Monday, April 11, 2011
Behind
I am taking down notes and writing about what I'm doing, I promise, just on paper instead. Honestly, folks, with first math overload, then strep, then mono (which I just found out today I have!), and now finals, I'm exhausted, and can only use the computer for limited amounts of time. Besides, pencil and paper is more soothing. I promise, as soon as I can, I will transcribe everthing onto the computer. But not today...
Chinese Shirt
This is my design for my Chinese inspired shirt. The pants will be abandoned. The decoration will be handpainted.
Thursday, April 7, 2011
Sew Green 4/7
When I walked into Sew-Green today, I was a little disappointed to find that I wouldn't be working on my project right away. But I quickly got over it, realizing that I was getting a ton of help, fabric, and fun for free, so I better be ready to help out when I can. Our task wasn't even work. It was fun too!
We were supposed to design and remodel t-shirts for Sew-Green's booth at an event in the Women's Center encouraging young teenage girls to be confident and outgoing. There were guidebooks on how to re-fashion t-shirts, and our job was to make a few demos, without sewing a single stitch! At first, I was perplexed. How am I supposed to do that?? But after flipping through the book, I found a t-shirt that had been made into a cowl, and since I've been in a total cowl-obsessed phase, I pounced on the opportunity and started cutting up the t-shirt, and weaving strips of cloth for making the seams. My cowl ended up looking pretty good! It wasn't as good as the demo (somehow they never are), but it was wearable! I'll be able to take it home and show you guys after the show.
After finishing the shirt (honestly I did it a little fast, not just because I was excited to see it made, but honestly because I wanted to move on as well). Autumn was a little panicked. She wanted to start all over with the draping, using a pre-made cowl as an example instead, since she was worried about it not looking like my sketch in the end. It was sort of nice to know that someone was concerned about my project, but also ironic that she was more worried than I was! I felt really bad for making her worry, and reassured her that during my project, one of my goals is to learn how to be less of a perfectionist (an new goal, which I've made up on the spot!), and that if I don't finish five pieces, that is absolutely okay, just as long as I learn more about making clothes. I wanted to learn how to drape a dress, and so it was okay if it wasn't perfect. It was a learning experience, and an experiment.
So I set to work with the design I had draped, and after unpinning it, I set to work using chalk paper and a pokey rolling tool to copy the pattern on the other side of the cloth with chalk paper. I did this by pinning the cloth directly in half, and then slipping the chalk paper under the cloth. I then pressed the pokey rolly thing into the cloth, and the chalk imprinted the other side.
I then added a one inch seam allowance to both sides. Afterwards, and this was the scary part, I cut the cloth along the seam allowance line! After cutting the cloth, I pinned it back up, and it looked like a dress! Yay! I've been told that next time I will be able to finish the dress, but I'm not sure. We'll see.
Towards the end, I was able to look in the fabric bin that Autumn brought in for me to sort through. It was very kind of Sew-Green to offer these fabrics for free! A lot of them weren't usable for my project, but I did find two pieces of cloth that were quite nice! There was an orange stretchy material, and a blue material. I took swatches of both (though I think I've lost them unfortunately!). My homework this week is to design a garment using this cloth, since I need other cloth to start my next few pieces.
We were supposed to design and remodel t-shirts for Sew-Green's booth at an event in the Women's Center encouraging young teenage girls to be confident and outgoing. There were guidebooks on how to re-fashion t-shirts, and our job was to make a few demos, without sewing a single stitch! At first, I was perplexed. How am I supposed to do that?? But after flipping through the book, I found a t-shirt that had been made into a cowl, and since I've been in a total cowl-obsessed phase, I pounced on the opportunity and started cutting up the t-shirt, and weaving strips of cloth for making the seams. My cowl ended up looking pretty good! It wasn't as good as the demo (somehow they never are), but it was wearable! I'll be able to take it home and show you guys after the show.
After finishing the shirt (honestly I did it a little fast, not just because I was excited to see it made, but honestly because I wanted to move on as well). Autumn was a little panicked. She wanted to start all over with the draping, using a pre-made cowl as an example instead, since she was worried about it not looking like my sketch in the end. It was sort of nice to know that someone was concerned about my project, but also ironic that she was more worried than I was! I felt really bad for making her worry, and reassured her that during my project, one of my goals is to learn how to be less of a perfectionist (an new goal, which I've made up on the spot!), and that if I don't finish five pieces, that is absolutely okay, just as long as I learn more about making clothes. I wanted to learn how to drape a dress, and so it was okay if it wasn't perfect. It was a learning experience, and an experiment.
So I set to work with the design I had draped, and after unpinning it, I set to work using chalk paper and a pokey rolling tool to copy the pattern on the other side of the cloth with chalk paper. I did this by pinning the cloth directly in half, and then slipping the chalk paper under the cloth. I then pressed the pokey rolly thing into the cloth, and the chalk imprinted the other side.
I then added a one inch seam allowance to both sides. Afterwards, and this was the scary part, I cut the cloth along the seam allowance line! After cutting the cloth, I pinned it back up, and it looked like a dress! Yay! I've been told that next time I will be able to finish the dress, but I'm not sure. We'll see.
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
In Class 4/5
The class started out a little rocky. It seemed like a third of the class hadn't turned in their 3rd Quarter Evaluations, and got a zero. Ouch! Ms. Lord wanted us to learn that despite the class being WISE, deadlines would still be enforced, and that we shouldn't slack off. I was really glad I hadn't slacked off on my evaluation. Actually, I had sort of gone overboard on my evaluation, writing four pages. It was a way for me to evaluate my own work, and it really helped me see what I had done, and what I needed to do. I enjoyed the chance to be able to organize my outlook on the whole project. It wasn't my best writing (I did it pretty fast, honestly), but it was very useful.
We were also told that on Monday, 4/11 at 6:30, our journals would be distributed amongst others in the community in order for them to evaluate our journals! Fun fun! I hope they enjoy mine. I've put in a lot of effort trying to make it SHOW as well as tell.
We also were given an assignment to collect research for a peer. It will be due next class. I thought that I would do research for Katherine, since my line is inspired by birds, and she's doing a nature journal. I just found a cool website on birds, and I think it would be great for her (see Browsing).
Finally, a word of advice from Ms Gergley, which I must keep in mind- if it's ont in your journal, it didn't happen!
We were also told that on Monday, 4/11 at 6:30, our journals would be distributed amongst others in the community in order for them to evaluate our journals! Fun fun! I hope they enjoy mine. I've put in a lot of effort trying to make it SHOW as well as tell.
We also were given an assignment to collect research for a peer. It will be due next class. I thought that I would do research for Katherine, since my line is inspired by birds, and she's doing a nature journal. I just found a cool website on birds, and I think it would be great for her (see Browsing).
Finally, a word of advice from Ms Gergley, which I must keep in mind- if it's ont in your journal, it didn't happen!
Mentor Meeting 4/5
Today I met with Ms Lasher as usual, and we had a very brief talk about what I did at my last sew-green session. I told her that there was a possiblity that I might complete the dress during the next session! We also talked about how, since the MUN team (of which she is the advisor) might be going to NYC, I might be able to take a detour during that trip!
Saturday, April 2, 2011
Sewing at Home 2
So I finally tried to sew my pants again... and failed, again!
I first pinned them, which took forever, since it wasn't lining up right, and of course, perfectionist me would NOT let a single pin be crooked. I tried them out, made some adjustments, and set to work to sew them. I realized that the thread was not actually true black, but it was very very close (annoying...)
My hem was actually pretty straight, but I had sewn it towards the bottom of the fold I had made, which would cause the top to fold down. I didn't want to do two seams either. I slept on it, and the next day, I ripped out the whole seam. I need to stop being so OCD!! However, I have become VERY good at ripping seams (before I used to always snag the cloth by mistake, but by pulling the thread back and ripping the loops, it actually goes a lot faster, though it still took me more than an hour to pull out one seam).
Next time I'm going to do it right! I'm going to sew with a wider margin between the hem and the seam, and I'm going to IRON it beforehand! Ironing gives you a nice hem, so that you can sew even more perfectly, without bulges. Although others might not have to iron, I do, and I'm going to have to iron the bags for Sew-Green anyway, so while I'm at it, why not iron the pant's hems as well?
I first pinned them, which took forever, since it wasn't lining up right, and of course, perfectionist me would NOT let a single pin be crooked. I tried them out, made some adjustments, and set to work to sew them. I realized that the thread was not actually true black, but it was very very close (annoying...)
My hem was actually pretty straight, but I had sewn it towards the bottom of the fold I had made, which would cause the top to fold down. I didn't want to do two seams either. I slept on it, and the next day, I ripped out the whole seam. I need to stop being so OCD!! However, I have become VERY good at ripping seams (before I used to always snag the cloth by mistake, but by pulling the thread back and ripping the loops, it actually goes a lot faster, though it still took me more than an hour to pull out one seam).
Next time I'm going to do it right! I'm going to sew with a wider margin between the hem and the seam, and I'm going to IRON it beforehand! Ironing gives you a nice hem, so that you can sew even more perfectly, without bulges. Although others might not have to iron, I do, and I'm going to have to iron the bags for Sew-Green anyway, so while I'm at it, why not iron the pant's hems as well?
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