best picture ever

That's Violet. She's pretty damn pleased with herself, sitting at the table like such a lady. I made that sweater and she'd better enjoy it because I don't foresee ever being able to have the time to knit a garment again. Whenever there is a convergence of free time and creative energy, I sew something for own damn self. And then I can't get anybody to take my picture so I can't even show off on the interwebs.

soda bread

This is not quite soda bread. It's more like a cake with the essence of soda bread. Whatever it is, it's moist and delicious and I'm all for it. I used this recipe except I used part whole wheat flour and skipped the caraway seeds and the butter/sugar topping. We ate it too quickly so now I have another in the oven, this time with a bit less sugar and butter instead of oil. Because I cannot leave well enough alone.

In unrelated news, my new computer is still causing me grief. My pictures are all over the damn place and I can't get them arranged in a single file in Picasa. I almost cried, then I moped away and ate half the soda bread/cake.

fracking fungi

I just ripped up 20 octopus stinkhorns from my garden.   They are without a doubt the worst smelling things I've ever encountered (rotten meat + vomit + skunk);  I very nearly threw up while digging them out.  Ugh.   The worst is that there will be more of them out there in a few days.  If this is how I need to spend the precious minutes of each afternoon when the kids are all asleep, I really need fewer hobbies.  I want to pave over the garden or possibly set fire to it.  I feel like I can still smell it, so now I need to go wash my hair while pretending I don't have three crying children.

learning curve

We got a new computer because our old one was diseased and geriatric.  Since I rely heavily on my browser to remember my passwords, getting a new computer is like joining the witness protection program.  None of the sites I frequent know who the hell I am, and I can't remember my user ID let alone my password, so it's all very disorienting.  My mind apparently cannot process the fact that the new keyboard is set up a bit differently than the old one; I feel like I'm typing with my feet.  And since I'm also bouncing a baby or trying to wrangle a toddler I just give up and read a book.

Also filed under "annoying developments" is the fact that Joseph finally figured out how to  climb out of his crib.  He's two and a half, which I realize is a long time to stay in a crib anyway, but he's such a troubled sleeper that being in an enclosed space really helped him.  To wit:  now that he is free range he sleeps curled up on the floor in front of his bedroom door.  And by "sleeps" I mean "passes out unconscious for a few minutes at a time."  The other day during naptime he stripped himself nude and peed on the carpet.  This is not a child who knows how to put himself to sleep.  So he's exhausted and cranky, and his parents are even more exhausted and cranky than they were before the criblessness.

And somehow in the middle of all this the babies have turned into actual little people with distinct personalities.  Four months!   I have loads of pictures but I still need to figure out how to transfer them from the old computer and get them off my camera which is what I think I'll do tonight instead of making dinner.

peter pan collar blouse remake

This used to be a long sleeved oxford style shirt (like this). I bought it in 2003 (!) to wear to work and I recently found it in the garage boxed up with other random crap.  It fits very well (which makes me wonder how the hell loose I used to wear my clothes) but I'm not crazy about that style of shirt so I decided to play mad scientist and figure out how to make it wearable.  I hacked off the sleeves and used the sleeve fabric to make a new collar.

I wish I had taken pictures of what I did because then I could have a tutorial, which would have been a first, but it turns out that Gertie has promised a peter pan collar tutorial later this week and she actually knows what she's doing.  But in case anybody's interested in my rinky dink method of making and attaching a peter pan collar, here's what I did:

I lowered the neckline (I eyeballed it). Then I lay the shirt flat and traced the new neckline onto a piece of paper. I drew a peter pan collar around this neckline tracing, and added seam allowances on the outside.  Voila!  A peter pan collar pattern piece.  I cut out two collar pieces:  for the upper collar I used the discarded sleeve fabric, and for the undercollar I used white broadcloth that was left over from some old forgotten project.  I sewed these two collar pieces together (right sides together) along the outside, clipped the curves, turned and pressed. 

To attach the collar to the shirt I sewed the edge of the pink (upper) part of collar to the inside of the shirt (right side of the collar facing the wrong side of the shirt); then flipped it to the outside. I then turned under the edge of the white undercollar 1/4" and topstitched it in place. None of the stitching is visible from the outside. 

Here you can see the topstitching on the undercollar:

And this is the inside of the shirt:

This is not the slickest way to attach a collar but it works for me.

tulip skirt

I wanted to make myself something in order to compensate for the fact that we've had a nutty few weeks. The babies have had growth spurts / feeding frenzies, Joseph has been in an evil mood due to some new molars, and I've had a toothache/sinus infection/spate of new allergies. Sometimes it's easier to get through a rough afternoon when you have a distracting project to focus your energy on: you pop a few motrin, put the homicidal toddler in front of a truck DVD, and nurse one baby at a time (at the sewing machine).

This is Jenny Gordy's tulip skirt pattern from the Winter 2008 issue of Stitch magazine. I made it in what fabric.com called a cotton/rayon faille, but it feels like school uniform quality polyester to me. At $1.99 a yard I'm not complaining. I'm not delighted about the fit; I have to stand up damn straight to avoid some belly vs. waistband conflict. I'm wearing it today and I'm exhausted from the effort. One of the benefits of always having a baby in a sling is that I can slouch and slump and let my poor belly go all over the place and nobody's the wiser. It's kind of interesting to be focused on my stomach instead of my butt as my source of angst. Hello, middle age, I can see you from here!

Anyway.

The skirt went together easily with very few modifications (an inch or so longer, some extra topstitching) but I had a bit of an epiphany while cursing over my machine's inability to make it through one effing buttonhole without getting stuck: I could have installed ten invisible zippers in the time it took make the buttonholes, sew on the buttons, and hand sew the wretched hooks and eyes at the waistband. I really need to man up and get over my issues with zippers.

kitchen mats

I have this lurking feeling that I've already written about this before.  I finished this mat literally days before the babies were born (when I was young and carefree) and it's been a bit of a blur since then so bear with me.

This is basically a bath mat, but it lives on the kitchen counter next to the sink for draining dishes.  We have a dish washer but the pots, pans, mixing bowls, and a few other things still have to be hand washed.  I'd much rather just let them air dry than go to the effort of wiping them, but dish racks are pretty useless where pots and pans are concerned.  So we had been letting everything drain onto a depressing soggy dish towel.   This mat replaces the towel and is better looking and more absorbent.  And when it's not in use it still covers up part of my hideous counters.  You should probably go make one right now.

I also made one for the floor in front of the sink but that's not nearly as important.

I'm very pleased with the method I used to make these.  I pieced together the top, then sewed it directly to a piece of old towel, right side up, quilting it as if the towel were the quilt back.  Then I bound it like a quilt.  The very dense horizontal quilting lines (about half an inch apart) and the thick linen binding make it much sturdier and more substantial than this mat.  This is definitely my new preferred method for making bath mats, because you know we should all take a stand on that issue.