Made by Lucy: Recital Dress

My husband takes pains to tell our daughter that not every kid gets to sew her own clothes. He doesn't like to see her take it for granted that thanks to her mother's skills, she has the opportunity to design and sew (on a machine!) one-of-a-kind creations like her recently completed Recital Dress:

Kindersewing: Connect-the-dots Sewing Sheets

In a previous post about getting started on sewing with kids I told you that sewing paper is a great first step toward true self-directed sewing. Eliminate the thread and you don't have to worry about tangles and jammed bobbin casings. But sewing straight lines on ruled paper won't keep kids interested for long. Connect-the-dots, meanwhile, totally will. 

Following the dots is good practice for pivoting around corners, sewing curves, and lifting (and putting back down!) the presser foot. By the end of sewing all three of my printable sheets, you kid will be well on his or her way to stitching safely and consciously. 

It's actually harder than you might think. You have to go slowly, but the result is fun: as the needle punches holes in the paper while you sew, the secret picture is revealed:

 My daughter is almost six, and she loves this activity. It buys me a solid half-hour at my own sewing machine. Win-win!

It was hard to get her to guide fabric under the presser foot when she first started sewing on a machine. But look how she uses both hands with the paper:

Look Ma, no thread!

This activity is great practice and really fun. If your rookie sewer tries one of my sheets, please post a pic on Instagram or Twitter and @ me (sewyorkcity). I'd love to see it!

Click here to download the printable file 

And here

And the last one

(Why can't blogger attach a link to a picture? It's enough to make a lady want to move to Wordpress!)

Happy sewing!

Sewing: So Easy a 5-year-old Could Do It (Fetch me a 5-year-old?)

So many people I meet think they are incapable of sewing — that there's some secret trick to it that would take them forever to learn. But it's just like any skill that you master bit by bit as you go.

Take cooking, for example: you probably started out making something simple like scrambled eggs. In time, your scrambled eggs got better and better. So then you tried an omelette. And after a few of those, you may even make a souffle (or a cake because who even eats souffle? Gross).

And when you teach kids to cook, you're not going to start out by handing them Julia Child's recipe for Coq au Vin. First, you let them whisk while you hold the bowl (always hold the bowl, unless you're a total masochist — or you have a maid, and then by all means let your maniac child beat some batter solo). When they've got that down, you let them crack an egg. And as they prove they can be trusted, you might even let them stir at the stove.

It's the same with sewing: your kid will be plenty challenged by taking over just a few of the easiest steps. And in time, if they enjoy it, they work their way up to the point where you don't have to hover over their shoulder to make sure that they remember to put the presser foot down.

• Safety — Many people wonder about the safety of letting a child sew. After all, the needle is sharp and little fingers aren't always so careful. But if there's one thing that kids truly HATE (next to daily sunscreen applications and food touching other food, especially green food) it's needles. Kids will talk to you ALL DAY LONG about how much they hate needles. And they are pretty good at keeping away from the things they hate, including green food, socks with seams (yes, I'm aware that all socks have seams), and needles.

That said, there are some kids who would gladly sew their fingers together just to mess with you — and those kids shouldn't be trusted with a sharp pencil, let alone a sewing machine. You know your kid best. If your child sits still for an art, craft or building project, then they might have the maturity for sewing. This is NOT coded language for "boys don't/can't/won't sew." To the contrary, I think many boys would be interested in sewing if given the chance; after all, they get to put their foot on a pedal, which is kind of like driving a car, and they get to construct, an activity that for some reason is considered a male domain — except when it's done with fabric. (Whatever you do, don't try to teach a four-year-old to sew. Four-year-olds think they know everything. Wait at least until your child has been humbled by the rigors of Kindergarten.)

• Skip the technical stuff for now — When I teach adults to sew, winding a bobbin and threading the machine are the first skills I want them to master. If they have any hope of sewing independently, these are the two most important skills they can take away from a beginner class. But kids just want to get down to business — and they might get bored if too much time is spent on setting up. (Teens and confident tweens, however, are capable of quickly mastering the skills of bobbin-winding and machine-threading. I have one student who claims bobbin-winding is her "favorite." Some of my adult students, meanwhile, really sweat it every time they have to change their bobbin).  

• Introduce one element at a time: When you were a kid did your dad or grandpa ever let you steer the car? While a perfectly responsible adult may let a child take a turn at the steering wheel, you would have to be the town idiot to also let them operate the gas and the brake too. A sewing machine is likewise a pretty complex piece of machinery. But you can let a kid start out slowly by doing just one task at a time; she can "steer" while you drive (press on the foot pedal), or operate the pedal while you steer.

Following a chalk line is easier for kids

Or, if that's too much, invite your child to put down the presser foot and turn the handwheel to drop the needle before you begin sewing. That's pretty much the "whisk the eggs" equivalent. You might be surprised by how happy a kid will be doing these two small tasks.

• Go threadless — Eliminate another element by removing the thread from the machine and giving your child a piece of paper instead. He or she can practice stepping on the foot pedal and feeding the paper under the presser foot without you having to worry about tangled thread, wasted fabric, or a jammed-up machine. They will be delighted to see all the little holes the needle makes in the paper (if you're worried about dulling a needle, save an old one for times like this). A simple connect-the-dots sheet is good practice for kids learning how to manoeuvre fabric on a curve or around a corner.

• Lower your expectations (and theirs) — This is not your sweatshop and they don't work for you. Depending on your child's age, you might only have a half-hour before they lose interest and move on to something else. So choose a quick project they can complete easily to build confidence and interest. A doll pillow or blanket, simple bag, or gathered skirt with an elastic waistband, are all great first projects for young sewers.


• Share the load — If your child is hellbent on sewing something more complicated, think about what tasks they can handle and which ones you should do (for safety reasons and also to avoid too much frustration at the outset). Cutting out the paper pattern and straightstitching the side seams of a dress may be enough involvement for a younger child. Or perhaps your kid will like marking the fabric with a chalk pencil and snipping stray threads with little clippers after you sew every seam. (Again, you might be surprised by what sewing-related tasks your kid will happily handle. Take prewashing fabric, for example. My kid will spend a happy half-hour handwashing fabric in the bathroom sink. It's like a trip to the water park without having to apply sunscreen. I win.)

• Make it easy — Take a few extra steps to simplify each task, and your child is less likely to give up in frustration. Use a ruler and chalk to draw seam lines for him to follow (rather than use the throat plate guide). Or trace the outer line on a paper pattern in a felt pen or highlighter so your kid avoids cutting through the wrong part of the pattern.

If teaching your kid to sew sounds like work for you, that's because it is. But just as a kid who helped prepare dinner is more likely to actually eat it, so too will a child who helped sew wear a new dress you made (rather than leave it to gather dustbunnies on the floor of her closet. Cough, cough, ingrate, cough, cough, been there). In time, you will have to help less and less and your kid will have learned a valuable skill.

That's right, she made this.

Any other tips you can add on getting kids started with machine-sewing? Share them in the comments!

Kindersewing: Tapping Into Childlike Confidence for Better Sewing

Teaching tweens how to sew is awesome for one fact: they don't sweat it if they make a mistake. While most of the women in my adult classes (at Bread & Yoga in Upper Manhattan) stress about aligning seams just so and edgestitching evenly, the kids just forge ahead without any worry. And when they do make a mistake, they pick it out and do it again. They aren't hard on themselves in the way that grown women are. They may not be the strongest sewers, but they are better than we are at making mistakes.

Cutting skirts in sewing class

As adults, we have a couple things that we do well. For most of us, there's one thing we're trained or schooled in, and we do that daily for work. We may also have a hobby or sport that we play, and we've probably been doing it for some time — maybe even since we were tweens. So the opportunity to make mistakes doesn't come up all that often for many adults. We are out of practice at flubbing things up. We take it personally. We use the word "fail" as a noun.

And that's the biggest challenge I find in teaching adults — reminding them it's OK to make a mistake. Nobody will die if you sew the right side of your bodice to the wrong side of your skirt. There's more fabric. There's always more fabric. You need to break a few eggs to make an omelette.

But the kids. They are awesome at failing. They do it with such grace. They don't berate themselves or question whether they could ever be good at this. (And I don't need to tell them that I also make mistakes — though they do like to hear that).

Peter of Male Pattern Boldness recently ruminated on what it means to be a fashion designer — and whether those of us who sew for fun would ever use that term to describe ourselves (many home sewers are actually much more involved in the process of creating something original than many modern-day designers). Reading the comments on his post, it's clear that even those among us who have the skills and creativity to create whole outfits from scratch are wary of labeling ourselves "fashion designer." We reserve the term for those who have professional accreditation, their own section at Macy's and are know by a single surname.

A kid, meanwhile, has no qualms with staking their claim to a title. Paint a picture at preschool and you're an artist. Help dad with dinner, and you're a chef. Learn "uno, dos, tres" and you're telling your building's Super that you speak fluent Spanish. Ask my daughter whether she's a fashion designer and she would say yes:

She'll be six in the summer and already she's sewing on a machine. And, because she has kid-confidence, she's also designing. But she's not a prodigy or anything — and I'm not bragging. Rather, I'm showing you this to make it clear: designing is not all that hard. Even a kid can do it.

You draw a picture. You choose some fabric. You commission a patternmaker to draft a pattern for you (What? You don't have access to a patternmaker? So you use a commercial pattern that matches the design you had in mind. If you think about it, it's the same thing!). You sew it. You wear it — and you tell everyone you see that you made it. (Seriously, every person in our corner of the Bronx will know by Friday that my kid can sew. Talk about self-promotion. I could learn a thing or two from this kid.)

When we teach our kids (or someone else's children) how to do something new, we praise effort and tenacity just as much as achievement. In the face of frustration, we remind them gently that they are learning — and that every mistake is just part of the process.

So too should we be kind to ourselves: how would you talk to a child about the mistake he or she just made? Be at least as nice to yourself and you will enjoy sewing so much more. And give yourself the same credit you would extend to a child — if sewing were easy, everybody would do it and H&M wouldn't exist. It's not brain surgery, but it does take practice. So please, be proud of your sewing accomplishments — and call yourself whatever you want to!

Zen and the Art of the 100-hour Sewing Project

Have you ever been on a really long bus ride? Like, one that could be counted not in hours, but days?

I once rode the Greyhound from just outside Medicine Hat, Alberta, to Toronto with a friend (we started out in Victoria, B.C., but her car's engine seized just as we crossed over into Saskatchewan; we sold the car for parts and hitched a ride with a Canada Post delivery truck to the closest bus "depot" — which was actually just a gas station on the Trans-Canada Highway). The bus ride was 48 hours long — nothing compared to the hellish trip experienced by the young couple who got on the same bus in Whistler.

It's my theory that in order to survive such a test of endurance, you must give yourself over to it completely: You've got to say to yourself, "This is my life now. I live on this bus. These are my people. I am never getting off." Only then can you actually begin to enjoy the trip rather than make yourself miserable counting down the hours until it is over.

I'm feeling this same way about a couple things this week:

1) My kid has a persistant case of pinkeye. Of course that means she can't go to preschool because it's so crazy infectious (she contracted it at a birthday party last weekend; half the girls in attendance got pinkeye, the other half the flu. I guess I should consider myself lucky — I hate cleaning up vomit).

Nor can we go anywhere kids are in attendance (that would be unethical), or set up playdates (passing on pinkeye is not the way to win new friends). Instead we must hang out at home, doing craft projects and struggling with the impossible task of forcing medicated drops into a four-year-old's eyes thrice daily. This is my life now. Today we made soft pretzels and watched My Little Pony.

I thought the pretzels were amazing (I used Smitten Kitchen's recipe). However, my picky kid is the most hyperbolic food reviewer; she said the pretzels were so horrible that people were going to fill the street outside our window and start chanting, "The dough is yucky! The dough is yucky!" A simple "no, thank-you" would have sufficed.

2) Kenneth King's Jeanius Craftsy class. I am never getting off this bus:

Drafting on silk organza

What you're looking at above is the pair of pants I am copying, basted along the seamlines with a thick, white thread, and then pinned to a piece of silk organza marked with grainlines. I've now finished transferring my draft to paper. Following this, I only have to test the draft, correct the draft, turn the draft into a pattern, and then construct a pair of pants. I am on Lesson 3 out of 11. These are my people now.

All of it wouldn't seem so daunting if I was actually confident these pants can be replicated. I couldn't even tell you what kind of fabric these are made from. They're from W118 by Walter Baker. (Not a brand I had ever heard of; I bought them at Marshall's last December). The tag says 64% Polyester, 32% Rayon, and 4% Spandex. They're obviously a woven, but I can't see a grainline for the life of me. And they seem to have at least a little stretch in every direction, which must be why they are so amazingly comfortable and super flattering. Probably my best bet would be to head to Mood and ask someone who knows their stuff. Or try making them in another fabric, and adjust the pattern as needed. (Also, somebody better help me eat the rest of these pretzels, or this pattern will definitely need a few adjustments).

Edit: I've been googling, and now I think they're a poly-blend crepe. 

So how do you maintain your calm when mired in a month-long sewing project with no end in sight?

Princess Culture — Still Promoting the Patriarchy After All These Years?

Quickly after posting pics of Lucy's new princess dress yesterday I realized what a squandered opportunity it was to write only about how I made this costume for my daughter — and not WHY?

After all, you may not know this, but I am a full-on feminist — the kind who lays awake at night troubled by the messages my little kidlet is absorbing from books, movies and music (to some that may seem antithetical because I am a work-at-home mom who sew her family's clothes and bakes pies — a traditional skillset that would have served me well in a more repressive time). 

I kept princess culture away from my kid as long as possible. (For an interesting analysis of Princess Culture, check out Peggy Orenstein's "Cinderella Ate My Daughter" — a great read for any parent of a girl). Not only do I find it upsetting to encourage our daughters to aspire to an elite position only attainable through birth or marriage, but the endgame in all princess stories is teen marriage — not something I would wish for my daughter. I prefer her to watch shows and read books about solving mysteries, making friends, or starting a rock band (her latest love is "Ruby Gloom," which will turn her into a goth quite soon I'm sure of it). 

Maybe it's the English Major in me that I cannot enjoy these classic tales without parsing out the patriarchal oppression. Poor Cinderella is forced into child labor, with marriage her only means of escape. The Little Mermaid gives up her voice for a man. Belle develops Stockholm Syndrome for a major jerk. And you can't get any more passive than Snow White and Sleeping Beauty, who both end up in comas. 

But Disney princesses (especially the post-Millenial ones) are also brave and adventurous — qualities I do like to encourage in my daughter. Tiana outwits a Voodoo witch doctor. Merida fights off a bear with her bow and arrow to save her mother (If you haven't seen it, Brave is an incredible feminist film. All of the main characters are female, and there's no love story — only a rescue adventure tale that brings a girl and her mom closer together). So, I made my daughter a princess dress. This is what she does in it:

Pretty badass. 

Thinking about all this earlier today, I asked my daughter what was so great about being a princess.

"You get to have fancy things like dresses," she said. Like, duh, mom.

So she's in it for the fashion (and a little class escapism), which means I shouldn't be so hung up on all the other stuff.

Because if I do, she'll probably rebel and become one of those women who dream about getting married at Disney World in full princess regalia. Or worse. Better to get it out of her system early, so she can go on to mutilate Barbie dolls or whatever it is that five-year-olds do.

Any parents out there who wrestle with the Disney Princessification of your kid? Do you try to get your child to think critically about these stories (which I try to do, to my kid's annoyance)?

Just Do It (Or Make It, As The Case May Be)

How many times has someone said to you, "I've always wanted to learn to sew," and what is your reply?

a) You should! It's so rewarding.

b) I know a great class at _________.

c) I can teach you.

d) Forget it, you don't have the patience.

(Sorta kidding on that last one).

And how many times has someone told you about the (usually better than yours) sewing machine they have stashed away in a closet (and that they have never used)?

If you're like me, I'm guessing many.

My mom once said to me, "I've always wanted to learn how to canoe." My mom lives on an island in the Pacific Ocean — where the weather is pretty temperate most of the year. Oh, and in Canada, where Parks and Recreation programming is so cheap it's a sin not to sign up for something. She could probably go canoeing seven days a week for about 10 months of the year. So why hasn't she?

And why haven't those people we all know just dropped a damn bobbin into their (better than ours!) sewing machines and started stitching?

Lack of time is a reasonable excuse for only so long. So is access to knowledge: I can tell you where to get free patterns and online tutorials, and that there's no shame in practicing on old bedsheets.

It's the same reason I put off learning an instrument, taking up a sport, or attempting to make bread again: fear of failure.

When it comes to sewing, there's the fear that whatever you make will be so horribly botched, it will resemble Denise Huxtable's "Gordon Gartrell" shirt. Or for canoeing, that you will fall into the water, embarrassing yourself in front of your (really, no more advanced than you) classmates (or drowning, I guess?).

In the past few years I've become pretty risk-averse — a side-effect, I think, of becoming a parent, as well as some minor PTSD following an attack in the park, and the fact I haven't had health insurance. But fear of losing life and limb — those are OK to cling to, in my mind. However, if the only danger of taking up a new task is bruising your ego a little, there's never going to be a better time than now to just go for it.

Over the holiday break while my husband was home, I should have been sewing. But I don't have any good fabric in my stash and our personal fiscal cliff is still on the horizon for the moment, so I took up a different project — something that I'd been thinking of for some time, but had put off out of fear of failure. It did involve some sewing — freestyle machine embroidery — as well as painting. And, because I'm prudent like that, I used an old bedsheet as my canvas.

Here's the photo that inspired me. I took this last summer while we were visiting my dad at his ultra-remote West Coast British Columbia home. It's probably the best photo I have ever shot. I love the colors, composition and pure joy on my kid's face. I've been wanting to do something with it since then:

 
This is not a humble brag, though I know it may look like it. I'm not actually that thrilled with my execution of this art project. But I hung it up anyway, and I'm sharing it here to show you that nothing bad actually happened when I attempted something new. I'm down one ripped bedsheet, a quarter-spool of thread, and a few small bottles of fabric paint. And the only person who has criticized my effort can't wipe her own butt (not naming names).

This is both my pep talk for today, and the crux of my New Year's resolution: don't let fear of failure get in the way of anything this year. If you've been wanting to start stitching, grab an old bedsheet and fire up the Google box to search for "how to thread a sewing machine." If you want to make art, turn off that part of your brain that says you can't draw. If you want to play guitar, don't worry about your roommates' judgement of your feeble strumming. Nobody is Jimi Hendrix (or Sandra Betzina) at first. You'll get better eventually.

Can you tell the outline is stitching?

This resolution is borne out of being a parent of a currently 4.5-year-old kid. At age 3 and 4, I witnessed her joyfully experimenting in all manner of hobby and activity — and with so much self-confidence. In her mind, she was an artist, an athlete and a musician (also, she mistakenly believes she can speak Spanish. Again: so much self-confidence1). It hadn't yet occurred to her that she would only excel in one field. I'm guessing most of us (aside from natural-born pessimists) start out this way — enjoying pretty much everything we try.

But already I can see the fear of failure creeping in. She'll walk away from a game if she's not winning, crumple up a drawing and have a tantrum if it's not exactly as she'd hoped it would be. And sometimes, she'll avoid an activity altogether if she suspects she won't be the best at it — even when her dad cheerfully says, "Everyone won, because everyone had fun!"

I don't think anyone or anything is to blame for this. It's natural; success feels so good, that we can begin to fear its opposite, even though the anticipation of failure is usually far worse than the actual act of losing. It's an exceptional person who can try something new without any fear of failure. It can be debilitating if we let it. I know it's something I'm still trying to shake (and the reason I never played sports or wear white after Labor Day).

One way to help my kid channel her fear of failure into something positive, I've decided, is to let her see me fail. More specifically: let her see me fail and NOT freak out about it. So that's my resolution this year: try more — and fail gracefully.

Any sewing (or other) new things you've been avoiding out of fear of failure? Name it and claim it! (Did I make that up? Or Oprah?)

Advent Cabin

Though Jesus is not our reason for the season, that doesn't mean I'm not trying to inject our secular Christmas celebrations with meaning above "What do you want for Christmas?"

Thanks to our current budgetary constraints, there's no risk of our four-year-old being spoiled. And, lucky for us, she's admirably modest in her wishes — and has never once even asked me for a toy she's seen in Target or whatever, which is kind of amazing. But (BUT!) I find that on the days she gets the most, she can be the most ungrateful.

So in addition to her cheap Target-brand chocolate advent calendar, I made her a toilet paper roll cabin calendar, an idea I stole from this much better version I first saw on Pinterest — originally from Morning Creativity:

My version looks much more DIY thanks to the fact we were out of printer ink (are we not always out of printer ink?).

But instead of treats or small gifts, I stuffed each tube with Christmas jokes only a four-year-old would love  (e.g.: What do you get if you cross mistletoe and a duck? A Christmas quacker!"), good deeds and "Christmas dares" (a concept I totally made up but don't tell my kid, OK?).

Of course she was much more excited to open the window on her cheap chocolate calendar yesterday, but she was also game for her first Christmas Dare, which was "Give someone (other than mama or daddy) a nice compliment." She made me email my friend Briony, who was visiting from Toronto and we had seen earlier in the day, to tell her she looked pretty in her furry coat. I hope a little bit each day, I can help her see that the best way to spread Christmas cheer is not only singing loudly for all to hear, but also to make someone's day in some small way.

A few more examples of the Christmas Dares and good deeds I hid behind each brown paper number:

• Chose one grandparent to call and sing a Christmas carol to.
• Here's $5. Now go buy a small gift for someone else.
• Here are two lollipops, one for you and one for someone in our neighborhood. It's your choice, now go deliver it!
• Here's some paper and an envelope. Write a short letter to anyone you like, and then ask mama to mail it for you.

Do you have any good deeds or Christmas Dares that would be appropriate for a small child?

Best Thing/Worst Thing

This year has been a challenging one for our family. While not awful/horrible/no good/very bad like 2011 was, 2012 has forced us to dig ever deeper, drawing on reserves of endurance, patience, thrift and faith (not in a God, but each other).

My husband went back to school, and has been gone all day and night throughout most of the last 10 months. The burden of child care falls on me, and I also work from home. That we don't have family nearby who can help out (or the money to spend on a babysitter) is exhausting. I never, ever get a break. And even when I sleep, I am worrying. After all, we've spent thousands we don't even have on the hope that his talent will lead us to a more prosperous place. 

But the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel is within view. He's now interning, which is wonderful because he loves the work and is hopeful it will lead to an actual job one day soon. But for right now, life can feel grueling. I cry every other day just worrying about Christmas. The election keeps my husband up at night.

Also, four-year-olds are not the most understanding individuals; just when you are bearing the biggest load you've had to shoulder in your lifetime, they will hand you one more thing to carry — literally and metaphorically. Like, you're carrying five bags of groceries, a backpack and her scooter, and then she'll try to hand you a booger. This has actually happened. (Also, just when you're feeling terrible about yourself, that your hair needs a new cut because it's starting to look like a sheitel, that's when your kid will decide to start calling your upper arms your "chubbies." This has also happened.) 

Aside from all the work, no play and ceaseless whining, the challenge for me is being happy with what we've got for just a little bit longer. It's a difficult thing to do, though I sometimes feel like I've mastered getting by with nothing new. But then I look at Pinterest, or the well-lit blogs of those more affluent than I, and I'm down in the dumps that I have big ideas that must all wait until another day. I struggle all the time with wanting to do more, write more, sew more, create more. But all that demands resources we just don't have. 

So I'm trying to focus this week on being grateful for what I've got — and learning to enjoy the things I can do now, rather than lamenting all the stuff I want to do but can't. 

When we're feeling stressed about paying the rent or job prospects or our future in the uncertain run-up to the U.S. election, we try to calm ourselves by taking stock daily of the good things we've got going for us. It's now a nightly game to play "best thing/worst thing." We ask each other over dinner what was the best thing that happened that day (often it's just Lucy and I because Ryan works so late on weekdays), and the worst thing too. It forces us to acknowledge that even if we're feeling shitty and stressed (or are just coming down from a tantrum, as the case may be), there was something good that happened in the day, even if small. And acknowledging the worst thing of the day gives us a chance to talk it over, enjoy a little empathy, maybe find a solution, and not feel so alone in our worry over it. 

(It's also funny as hell to hear what our four-year-old will say. She's so much like me, often her "worst thing" is something that she didn't get to do — as in, "I didn't get to watch three episodes of My Little Pony. I didn't get to play with my best friend. I didn't get to eat a whole bag of Halloween candy.") 

One longer-term project I have planned for my family is a jar like this one I saw pinned on Pinterest (the source seems to have disappeared, but you can get the idea from the description below):

But instead of waiting until New Year's Eve to take stock of all the good things that have happened to us, we'll allow ourselves to read a few whenever we need to come down from an anxiety high. It will take some follow-through to remember to add items to our "good things" jar, but the benefit of perspective will hopefully be enough encouragement for me to stick with it. It's a little Oprah-iffic, I know. But it turns out I'm not all that positive a person at times. I need to work on it. 

Likewise, instead of rueing all the projects on the backburner right now because fabric is not in our budget, I've decided to take on a few meditative projects — stuff that's satisfying, but doesn't endanger my ego if it doesn't pan out. Like knitting, which I used to do (I must have; I have a large plastic container full of yarn!).

Check out this cool cuff I saw on Pinterest (which is not all "thinspiration" and hair tutorials, after all!): 

How cute is that? I used this tutorial on tying a Turkish knot (though I did two fewer twists than the tutorial suggest because I wanted it to look like the one in the above photo). It took about an hour and a half of knitting I Cord to make this. I think it could make a decent Christmas gift for friends and sisters-in-law. 

 It's warm and cozy, and chunky too — just like my chubbies (damn kids).

So how do you maintain perspective when hard times have you down?

DIY Chevron on Vogue 8771 Dolman Tee

I leave my laundry mountain in the photo to make you feel better. You're welcome.

Yesterday was Yom Kippur, which meant my four-year-old had the day off pre-K. When my big plans to hit up a museum were dashed because she wasn't feeling well enough to leave the apartment, I decided to enlist some old-fashioned child labour in creating the above Dolman-sleeved sweatshirt, sewn from Vogue 8771. (I'm wearing it as I type this, but have no pics of me in it, because my photographer got a real job and is now gone during all daylight hours. It's just as well because I have a few fit issues I will need to correct before I sew this again — which I will.)

Here's the line drawing, on top of which I photoshopped a chevron design for inspiration. (Are we still into chevrons, people? I'm digging it. I'm also still really into Vampire Weekend.)

You can see from the top photo that in the end I opted not to make the long sleeves. I put it on midway, and it just seemed like it would be too hot and constricting for me. NYC apartments are overheated, ya'll. I also cut off the bottom asymmetrical hem because it went a little low over my booty and was a little tight on my hips. 

I have this box of fabric paint a former neighbor passed on to me a few years back, and it just keeps coming in handy. All I needed for this project was a ruler, sponge, and some tape (I would have preferred masking tape, but you can see here all I had was packing tape. It worked fine). 

First I marked center front on the top and bottom using pins. Then I used a strip of tape to create a straight line down the center. Then, using my picture for a guide, I used the tape to mark off my stripes. The stripes are 2 inches wide, while the "white space" between them is 2 &1/4 inches.

After I had one side perfectly spaced, I used a pencil to mark a straight line up the center front of the tape, and cut away the piece I had used to mark it. There's possibly an easier way to do this. It's probably been done before. But it worked. So why are you arguing with me? Go to your room.

Then I taped off the other side of the chevrons, again using my ruler to make sure my spacing was as exact as I have the patience for. It should be noted this little stinker here was helping me the whole way:

Then we sponge-painted the stripes, first with a chartreuse color I mixed up, and then adding black to the mix with each stripe to achieve a cool reverse ombre effect. Or something like that. We did our best:

I know what you're thinking: there's paint on your floor. It's cool. It comes off. Also, I needed the tape to hold the shirt panel down, and I couldn't think of a better way:

After it dried, I sewed the shirt, which took me about 20 minutes. That's how quick it was. I won't show you how to do that, because if you have the pattern, you have the instructions.

Ok, fine. Here's a pic of me in it. A four-year-old took it. Can you tell:

It was a bit of an experiment, and not a bad way to pass the afternoon indoors with a slightly sick kid. (We also baked a chocolate cake, to celebrate Ryan's good fortune). As I said before, I have some fit issues to clear up because this top looks a lot better on my dressform than on myself. But that's for another day — and another post.

Cardboard Skeeball!

I've been on a blog hiatus (reading them as well as posting; I miss you guys!) due to an extended vacation to my home on the West Coast of Canada followed by a summer of single-parenting due to the fact my husband comes home only to sleep these days, he's so busy with work and school.

Neither am I sewing, which pains me greatly. (I did manage to successfully alter my best friend's wedding dress on a borrowed machine back at home though!)

The one creative thing I have managed time for these past few weeks is this skeeball game I crafted from cardboard and hot glue for my kid's fourth birthday party. It's nearly life-size, and features faux lights made from water balloons. I studied photos of skeeball games to get the bump just right (without it, the ball won't bounce up into the hole). It worked perfectly. I wish we got some video of the kids playing with it before it was destroyed (inevitable considering it was made from cardboard and four-year-olds hopped up on birthday cake are as good as your worst drunken party guest. They took particular delight in pulling out all the balloons and stomping on them until they popped. I hope none of our neighbors have PTSD; it sounded like a shooting range in there for a while).

I believe there was some interference going on there. Note all the "lights" were smashed by the time the parents got to play

I know. How could I have "no time to blog" if I had the hours to make a cardboard skeeball game? It didn't take me that long, and I loved it. If only "making shit with cardboard" was a viable career option.

To kvetch or not to kvetch

Readers, have you given up on me? My apologies for the hiatus, but my husband went back to school at the beginning of January just as my (paid) workload spiked. He's gone 16 hours some days, so there's been a lot of slack to pull up around here. And too many balls in the air makes Suzie something something, so I had to ignore my blog (and everyone else's too, lest I get too distracted and fail to meet my 1,200-word-a-day quota.)

Anyway, I am up at 6:30 a.m. on a Sunday so I can fit in writing here while my family sleeps. Now, I wish I were the type of person about whom others would say, "And she NEVER once complained...." but I'm unfortunately totally not. In fact, I envy my Jewish friends and neighbours most for the fact that they have words to sum up the two things I find myself doing frequently: kvetching and schlepping. And man, do I ever hate schlepping (and do I ever kvetch about it). But if you live in New York, and particularly, if you live in New York with a kid, do you ever spend a lot of time schlepping.

So I wish I could squeeze out my first blog post in months without complaining, but that's not who I am. And if you're back here reading this after giving me up for dead, then you probably love me anyway. (And know that I love listening to your complaints too. So if you need to get something off your chest, please leave it in the comments below, and I promise to read it, nod heartily and say to my screen: "You're SO right! Uggs DO make everyone look like they have fallen arches!")

Kids really are the worst. They somehow simultaneously ignore every word you say while shouting out demands and then berating you when you don't fulfill them to their exacting preference. It's emotional abuse, spending 12 hours a day with a preschooler. Akin to working with Anna Wintour, I believe. Kids drive you to drink.

Husbands really are the worst too. They take out the vacuum to clean up because they invited their cousin over on a day you have to work from home, and then leave the vacuum in the middle of the living room floor for days....and days....until it's a week later and everything needs to be vacuumed again anyway, so you just do it and put the damn thing away, which means you totally lost this game of Vacuum Chicken. Husbands drive you to drink.

Lucky for me the only word my kid can read is her own name, and my husband never looks at my blog, so I don't have to worry about either of them reading what I have to say about them.

Did you come back here to read about sewing? I have sewn a few things in the time since I last wrote: a couple jersey tunic tops, which have been in heavy rotation. I still can't think of how to write about them in any useful way. Also: Sewaholic's Minoru jacket, which I love and have worn on several occasions because it's been eerily warm in New York this winter. I have no pictures of it yet though, because my husband is gone 16 hours a day and I have no one to help me by taking photos. Also, he takes our camera to school, so even if someone stopped by (and NO ONE ever stops by because I still haven't made friends in our new neighbourhood) there would be nothing to shoot pics with. I kvetch.

I have to sew a shirt for my daughter's BFF for her birthday, but I can't get downtown to the Garment District to buy fabric. My kid suddenly hates riding the subway (I don't blame her; from where we live now, it's a serious schlep to get anywhere). So I can't drag her with me by promising a ride on the Bryant Park carousel anymore. That used to work. Now she just looks at me like "been there, done that" and starts screeching in a way that makes my blood pressure rise instantly. Kids not only drive you to drink, they also drive you to kvetch.

The monster who hates her Christmas tree

For those people who consider themselves too selfish to ever be suited to having children: you are probably right. Because if there is one thing about parenting you should know, it's that all of your aesthetic aspirations will be trampled upon by the tiny feet you work so hard to care for. And you are  monster if you care about the fact that your sweet little darling put cut up pieces of twine all over your Christmas tree and 3/4 of the ornaments are clumped up on the bottom 18 inches of the tree like so many Canadians huddled along the border. And if you dare to redistribute them because the rest of the tree looks downright barren, your husband will give you a look that says, "I feel like I barely know you." Because then you are the perfectionist whose kid ends up in therapy because she's unable to accomplish anything out of fear her mother will swoop in and fix it. Oh, okay: not you. Me. ME! I am the one stuck with a tree that looks like this:

If we lived in a house in a city that didn't demand your dining table abut your Christmas tree, I would have two trees and my kid could cover hers in garbage, which is what she wants. Until then, the only thing for me to do is stop caring. Again: my husband thinks I am a monster.

Here's my contribution to diabetes this week: Homemade Gingerbread Caramels wrapped in origami boxes I made from cardstock:

Here's my assistant trying to sneak a taste (is it Food Safe (TM) to wrap candy in your underpants?)

That's all for today, folks. (P.S. I interviewed two people in Saskatchewan last week and they BOTH said "folks" repeatedly. Cute, right?)