Yes you can, but....why???

A short one today - extra fitting has been required for the latest commission, but that post should be up soon.

And so a rant!

I am completely confused by this article: http://byhandlondon.com/blogs/by-hand-london/make-your-own-pashmina

For those not interested in visiting the link it's about how to make your own pashmina.  The steps are basically: buy pashmina wool, cut to desired width, finish edges with a single row of stitching and a bit of fray.

Simple, straightforward and, to my mind, utterly pointless.  You're not getting anything new or different from this kind of pashmina, you're not using up material from other makes (though I guess you could if you had a very large scrap of something suitable), and you're not really saving any money.  The poster is apparently close enough to Goldhawk Road in London to pop in to grab some pashmina wool, but I haven't managed to get there yet and I've been trying for years (juggling life with trip to obscure London location is surprisingly difficult).  And if I did it would cost me way more just to get there than to just buy a ready-made pashmina.  I've never seen pashmina wool in any local shop and decent wool is generally not cheap so buying online (where you can rarely buy less than a metre in anything other than quilting fabric and there are postage costs) wouldn't be a saving either.

This is definitely one for my exceptions list - though if there was anything different or interesting you were getting out of this make rather than a plain pashmina I might be less scathing.  Maybe I'm too practical, but for me making something has to have some point to it....

My Sewing Space

So I see a lot of posts on the sewing blogs I follow about sewists sewing rooms or sewing spaces.  Some of these are professionals who work from home, occasionally the odd sewing studio for someone who's branched out to something a bit bigger, but generally they are sewing rooms (or parts of rooms) of hobbyists like me.  Obviously they tidy and clean for the pictures, but these spaces are so different from mine - so pretty and full of pristine Ikea furniture that instead of being inspired I feel like rolling on the floor laughing at how far far FAR I am away from such a mellow, serene "me time" sewing experience.

And so today I shall take you on a tour of my sewing space!

Hint: this ain't it.

Commission - flannel shirt 1

I have been (very slowly for life reasons) been embarking on something new which I hope will help me level up my pattern drafting and bespoke clothing making.

My dad has commissioned me to make him a casual shirt for the autumn/winter - something nicer than a t-shirt, but not a dress shirt.  I suggested flannel and found this fabric:

Oo - another familiar pic...

Technical clothes

In my previous post I mentioned this hoody, which I was given for my birthday and I thought it would be a good opportunity to explain what I mean by technical clothing in my exceptions for not buying clothes.

Fashionable hoody is fashionable (credit: Sensory Direct)

First a little bit of background to why I asked for and why I looooove this hoody.  I have some issues with anxiety (read: have had panic attacks and other anxiety related problems since I was tiny) and find that deep pressure helps me relax.  Deep pressure is essentially a firm consistent pressure, which Temple Grandin famously found helped many people with autism cope with the world.  She developed a hug machine to squeeze people to their heart's desire, but the same effect can also be felt with weighted products: weighted blankets being the most common.  Since Temple Grandin implemented it as a therapy for autism it's expanded to other areas.  I know quite a lot of people who find it helpful for their anxiety (though there are plenty of others with anxiety who find it anything from pointless to horrible) and plenty of people with no particular issues who find it comforting.

I made myself a weighted blanket a while ago now and sleep under it most nights (the recent heat and having to be without it was unpleasant), but it's not exactly portable, and if I'm having a stressful day and just want a bit of a top up on my calm while still being able to watch Oscar or sew, the hoody is way more convenient.  Also the hoody is much easier to take if we're going away somewhere to sleep under - I can throw it on my legs or my chest and be comfortable enough even in a strange bed.

On to the technicalities!  Since I did make my weighted blanket I do have some insight into how I would go about making a weighted hoody and my initial inspections when it first arrived bore out my theories.  The weight in a blanket it produced by putting two layers together and essentially sewing little sealed off pockets all over the blanket full of little plastic pellets to create an even weight distribution.  Here's a tutorial I looked at before I made mine.

Credit to the lady at the above tutorial.  You fill each row with pellets then sew across.  Fill, sew, fill, sew....

The hoody is made in a similar way - hidden pockets on the inside of the hoody contain weights of varying sizes made with this method.  You can actually order additional weights to add to it, but it's plenty heavy enough for me.

dinky weight

So why not make this myself?  It's just a hoody with some weights in.  Well, yeah, I could make it myself, but for me there's a couple of reasons not to.  The first being that I wanted it quickly (I'm impatient) and didn't want to learn how to make a halfway decent hoody from scratch first.  I guess I could have found a secondhand hoody and added pockets, but that runs into all kinds of other problems with making sure the pockets are in the right place and the right size and not visible from the outside and blah blah blah.

Another reason not to make it myself I learned from making weighted blankets.  My machine is great and all, but it's still just a home machine and it really really doesn't like it when it hits even small pieces of very hard plastic.  There are some things it's really just not made for and dodging flying shards of shattered needles is no fun.

In future as I get better and maybe get better equipment I might try more of the things that I consider "technical" at the moment, but for now I'm happy having a little bit of leeway on not buying.

Commission - Houppelande lite

I've seen this somewhere before....

 You may remember the fabric for this one from my post a little while ago - this was the strange situation where the lining actually cost more than the outer fabric and I was sure that was breaking some kind of rule.

Well if it was it doesn't seem to have done any harm, for here is the completed garment:

Sewing machine holiday

My sewing machine is having it's very first service!  Given I don't even know how old it is (I got it secondhand from a friend of a friend) and how much it has been used especially over the last few years it is waaaaaay overdue for a service.  I'm dreading the fluff and lack of oil and horrible things they may find inside it (I don't eat while sewing, but I do sew non-standard things now and then...), but I am very much looking forward to having it back all spiffy and working smoothly again.  It's been very very slowly getting ropey over the last few months especially with more tangles and snarls and just general sluggishness, so hopefully when I get it back those will be gone and I should be able to have a carefree sewing experience (lol).

In the meantime I have more sashiko (including a sashiko commission - ooo....) to do, some pattern drafting and other non-machine-y things to do.  I also have about 4 blog posts in the works, but haven't had much time/energy/will lately.  Hopefully I'll be able to get more of them done while the machine is having it's spa time as well.

Birthday sashiko!

It was my birthday....I was going to say 'recently', but actually over a month ago now (I've obviously not being paying attention).  I got lots of lovely pressies, but I have to say the one I was second-most looking forward to was my new sashiko kit!

Yay!