Saturday, March 13, 2010

Sewing 101

My friend, Megan, has wanted to take up sewing, so I agreed to join a class with her. Whatever techniques may have been missed while learning to sew a pink corduroy lip-shaped pillow in middle school home economics, or from what my mother managed to instill in my crafting repertoire, I will now learn.

Our first class was last Wednesday and I can only liken it to a community college class. There's this slightly under-funded feeling about the place, but where else could one learn such intrinsically valuable skills? There was a shocking 4 men in our 10 person class. Of the hodgepodge characters in this class are ones that you would like to spend some time with and would never have otherwise had the chance to interact with. Then, there are others that you hope you don't end up having to share a table with. All-in-all, not a half-bad group to spend four 2 1/2-hour sessions with.

The sewing project we will be working on for this class is an apron. Megan and I have already completed the overwhelming task of selecting fabrics for our first project. There are SO many cool fabrics at the Fabric Depot that choosing the best combination felt something like committing to your first born's name. But, we were finally able to convince ourselves that this would just be one of many projects and we were going to have to decide. I found a cute little leaf pattern and a vibrant orange fabric and am quite satisfied with my selections. Can't wait to share my technically correct, finished product!



Small Victories

I finally figured out how to get the stupid knot and plastic stopper on my blind drawstrings to hide (for the most part) within the decorative wooden toggles. There was nothing more frustrating than grabbing the end toggles to pull the rather heavy blinds up, just to have the wooden pieces slide off the knots and into my hand, with no motion of the blinds. Now that I've figured out how to properly install those plastic buggers, that's one window down, nine more to go...

Before -














After -