Sewing Meetup!

I am a terrible procrastinator.

About three weeks back Tanitisis and I realized that we lived in the same city and arranged to meet up. I confess that I was just about as nervous as I was back in my Cupid.com days (yes, I did that). We met up at a coffee shop near my work in the more "artsy" district of town, and by district, I mean street—Saskatoon is not very big, but it does seem to have a little bit of everything.

We didn't even really talk sewing all that much, but we ended up having a lot in common, and I'm super pumped to have a sewing buddy in town. Even better, our meet up has drawn out another potential like-minded individual that lives in town and has a presence on PR. Jodi B (from PR), if you are reading this, I can't find you on PR, unless you are teasing me and actually live in Virginia.

Here we are according to my camera:

And here we are according to Tanitisis's

When searching PR I came across another blogger who looks like she may live in Toontown. http://butterfly-747.blogspot.ca/. I hope you don't mind that I've directed traffic at you (if you do, please leave a message and I'll remove the link).

Since my last post, I've seemed to come out of my sewing funk thanks in-part to Tanitisis, who also happens to work at Fabricland and mentioned in her last post that the stretch denim had gone on sale half price. I had spied some denim-look knit there a few weeks ago that I wanted to make into jeggings (really Erin, at your age? Didn't you wear stirrup pants once in your life? Isn't that enough?) Yes really. Now I have to make some appropriate tops that cover my ass so I don't feel naked when wearing them. There were some fit issues when I made them up that may be useful to others, so that will most likely be my next post.

I've also made a lot of other progress on my other projects:

1. knitted socks: finished. They are thick and warm, and fit my foot amazingly well.

2. knitted sweater: I finished all the pieces and then realized when trying to sew them together that I have to rip out the front and the back pieces to the start of the armpit shaping. Oh well, something to do while I watch tv.

3. Baby quilt: I'm almost done, and I'm pretty pleased with it. There are a few lot of mistakes in the quilting and it's not perfectly square (much to my mother's insistence that it needs to be to add the binding). I figure that at some point it will probably get pooped on so really people—I'm okay with the imperfection. This, coming from the girl who used to, as a child, wiggle my toes until they felt "even" every night when I went to bed. OCD much?

All safey-pinned up and ready for quilting:

Après quilting with binding attached (but not finished):

Showing the backside which reveals my horrendous quilting. Here's hoping that's the side that gets pooped on most frequently.

A close up of the binding: 

A close up of the cheater's version of a mitered corner.  

All I have left is hand sewing the binding down—yet another thing I can do when watching more television. 

And for all you haters of my fabric choice for the backing and the binding—I'm talking to you dear husband and sister who raised your eyebrows when you saw the plaid—you can suck it because I think it looks cute. 

One more thing. Being from Saskatchewan, I don't like to to point out our extreme weather, because I really hate to perpetuate stupid stereotypes like "Canadians all live in igloos" or "drive dogsleds to work". That being said, I have to share a few photos of our spring weather this year (specifically after the storm we had this week).

This is a girl I was in a show with who posted this pic on Facebook:  

To be clear, that's not actual snowfall, but a big-ass giant snow drift closer to the edge of town. But still... yeesh!

Apparently, this has happened before though:

WTF. Why does anyone live here? Oh yes. Because they are friggin' crazy: 

Trena, this picture is for you because I know that you bike—probably not with a skidoo helmet though. Ridiculous. 

Hopefully we don't get any more snow, although it can actually be very nice when it's sunny out (from our front window this morning):

Now I have to figure out how to take flattering pictures of myself in leggings that I will most likely regret posting to the internet. Happy Sunday!

Getting my knit-on etc.

Well, it's been a while. A lot has happened in the last month, so I'll provide a recap:

We went snow shoeing, skiing, started P90X, got sick, took a break from P90X, started knitting, stopped sewing, had a drastic change in diet, etc, etc, etc.

We have an exorbitant amount of snow this year, and I bought a groupon for a snowshoe rental. It was okay, but I like skiing better.

 
(snowshoeing at the local golf course)

I admit, I'm a little stuck in the sewing department. I made a couple of major fails and then another slightly disappointing piece that took the wind out of my sails. After my successful Jungle January blouse, I whipped off another Renfrew using a unique piece of knit I found at a second hand store that I was saving for B, but then selfishly reallocated to myself.

This goaround with the Renfrew, I was not as happy. It seems that the minor fitting issues that I could live with on the first make were magnified in this one. Namely, the biceps are tight, and I think I need to make the arm scythe larger too, not to mention a sloped shoulder adjustment. Now that I've washed it a couple of times, it feels better in the armpits, but something needs to be done if this is ever going to be a tnt for me. I was even thinking about going up a size to see what that feels like. I should probably also look into a sway-back alteration, but I just can't seem to give a crap about an angle I can't see.

My next sewing project was just barely started when we wend skiing, I got sick, and stopped being motivated to sew. It's a baby quilt for my friends in Calgary who are due in a couple of months. I used this Rough and Tumble pattern as my basis, but squared things up a bit to make construction easier and scaled everything down to the craft-size batting I had in my stash. I only have one of the coloured strips done, so it's not even worth showing you a progress shot, but here's the inspiration quilt:

http://www.modabakeshop.com/2011/12/rough-and-tumble-quilt.html

I also took a learn to knit class in January, and continued with a sock class at my local yarn shop. I was considering buying a much cheaper course from Craftsy, but honestly, getting out of the house, meeting new people and having two hours to myself only focussing on making something is worth the extra $. I am surprised how much i look forward to it every week. 

The Learn to Knit class sweater (children's size 4). It will go to my nephew. 

And the sock class socks in progress: 

I'm also currently working on an easy sweater pattern I purchased so long ago, I don't even remember when it was. I had completed the back but then unravelled it when I was cleaning up a few years ago for a move. 

I now have the front and the back done and just have the sleeves and assembly left. 

The slow pace of knitting used to frustrate me, but I like that I can do it while watching the many shows on tv that I keep up with but don't really care about. 

There are a tonne of sewing projects that are floating around in my head: finding/fitting a tnt button down shirt pattern, blazers, jeans, pants.... the list goes on. All are complicated and intimidating which is mostly why I'm procrastinating starting anything. 

Today I'm having my very first sewing meet-up (ever) with tanitisis. We just learned that we live in the same city and are going for coffee. Confession: I feel just as nervous as I did before a date back in my "cupid.com" days, but at least now I know that we have something in common!! It will be very nice to have someone in my age bracket that will understand sew-speak. It should be fun!

In conclusion, I hope to get my ass back in gear and sew some things soon!!