Today is 2 days until launch. the launch of my first clothing line. Do you believe I’m 55 years old? this is something I have wanted to do for a long time but I was afraid. I didn’t know exactly how to proceed and I worried I wasn’t good enough or smart enough. Then just a little under 2 months ago I thought to myself, “If not now, when?” and “Stop being a fraidy cat.” So here we are. I designed a skirt that is a style I love and is so comfortable I can’t stand it. What style you say? A fited waist and a free hip – which means it isn’t fitted at the hip. It’s a wrap skirt so can be a little ti ..read more

It’s embarrassing. I’m 55 years old and I feel like my eyes are just beginning to open. I’m not going to write about spinning or sewing today because I am sad. Sad that a police officer can kneel on a man’s neck in the daylight with 3 other officers standing by until and even after a man is dead. Because he was suspected of using a a counterfeit $20 bill. This man was not a criminal. He was well liked. He had friends and family . His Name is George Floyd. And I know for a fact that if he was white none of this would have happened. I’ve seen people I know complaining about the protests and the ..read more

Early in March I started making protective masks. It happened accidentally. I went with a friend to visit an assisted living home for her husband. it was at the beginning of things in Michigan. You couldn’t visit people in the hospital and medical workers were having a hard time getting protective gear. We went to the place and they gave us shoe covers but couldn’t give us masks because they couldn’t get them. I was sad for them and also worried for the residents of the facility. I had seen a tutorial to make the surgical style (pleated) and the shaped masks. I quickly found the tutorial and s ..read more

I had this really cute blue stretch cotton fabric and I wanted a good short sleeve dress for every day. I bought the fabric at Fabric Mart one of the times I visited my parents last year. It was on a great sale so I bought all they had on the bolt. I like to do that because then I know I have enough to make whatever I want and also if anybody loves the fabric I have enough left over to make something for them. That exact thing happened with this fabric. Maggie loves it and wants a top out of it. I have narrow shoulders but if I cut the shoulders narrower that usually means I need to cut the s ..read more

A few months ago I saw that Sitka Fabrics was adding more woven fabrics to their store and they were looking for some dressmakers/sewists to make some clothes out of their incoming collections. I immediately raised my hand and they said yes to me! This is my first project for them. I don’t know if you remember my Christmas dress from this year. It was an exact rip off of the one Gretchen Hirsch made. I picked up the fabric at Beetle and Fred when I was there in September. The pattern I used is from Butterick and it’s number B6284. After very little adjustment I made a super comfortable dress ..read more

I bought some fabric. I know, it’s not a surprise but I’m super excited about it because I knew exactly what I wanted to make with it when I bought it. It came from Seams in East Lansing, Michigan. Check that store out. There is plenty online and there are some fantastic apparel fabrics you may not be seeing in other places. It is a double faced fabric with wool on one side and silk on the other. As soon as I saw it I knew I wanted a reversible skirt. I wanted to be able to show the shiny silk side sometimes and the lovely wooly side at other times. I also know that I feel better in a skirt w ..read more

I had the opportunity to go to Italy in the middle of January. It’s taken me this long to process the trip. It was a whirlwind. And I felt a little guilty because we had just returned from our family vacation to Disney World a few weeks before but when someone offers to fly you to Italy for a week, are you gonna say no? Five years ago this week my friend Dana and I took a girl’s trip to Disney World. It was so fun. We went to the spa at the Grand Floridian Hotel. We saw every princess. We rode rides and ate all the things and just had a magical time. We decided to do it because our birthdays a ..read more

It was a fabulous trip. Like I said in my post from last week, In June I decided to make an outfit for each day we were going to be in the parks. My plans changed and morphed over time depending on what fabrics I found and how I decide to change how I was going to use them. This polka dot fabric was the very first fabric I bought and I knew I was going to make a circle skirt and the outfit would be reminiscent of Minnie Mouse with a fifties sort of look. The top is a wrap top designed by Gretchen Hirsch for Butterick. Pattern Number 6285 I love the top. I wish it were slightly longer but I ca ..read more

We went to Disney World in December. It was for Maggie’s high school graduation but we had to put it off because we couldn’t go in May or June due to other plans. Nobody likes going to Orlando in July or August if they can avoid it and since I’m a giant baby about being in the heat we put it off longer. Then Maggie and Ryan had to be in their respective schools so Christmas time was the next available break. Going in December is fine with me because I love Disney World at Christmas. All of the characters have special outfits and the decorations in all of the parks and hotels are just gorgeous ..read more

At the Sewing Expo in Novi in November one of the best classes I took was with Joe Vecchiarelli who has been working in the fashion industry for over 40 years and is the costumer for Dancing with the Stars. The class was about draping and pattern making. Of course it was only a 3 hour class and we had to share dress forms so we got only the very basics but it whet my appetite for more. I had never seen draping done in real time before and I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. I have always worked with patterns that someone else has made and honestly, didn’t really understand how the designers ..read more