Honeycrisp Mittens! I made 'em!

Have you seen the new Honeycrisp Mitten pattern from Mari at Disparate Disciplines? I was lucky to be a pattern tester, and now I get to show mine off! 

As you can tell from the snow, winter has truly started in Canada. Even the local lake has frozen over now, and my 45 minute commute through the countryside now takes closer to 60 min because of the ice and snow! (Don’t worry, i’ve had my snow tires on since October!) 

I wanted a warm pair of mittens to go with the coral and cream wool cowl my sister is knitting me (which, incidentally, turned out to slightly resemble bacon! Yum.)

For my mitts, I used polar fleece form my local Fabricland. I bought .5m, and still had enough leftover after the mitts to make a cosy cushion for my new kitty! (More on that later!) It took me about 5 minutes to cut them out, and maybe 30 min tops to sew them. I can’t wait to make some more for quick Christmas gifts!

My favourite aspect of the pattern is the v-shaped seams where the top piece wraps arounds and meets at the inner wrist. (Most confusing explanation of a simple seam ever. Sorry about that! But look, it’s elegant, pretty and fun!) I sewed them on my regular sewing machine, and left the edges unfinished. Sewing with fleece makes everything so simple! 

If you are looking for a handmade gift you haven’t already given everyone another year, I really recommend this pattern! It is based off quite careful measurements when you fit for yourself, but I think it would be quite simple to guesstimate what size your friends and family would need. I think my next pair will be from a thrifted wool sweater - all the warmth of wool mittens, with none of that pesky slow knitting! 

As for that other thing I mentioned… we got a KITTEN!!!!! We’ve been promising ourselves for years now that we’d get one when we moved out of my parents’ house… so when I got full-time work last week, it seems like the right moment! We meant to adopt an adult cat, but I’m so glad we got swayed by this little kitty’s purring! 

Meet Clay! Short for Dr. Clayton Forrester, a mad scientist from Mystery Science Theatre 3000… and my husband declares our next cat will be Frank, Dr. Forrester’s sidekick! Nerds. What can you do but love them? 

Clay is 5 months old, and the highlight of my day! I’ve always lived with cats, but never one of my very own… and I instantly became that crazy cat lady who talks to their cat and photographs them constantly. I”m not ashamed, though, because I have such good cat lady role models in so many Sewcialists! 

(This is how blurry most of my pics of her are! She’s a quick little devil!) 

Meow. Cats are the best. Also, mitten. Mittens are cos and warm and well designed! Cats AND mittens? That makes for a happy winter! 

Sewcialist Circle of Trust

When I tell non-sewing friend and coworkers that an internet friend is visiting me this weekend, and we’ve never met before, people keep giving me the oddest response. "Thats brave!" they say, while looking highly doubtful.

Watch out! The grunge Sewcialist is coming to town! 

Brave? Like the lovely Leila could turn out to be… what? A 14 year old? A creepy 50 year old guy? A friendly, kind lady who only *pretends* that she sews so that she can lure me into letting her into my house? As far as I can tell, it would be a full-time job fooling me on Twitter, Facebook, email, Google chat, Instagram and blogs, let alone sewing! 

Could you doubt this face?

Of course, I understand their misgivings and surprise… but it’s certainly not a fear I’ve ever had while meeting sewing bloggers, nor how I live my life! In fact, my sis met her husband in a chat room WAY back in the day, and my parents regularly stay with or host Morris dancers and musicians from the UK that they’ve never met before. I’ve lived on 5 continents and, within reason, always trusted the people I live, travel, or share dorms with.

If anyone should be afraid, it’s Leila. I’ve just spent time writing a post when I should be cleaning. Sorry hon! At least the sewing room is ready to go! ;) Oh, and of course, I found time to make a new dress earlier this week - a Lady Skater with cowl from this lovely crepe knit! 

How about you? Do you have trouble explaining the wonders of the sewcial network to your non-sewing friends and family? Do you ever feel a twinge of doubt when you go out to meet a blogger you’ve never met IRL?

Lazy Tips for Sewing (Any Fabric): Easing Circle Skirt Hems with a Serger

I’ve been doing a lot of unselfish (but oh so fun) sewing for other people lately, including 3 dresses and a top for my sister and as many shirts and pants as possible for my baby niece! As a result, I’ve got nothing to blog! Instead, I’ll give you another lazy tip: 

When hemming circle skirts, use your serger to gather the curved hem before folding! 

This is another of those maybe-to-obvious tips, but I do use this trick a LOT, so I wanted to make sure everyone else was too! 

This is a 1/2 circle skirt (A Tiramisu, of course! :P) Because of the flare shape of the skirt, the folded hem will need to be eased to fit the smaller circumference of the skirt. (Seriously, i can’t figure out how to explain that any more clearly. I just hope you know what I mean! ;) 

This could be done by careful ironing, or using a curved hem template… but I prefer quickly gathering it with my serger!

Here’s a fuzzy shot of my Brother 1034D. 

I set my serger to gather slightly, and serge the whole bottom edge of the skirt.

Voila! After serging, the bottom edge of the skirt naturally flips up and eases into shape, ready for hemming. At this point I iron a fold, and stitch it in place with my regular sewing machine. 

This particular dress is a super-stretchy ITY knit, but I still just used a  regular straight stitch. The 1/2 circle skirt is so full there is rarely much pressure on the hem stitching, so for me, a straight stitch is plenty strong enough! Of course, you could do a lightening bolt stitch, or a nice double needle hem… but those both take extra time, and I’m LAZY!

Bonus: Easing hems with the serger works equally well with woven fabrics, or with a curved hem on a knit top!

If you are lucky enough to have a serger, do you do circle hems this way? If you don’t have a serger… Sorry! Do you have any tricks for easing hems?

ps. Are you following the new Sewcialists Blog? We’ve got some fun Red October round-up posts and inspiration for the Grunge Sewalong coming up!

It's a Sewcialist Revolution!

We’re taking over the world, Sewcialists! Well, at least the blogosphere… because we have a brand new Sewcialists Blog! 

We’ve been thinking about this for months, so I’m really excited to finally make it happen! As we start to create more and more monthly sewing themes, we need a central place to organize everything. The new blog will be coauthored by, well, any sewcialist who wants to help! 

Coming up soon on the Sewcialist blog we’ll have round-ups of Red October, information about several sewing challenges in November, and a heads-up about Green December! We might even manage to squeeze in a Sewcial Bee again before Christmas - What do you think? 

Ready to go check it out? Please subscribe, and stay posted for some *VERY EXCITING NEWS* about another Sewcialist tech breakthrough coming later this week! 

Lazy Tips for Sewing Knits: Prewash, dang it!

I’m a bit obsessive about this tip: For the love of pretty fabric, prewash your knits! Wash ‘em in hot water, dry them on hot, and for good measure, wash and dry them again! 

I learned my lesson on my second-ever tee shirt. I was so excited by the success of my first tee that I grabbed some brand new thin black polkadot knit from fabric.com, and whipped up a cute Renfrew without prewashing it. And then, oh then… then I washed it. In just one wash it shrunk 3 inches shorter! Aghhhhhhh!!!!

Here it is, with a normal-length grey Renfew for comparison: 

The pictures aren’t the best, but if you squint you might be able to see that the grey Renfrew covers the front pockets, but the black one only just covers the waistband. I find the black top too short to stay tucked into high-waisted skirts, and it’s even too short to comfortably wear as pyjamas. Too many drafts when I sit or bend! 

Here are the two tops layered on top of each other:

Now, I know it may not look all that dramatic to you… but I promise, it makes all the difference in the wearability of the tops! 

Of course, there are a few factors at work. First and foremost, I should have prewashed the black knit. 

Second, It’s a cheap tissue knit. Maybe a better quality knit would have shrunk less? I find that rayon knits shrink up quite a bit too though.

The sad thing is that I really like the idea of this black top! It is printed with a beige polkadot, which I thought might dizzying to the eye. Instead, I sewed the top with the wrong side of the fabric. One the left below is the shirt inside out… and on the right is the “good” side, with contrast neck and cuffs and just a hint of polkadot shining through. If this shirt fit, I’d wear it all the time!

Nowadays, I always prewash knits twice before adding them to my stash - that way I’m ready to sew! I know that lots of people don’t prewash jersey, and that’s fine if it works for you… but if I’m going to put my money and time into making something, I want it to fit the way I intended!

How about you? Do you prewash? And if you do, do you use the heat settings that you’ll use forever after, or do you blitz it as hot as possible?

Ps. I missed this black top in my roundup of Renfrews in my closet, which brings my total up to 11!

Pps. The rest of my Lazy Tips for Sewing Knits are now gathered in the header bar up at the top!