Monday, December 31, 2018

Healing my soul with Jamies

What do you do when you just NEED to sew and you haven't done it in a LONG time really, so you need to make something that really won't matter if you screw it up.  And there are no longer small pink flannel people in the house.

You look in your "stash" and find two smaller pieces of crazy pink prints long ago intended for small pink people which you think MIGHT make one pair of adult jamies--maybe. Then you decide how to coordinate the two fabrics, lay it all out, and you can JUST get the pieces with almost no leftover bits ('cause you're good at that). So you think of how to combine them, cut, sew, and guess what, you have new jamies!

I told my 12-year old granddaughter I was making "the world's ugliest jamies".

Little Miss Artist took a look and said, "they are NOT ugly, they really aren't. They are actually pretty good for combining two random pieces of fabric; they are just PINK!"

(Don't you just love the honesty of children?)

And I said, "And you know what, I DON'T WEAR PINK!" Much laughter ensued.

I haven't worn pink since I had my colors done 30+ years ago, but guess what--I'll be wearing these--they are cozy! (And crazy suits me just fine...)

FYI: It probably took 3-4 times as long to design and make "coordinated jamies" than if it had been one piece of fabric with no matching required. But it was good--required total mental absorption. (Not to mention 'reverse engineering' a store bought pair and adapting a pattern that was way too bulky...)

(I know, some of you will need to wear your sunglasses while you choke!  Never in my wildest dreams would I have chosen these fabrics to coordinate, but it worked--it really did.)

Thursday, December 27, 2018

Couch pillows from tea towels

Several months ago, my daughter wanted me to make her some pillows from some very adorable animal tea towels.  Extremely simple:  determine where the animal placement should be, sew a seam across the end pieces (even though they do not end up being at an edge due to the pattern) LEAVING an opening to pull it through, sew down both sides, pull the outside through, stuff, and stitch the opening closed!  Done.

For the record: