My Road to Craftiness

Remember when I said that I wanted to learn to sew? That was kind of like saying we want Easton to poop in the potty. Eventually, it'll get done, but it's going to be a long and slow process.

I started by finding a tutorial online for making an apron out of an old pillowcase. It looked so easy! But it was not. I could not understand most of what I was supposed to do. Even with the pictures I had problems when it came to the waistband/tie section. So I just made up my own version. (pay attention here, this will be a running theme). I ended up with two aprons made two different ways. Both have flaws, but I learned some things about pockets and "finishing" an edge.

Feeling confident, I bought the book In Stitches by Amy Butler. It's supposed to be for beginners. Um....no it's not. Unless beginner means you've been sewing for 5 years or more. But it had a cute apron pattern and did not use complicated language. I tried doing ONLY the waistband/tie section of her pattern, since that is the step I was having trouble with. Hours later, I got through it, but it was stressful. One side looks nice, the other is crooked. I did, however, learn to make a pleat and was happy.

A week or so later I found out that one of my crafty friends was having a birthday and I decided to practice on her. I freestyled this apron. No pattern. No instructions. Still not perfect but my best project so far.

And then Hancock's had a sale. $1 patterns. So I ventured away from aprons to try a shirt. This pattern was labeled as Very Easy. But when I opened the envelope and looked at the instructions all I saw was jibberish. So, my crafty sewing friend came over to help. The shirt had three pieces. Front, Back and straps. Simple enough?

Well, lesson number one. Read the pattern. I didn't realize that all the sizes didn't come in the same envelope so instead of the 6-8-10 pattern, I had gotten the 20-22. But I needed to learn and I had willing help so we went ahead anyways. The process would be the same regardless of size.

Lesson number two. Iron your pattern. Who knew? I thought that flimsy paper would surely burn but it didn't. So after pinning and ironing and cutting, I learned:

Lesson number three. Pay attention to the material yardages for the size you're using not just the first column!! The pattern called for 1 3/8 yard. I had 2 yards, no problem. But that was for the first size not the size we were using. Duh. So I did not have enough material. Insert snowflakes. This pattern was "self-lined" (should not be in the Very Easy section in my opinion) so we used some spare snowflake material as the lining for the front piece. Would've been better as a back piece but those had already been cut by the time the problem was discovered. So....more cutting, more pinning, more sewing. This was actually starting to look like a cute little top. Until.....

Lesson number four. Understiching. What?? Understitching should NOT be in the Very Easy category. Even my crafty sewing friend had to double check her memory on this. I do not like understitching. It took a long time and I'm not convinced it was necessary. By the end of the afternoon we made it to the final step and had to stop due to time restraints. (It was homemade ice cream night at church and we couldn't be late for that!!!)

And finally, I learned lesson number five. Never leave Jenny alone with a sewing machine and an unfinished project. Deciding that I'd learned many lessons and understanding that this was a "practice" I abandoned all rules and started hacking the poor unsuspecting top. I thought, hmmmmm......if I just take out some material in the back, I could make this fit me! So I cut and eyeballed and sewed and cut some more and eyeballed some more and ended up with a fitted top. I even added some pleats on the front to compensate for my lack of bust. It is finished. And it's a top. But I don't think this one will actually make it out in public anytime soon. I'm going back to Hancock's today to see if I can get this same pattern in the correct size and try it again.