A Patchwork Skirt

My friend Mr. Preston texted me early one morning back in May sometime. He was getting in some repro 80's style parody t shirts, and thought I might like one. Of course I wanted one! While I waited the few weeks til he got them in I decided it was a good time to make a patchwork skirt to go with the new tshirt. 

I've wanted to make a patchwork skirt for awhile. I saved a bunch of images last year of patchwork skirts from the 60's, 70's and 80's. They are all cute and I love how they go with anything. I remember having some clothes made of not real patchwork back in the 90's, but patchwork printed fabric so it looked like patchwork without, well, all the work. 😂

A lot of the earlier patchwork skirts I looked at seemed to be made of simple blocks sewn together into a tube with a drawstring or elastic waist, and sometimes a slit for leg movement. I did find one from, according to the site it was listed on, the 60's and it intrigued me since it was made of a series of graduated blocks, smaller at the waist and largest at the hem. This made a very pretty shape without the need of elastics or drawstrings or slits. I decided to go with that style, even though my tshirt is from two decades later. 

Some simple math later I had made paper templates for all my blocks and it was time to choose fabrics from my stash. It was fun looking at the different combinations and deciding how to lay them out. I like my end product a lot! Each fabric is meaningful to me in different ways. Some of the fabrics are truly quite old and vintage and some are new - like the soft yellow that I used for Rosie's birthday dress back in April. While I sewed this skirt my Grandma was dying of cancer and so a lot of thoughts of her are stitched into the dress as she was constantly on my mind. 

I wanted to do a good job making this so I took the time to try to match all the seams nicely and serged every seam. Then, to protect the seams further from wear and tear I put in a lining. The waist came out a little big so I had to ease it to a binding to fit my waist and that is probably the only thing I don't like about the skirt. I would prefer it if it fit smoothly without easing but this is how it had to be! 

My shirt came in late June and I love it! I don't wear tshirts a lot but this one is certainly a favorite. I wore it on the 4th of July as an attempt at red-white-and-blue and my son took some pictures for me at Fort Salem, a sacred site near here. My Grandma was not expected to make it through the day (although she did, passing a few days later) so she was very present in my mind. I brought my flute out and my drum as it seemed the right thing to do. Later that night I went to a nature preserve with Malachi and brought my guitar. We watched the sunset and saw a beautiful turtle and just enjoyed the moments. They all seemed precious as they dropped off, one by one, to the time of my Grandmas crossing.

I like the skirt with other shirts too - like I mentioned, these skirts go with anything! This white blouse with yellow embroidery is one I've worn to death since getting at Goodwill a few years ago. I really need to make a replacement blouse for it. Actually, I think I have. . .but I still have kept, and wear, this one! 😂

Making this skirt was a slow process of love and memories. It did make me realize I need to make a few more skirts. I am down to just a few I wear in regular rotation and all my others are pretty well faded and not so nice anymore. I currently am making a set of cape dresses for a friend but once I have completed those, maybe I will make another skirt. There are lots of different patchwork styles I could try. Or I could just go with my usual, basic, peasant skirt. I am liking fitted waists again and would like a few skirts that are more structured, maybe with buttons and pockets. Maybe corduroy for cooler weather. Because, yes, the weather is cooling and soon autumn will be here and my heart is so, so glad. I so love this time. Mabon comes. 

Love,

Sarah

August

This summer has been filled with a lot of things; in July my grandma crossed over after having been diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer back in May. I am grateful she didn't have a long, lingering sickness. She was able to be medicated for her pain and the last time I talked with her (via video chat due to Covid-19) she was at my aunts beautiful, rural home in central Illinois. She took her phone around to show me the horses in the pasture and the wide open sky, dotted with fluffy clouds, and her sweet cat, and pictures of loved ones on the walls. My aunt had her surrounded by beauty and by memories of happy times. Later, when she had to go to the hospice center, my dad would sit by her side and sing songs to her. She was a strong, beautiful lady and she slipped away on July 7th. 

As all things cycle and seasons gently rise and fall in the continuing breath of life, my sister married her love a few short weeks later and I was filled with deep gladness to be able to be there for her and with her as she pledged her love to her new husband. The day before she married, my mother gave me a ring that my grandma had worn when she went into hospice. I wore it for the wedding and it felt, truly, like my grandmas sweet spirit was among us. 

I will have a post of the girls flower girl dresses and some photos of the wedding and the yellow dress I made to wear there but today it felt more right to just post about the quiet daily life I am so grateful for. While it was so good to see my parents for a brief time and to gain a wonderful new brother (and two darling nephews!) I was so happy to come back home and to rest in the gentle arms of these hills. I drove out yesterday to pick up my son from his friends house and the ache of grateful joy was almost unbearable. I love this place; I love this land, and I will be content and happy to stay here for the rest of my time on this earth. 

I love this little town, though I would jump at the chance to eventually move back out into the country. I love the familiar faces of my neighbors and the small talk and town gossip and news. I was ridiculously excited when our new pharmacy opened yesterday. I love all the school issues and sports and making cookies and masks for all my boys, whether biological or heart adopted. I love the rain and the sun and the moods that fall and rise over the fields and hills and the wind that rustles through the trees. I don't deserve this happiness but I am so grateful for it. I love my home here. 

One of David's latest paintings!

After the wedding I brought my girls home from their summer visit with grandma and grandpa and the boys stayed behind (except for Judah, who decided he wanted to stay home this year). We went out to check on the berries and found that there is a whole lot of them and more that will ripen over the next week or so. The girls picked all they could fit into their tied up bandannas and plan to go back with their plastic beach buckets to get more. I'll be happy if we can get enough for some jam and maybe a pie or two. But, I am very wary of the copious poison ivy entwined around the berry bushes - I'm recovering from a second poison ivy episode and I don't want to deal with another! 😂

I was able to bring my great-great grandmas sewing machine home from my parents. They have been keeping it for me for a year or so. I spent an afternoon rearranging my sewing space and fitting the cabinet in. Above it I hung the picture my parents gave me that came from my grandpas bedroom. On the back a note reveals that it was given to my grandpa at the time of his mothers funeral, in 1999. It seemed only fitting to keep both picture and sewing machine together. I am so lucky to have these things to remind me of my family that has gone on. 

And yes, I definitely plan to use this awesome treadle machine as soon as I get it running! I think all it needs is a long belt but I will have it looked over and cleaned by my service guy to make sure it has all the right parts. 

It's been a very emotionally intense summer and I am liking this calm, cool August so far. After weeks of humidity and near 100-degree days it's been breezy and cool this one so far. I smell autumn in the air and a spicy, intoxicating scent from woods as the earth prepares for the cold months ahead. It makes me feel so alive and filled with wild energy and joy. In three weeks the kids return to school so I will be making a variety of mask styles for them and have some plastic face shields as well. It will be a bit of an adjustment as they transition back into a different kind of school year but I am hopeful they will do ok and the teachers and staff will not have a terribly difficult time (although I know they are working so hard as they deal with all this new stuff). 

I made these last night from our own green tomatoes!

I will close for now. I love you. You are important to me. You are my family. Be well, be safe, know you are loved. 

Love,

Sarah 

A White Painted Kaftan

I have really fallen away on this blogging thing. . .and I was doing so good most of the spring! Blah. I am so freaking far behind in chronicling sewing projects that I won't ever catch up. One thing that makes it hard when it comes to blogging is the organizing of photos. I have been taking more photos with my dslr lately and just transferring them to my phone instead of downloading them onto the computer where I can edit them with Lightroom. Once in a while I'll download all the photos (usually a few hundred at a time) and just. . .leave them. Editing takes a long time, even if I don't do much more than crop a photo or adjust the brightness and shadow. And then I've been lazily exporting from Lightroom into a folder that is supposed to only contain photos from 2019. So this morning I finally got up super early and decided it was as good a time as any to organize my photos on the computer and I think I have that all sorted now. For the last ten or so years I just put all our pictures into folders by year, and each folder has subfolders for the individual months of each year. I think that's my favorite way to organize photos although when I do a lot of pictures for sewing projects it makes me want to create folders for just sewing projects. Olord the good things I could do and how organized I could be if I just had the time! (and I can't use that as an excuse. If one wants something bad enough, one creates the time.)

Waterfall at Ceasars Creek, where I went hiking with my friend Dennis recently.

Anyway, yes, I've been sewing quite a bit this summer. Mostly just everyday clothes for me and the girls but it's actually been awesome to feel consistently creative and inspired! They are mostly just simple and quick projects but yeah. It's been good. It really helps to have a dedicated sewing room and all the little items that ones needs to be able to do things quickly and well. For many years I got by with the most bare bones basics, but I've made a conscious effort to pick up little things here and there over the last year or two and, most importantly, LEARN TO USE THEM, and it is really starting to make a difference. Like, my very old second-hand Facebook marketplace serger and learning how to use it for finishing knits. . .and using fusible tape to make nicer hems in knits. . .and how to use a double needle. . .and getting comfortable with rotary cutters and buying new, nice pins often and not using chintzy nasty fabric just because it's cheap. (although, in this post, this fabric IS kind of chintzy, nasty and cheap!) I used to take satisfaction in doing things the hard way but eh. There is no glory in consciously doing things the hard way just because. It doesn't make me a better person and definitely not a better seamstress. Give me alllll the shortcuts and all the tips and tricks and I will try each one. And as a result, me and the girls get cute new things to wear that cost way less than buying new! (garage sales are still awesome though. I got Anne SO MANY clothes at one a few weeks ago, most with tags still attached, for 3 items for $1! 😮)

Speaking of cheap fabrics, have any of y'all been using the precut fabrics that Wal-Mart has started selling a lot of? For the last few years they've sold pre cut lengths of poly cottons and some mystery fabrics, but it seems that lately they are moving more and more to these pre cut lengths and phasing out the bolts. At my local Wal-Mart, which is the closest place to me where I can buy fabric, most of the cottons were bought over the spring when everyone was making masks. They still have not restocked the bolts but there has been a huge increase in the pre cut fabrics! I have bought a lot of them and they are actually quite nice. Some are crappy, yes, but the quality is consistently getting better. And they are CHEAP. 2 yards for $2? 3 yards for $6 or $8? Um yes!!!

Evolution of a kaftan. . .

Yoke sewn to neckline and curved hem cut. Time to stop for the night!

 I was out late one night getting a few groceries, a few days before summer solstice and as always I went by the fabric section just to see what they had. A pre cut length of cream colored, stretchy, open patterned fabric jumped out at me and I brought it home, along with another pre cut length of a truly low quality, cheap, flimsy, stretchy, silky fabric that I thought I'd use for a lining. It was definitely a spur of the moment thing. I got home around 9 that night and after putting my groceries up and getting the kids ready for bed I began sewing. I was determined to make a special dress to wear to Serpent Mound for summer solstice!

Side seams, belt slits and belt put in

I knew the stretchy fabric would be horrible to sew so, what garment requires no seams and just hemming?  A kaftan! It was an easy choice. I did make it a little harder on myself by deciding I wanted to use the full width of the 60" fabric, so after measuring up about 15" from each selvedge edge, for elbow-length sleeves, I cut a very wide, giant neckline in the rest of the folded rectangle that would be gathered to fit a yoke with a normal neckline.

Finished kaftan but the yoke was too plain!

Paint to the rescue!

It wasn't too complicated and I used a firmly woven cotton for the yoke, so I had something stable to stitch the gathered, stretchy neckline to. I lined the yoke and the stretchy gathered edge of the kaftan was stitched sandwiched between the yoke outer layer and lining. At that point, it was nearly 11 so I finished the dress the next day by sewing up the sides, about 14" in from the edges, and finishing the edges all around the dress with cotton binding I cut from scrap fabric. I sewed some lace from my trim jar onto the yoke since it seemed a little too plain. I desperately wanted to embroider a pattern of oak leaves and acorns onto the yoke but that would take too much time, so I ended up using some of my sons acrylic paints to quickly paint some daisies and swirly lines and little gold dots onto the yoke. I cut four slits to thread a belt through for the waistline and my kaftan was done!

Needed an under-dress

But it was very see-through and the two white slips/under dresses I had didn't work with the neckline of the kaftan. I used the cheap horrible stretchy silky fabric I had bought for lining and made a quick under-dress the day of solstice. I used my fitted crop t-shirt pattern, adapted from the Deer & Doe Plantain t-shirt pattern, to make an A line, lower calf length, sleeveless dress with a V neckline to match the neckline of the kaftan. I finished the armholes and neckline with narrow bands and just left the hem raw, since the fabric does not ravel.

It was lovely to wear the fnished dress to Serpent Mound, although the hem of my dress did pick up a lot of bits of grass and leaves as I trailed it around. I think I should have made it a bit shorter - but, oh well! It's fine as it is.

This pretty triple-leaf brooch was perfect for the dress!
3 is a sacred number in many traditions and cultures, representing many things. 

I also finished my rosette necklace that I began back in Februrary (I think? Maybe March.) I was deeply inspired by the sun and cross symbol that was used by the prehistoric Mound Builder cultures that lived here long ago and created the mounds that we still have with us today. The sun symbol was once thought to indicate that the Mound Builders were sun worshipers but we know now that they probably were not. The cross is thought to represent the world suspended from four threads. I drew out my design onto thick interfacing and spent way too many hours filling in each area with glass seed beads I picked up awhile ago from Windy's World. As this was my first time trying this type of craft my beads are too closely packed together which has caused a little bit of buckling and distortion of the design, but all in all I am vastly pleased with it now that it is done! I took it with me to the Serpent and it is a very special piece to me.

We also made two new shamanic drums, that we also brought with us but did not actually play since we simply ran out of time and spent a lot of our time walking around and enjoying the (socially distanced) company of everyone else who came. We have since played the drums very often and they have a nice sound.

Much love,

Sarah