Weekend Production So Far

13 embroidered tees and/or sweats plus 1 denim shirt. At 30 minutes minimum per shirt to set up, embroider and trim jump stitches, you do the math. So GLAD that's done. My sister owes me. Big.

2 cammie purses cut out and ready to sew during the upcoming week. One is for hire. One is for me, a re-do of my first purse, since I've improved the construction, and also because I've used one of Tyler's actual retired cammi blouses this time. (Retired due to ugly an ink spot on one pocket which I cut around.) Since I'll be at his base again in 3 weeks, I want to have my New! and Improved! purse done for that trip.

Jalie 2921 cut out and ready to sew as soon as I'm off the computer. The print will be the top. The solid below is the sweater I bought last week. I want to wear these tomorrow with a black skirt, as my nod to Halloween — in color, if not in costume.

Also on the agenda — laundry, a bit of grocery shopping, maybe some closet reorganization tonight during the football game, and finding some black tights while I'm out this afternoon. If not, I'll just go with regular nude PH. 

Oops … I Did It Again

Yep. More fabric. Curse you Fabric.com. I was just browsing (I swear!) on Fabric.com and noticed new ITY knits since the last time I looked. I am powerless over a good knit print and before I knew it, I had $169+ worth of fabric sitting in my cart. But instead of pulling the trigger, I took a breath and walked away. And wouldn't you know, Fabric.com also noticed I had abandoned my cart and quickly emailed me a 15% off discount code to tempt me back. It worked.

I really love ITY knits lately. First, they are a dependable order. What I mean by that is that I always know what I'm getting with them, unlike, say, rayon knits which can be hit or miss — and are usually miss. Second, the best prints seem to be ITY and you all know I love me a crazy print. But the strongest reason I'm loving on the ITYs is because they are very easy to sew/fit and are actually quite comfortable for me to wear. I know, polyester right? But I wore an ITY something (either dress or top) every day while I was away and most days I was outside a good deal of time. I sweated, yes, but not because of the polyester. It was HOT. You would be sweating buck nekked. ;-) But what I didn't do was stay wet and soggy. The ITY knits do breathe and they stay dry since moisture (a pretty word for sweat) quickly evaporates.

In other sewing room news, I'm making progress on my planned weekend projects. The embroidering of the RTW shirts is done. Here's the tees and polos for my BIL:

And the "special edition" for my sister …

… which has been properly blinged. Hey, if Elizabeth can make up verbs, so can I, right? ;-) I added some hot-fix crystals to the wheels of the truck and car and a line underneath it all, plus one yellow crystal for the truck's flashing light. Cute, yes? Lisa will love it. I think she got the sparklie thing from me in my younger days, when as my kid sister she used to adore and worship me. Ahem. ;-) But really, I used to wear a lot of flash. Now I'm old and boring. I think I should change that. Well, the boring part anyway. Can't do much about the old.

Speaking of embroidery, why is it that as soon as you walk away for just a minute, the thread jams? I diligently sat in front of the machine the entire time during the first four stitch-outs and they all were smooth sailing without a hiccup. Then I started the fifth and last and decided I wanted a drink so I left the machine stitching and went downstairs to the kitchen to grab some water. Yep, you guessed it. When I got back upstairs, the thread had jammed, the stitching had stopped, and I had part of a "G" to clean up and stitch again. Arghh.

After the embroidery was done, I cut out Lisa's birthday top and it's ready to sew this morning as soon as I switch serger and coverstitch threads. I decided on the Hot Patterns Sunshine Top, with a few minor alterations that I made while cutting. The "hand-me-down" tops I brought her were both sleeveless, but I know she has bigger arms than I do so I widened the sleeve and armhole a little bit. I also made it longer for her long torso and I added a little more tummy and booty room since hers are bigger than mine. Good thing she doesn't read this or she'd KILL me for saying that.

Priceless

Alternate titles for this post:

1. What I Did This Afternoon Instead of Working

2. How Spoiled Is My Son?

3. Why I'm Glad I Have An Embroidery Machine and Software, Even Though I Don't Use It Much

- - - - - - - - - -

Apparently the football coach sent home order forms during summer workouts. Equally as apparent — none of them made it to our house. Typical teenage brain fade, I suppose.

The coach decided this year that instead of wearing game jerseys on game days during school hours, he'd have all the players buy "kits" of various game day paraphernalia. (I'm sure there were some profits that made it into the football slush fund too!) DS wasn't really paying close attention. He knew he didn't want or need the cleats or the shorts or most of the other things in the kit. And by the time he realized he actually *did* want and need the polo shirt (read: the coach expected him to be wearing it), it was too late.

Last week, we bought a navy polo shirt so he could at least look similar to his teammates. He tried to describe the embroidery on the official shirt, but we just weren't connecting with the description. I told him I needed to actually see one. So, last night he brought home his friend's shirt and then expected me to perform digitizing magic today so he'd have a "real" shirt tomorrow.

Abracadabra!

I only use my digitizing software about 3 times a year so I always end up fumbling around before I remember what I'm doing. But a couple of hours later, I actually had a workable design. And even though I really didn't have the extra time, I forced myself to also make a couple of tests. I'm glad I did, because a few adjustments were then made and the final stitch-out is nearly perfect. (See, "muslins" are necessary for all types of "sewing!")

My tests:



The friend's original shirt:



DS' new knock-off:



It's pretty darn close, DS is happy, and there's no way a bunch of teenage boys and/or football coaches will ever notice the differences. I think I'll keep my mouth shut.

Details

It seems that the embroidery just does not want to be photographed, but here's another attempt anyway. The effect is subtle, but not this subtle!



There was a question in the comments about the embroidery design. It comes from a Husqvarna Viking disk, #150 Designer Flowers. Apparently, this collection has been discontinued because it's no longer listed on the HV website. But the image files were still there with a little digging and I came up with this screen grab.



As you can see, the original design is smaller and has many more colors than my final motif. I used Embird for the editing. Below is the "Mega Hoop" design I created from bits and pieces of the original HV design.



This is the single hooping file for the pockets, which is just a separated-out section of the larger design above.



Here's a shot of the pockets. You can see the embroidery a bit better here than in the leg shot. (Reminder: You can click to enlarge all of the photos.)



And here are the pockets on my backside, the embroidery again being an elusive model.



The outfit on Zillie:



A close-up of the gathered short sleeve:



I've had comments in favor of the length of the top. I'm still giving it thought. I don't usually wear my tops this long and it sorta feels like the typical, big & baggy top that plus-size women hide under. I know it isn't the same, but with the extra pounds that have recently found their way onto my already fluffy self, it's difficult to get past that feeling. That's one downside to having a great kitchen that I love to cook in! ;-)