Green Denim Lander Pants

I have THE BEST story to tell about these pants.  I made them back in October, just in time to attend a conference on Women in Engineering.  Just after joking with some coworkers about not needing to attend the "Branding Yourself" panel because "my social media is on point"... I was recognized by a fellow sewist (from Winnipeg?!?) JUST BECAUSE OF MY PANTS!!  It seriously made my day, and it was SO much fun to meet a fellow sewist/ engineer!

2018 Wrap-Up & 2019 Make Nine Plans

I realize I never posted my 2018 Make Nine plans on here, so I won't really bother with posting the outcome (I'm very pleased!) since you can find a pretty detailed breakdown over on my instagram account.  I didn't get a whole lot of blogging done, mostly because I didn't make the effort to take photos of a lot of my makes (more on that, over here).  BUT - I really did make a lot of things!!  I've also been more on IG than on my blog since it's just so much faster and easier to share a quick snap of my work outfit for the day, or a story on what I'm working on.  So, despite not being successful at blogging about the things I've made, I've been quite successful in filling my wardrobe with even more me-made items.

On to 2019 plans!!  While I do really like the idea behind the Make Nine Challenge, I realized I didn't really like picking out nine patterns I was going to sew throughout the year.  New, exciting patterns are released, a pattern I chose back in January might just not be my style any more, and I definitely sew WAY more than nine things in a year, so it's not much of a challenge!  So, I revisited the actual goal of the challenge:

This is a gentle challenge. It’s not one that you can fail. It’s meant to be flexible, a tool you can use to evaluate your motivations and needs for working towards specific things as the year goes on. This is meant to be a challenge focused on learning more about yourself and your making habits while achieving goals. Work at your own pace and join in at any time. – That’s it! (Rochelle, Home Row Fibre Co.)

With that in mind, I decided to go about my 2019 Make Nine a lil' bit differently.  CATEGORIES.  There are SO MANY PATTERNS I really want to sew this year, and other things I would like to get done... but I picked a handful of things that aren't on my usual go-to list.  This gives me a whole bunch more flexibility, but still acts as a goal to drive my sewing for the coming year.  Click on through for more deets and some patterns I'm thinking about.

Jenny Overalls Shorts

I'll be honest, I was a little skeptical of this whole overalls trend that kind of picked up this summer... but the more I saw the different types & patterns popping up, the more they piqued my interest!  Aaaand, leave it to the ladies at Closet Case to release a pattern which was exactly what I was looking for.  I know there are tons of other options, but I typically have very good luck with the drafting from Closet Case, so I snapped up a copy of the Jenny Overalls, ordered the snaps & buttons, picked up some canvas from IKEA, and set to work.

The first pair was my "wearable muslin" in a bluey-green canvas fabric.  They turned out... just ok.  Having made the Ginger Jeans with little alteration to the pattern, I was pretty confident in going into these with no changes, sewing up a straight size 14 as my measurements were just about bang-on (40/33/42).  That was probably my first mistake.  The Jenny's are drafted using a different block than the Gingers, and the changes resulted in the waistband of these overalls being a smidge too tight, and the rise being too short (ouch!)

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Tulip Festival Penny Dress

WHAA?!  A blog post?  It's been a while, eh?  I actually haven't gotten around to taking photos of any of my newer makes, so I'll be posting here & there some "older" makes from earlier in the year that I do already have photos for.

I really, really love it when you find a fabric that pairs so well with a certain pattern.  I saw this cotton-linen blend at Fabricland back in the early, early spring when I was there with a friend from OGG exec, when I expressed how much I liked it (because omg floral cotton-linen) she suggested making a dress in time to take photos at the Canadian Tulip Festival.  DUH, PERFECT IDEA (thanks Crystal!)  I just had to decide on a pattern....

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#SewYourStashSeptember

We might be a week and a bit into the month already... but my friend Kate (@ilovecupkates) came up with this great idea to stick to only sewing what she has in her stash for the whole month of September.  I decided to join her in this pledge since I too, have an overflowing stash of fabric!

Lots of sewists have a self-imposed #fabricbuyingban from time to time, but we thought, “why not make this into a monthly challenge?!”  And so, we have #sewyourstashseptember!!  

We want this challenge to be open-ended, so you don’t have to put a total ban on your fabric buying for the month if you don’t want to.  We all know there are sometimes some killer sales you just have to take advantage of!!  This challenge is meant to make you take a closer look at what you already have, and maybe fall back in love with some fabric you bought years ago and never used.

So!  Take a look through the piles of fabric you already have, and make your own #sewyourstashseptember pledge!

Me-Made-May Outfit Tracker Template

As I noted in my Me-Made-May 2018 Pledge, I wanted to put together an "outfit-tracker" to keep track of what I wear every day, and how I feel in each outfit.  So!  I put together a GoogleDoc spreadsheet to keep track of everything.

If you would like to download the template, I've made it available at this link: http://bit.ly/2HYLC9d

If you do use it and share it, all I ask is that you tag me @kalliesews, or give me appropriate credit as I built it from scratch 🤓.  Thanks!  If you have any questions or comments, leave a comment here and I'll get back to you as soon as I can.  Happy #MMMay18!

Me-Made-May 2018

It's the most wonderful time of the year for the online sewing community - Me-Made-May!!  I'm home sick from work today, and finally have some time to put together this post!  It's going to be a long one, so feel free to skip down to the bottom for my actual pledge.  However, I think reading through my thoughts on my MMMay challenge will hopefully help to explain how I chose my pledge this year.

This will be my third year participating in MMMay, and my handmade wardrobe has grown by leaps and bounds since my first year participating (2016 summary, 2017 summary).  While having a substantial me-made wardrobe kind of makes the whole "wearing me-mades" part of MMMay easier, it put me in a bit of a pickle deciding how to actually challenge myself this year.  MMMay is meant to be a personal challenge with your me-made wardrobe (as discussed here on Zoe's blog) and not a photo challenge where you post an outfit-selfie every day on instagram.  I already wear mostly me-mades every day now, so that really isn't challenging for me any more.  I put a quick call out on my instagram stories and I got some feedback from some of my followers/ Ottawa sewing buddies for some interesting challenges:

• Putting together a handmade capsule wardrobe for each week or for the entire month
• Documenting which me-mades actually get worn
• Less repeats and wear lesser-worn items
• Refashion some older garments or something from a thrift store

I will be perfectly honest - I actually think capsule wardrobes are kind of dumb.  Absolutely NO offence to people who love them (or to the person who suggested it, I do appreciate your suggestion!), I have just never understood the point of 'curating' your closet down to so few pieces.  Variety is the spice of life! (says the person with an absurd amount of blue items in their closet).  I don't like being limited to certain outfits and I really love sewing and integrating new things into my wardrobe to work with older items.  I'm constantly thinking of new outfit ideas and how different things I have made could work together.  Now, I TOTALLY get the point of having everything in your wardrobe go together perfectly, and I've definitely started to try to focus on that with my sewing.  BUT the whole capsule wardrobe thing just isn't for me. 

When it comes to refashioning items... for whatever reason, this is just something that has never really piqued my interest?  I do have some older skirts that I made when I was just learning to sew (and a gathered skirt was the best thing I could do) that no longer fit, but the fabric is still in great shape.  The skirts are long enough and there is enough fabric in them that I could definitely squeeze out a top or something from them... this just isn't top of my list at the moment.  While I love the idea, I don't think it's something I'm going to work into my MMMay challenge this year.

As for documenting which items actually get worn and working in lesser-worn items, this is something I can really get behind.  I know I have a whole bunch of me-mades that have been languishing in the back of my closet or the bottom of my drawers.  They get worn sometimes but they're not necessarily part of my regular rotation.  Or, things that I wore a couple times and decided they just didn't work for me.  What I think would be super helpful is to create a database of all my me-mades and throughout the month, track how often each of them gets worn.  I could also keep track of how I felt at the end of the day in each outfit (and if I get any compliments on an outfit that day).  I also still have some RTW items in my wardrobe that I have had for a while (or basics like camisoles, bras, and undies) that are starting to get tired and need to be replaced soon - I can document these and plan ahead to replace them.  SO - now that I've written out all those paragraphs and figured things out... here's my (kinda long) pledge for Me-Made-May 2018:

I, Kallie Auld, sign up to participate in Me-Made-May 2018.  

Over the course of May 2018, I will strive to wear all of my seasonally-appropriate me-mades.  I also pledge to work in older me-mades that tend to get less (or no) wear, and to track what I wear every day how how I feel in each outfit.  Items that go unworn will be either refashioned, given to friends, or donated.

There it is!  I'm hoping this is actually a good challenge for me, and by the end of the month I'll have a better organized me-made wardrobe and more room in my closet and drawers for the things I have planned.  I'm also going to try to put together a database of sorts of all the items in my wardrobe, and set up a page where I can input what I wear every day.  I'm probably going to document each day on my Instagram as per usual and post weekly updates here on the blog.  At the end of the month, I'll post a summary of how things went and hopefully share the details of my clothing database.  

As with every year, I can't wait to see what everyone is wearing this month.  Best of luck with all your personal challenges!

Birthday Suki Robe

I made this Suki Robe (from Helen's Closet) for a dear friend for her birthday waaaay back in January.  I don't often sew for others (thoughts on the phrase "selfish sewing" to come later... spoiler alert - I hate it), but when I do I want to make something special!  I bought this gorgeous floral rayon from Blackbird Fabrics and it has the perfect drape for a breezy robe (have I told you how much I love rayon?  because I LOVE RAYON).  The only tricky part was photographing this one... not the easiest to show off a robe when it's not on a person, and we all know black fabric is notoriously hard to photograph!

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Sewing Room Overhaul

HOkay, time for some fun stuff!  Back during the Christmas break, I finally got around to painting and redecorating my sewing room.  Since moving into our house, it has been so nice to have my own space, where I can leave things as-is in the middle of a project and keep it all out of the way.  We have a 3-bedroom bungalow (and no kids for the near future) so Matt and I each have our own spaces to do what we wish with.  I don't really have much more to say other than I LOVE THIS ROOM!  What a difference a fresh coat of paint makes.  The gorgeous wood floors really pop and the room just feels that much more inviting.  It was really nice to finally get some of the art I've been hoarding up on the walls too.  SO, first off are the before photos.

From when we first moved in:

To just before I painted:

You guys.... holy crap was it hard work fixing up the walls.  There were lots of holes, and I needed to sand down and wash them all.

I'm actually still not entirely done... I still haven't painted and re-installed the closet door!  It's hanging out in the basement and I'll get to it eventually ;)

And.... now for the finished room!  I re-arranged where the furniture is, and I like the layout much better.

I've had the Kallax shelves for a while now, but moved them from where they were.  I also got a HUGE (selfie) mirror (see above) and a clothing rack for storing UFOs, items to be photographed, as well as some ongoing projects and fabric.  Pretty much everything in this room is from IKEA, aside from the ironing board.

Here's a couple details if you're curious:

• Paint colour: Benjamin Moore 'Moonshine' (trim is BM 'Simply White')
• Kallax Shelves
• Wall Shelf
• Clothing Rack
• Hanging Organizer
• Desk (old, this one is similar)
• Desk legs
• Mirror

Sewing, Blogging, and Body Image

Oh hey!  Been a while, hasn't it?  I promise I've been busy sewing up a storm (like, I have probably 20 garments that are still unblogged?) even if I haven't been so great at updating the blog.  Probably better to follow me over on Instagram, even if I haven't been that great at updating over there either.

When I started this blog, it was going to be the main spot where I would share all of my makes, before finding an absolutely thriving community of sewists on instagram.  I've been finding it easier and quicker to share over there, BUT I do want to get into more of the nitty-gritty details of ym garments on the blog.  

I have been meaning to update this space with all of the things I've been making (I'm not kidding when I say there could very well be nearly 20 things that I've made since my last real update back in the summer) but taking photos of myself has proven to be a bit of a challenge in the winter months for various reasons.  I feel like things have been really busy, even on the weekends, and I honestly couldn't tell you what we've been up to it's been such a blur!  I've also been busy getting the Ottawa Garment Guild up and running, work has been busy and stressful too (the good kind though?).  Winter is tricky because the weather has been crappy and there isn't a great spot outside for me to take photos (*note to self to fix this for next year!).  I still haven't shared with you my Christmas Party dress!  Yeesh!  Even though I've re-done my sewing room (update coming soon) and added better lighting, it's still not easy to catch the tiny window where I get some good natural light coming in - either that or Matt and I are out doing something during this prime photo time!  Aaaand to top that all off, I've been struggling with my body image for a bit and just have not been happy with how I look in photos.  I've gained some weight since changing birth control pills and leaving roller derby (thanks, repetitive strain knee injury) and have not been great with working out regularly.  I also find that I get a serious case of the "winter blues" (have not been officially diagnosed with seasonal affective disorder) and just want to sit on the couch all day in my sweats when I don't have any plans.  It's been frustrating feeling like crap and having a bunch of things I've sewn recently not quite fit the way I want them too.  I know that the online sewing community is amazingly body-positive and supportive no matter what size you are, but taking and sharing photos of myself when I don't feel  (or look) my best just isn't going to happen.

All that being said - we've had a wonderfully sunny weekend here in Ottawa and spring is just around the corner.  I've got a bit of a spring (ha!) in my step now that the days are longer  and brighter AND I made my first pair of jeans!  and they mostly fit!! If that isn't a sewing confidence booster, then I don't know what is.  I have a plan in place for working out more regularly (downloaded this app - love it so far!) and I feel like I'm getting back in control of my work/ life/ sewing schedule.  I'm going to try to get back into the swing of posting regularly on here once I manage to take some photos.  I might even set a posting schedule for myself?! (ahahah probably not).  ANYWAYS - If you made it this far, thanks so much for reading along.  I feel better getting that out there, and feel like I can move on from it a bit.  Now, time to get sewing a second pair of jeans! ;)