out of hiding

oups! it appears i had disappeared from blogland for what? three months? yeah... let's forget about that and move on to happier subjects.


a lot of my friends have recently dug out sewing machines from deep down in their closets or borrowed them from friends or family and are starting to sew. i'm so excited to know that they are finding ways to learn new techniques and ways of expressing themselves while also expressing love for their family and the planet by heading more into a "handmade life" direction.

so in order to celebrate beginning seamstresses and creating for the ones we love i thought i'd create a tutorial.

i've decided on a simple vest as it seems the most versatile piece of clothing i can think of.
anyone can wear a vest at any age. boys, girls, babies, toddlers, mamas, papas...
making clothing for kids may not seem worthwhile sometimes because they outgrow everything so quickly. a vest fits much longer than pants or shirts. it transitions well through the seasons doesn't stain or wear out easily and this one is even reversible giving you basically two pieces in one!

got the point? it's time to make a vest.

the other reason i thought this would be perfect for a tutorial is that i think it's a good example for one of the biggest obstacles we encounter with sewing... the planning and thinking ahead.
all the sewing required for this is very basic and suitable for true beginners. but putting these few pieces of cloth together in the right order seems very counter intuitive at first. and because most patterns seems to assume that the reader just knows how to do this kind of work, i haven't found the process explained in a detailed way. for me personally purely written instructions are basically worthless. i need images. so this is going to be extremely picture heavy (excuse the yucky water stains on my ironing board) and i hope it works for you.

here we go...




for this vest i'm using a pattern i found in ottobre magazine but you can easily create your own by tracing the shape of a shirt which fits the to-be-vested-person well.




trace the pattern onto left side of one of your fabrics. place fabrics on top of each other, make a decision about seam allowance (i add 1cm all around), cut.





see? two layers. cotton print and purple stuff. i have three pieces of each. back and two front pieces.




begin sewing by taking your outside fabric (cotton print in my case) right sides facing each other. now sew only the two shoulder seams with a simple straight stitch. repeat with your inner layer of fabric (purple in this case).




now spread out both layers (it'll kinda look like a big U or V), open up the shoulder seams and press with an iron if you're using cotton and are a very tidy seamstress (i didn's press. i'm not tidy.). have the right sides of the two different fabrics face each other.




do as much pinning as you feel you need in order to keep both sides in place during sewing. i use very few needles if any, but if this really is your first project, use a lot of pinning to spare yourself some frustration later on. pin along all the outsides of your fabric U or V.




now start sewing your two layers together. start at the bottom of the side seam, stitch along the whole front, up and around the neck, down the front again until you reach the bottom of the other side seam.




now do the same for both arm openings. remember, your two layers are still spread out U or V shape right sides facing each other. this might feel crazy and like it couldn't possibly work to you, but it will! ;)




here's the big U or V. depending on how much seam allowance you used and what kind of materials you're working with you should trim the sewn edges now. you can do lots of little snips where you've sewn rounds, really trim corners if you use a pattern with sharp corners or ,as i did, give it a good trim all around.
in this case i'm not terribly concerned with fraying because i've chosen fabric i know won't hold up very well with lots of washes anyway and we will also topstitch these vests all around in the end, so fraying shouldn't be an issue really.





now we turn the vest right sides out by pulling the fabric through the shoulders. crazy. i know. but it works.




see? right sides out. arm holes are sewn, neck and front opening is sewn. still open are the side seams and the bottom seam on the back.




this is where you might get really confused and it's also where the sewing could get a little fumbly. deep breaths. this WILL work.
you now close the side seams. which means starting with your outside layer fabric you put the fabric right sides facing and stitch along the side seam top to bottom. be careful not to accidentally sew onto the inside fabrics.
then you fumble around a bit more until you have the inside layer fabric's outside seam ready to be sewn the same way.




this picture shows the side seams of inner and outer layer.

repeat for the other side seam.




turn it all right sides out and find that it really looks like it actually might work out in the end! woohoo!


at this point the only part left to sew together is the back's bottom. so you turn the vest wrong side out again, neatly line up the two layers in the back (use pins!) and then stitch them together leaving a hole in the middle big enough for you to use for turning the vest right side out again.




here's the bottom seam in the back. i sewed one side, left a hole big enough for my hand, sewed the other side.




turn right side out. neatly fold in the seam allowance where you left the hole. (again, use pins.)


use your hands or an iron to press the vest into shape now and get it to look clean and even.




then topstitch all along all the sides and armholes. i start right where i left the hole. because of the topstitching i don't need to handstitch to close the hole. it also helps the vest stay in shape through washes and keeps the fabric from fraying over time.




voi-la! here are my first two vest. one for joon and one for mika. making these took far less than an hour each INCLUDING tracing and cutting out the patterns and picking out fabrics.




there are endless possibilities for different designs.
i will be adding button loops and buttons to these but needed quick gratification today so they had to be plain at first.

you could use different shapes, add pockets, do patchwork, use fleece, fake fur, leather, trims, feathers, rig rag, pom poms.... endless variations.


so? are you making a vest today?

the pledge

it's july 1st, a day i've been mentally preparing for the past couple of weeks. the reason today is special? it marks the first day of a 2-month long experiment for me.
i've decided to take the wardrobe refashion pledge.

the official rules as stated on the website are as follows...


1. No buying new! (handmade is excepted; So this allows for Etsy purchases etc!!) All clothing must be Recycled, Renovated, Preloved or Thrifted, or Handmade only for the term. Employment related and special needs clothing (ie sports, school), shoes and undies are excepted from the rules, although you are encouraged to have a go at making these.

2. In extreme circumstances, maybe a special event, or the worlds greatest and most amazing never to be repeated sale that you simply can not pass up, you may use the Get out of Refashionista Jail Free card. You are able to use this card once during the 2 month part of your contract; ie 1 for 2 months, 2 for 4 months etc. Of course you need to fess up on the blog and display the button!

3. You must post on the blog at least once a week to let the community know what you've been up to. This will not only give you brag points, but inspire and encorouge others! Of course you need to display the button on your blog and have copied the pledge in at least one post, and provide a link to your pledge under the button.

4. You need to be honest and admit when you've fallen off the Refashionista Wagon! Go directly to Refashionista Jail, do not pass GO and do not collect $200! Apply for parole once there.

refashioning has long been something of interest to me and i've collected several big moving boxes full of pre-loved (or not so loved) clothing in the past few years hoping that i'd one day put new life into these items and make them wearable again. once i really got into sewing though i unfortunately also really got into buying fancy new fabrics and so i created new items from scratch using new materials and those boxes have remained more or less untouched.

doing lots of thinking about consumer culture lately and having lots of interesting conversations with my awesomely driven creative and independent thinking husband i realize that i must try as best as i can to make use of the resources we have and that unfortunately the only way to change consumer culture is to avoid being a consumer of mass production whenever possible. even if that means being inconvenienced at times. so there are lots of "thinking outside the box" challenges ahead of me and i'm very much looking forward to facing them.

in addition of taking the pledge for clothing i've also promised myself that we as a family will take the spirit of no buying new! re-use! and less is more! to all aspects of life. over the next two months we will only purchase things we actually truly need or which will help enable us need less (i.e. we just spent 100 bucks on a bicycle cart to pull around the children in and will need to purchase new tires and small bits to get our bikes in running order so that we will have fewer reasons to use a car) and when we will try to purchase used items whenever possible.

i will post on the wardrobe refashion blog at least once a week about the wardrobe part of our experiment. if we make other cool discoveries or come up with cool anti-mass-consumption stuff i'll most likely post about it on our family blog.

so now here's the official part...

The Pledge

I, Karoline Stephens, pledge that I shall abstain from the purchase of "new" manufactured items of clothing, for the period of 2 months. I pledge that i shall refashion, renovate, recycle preloved items for myself with my own hands in fabric, yarn or other medium for the term of my contract. I pledge that I will share the love and post a photo of my refashioned, renovoted, recycled, crafted or created item of clothing on the Wardrobe Refashion blog, so that others may share the joy that thy thriftiness brings! Signed xxx.

not getting jack done

again.

it's been twelve days since i've touched any sewing tools and i'm very close to losing my mind. we've had a toddler birthday, two sick kids and a whole lot of commotion due to our crazy decision to move to my mom's house for a few weeks. my sister is moving into a new room there which needed a lot of renovation and then we're "swapping" living situations with my youngest brother for a few weeks. which means we'll have a yard and garden to enjoy and we'll get away from the crazy noise level of our downtown living for a while. should make the kids happy and us too.

anyways, i haven't done ANY sewing since the quilt. i'm physically hurting. going through withdrawal. bad withdrawal. BUT we've decided to take some sewing stuff (i'm thinking two machines, the serger, materials and notions?) and set up shop in my sister's old room for the time being. i just got a fancy big sewing book in the mail, bought some more fabrics at ikea and am mentally preparing for taking the "wardrobe refashion pledge" for two months starting july first. so i'm really hoping that this dry spell will be followed by a huge wave of creative outlet and productivity. and i'll let y'all know as soon as i have anything exciting to report.

may the creative spirits be with you and me and let's all hope summer will return to germany within the next few days. the weather has been awfully depressing.

on the line

serged, washed and now drying... about half of my recent fabric purchases.

yes, yes. i've sucked at blogging. been too busy enjoying summer with the kids and making stuff. i WILL take pictures of recent projects and i WILL upload them soon though. promised.
now back to cuddling the baby...

spring awakening

the hoarding of materials and sleepless nights due to inspiration overflow have begun again.
three weeks after mika's birth i wiped a thick layer of dust off of my sewing machine (yes, it should be covered, but i just love at least looking at it from across the room every day).

first i pimped a little hoodie sweater jacket for my cousin's birthday and forgot to take a picture of it. oh well.
then i moved on to actual sewing and made myself a quick and easy top and a very retro very artsy dress for joon. then a quick two minute hat for her and today i shortened one of the many pairs of cheap jeans i recently bought.
i sold a mei tai and put everything i made off of that right back into two big fabric orders from the states which should arrive here some time next week.
i got a little bit of fabric at ikea and bought a couple of vintage materials at a fleamarket yesterday.
the list of things i want to sew is growing by the minute.

on top of all of that trin and i went to hollaendischer stoffmarkt today... fabricgasm! seriously.
140 or so market booths selling fabrics, threads, ribbons, zippers, velcro, bias, patterns, absolutely everything related to sewing and all of it for much less than at the overpriced german fabric stores. our town's market square was filled with gorgeous materials and i got to walk through it all with my best friend and without our crazy toddlers or impatient husbands for two hours. it was absolutely amazing! i didn't buy a whole lot because i just spent a lot of money on fabrics, but i did finally get that little biastape making tool and bought some jerseys, the perfect material for the thai fisher pants i've been wanting to make and some funky corduroy for kid's pants. all of that for less than 30euros.
my head is still spinning, my heart rate is probably still elevated and my creative spirits are completely overflowing. time to get a sketchbook and stop sleeping altogether.

so. tomorrow i plan of finishing a kick ass guitar hero mei tai for the store and then it's off to working on my family's spring wardrobe... for now though here are some pictures from today and a promise that i'll take and share pictures of my most recent projects asap.

yay! for springtime and the earth's fertility! can't wait to see everything in full bloom soon!

maternity leave and sale

so this is it. i'm officially putting myself on maternity leave.

it really has been a tough decision to make. i had just gotten into such a great flow of work and it felt so good to focus on something other than being a mother and wife and i've just recently discovered all these great sources for gorgeous materials which i'm now dieing to work with...
but i've spent the past two weeks in misery wanting to do so much and feeling more and more physically and mentally unable to keep up with myself and my desire to create and now i'm giving in and just taking an official break.

no more sewing for the joontoons store for a while. well, i might finish the two mei tais i've started, but i'm not putting any pressure on myself.

there's still lots i want to get done for joon, the new baby and i have a couple of things i'd love to get done for christmas, but i need to mainly just let go of the idea of "working" every day and instead focus on taking it easy, enjoying these last few weeks of being pregnant and of being a single child's mommy. it feels so important right now to soak up every minute with joon!

the pregnancy is still going super well, but the baby is already sitting very low just like joon was and i can tell there's constant pressure on my pelvis, so my midwife told me to put those legs up and not do anything that's not a neccessity. i plan on not having to go through the whole hospital stay and bedrest due to premature labor thing this time around.
our midwife will be on call for us starting january 18th. that's only slightly over a month from now!! whoa.

so, in celebration of maternity leave, i've decided to have a small weeklong sale on etsy. yay, yay, yay!

while i will no longer be creating new pieces and don't know when i'll return to sewing for the etsy store, i'll keep the store running until i go into labor at which point the store will actually go on a few weeks of vacation as well.

oh, i've been meaning to take pics of the few things i've managed to create these past two weeks, but somehow i haven't even been able to update my facebook status on a regular basis... it looks like i may get around to taking pics tomorrow though and i'm excited to share with you the goodies i've sewn from my favorite michael miller fabric. :)

much love and crafty holidays spirit to everyone!

i blame church

yay! i found yet another thing to blame church for! ;)

growing up as a baptist church pastor's granddaughter did have a few advantages... everyone knew and loved us. or they had to love us, which is probably closer to the truth. anyways, one of our church members was in the textiles industry. i believe he had a fabric business. he always gave us big stacks of little fabric samples to play with. so as a young child i had this kid sized plastic suitcase filled with lots and lots and lots of silky fabric samples in all shades and colors and for years that suitcase full of scraps was my favorite thing to play with. i'd dig my hands in there and swooosh! throw them up in the air and let them rain down on my head. i'd sort them, stack them, tie them, swooosh! them again.... sigh!

why am i telling you this? because i just spent half an hour shaking my booty to old school no doubt and rearranged my neatly folded garden party fat quaters in every way possible, by print, by color, by color in a different way.... it made me think of that suitcase and helped me understand why it is that i'm so obsessed with fabrics.

i took close to one hundred pictures of it all. does that make me a fabric nerd? i need something to hold on to when all these beauties have been cut, turned into pretty things and have lovely new owners. speaking of cutting, that's what i should be doing. cutting those fabrics. seems i'm avoiding having to do that by posting endless rambles on my blog. yes.

so anyways, here are all my pretty new fabrics lined up and there's a shot of the totally non-traditional christmas wreath i made for our front door the other day. i needed to make something random and random it is. oh, and i thought i'd include the view from our bathroom window at sunrise a few days ago. i loooooove snow! at least this year.











and now i'm off to working on mei tais again. finally!!

ouch

motrin has issued an apology and is pulling the add from all media as soon as they're able.

but, i think this is a good (or bad) example for how companies with financial gain in mind shape public opinion.

my truth about back pain and babywearing is that i no longer have backaches because i've carried joon every day for more than a year taking advantage of the great baby carriers that are out there. now at seven months pregnant i hardly carry her anymore, but i'm still backpain free! when i was pregnant with her my back was killing me most days.

so maybe that's why motrin ran this add, they've noticed a drop in sales along with an increase of sales in quality baby carriers. ;)

whoa

i am so tired it's hard to put in words. but i'm at least as happy as i am tired and being happy is far more important and way more fun to think and write about.

so yesterday was my 20-something-th birthday (seven? i think so. no. six? whatever.).
it was absolutely fantastic! if fact, it just simply could not have been a more beautiful day! which i must admit caught me by surprise, since the last birthday i remember i really enjoyed was more than fifteen years ago.

yesterday everything was perfect.

i got to sleep in as long as i wanted to. when i forced myself out of bed to get started on some sewing work i walked into a tidy living room (you know that we have a seventeen-month-old chaos machine living with us, right?) and found really cool handmade by my superhero husband birthday decorations. joon and i snuggled on the couch while dave made me a huge mug of coffee and quite possibly the tastiest banana pancakes of all times which he topped with lots of nutella and a candle. yum!
i got to do all my online catching up and then dave took joon out to the playground and i had a few hours to sew in peace. i soaked up every minute of it and had a great time.
eventually i managed to put my project down, got ready for company and then most of my family came over for coffee and cake. i got some really great gifts (handknit socks for joon and new baby, big ole basket of organic fruits and veggies, yummy beer shampoo from lush, cash for sewing notions, an ikea gift card so i can get some storage boxes and lamps and such for my workspace, a really cool teapot and a candle thingy to keep the tea warm, a crazy looking felted flower vase which i have to take a picture of and show you tomorrow, a storage thing for my threads which dave made for me last minute and i should also show you a picture of and oh yes, my sweet old pfaff machine), lots of pretty flowers and most importantly everything was just totally relaxed and full of love and appreciation. i looooooooooooove my family!

in the evening we ordered pizza and hung out some more until eventually everyone left and we got joon to bed way past her bedtime.

dave and i hung out on the couch a little longer, i ordered some fancy designer fabrics on etsy and we went to bed very happily and blissfully unaware of how crappy the rest of the night would be. and that's why i'm tired and getting ready to go to bed early tonight.

yes, the perfect birthday. thanks so much to dave who really is the best husband and father anyone could ever wish for, joon who's most certainly the cutest kid on the face of this planet and keeps getting cuter by the minute, my family whom i could not be more blessed with and my sweet friends who sent "happy birthday" messages and let me know they were thinking of me.

love, love, love!

more craft stuff tomorrow. promised.

long overdue

i made something for myself. yes, myself. i've been trying to remember when i last sewed something just for me and i honestly just don't know... it must've been a while.

so i finally put the bag i've been dreaming of for weeks on top of my "things to sew" list and finished this morning.










yes, it's more "garden party". i'm still completely obsessed with that collection and i'm checking my etsy every five minutes or so hoping to finally make a sale so i can buy more a.m.h. fabrics. turns out she's coming out with a new line in january and i just saw the first pics of it on her blog... must have all of them. now!

anyways, i had originally planned to make the actual bag from the darker "table cloth" fabric but after two mei tais i didn't have enough fabric left for this enormous tote so i went with the green instead. the bag has four inside pockets which will hopefully keep me from having to search for keys or cellphone for ten minutes while trying to keep a newborn and a toddler happy. i went for the totally oversized look knowing that i'll soon be carrying around necessities for two kids in cloth diapers. we'll need looooooooooots of room! i also made sure the strap was long enough to fit around our stroller's handlebar so that i won't have to carry it when i'm wearing our new baby.
the blue inside fabric is a really heavy ikea home dec cotton and i'm hoping this big beauty will be my faithful companion for a long time.



so much for the bag. the black backround btw is the new enormous chalkboard dave made the other day. it serves as canvas to joon's recently discovered creative outpours and the top half will hopefully help us improve on scheduling our day to day activities which we've been shockingly bad at lately. too much to do too little time and as always way too many ideas.



one last thing, i've been wanting to write about one of my favorite german traditions, "st. martin's fest". st. martin's day is on november 11th and it celebrates the memory of some dude on a horse who cut his cloak in half with his sword and gave half to a poor man in the street about to freeze. the poor man's life was saved and martin became a saint. or something.
anyways, there's more to it of course but what matters to me is the fest that comes with that story...

each year around november 11th all german children make paper lanterns and then they gather one evening and go on a little parade usually led by "st. martin" on a horse with a cloak and a sword and some sort of knight helmet thing which is usually made from plastic and looks really cheap. there's usually a small brass ensemble and then there's lots and lots of children and lots and lots of parents and they walk through the streets with their selfmade lanterns and sing songs. in the end they gather around a fire, drink hot chocolate or "gluehwein", eat a particular st. martin's bread and just look happy and peaceful and... i love "st. martin's parade"!

this year we missed the festivities in my old part of town which i always went to growing up. it's by far the best one out there, i'm sure! (no, i'm not biased.) but for some reason it was held super early this year so we didn't get to go. instead we went to the one in our new neighborhood which was also fun but nowhere near as romantic. joon had a great time though! that's what matters most.

and it reminded me of why it is that i didn't really mind the long dark and cold season in germany as a child... it was because i constantly had really fantastic reasons to craft! starting with german thanksgiving ("erntedank"), then st. martin, my birthday, my two brother's birthdays, st. nicholaus on december 6th, the whole time leading up to christmas, my mother's birthday, christmas, new year's and by the time that rolled around we already got to get excited for spring again!

so this fall and winter and all falls and winters from now on, i'll make a point to create! to take the time to sit down and really focus on small crafts, drink yummy tea, use lots of glue, surround myself with colorful materials, bake cookies, all the good stuff.
i love love love summer and being outside constantly! but the cozy cooped up in the house aspect of winter i love just as much. i just haven't been aware of it.

what a week

we have a new president! well, you do. if you're american. does the rest of the world get to call him "our" president? in this case i kinda would like to call him that. at least for now. anyways, he's not really president yet. so i guess that statement was just all wrong. america has a new president-elect! there ya go. what i meant to say is, i don't remember the last time anything "politics" made me this happy!

unfortunately the elections took two complete days out of my crafting week. tuesday our midwife came over, we went on a great outing with dear friends and prepped the house for a little election party. then i stayed up til almost 4a.m. which left me useless the next day and i thought i'd better not set foot near scissors or a sewing machine til after a good night's sleep.

i got caught up though, mainly thanks to my butt-kickin' husband who btw is for sure the greatest dad to have ever walked this earth! i love you, dave. :)

so here are the results of a semi productive week...


green toddler mei tai going on etsy tonight












"very berry" baby mei tai unfortunately not going on etsy because it's flawed. i love this thing and i hope maybe it'll find a home somehow. if you're interested, drop me a line and i'll give you all the details and make you a great price! ;)





one more thing about this past week... it's just shocking to me how grown up my "baby" has suddenly become! baffles me every day. seriously. here she is "getting dressed".

celebration

yay, yay, yayyayyay! for obama and the american voters!

i'm so excited it's impossible to put in words. and it'll take a while for all these good news to really sink in.

in the meantime i just feel like celebrating and decided to put everything in my etsy on sale til sunday.

wooooooooooooohoooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!

heaven

i got my machine. it sounds like music. seriously. that little razz... almost as beautiful of a sound as joon laughing. almost.

the lady i got it from was so sweet, she almost cried when dave and my brother carried it out the door. she asked me to call her and let her know how things are going and i promised i'd send her an email with a picture of work done on her machine. it used to be her mother's and she said it was time to let go but it felt like a family member leaving. sigh.

anyways, i tidied up and sorta half cleaned my sewing area yesterday so that my new friend would feel welcomed into her new home. for now she lives right by the window which is where i usually have my ironing board set up. once i get a proper extension cord and a really good lamp i'll probably move her into the corner and rearrange things a bit. for now, i need to give my new old pfaff a really good cleaning and work with the settings a bit and study the manual really well.
this will take up all of my crafting time for the next couple of days which kills me because i have a million and one projects already started or at least listed to start on. why oh why don't creative people not an extra ten hours in every day??

well, here are the pics...











original receipt from '56. how cool is that? i also have the bill and exact description of a cleaning and adjusting job done in the late 90's. the machine has hardly been used after that last check-up.






lots of bobbins, foot thingies and other little original parts.