Speaking of Pants

I have signed up for the Pants Fitting class presented by Shannon Gifford over at Pattern Review. It starts next week. I am very excited. I have decided to pick up Simplicity 2860 to use as my base pattern. It is one of the patterns Shannon recommends. I hope I can find it locally at Hobby Lobby or Hancock's. If not, I'll look through my collection of magazines and find a pattern there.

David Page Coffin book coming in July

Check this out-David Coffin's new book on Making Trousers

The Wedding Quilt

Our trip to Phoenix was planned around my sister-in-law's wedding.

The quilt in the pictures from Albuquerque was my gift to them. I really loved making this quilt and it was quite fun having it oohed and aaahed over at the wedding luncheon. My gift was the only one opened at the reception. I'm afraid I insisted. After putting that much time into it - I want to be able to see the recipient's face when they open it. Terribly selfish of me, isn't it?

I know Nikki appreciated it because she makes lovely quilts herself. Besides... a picture's worth a thousand words.

Spring

Spring is being signalled this year by small things-

The trees have not leafed out yet, but small little blooms have started appearing: crocus and daffodils,

various wild flowers I don't know the name of.



The cacophany of sound when you open the door- the birds are back. Friday at work, I could watch them gathering materials for nests. Right now I can hear cardinals and a woodpecker and various song birds. A moment ago a pair of Canadian geese flew over. I never notice how quiet winter is until it becomes so noisy in the spring.


The other day, a wood duck landed on the factory chimney across from our house... it seemed a funny place for a duck to be.



Spring also means the start of the garden. Last weekend we had three days and gorgeous weather so most of the beds were prepped with two truckloads of compost

and we planted potatoesand onions.

Coleen's Year in Review 2008

Working on William's Christmas present. She made him a hooded sweatshirt and sweatpantsShe also made me a skirt. Somehow I have no pictures of either William or I in these clothes. I'll have to correct that. I admit I actually wrote most of this post in January and was waiting to post until I got pictures, but I'm giving up...or else it will be time to do the 2009 review before I even get 2008 published.
We forgot to shorten the sleeves...

She made her whole outfit in both of these pictures.



After looking through pictures to find what I had done last year, I really thought Coleen's sewing should have it's own post. She really has done a lot and I'm quite proud of her. She is a good listener and tries to follow directions. Most of these patterns come from Ottobre magazine, so she traces the patterns, reads their brief directions and then I give her mini-tutorials as we go through the different steps. She doesn't cut anything out yet- I will let her iron and use the sewing machine, but I can't hand the rotary cutter over to her. That thing just makes me too nervous! Since the patterns come from Ottobre, they don't have any seam allowances and so it is easier for me to cut them out then have her add s.a.s before she cuts them with scissors.

Karate tournament

Ok, life keeps going forward, though I don't seem to be getting much blogging done.

Coleen had her karate tournament the second week of March. There is a new form (series of moves) each time you earn a new color belt. Most of the competition is judging groups of kids on how well they can perform their form.
Here she is doing one of the kicks... I'm not sure if I've figured out how to take action shots yet.
There were four kids in Coleen's group. She did quite a good job and won a blue ribbon. She was quite proud of herself! And we are quite proud, too...

We interrupt...to bring you a sewing post

Hmm... don't know what happened to the rest of the trip. Not much computer time lately, but will get back to editing photos and posting the rest of it soon (Though I won't so brazenly post that it will get done this week.)

Coleen had her spring piano recital this past Saturday. She played a theme from Don Giovanni by Mozart and an arrangement of 'Don't Get Around Much Anymore' by Duke Ellington. We decided she needed a new dress to perform in. We chose a dress and jacket from Ottobre and got to work. Coleen made the dress and I made the jacket. Both fabrics are from my stash. She is getting good at figuring out the directions on her own and I only really helped her with the gathering of the skirt and the zipper.

As usual, I found these patterns well-drafted and they went together well. We took what shortcuts we could - the insides could definitely be prettier! All seams are serged on both the jacket and dress, but if I had more time, I think I would have done a Hong Kong finish on the jacket seams.

I am very happy that we were able to get both done in just under a week - it really makes a difference when there are two working on a project... as the saying goes - many hands make light work.



Her concert was a great success!