Sunday, November 29, 2009

Phew!

I hope everyone who celebrates Thanksgiving had a great one!

This was a productive weekend for me. Of course it helped that I didn't have to hostess the Thanksgiving meal but, instead, enjoyed a gathering at a friend's house. For the meal, I decided to make two items. First, I made maple cheesecake, which I overcooked by at least 10 minutes until it was golden brown – it then collapsed (that has never happened to me before!) so I couldn't bring that. My second contribution was the dinner rolls, but the yeast (which I had just bought) was expired. The dough did rise, kinda sorta, but it took all day and was definitely lackluster, so the resulting rolls, while edible, were a bit disappointing. My friends graciously overlooked my cooking foibles and it was a great evening. I want to track down the Chipotle Sweet Potatoes recipe one friend brought – those were truly yummy!!

The rest of the weekend was dedicated to holiday sewing. I completed the gift for my sew group's upcoming holiday luncheon. (Phew!) Some of them read this blog occasionally so I can't post it quite yet.

DD2 has her Winter Concert performance next Friday, and she has to wear black: a long black skirt or slacks and a long-sleeve black top. How funereal. For the bottom, I made a skirt that I had drafted for myself, but scaled down to fit her. For the top, I made my first pattern from Burda magazine and experienced the joys of tracing off a pattern with zillions of lines in different colors. Getting DD2 to dress up is not unlike herding cats, so I had to make it as easy as possible for her, meaning I didn't get as many fittings in as I would have liked nor did she have a lot of input. (She prefers a line item veto sort of approach.) I hope to post photos later this week when she dons the whole outfit.

I have one more Christmas gift to sew, and the fabric is on order. So I feel like I'm doing pretty well, all in all. :)

I'm still dithering on whether to enter the 2010 SWAP (Sewing With a Plan) contest on Stitcher's Guild. I think about my own [potential] plan every day. The swap would require me to sew more bottoms than I really want to, at the moment, and it limits me a bit. For example, I would like to sew up a few jackets and I couldn't make more than one for the swap, so I don't know... On the other hand, it could push me a bit and would be satisfying to complete it (I have no illusions that I would win any prizes)... I may just sew alongside the SWAP participants without actually entering, so we'll see.

The Vogue/Butterick/McCalls pattern site is having a very good pattern sale tomorrow, Monday, only. Butterick and McCalls are $1.99 and Vogue are $3.99, before the member discount. And shipping is free for members. The sale ends tomorrow night (Monday) at midnight CENTRAL time. That has bitten me more than once, when I sat down to finish an order after 10pm Pacific, but it was too late to get the sale prices.

3 comments:

  1. I just ordered 5 patterns from that sale. I almost placed an order last night, but I am so happy I waited. I have considered entering SWAP, but I don't think I ever will, because I am all over the place in my sewing. I do have a sewing plan, but none of the pieces all go with each other.

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  2. I missed the last couple of pattern sales at Jo. I have a list building, so hope I catch the next one. You always make such cool stuff. Can't wait to see your next creation!

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  3. The thing about SWAP, is that it forces you to FOCUS, decide and sew even when the sewing becomes excrucitatingly (?sp?) boring. But the end result is so overwhelmingly wonderful and I'm not talking about the clothing. I am refering to the internatlizing/externalizing of what clothing you truly need, what truly fits and how you are suddenly well put together as opposed to throwing something on. It is a wonderful experience, albeit painful at times. I wholly recommend but admit I'm not participating this year. I will be cheering you on from the sidelines.

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