatneck tee, 4. red ticking capri, 5. flow shirt, 6. fridas kjole/dress, 7. Vintage Fabric Girls Dress from Japanese Sewing Book, 8. front closeup, 9. klein hemdje

1. Muslin, 2. silk tank, 3. … just because i’m so proud of my sewing…, 4. new lacy top, 5. DSCN6074, 6. i made my jeans! (simplicity 3850- built by you), 7. 28may08, 8. Rok voorkant, 9. Built by Wendy dress – front view

After a week (a week!) of nursing sick children I thought I would have a couple hours to sew on Saturday morning, but of course then I got it.  crap.  I had grand plans of conquering an actual pattern: simplicity 3835 (any advice welcome–has anyone lined this? can anyone tell me how to line this?).  There were some angry and rushed attempts at garment making in high school with very homemade results, but now I’m ready to learn for real.  These pj pants are from Amy Butler’s book “In Stitches” and were dead easy.  Like sewing drawstring bags for your legs and about that flattering–when she says wide leg, she means wiiiiide leg.  I have been meaning to make them ever since I found this fantastic sheet at a thrift store long ago. I think the idea of making pajamas from sheets came from soulemama.  And when you are wearing them it really is like you never got out of bed!  My sick self stayed in these pants all weekend long. I did manage one little project (from soulemama, the book).

another pair of pants! though much, much smaller and from a shirt.  There are many more of these planned for the summer months.  They are easy and comfy and just right for the playground.  I have grand plans for making my kids’ clothes too.  It doesn’t help seeing this and this and this.  But I don’t have a clue as to how to sew clothes (unless it resembles a drawstring bag) so mostly I’m just dreaming.

I’ve been looking for some kiddy size chairs recently because we have one chair and two kiddies.  I was getting a little frustrated because I couldn’t find anything, much less anything vaguely stylish. Then on Saturday at Vinnie’s there they were.  It was Saturday–the place was packed, there were little kids everywhere and it was well past noon.  How is it possible that no one scooped them up?  They did look a little shabby and there was a $15 dollar sticker on each, so I guess that is a deterrent.  Fifteen bucks is a lot for a little chair and I carried one around the entire store convincing myself it wasn’t.  Turns out it was for the set and since I decided I was spending $15 anyway, I took the lot.  This is much more than you need to know about any shopping experience, much less mine. But hey chairs! with a cool vinyl print–can you even get that nowadays?

Other things:

I was lucky enough to be short listed in the 2nd Annual Softies Awards. You can vote here (if you are related to me, you have to vote for me).

The drawing for my sewing book will happen on Monday (um midday? naptime? somewhere around there central time), so if you’d like to put your name in the hat please leave a word here (if you are related to me, you may enter, but really you should call instead).

Another post about another artist, because there’s not much coming out of my studio these days and what is coming out comes out very, very wrong.  I picked up this book at a thrift store a while ago because I recognized the author’s name.  Eugene Ionesco was a playwright in the sixties who wrote in the style of the Theatre of the Absurd (thanks wikipedia).

The story is not so absurd, just a little silly.  Thankfully it’s not like his other plays: “Ionesco’s plays depict in a tangible way the solitude and insignificance of human existence” (thanks again wikipedia).  In the story, Josette’s mother and father are lying in bed tired and hungover (it’s always nice to read a book where the parents are real, instead of cheery cheery and never busy) and her father tells her a silly story about a girl named Jacqueline.

Everyone and everything Jacqueline knows is named jacqueline.  Really not the best story–the father is hungover, cut him some slack–but the illustrations are fantastic.  The colors are muted, but the pictures are still psychedelic.  Etienne Delessert is the artist and a quick search on amazon came up with a couple of books he’s illustrated and I know this book is the first in a series he did with Ionesco.  Anyway, I just think his pictures are great and wanted to share them with you.

more here and here if you are interested.

I finished sewing a few things for the sale and I thought I’d pop in and show you. The bears are made from felted sweaters and printed cotton. I drew a simple bear then stitched, stuffed, and sewed on the features. Easy peasy. The denim and cashmere one is my favorite. I think it would be perfect for a little baby boy, but I have no idea if people will even buy these. I’m not much of a shopper (except for thrift stores and target) so I don’t really know what people buy or how much they pay for things. So how much would you pay for a bear like this ? They are a little under a foot tall (1 foot = 30 cm), machine washable, and super soft.

These are all the pillowcase dresses I’ve finished so far, but there are a few more cut and ready to go in my studio. I wasn’t going to make so many, but a showed a few to my friends and they were quite taken with them, so I whipped up some more. It doesn’t hurt that they are dead easy to make. And you can make them to fit girls from 6 months to 5 or 6 years old. For these I’m thinking 16 dollars a pop, what do you think? I haven’t sold stuff from a booth since my lemonade days, so I’m a little nervous about all of this. Tagging, pricing, talking up the things I’ve made. And this sale is the first of it’s kind so there could be a couple people there or hundreds. Nobody knows.