Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Vintage Sewing Contest

Yay, so I’m still inspired for this whole travel thing. I’ve been thinking of making European Spring Travel my theme in the vintage sewing contest at Pattern Review. It really is hard to pick what to sew. Each piece is considered separately. Hmm, hompefully this contest will force me to actually finish a project. I do hate to hem, that’s always what’s left over, but I’ll still where the dress to work, just unhemmed. I’m surprised that so few people notice unless there are threads hanging down.

Another goal is to use up my stash and do no more fabric shopping or pattern sopping until I have. This is, considering I’m still really wanting that Simplicity Jumper pattern, kind of unfortunate. I sold a book on half.com yesterday and sent if off today. Maybe I should post more of my random books that are just sitting in a box in the garage since I don’t have space for them on my bookshelves. If I take an RTW, I don’t want to stick my parents with everything, so it is probably a good idea to sell everything on ebay and half.com. I wonder what I should do about my computer. It’s great and I’d really miss it, but you can’t really take an expensive laptop backpacking through Europe, but it’ll be only a little over a year old when I leave. I’ll miss that old friend. And what about my car. I paid $2100 for it and I’ve put more than 20,000 miles on it. I’d probably be happy to get $1500 back. It’s been a good car to me. Anyway, I suppose that’s just more money for me. I can’t leave until after March anyway since that’s the final test that will determine whether I’m worthy of becoming a full-fledged librarian. Also, I should save money as long as possible. If I leave at the beginning of April, but have everything sold by the middle of March, then I’ll be prepared for the end. Goodness, it does make a body feel much trepidation, huh.

Well, I had some tacos for lunch, they were good, if not on my diet. If I’d waited I could have eaten at the art exhibit reception and not worried about the cost and eaten more low carb. Oh well, I’ll just remember that the taco supreme tasted really good.

So here are a couple potential patterns for the contest.

Vogue 2902
















Vogue 2903















Butterick 4919



















Butterick 4792





















Simplicity 3780






















Simplicity 4270























I have lots more true vintage to choose from at home that have come from that great haven of vintage sewing patterns, eBay. These are just some of the repro patterns I have too. I’d really like 4270 as a nightgown. And I love Vogue 2903, but it looks mondo difficult. But I guess we can stretch ourselves, right?

Monday, July 30, 2007

We just got a new book in on travel...

Well, I've been getting frustrated with saving money lately for my trip and I just haven't been worrying too much about it. Today, we got in a Rough Guide to Europe, 2007 so its pretty current, so I can become less frustrated.

I'm really tempted to start in January. That's a low season. I should have about $10,000 saved by then, hopefully. This won;t get me far for an RTW, but I begin to wonder if I could still work it. I've three credit cards and my debt is below $2,000 and I can charge up to $7,000. I will pay down my debt before leaving and just using the credit card for flights and trains and buses and some accomadation. Hmm, there's also bunac. If I catch a cheap flight to London in January, then I can work in London for a few months and do the whole see London thing. Or maybe it would be better to fly into London and do the tourist, then travel for several months and come back to London and work for several months starting in May. Then leave for points more easterly. Anyway, this bears thinking over. Any suggestions?

Saturday, July 28, 2007

So yesterday, I took my Mom out to Town East to celebrate her birthday. We stopped at Jo Ann’s and bought some patterns and material. Don’t ya’ll love that clearance rack, and its even better during the half off the clearance rack sales Jo Ann does once in awhile. I’ll admit I really wanted Simplicity 3673. I even called Ann to look the number up on her computer since it wasn’t in the early Autumn book. Sigh. I suppose I should simply wait until the Autumn book comes out. It’s just such a cute pattern. Anyway, after pattern and fabric shopping wherein I picked up a beautiful paisley with a blue background in a silky polyester fabric that’s gonna be a great maxi dress with flutter sleeves since I’m trying for some modesty here.

After shopping we ate lunch at On the Border and while busy, the beef fajita salad was so good. I was just so hungry I couldn’t resist the hot chips and salsa. Slaps hand. Must not eat chips to be low carb. You know this low carb thing works great until I don’t plan well and get seriously hungry to the point I’ll just eat anything and do. Like last night I ate some of the delicious store bought red velvet cake for my parents birthdays. It was GOOD, but unnecessary, I’m trying to stay true to the diet today.

Anyone else hear about the vintage sewing contest at patternreview.com?

http://sewing.patternreview.com/cgi-bin/sewingclasses/board.pl?t=23896

I think it sounds like fun, 2 months to actually complete projects. Of course, one of those months is actually during school so pretty much worthless since I can’t seem to sew and do homework at the same time. But that does give me at least a month to work on it. Hmmm, I’m just waiting for inspiration right now in the three days before it starts.

Thursday, July 26, 2007

First Posting

I'm sort of new to this blogging thing so we'll see how this goes. I love vintage clothes, sewing, Harry Potter, fanfiction, Nanowrimo, Texas, my family, my dog, etc... I suppose I'll talk about them all.

What's important to me right now is sewing this specific dress. Here's the inspiration, it's a Maggy London dress and I love the top half, not so fond of the pleats, but when you're making clothes, you can cut everything you don't really need. lol.
http://shop.nordstrom.com/S/2942054/0~2376776~2374325~2384392?mediumthumbnail=Y&origin=category&searchtype=&pbo=2384392&P=1

I'm a low carb eater and really enjoy it, except when I'm feeling depressed. Like most everybody else I also fall victim to marketing the the joy of getting the newest electronic gadget and still wonder where everything on my credit card bill comes from. I'm tried to detox on eBay right now, so wish me luck too. I love http://www.thefedoralounge.com and http://www.patternreview.com

Does anyone else on here get so excited when the newest pattern catalogs come out. I've seen several patterns from simplicity I can't wait to buy at the next sale. That is, if Hancocks or Jo Anns in Mesquite has the Fall patterns yet. I'm also getting interested in burda. They don't go on sale that I've seen and I've only seen them at Jo Ann's but no worries.