It's been over a month but I finally finished the Jump Rope Dress from Oliver + S. I had followed along with the sew-along as long as I could but then got really busy and really exhausted. I haven't done much sewing at all lately.
Yesterday was almost like a holiday so I spent the day voting (of course) and working on a few things around the house. I started by stitching the little buttons on the sleeves (vintage), then moved on to the snaps. I wasn't in the mood for buttonholes so I went with these lovely snaps I found at a thrift store. I love the little splash they add.
The pockets are to the other style that comes in the pattern envelope but I like them better. That's the amazing thing about sewing your own clothes -- you can do whatever you want. I'll take some pictures of Zadie in the dress soon.
While we were out of town, my long-awaited birthday gift arrived from Spoonflower. I told Mr. Lemon that I wanted fabric for my birthday so I picked it out and ordered it. It's much easier that way. These are from Heather Ross' new collection for Spoonflower called Macaroni Love Story. I decided to go with the organic cotton sateen. I have some of her cotton voile, some of the linen, and some regular quilting weight cotton, and of course this, so why not keep mixing it up? The sateen is very soft but feels hearty.
I love this design. When I go to pick out fabrics for a project, however, they are rarely like this. So I went with a test swatch of the two colorways that I was having trouble deciding between. I like having just a little bit -- enough for a pocket or some trim. As you can see for the aqua, I adjusted the scale from 300 to 375 dpi. It's not very noticeable but I just wanted to experiment. It made the people a little bit smaller.
These three are my little impulse buys. The Snow White is by Heidi Kenney of My Paper Crane, the yellow school buses are, of course, by Anda, and the awesome gnomes are by Paper Sparrow. I only remembered after I ordered the Snow White that I changed up the colors for the cross-stitch I am working on; it's not going to match. I'll have to figure something else out.
I wrote before about a swap I'm participating in. I'm usually very inspired by these types of things and was super excited to get started. When I was in grad school writing papers, I spent a lot of time doing ATC swaps to keep creative. For me, working on different projects helps keep my brain working in other areas too. So I thought this would be no exception even though I haven't done a swap with fabric before. I really love everything that's in the flickr pool and can't wait to see what comes in the mail for me. But I have to admit to being absolutely stumped on this one.
I pulled out some fabrics that I think will match my partner's house. I am going to piece something in strips like the image above from Heather, one of the swap moderators. I especially like what she's done with the one on the right. My plan is to cut 2" strips of fabric from what I've pulled from my stash and see what happens. I don't want to plan too much -- I really want to see what happens more randomly. I want to reference this fabric by Anna Maria Horner.
