Choir Wardrobe 02.26.17

Y'all.  I have seriously got to make myself do some sewing, even if it's just in 15 minute chunks.  I have a nice white blouse about 1/4 completed and it would have been SO NICE to wear today.  But, instead, I wore a cheap white blouse that doesn't fit terribly well that I got at an outlet just so I could have a white shirt that wouldn't grieve me if it got a small stain or two on it to wear for our annual Thank-You banquet, in which the church staff becomes wait staff for children's social service workers in our area and must wear black pants and a white shirt.  But, well, it doesn't have gravy or coffee stains on it yet, so, might as well get some good out of it, right?

The oft-repeated black and white stripe RPL modified Loes Hinse Oxford Pants, my even MORE oft-repeated black twill Burda 05/09 waistcoat, and a hemmed rayon/silk chiffon burnout scarf.  First time to put these together in combo; I think I like it.  Will like it better with the blouse-in-progress instead of the cheap blouse with the floppy faux-french-cuffs....

The scarf is pretty and I don't wear it enough.  I bought two or three pieces of the burnout silk on sale a few years back; 2 yards at 45" wide.  Cut off the selvedges, squared the ends and then split it in half lengthwise.  Rolled all edges.  Kept one, gave one away....of this fabric, anyway.  The others were Christmas stocking stuffers.

Next month we're wearing black and metallic gold.  I actually have half a calfskin that is gold foil finished, obtained a couple of years ago specifically to make fronts for a vest.  Thought I'd use that Burda waistcoat, but then I got afeared the collar would be too bulky in leather.  Not sure it would be as appealing without the collar, so trying to pick another style.  Not placing any bets on whether or not it gets done by the last Sunday in March....and I might have a couple of pieces of gold-metallicy-knit coming in the mail this week.  I *might* actually get something made from the TNT knit patterns.  Which would be great; currently I only have ONE metallic-y garment and March has 5 Sundays...

A perfect surprise...

So, yeah, there was no choir post last weekend.

Instead, there was a conspiracy.

My Dear Daddy had a significant 'ends-in-a zero' birthday, so my sister, who moved from Northern Indiana to upstate New York just before Christmas, flew in.  All four of my kids  rode with me (My Sweet Babboo had a statewide campout that weekend that he was somewhat responsible for, and Prince Charming was returning from a business trip too late to hitch a ride with us) and we drove up.  We got to the home place about half an hour after the New York contingent.

Dad, of course, had no idea we were coming.  My two brothers had just told him they were taking him to dinner, and his sisters and their hubbies joined us.  We all had dinner at an eatery in Thorntown, IN, that has some of the best onion rings you'll find anywhere.

Dad's not a birthday cake enthusiast; in fact, on a Facebook meme a few months ago I answered the question 'It's your dad's birthday!  What kind of cake will you make  him?' with 'Pecan pie!' I baked 3 pies and took them up, only to find that my mother had also baked some fruit cobblers, because, you know, Dad wanted pie for his birthday and she kinda had to make some because she couldn't tell him I was bringing pie...we ate pie all weekend...

The  next day, my niece, her hubby and 15 month-old, the only great-grandchild, flew in from Pennsylvania.  And, of course, Dad didn't expect that, either, although enough of us slipped up that if he'd  been paying strict attention he'd have known.  But that didn't really matter.  The baby was the icing on the cake. I don't think Dad stopped grinning all weekend.

And me...well, it's always something of a respite to walk around on the farm just a bit.  I breathe a bit deeper there...

Choir Wardrobe 02.12.17

Happy Valentines' Day!

I am having trouble getting to the 'post' button lately (hence the delayed choir post); even more trouble getting into the sewing room.  Still no progress on the white shirt, so February's black-and-white wardrobe is still pulling from old stuff.

A black slinky Sewing Workshop Cityscapes dress (which is out of print but, I believe, re-released as a downloadable PDF) and Sandra Betzina's  Vogue 8043 jacket.  Mixing the 'little French jacket' with an Edwardian hobble skirt was kinda fun; I don't think I've put those two together before. In any case, it's a  notch or two up from my typical choir wardrobe.

But, in other news, the lack of sewing/blogging is directly due to other stuff going on; just finished class number eight of the online master's of ministry program I'm doing through West Coast Bible College and Seminary;  plowing straight on to class number nine (out of twelve).  My goal was to finish by the end of April but class eight was a toughie and took longer than I'd planned.  So now it's going to be a bit of a push.

It's messing with my sewing time but the goal is in sight... ;-)

Looking for a blog reader...

Unfortunately, I've run into a difference of opinion with bloglovin and I have closed my account there.  You can still follow my blog(s) there if you do already; but I want to find a new place to read.

I tried just using the follow function on Blogger, but I had to cut and paste each URL and that got old FAST.

So I made a quick account on Feedly and migrated over there as best I could.

It was still rather a pain as I could not find any way to just export the whole lot from bloglovin'.  So I did it one at a time, and was rather surprised to see how many blogs I'd subscribed to that hadn't been updated in a year...or two..or three....  But at least I could type the name into a search box and, generally, it found it without having to type in the whole http line.

But it has some limitations.

Feedly only allows 100 feeds on their free account, so I moved the active ones over there; was still a few over a hundred so I had to drop all of them that I can read via the author sharing their posts on Facebook; that put me under the limit.  I had to combine some of my categories, as they only allow three on the free account.  Nowhere could I find the button that says 'follow my blog on...'

So...anybody have a feed burner that they love?  Cause I'm not sure I'm going to be happy over on feedly, but I wanted to get off of bloglovin' NOW.

I am not one to hop up and down and insist folks agree with me on things, but there are lines I will not cross and BL crossed that line. 

So.  Back to the hunt for a (free) easy to use little feed burner...

Choir Wardrobe 02.05.17

The usual wardrobe colors for February are black and white and this year is no exception.

And, as I have not managed to get ANY thing into the 'finished' column yet this year, the garb of the day is, well, old.    And my photographer didn't alert me to the fact that the t shirt could've used just the slightest tug into position.

But, whatcha gonna do?

I actually had this t-shirt show up in my Facebook memories page; I posted it as complete  on Sew Random 5 years ago today.  Oy.  It's from the February 2010 Burda mag...can't remember if it was still BWOF then or if they'd made the switch to Burdastyle.

Which just goes to show that a C+ garment is still gonna get some wear.

Once more, that Burda Vest from 2009, which is even older.

And baggy black Lee jeans.

All in all, adequate, but just.

I have a white shirt in pieces on the ironing board; mayhap I can finish it in the next 3 weeks and at least have ONE new thing to show for the year so far?


In other news, I ordered a couple of patterns from PR; with Hancock's gone my access to patterns has dropped somewhat.  There is a Jo Ann's on the other side of town, but I don't get over that way very often and they've dropped me from the mailing list, so I don't know when the sales are any more.

So my pattern acquisition has slowed considerably.

As in, the last time I bought patterns, it was from a clearance bin at Sir's Fabric on July 11 of last year.

But there were two recent Vogue releases that I just Had. To. Have.

Even if they are only for the collection and not for sewing...lol.

I will make the Betzina vest.  I will I will I will.   I will probably make Paco's blouse...I'd LOVE to make the coat but not sure I'm brave enough.  Maybe.