So. Awesome.

I am hanging out in the Windy City this week, visiting with Husband's family. It is a festive season of festivity and I have been kicking back with some festive knitting.  And it's been a busy week, but a fun one.

I've organized my stash and made sure everything is updated in Ravelry. It's now put away by color in the stash, which is how I often like to look at it in Ravelry, too. This here is my whole stash.

After some careful calculations, I figured that I had about 8 years, 3 months' worth of yarn. That's a respectable amoun of yarn for me and all of it is stuff I want to work with. I don't feel the burninating need to buy more yarn and I do feel the need to knit with the lovely yarns I have. That's a good place to be with your stash. I'd say it was a successful stash fluff.

And this happened:

I had the great pleasure this last weekend to have seen The Movie at a private showing with some serious cosplaying fellows from the 501st Legion. It was awesome. It was really, really, awesome. That's all I can say for now. So. Awesome.

I also made a lot of progress on some grinchy socks (I have a sock and a half, minus heels now) and finished a couple pair of jammies for a little Bu, which I will show you in a separate post. Blogging on the iPad is weird, I gotta say.

Dance of the Moose Pants Fairy

Happy holiday season! Whatever you celebrate, if anything, I hope you have  a good one. It's getting festive here at the House of M.

It's also recital week this week and, for the first time, both girls are dancing. It's kinda neat that Bu's first recital is Nutcracker because it's a special thing at the dance school. Bu's part is pretty small because the littles have short attention spans and are pretty much there to be cute and experience being on stage, but she's super excited and will just randomly start doing parts of her dance.

Bu and some of the Nutcracker Corps dancers

 The littles wear Christmas-y pajamas for their costume, which is easy, inexpensive, and comfortable. I had some wintery fabrics on hand, so I thought I'd do up some pajamas for her instead of buying some. I had just enough of this fabric for some jammie pants and the shirt is one she already had. I'm missing some bias tape to finish the other two sets of jammies in the works, but these are delightful and perfect for her first dance on stage. I give you the first FO of this week: Moose Pants!

The moose are my favorite

The second FO this week is a pair of socks for Miss Iris. These are called Pronaia, which means "forethought." This is the Fork in the Road pattern by Lara Neel in  Sock it to Me Fair Isle in the Covered Bridge for the main part and Knit Picks Stroll Solid in Fedora for the heels, toes, and cuff.

I'm also doing a fair amount of stash fluffing, which includes washing and measuring some of the handspun, generally taking stock of what there is, and making sure everything is entered properly with pictures into the Ravelry stash. For a taxonomist, this is a walk in the park compared to obscure Andean butterflies, but I'm using many of the same skills. Sort by shared characteristics (in this case, color), label everything, take more notes than you think you need to. That is how you science.

 Finally, as part of the upcoming Project Make reboot: A year long along of alongs, I'm announcing the first few months' alongs.

January is for Mending: Visible mending is more than just fixing your clothes. You're applying functional art to garments that would otherwise be tossed in the trash bin or headed to the thrift store. Mending is fun, decorative, and good for the environment.

February is for Finishing: I'm certainly not the first to suggest this, but as a person with  DaVinci Disorder*, I always have unfinished projects to attend to and this is a good chance to take stock and give some attention to what might otherwise be abandoned to the depths of the WIP pile.

Weaving in ends

March is for Embroidery: Embroidery is one of my favorite crafts because it's like painting with thread. It's also one of the oldest crafts known to humankind and hasn't changed much since the dawn of time. If you're into socks, mittens, or other things that come in pairs, March will also be for Making Mates, but I'm going to be focusing on embroidery for the purposes of Project Make.

That's it for now! I'm looking forward to the beginning of the year. 

*Da Vinci Disorder is not a real disease. 

Dear Halloween,

Dear Halloween,

You and I have had some fun times through the years. I've always loved you and I always will.

Remember that time I stayed up much too late finishing Iris' Dorothy costume? That was great. It didn't matter that she only ever wore it once, that one time was just perfect. I think that this was probably her first real cosplay and it'll fit Bu next year.

And carving pumpkins with Anna was pretty great. I always think of her in October. We didn't carve pumpkins this year, but that's okay. We still have pumpkins adorning our front yard and stoop.

Bu as the Hulk in purple pants and a green onesie felt like a stroke of genius. It was great for a tired mom and a small person who just wanted to be comfortable. Many a year, Iris has recycled old dance costumes and there were several years in a row where she slapped on a pair of wings and called herself a fairy. Now she's an avid cosplayer and I credit you, Halloween.

Bu loved being Captain America and even though we bought her Spider-Man costume this year, that's okay. The comic store guy invited her to a Halloween thing they're having. There's supposed to be a Spider-Man there. Sadly, we'll be out of town. I'm getting the impression that this one is going to become a cosplayer, too.

And me? I was a cosplayer before I even knew the word. My favorite costume was the Star Trek: TNG uniform that my mom made for me (in Science Blue, of course). One year we were the Three Weird Sisters from the Scottish Play. One year it was poodle skirts and the year we were the Addams Family, I accidentally let my baby sister, who was being Cousin Itt, walk into a stop sign... and then into the side of the house. I still feel bad about that.

I'm wearing my doublet this year because I love that piece and it's been a while, John is working on joining the 501st, Iris is gathering her own cosplay pieces, Bu is set with her Spider-Man outfit, and I'm already planning for next year. It's an election year, so I want to be a suffragette.

There are those who seem to think that Halloween makes it okay to be racist and there's the whole "sexy ____" genre of costumes and, if you're underage, "sassy ____." There are a whole lot of problems with the kinds of costumes you can buy, especially for girls. I'm not going to go into that except to say that it makes me angry, it makes me sad, but most of all it makes me happy that I can sew. You're the reason I love costuming and making my own Wednesday Addams dress is why I even learned to use the sewing machine (though that might have been inevitable). I still have that dress.


Thank you for spreading the love of costume to my kids and to John, thank you for giving me an opportunity to express myself through my craft, and thank you for helping me expand my skill as a sewist. Thank you for being such a big part of my life. Thank you, Halloween. Thank you for being you. I'm glad I know you.

Stay Spooky and see you in NC,
-Jess

Dear Readers,

I've nearly finished Louise. We'll talk about her come November.

Love,
-Jess

Rainbow-themed Jubilance

This week has been a pretty darn productive one and, looking back on June, I'd have to say I'm pretty happy with the way things are going. 

Thematically appropriate mug choice for this week.

I just want to knit and sew rainbows all over the place, but I have a shirt and a shawl to make for OAL shenanigans and will not be distracted from my goal. You will be mine, plaid flannel shirt, Oh yes, you will be mine.

Cutting continues at a slow pace and, wouldn't you know it, I didn't have enough interfacing. It's always the interfacing. I think I have some, but "some" always turns out to be maybe a quarter of a yard if you were to line up all the scraggly little pieces into a sort of rectangular shape, between which no actual pattern pieces will fit. 

It's fine. I bought more. 

I also came home with three new patterns because McCall's were on sale: 6613 is to replace the one I'm currently cutting, 6964 is for... because t-shirts, and 7141 is for my sweet otaku Fluffalo. 

I do still have some rainbow socks on the needles for the aforementioned Fluffalo, though, and that satisfies my need for rainbow-themed jubilance pretty well. They're my purse knitting, though, so aren't seeing much action. 

What is seeing a lot of action, though, is Trillian by Martina Behm. It's the second half of the OAL and my morning knitting. I'm well into the 2nd of three balls of yarn now and knitting with laser focus. I want to be done and I'd like to step up the pace on the Stash Amble/Mosey (aka Stash Dash for those doing more finishing than I). 

I did finish Die grünen, Easy Ribbed Legwarmers by  Carol Wells:

And those ended up being over 300 yards of old stash. I really love them, even though they're about the simplest thing you could knit, and I'm hoping to get quite a bit of wear out of them in the cold months. 

Then there was jam:

The observant among you will notice that my floors are really clean. Generally, while I wait for the jars to cool, I use the water from the canner to mop the floors. Most of these jams will be retained for us to have through the year, but some will end up given away at some point. There's still jelly to be made in the fall, so I'm sure there will be plenty to share. I'm toying with the idea of selling a few jars, but I haven't decided. What I may do is offer a few jars at the end of 2015 as part of the culmination of Project Make, but at this point I'm just thinking out loud.

This week's technique is processing jars of jam for safe storage. The best resource is the USDA Complete Guide to Home Canning and I'm a big fan of federally funded science that results in the common good, but I'll also outline my method here as simply as possible. 

• Before you start, sanitize your jars on "Heat Dry" in the dishwasher or in boiling water for about five minutes
• Make the jam or jelly, put the jam in the jars with about 1/4" head space (the gap of air between the jam and the lid).
• Heat lids in warm water, not boiling, five to ten minutes, until the plastic seal is soft. Use new lids. They're a couple bucks for a dozen, which is a bargain for food safety.
• Carefully wipe the rim of the jar clean as clean can be
• Place a lid on each jar and secure with a metal ring
• The metal ring should be secure so that the lid stays on and in place
• But not so tight that air cannot escape
• Submerge jars in boiling water that covers at least an inch to two inches of the jar for seven minutes
• Remove from the boiling water, you'll want a jar-grabber thingy, and let them cool until you hear a POP! from every jar. 
• The jars that don't POP! can be re-processed in boiling water or refrigerated and eaten right away. 

Looking back, I like what I'm seeing. I feel good about the things I'm making and because I want to continue this trend, I'm going to be bold and set some goals for this month:

1. Finish the plaid shirt
2. Finish Trillian
3. Find a neglected project and begin working on it before month's end
4. Sew a t-shirt for myself
5. Card the rest of the black alpaca and finish spinning it

Those are completely doable goals, I think. It's okay if I don't get all of that done before the month's out, but I'm so focused on the few things I am doing that I think I can get much of this short list done.

I just work here. (Fear is the mind-killer)

I like to post pictures of flowers from my garden, even when they really don't have anything to do with the rest of the post, but I don't really have a whole lot to show for this week except a pile of shirts to sew and a pile of mostly finished project bags that lack a few seams. I'm trying an assembly line approach with them and I'm about four or so hours into five bags, which works out to about $10/bag so far, if I were to use the average wage of a seamstress. There's all kinds of interesting data behind that link and it could be a rabbit-hole for a number nerd like me. It's useful, though, because those numbers can help you see what sort of value the market puts on your sewing time. In the grand scheme of things, it's not a lot. Ordinary sewists have, historically, never been valued very highly in a monetary sense, but it's a good starting point so that you don't undervalue yourself if you want to sell your services.
This year wasn't going to be focused on peddling my wares and I didn't really want to do any commission work, but the dance school was in a bind and I'm kind of okay with being paid to help them out. Apparently, they said "We'd like some shirts for little boys." and the vendor heard, "Please send circus tents under which they might perform." and were terribly rude about having been in the wrong about what size a young boy might wear. I tried on the "teen" size, which is meant to be larger than the child sizes, but smaller than adult sizes, so right about where I'm at on the size chart for boys' clothes. It was huge. Whoever did the size chart for these shirts should probably set aside the illicit substances from now on. Lord 'a' mercy.

This looks excitin'

Anyway, I've still got a lot of shirts to sew back up and not a lot of time before the recital. I'm not hugely confident with knit fabrics at the sewing machine, but Project Make doesn't care if I'm timid. Project Make decides that this week, I'm learning about knit fabrics, so I obey. Project Make is my beneficent overlord that requires nothing more than total devotion to learning. My biggest fear is that I'm going to screw them up beyond all repair, but fear is just an activity of the mind.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Where the fear has gone, only my seams will remain.

This week's technique is a two-fer as far as videos go and this week, I actually watched the video before trying the technique instead of my usual M.O. where I just do the thing and then watch a video about it.

Sewing with knit fabrics

Part One is an overview of knit fabrics and how they behave:

Part Two is the knitty-gritty on how to sew it (see what I did there?):

So, of course I really want a walking foot now, but I can make do with what I've got for this particular job and it won't look awful. 

In other stitching news, I don't really have that much to report. Legwarmers and Leto are continuing apace, but my focus has shifted mainly to sewing. I don't know if it's the weather or what, but that's where I'm at right now. I'd already decided on a couple more little shirts for Bu as next up in the queue, but now one of them will be red with white polka dots in honor of our trip to Disney this summer. 

Proud, but not prideful

You can tell this isn't Kansas because it's in color.

One of the first full garments I ever sewed by myself was a Wednesday Addams dress for Halloween one year and I still have it in my closet. Mom helped, of course, but she claims it's all my work and I can't help but be a little proud of it.

I made the above dress for Iris in '04 and the pattern is more fiddly than it looks, but that there is Dorothy Gale's dress. It's a licensed pattern, so it's the official Wizard of Oz Dorothy dress. I even compared it to the movie to make sure it was right and not some half-baked approximation.

There's been a Halloween costume dry spell the past few years and I've partly been thankful for it. Grad school occupies my brain like the 99% on Wall St., only it's been going on for much longer and I'm more willing to give into its demands. She's been wearing the costumes from her dance recitals and it's great she gets some additional use from them, but every year she doesn't ask me to make something for her, I feel a little bit like a kicked puppy.

Maybe that's silly, but in my head Mama is supposed to make the Halloween costumes. That's part of what a good mama does and it's one of the parts I really like. I like making something for the offspring that she's excited to wear and while I've made her lots of clothes, a Halloween costume is special.

Anyway, it's that time of year again and much to my relief, she's asked me to make her a fairy costume. She wanted a skirt and I suggested a vest to help hold up her wings. First, she wanted to be a woodland fairy and I'm thinking, "Browns and greens - no problem." I even found a camo that might have worked very well for such a thing. Unfortunately, she changed her mind in the fabric store. She wanted to be a rainbow fairy instead and no, there was no way to change her mind.

Sassy!

We got the last bit of a rainbow striped quilter's cotton and it was perfect. In fact, I think this is some of my best work. The black panel has a black lace layered in front of the cotton to give it a little opacity and it makes the other colors really grab your retinas and smack 'em around a bit. Both of the black fabrics were stash. Pro tip: Children grow. Measure them before you cut fabric to make a garment. Sure, you may have measured them last week, but they probably grew last night. I must admit to inserting this panel because I failed to measure the kiddo before cutting. It turned out to be a happy accident.

The closure is an invisible zipper and hook-and-eye, but the waistband has elastic in it to allow for growth of said kiddo. She should be able to wear it for a couple more inches of tummy growth. That might be a month or a couple years-- it's hard to say. Anyway, it fits perfectly, drapes well, the zipper looks great, and it the whole garment is the exact perfect thing for her. Not to mention that she loves it and is excited to wear it for Halloween. The part I'm really proud of is that I made this entirely without a pattern. I made it with maths from my brain.

I feel like a good mom again and that here's something that's as it should be. I feel talented and competent. I feel proud.

...but not prideful. I thank Athene for granting me skill with a needle, I thank Bekah for being a good influence in the use of references, I thank Iris for asking me to make this for her, I thank the Kindergarten teacher who suggested I learn to sew, and most of all, I thank my mom for teaching me.