American Dream Fabric: Denim

I crossed a line in the last few years where I get unexpectedly hit with nostalgia. Nostalgia from 20 to 25 years ago! I'm moving through that stage of life where I can't quite believe that I can talk about something from 25 years ago, when I was a teenager. I pause writing that, just can't believe it. The 80s revival brings plenty of nostalgia material for us Gen Xers. I won't see the movie Fame because I want to remember only the original. I see those vintage concert Ts with the black raglan sleeves and white body, and wonder if I should hit eBay for my favorite MTV bands from 8th grade. I'd probably pay more for the T now than back then!

The Clash, on eBay right now!

Van Halen, on eBay right now!

So I'm in Macy's back in September, buying Ralph Lauren pants for work. I buy from a handful of brands now, with the main criteria that they fit perfectly. I don't have time to waste browsing other brands -- just beeline to the petite Ralph Lauren section, pull my size, pay for it, take it home, I don't even have to try pants on. They fit perfect. They're the only thing in the entire store that fits well. I should have kept that in mind as I got all googly-eyed when I saw ...

A LEVI JEAN JACKET.

You can get it at Zappos.

With the red tab. Chest pockets. The classic jean jacket lines and topstitching. Exactly like I had in high school. My heart went pitter patter. Nostaglia washes over. I get woozy and warm. Totally unexpected moment. I lose common sense. I paw the rack desperately. Apparently many other women did too, because all that's left are Petite XS. Um, no. I'm not the same size I was at age 16 unfortunately. So I go to the Misses section and there's a huge display of Levi's jeans. But no jackets. I'm so disappointed -- I envisioned throwing a Levi jean jacket over a big sweater on a crisp October day at the cider mill. Never mind that while there's an abundance of cider mills where I grew up in Michigan, there are no cider mills in Chicago. You know how these visions of perfect wardrobe moments go.

So I carry an armful of Levi's jeans to the dressing room. They look like sh*t on me! The dream is shot all to heck. Ugh. I'm disgusted. It's like when you're having a great dream, like we got a completely rehabbed 15th century stone villa in Tuscany for free and we get to live there forever and ever!! For free!!! And a cat jumps on me to wake me up for food, because it's 5:00 a.m. and it's time to eat. So I go from a gorgeous olive grove and glorious sunset view, to sticking my hand in a plastic bag for dry cat food. Yeah, trying on the Levi jeans was like that.

But I never got to try on the Levi jacket. So that dream lived on. I couldn't get it out of my head. So I surfed online. I found the Trucker jacket on Amazon in petite. So easy to buy, I don't even have to put the credit card number in. Every day, I pull in the driveway, searching the porch for a box. It seemed to take forever to get here, though it was only 4-5 days. When it finally arrived, another dream blasted to bits. The jacket wasn't slightly oversized like I remember. It had lycra, and it was form-fitting. What is a Levi jacket doing with lycra in it!!! It was too tight. I looked like a denim-wrapped sausage.

Those of us who sew learn the fine points of fit and while we scrutinize fit, we learn what looks good on us and what doesn't. It's like Stacy and Clinton from What Not To Wear are little angels (or maybe devils?) sitting on our shoulders while we stare at the mirror, saving us from horrible mistakes. I needed a Stacy on my shoulder to tell me, don't waste money ordering a larger size, the whole Levi jacket shape is oh-so-wrong on me now. But I knew that, even as I hit the order button again on Amazon, this time with rush shipping, because I just couldn't wait another agonizing 4-5 days.

Well, today I am returning two Levi jackets at UPS.

The Levi dream is over. Three strikes in the mirror, and I'm finally out!! If only I could find a real vintage, oversized 80s Levi jacket on eBay ...

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I leave you with this story from today's CNN.com:
From farm field to cotton mill: The making of America's denim.

Stash Storage

This, shown at Nerd Approved, is one way to handle your stash overflow. You may be running out of closet space, but who doesn't have room for a chair or two??

Hourglass Hip Alteration

Tripped on this tip today ... a shirt/top alteration for full hips. An alteration useful for hourglass or figure-8 shapes when you want to keep the waist smaller, but allow room for the hips. I usually buy the right pattern size for upper chest measurement, and add more room to the side seams. This alteration from Off The Cuff blog is an elegant solution that maintains the pattern lines better. You may need to scroll down to the 3/29/2009 post.

Sewing Burda WOF 05-2008-101

It always starts with the fabric. In this case, a metallic coppery-bronze viscose blend from EmmaOneSock. This fabric was a treasure to sew! Substantial & didn't ravel much. I needed a jacket to wear over a dress at an event. I had bronze sandals and a bronze evening bag and this fabric looks good with them. Final decision was, what pattern? I flipped through 5 years of BWOF's and one pattern out of all popped -- #101 in May 2008.

I liked its slightly downtown feel with rivets and zipper. I thought the shape and style would contrast nicely with a black silk dress, and with the metallic fabric.

Other criteria: I was short on time and these lines could be quickly sewn. The peplum and exposed darts would give easy-to-sew shaping without fiddling too long for fit. I was looking for a collar-less jacket because it takes me a lot of time to sew collars.

Several reviews are on PatternReview.com -- search "05-2008-101" in Patterns.

Here's what I could add:

I didn't look at directions at all. But construction might have been more efficient if I had. It still went together nicely -- isn't it amazing how even when adding seam allowances, precise curves of BWOF pieces line up and fit together perfectly.

Edges are finished with hong kong seams. I did not install a zipper because I was running out of time. I will install one later. It feels dressier without a zipper, but I like the idea of the metal teeth giving an edge to the dressy fabric. On the faux pocket flaps, I used buttons instead of snaps.

Like others who posted reviews on PR.com, I was surprised with the blousiness. I added a third dart in the neckline to tame the blousiness, and like another reviewer, I stitched the darts down, up to 2". Although I usually need an FBA, the blousiness made the jacket fit fine without one. The sleeves were a bit tight in the upper arm, so I did an upper arm adjustment.

I'm petite 5'0" and the peplum sits a little low. I'll make this again and will definitely raise the peplum seam a bit.

Let There Be Industrial Lights

I was really pleased to get the latest Rejuvenation catalog and see gutsy industrial lights like this. Love it! But it unfortunately doesn't fit anywhere in my house. Believe me, I've tried to think of a place. Actually, it would be pretty cool to have some of these hanging in the garage! Instead of the four bare boring lightbulbs out there now.

As we re-do our sunroom over the next year, we'll need three sconces out there to replace the current lights that look like mason jars screwed in a socket. We already have lights from Rejuvenation in other rooms and I've always been happy with their service. I like customizing the lights on their web site to get exactly what we want. When we changed our minds about the sconces for our bathroom renovation, Rejuvenation was great about exchanges. So they're now my go-to source for lights.

In the sunroom, we're installing 18" square porcelain tiles that look like faux slate with shades of bluish, browns, beiges, rusty-coppery colors. I might install a contrast ring of metallic copper tiles -- not perfect shiny but with verdigris and variation like they've been exposed to chemicals. This Rejuvenation sconce has a slight touch of industrial and the three punches of copper high up on the walls would look nice with the new floor. I would just switch the shade to something stronger.

Sorry So Selfish

I've been holding out on giving back to the online community that I've learned so much from. I've taken what I've learned and had fun making things but kept it all to myself! Actually I've been busy living life. Although the internet can do so much for us, it can also completely take over us. That's my belief. Stickin' to it. Learned from experience. So I've needed to put the internet back in its rightful place in life. I never did nor never will do Facebook or Twitter (and I'm comfortable enough to violate "never say never") -- keeping up with email, web sites, blogs and discussion boards is enough. I just don't understand how people can have enough to talk about, without having time to live offline enough to have something to talk about online. ??? Am I missing something? Or am I just lame? Can't juggle it all? Whatever, we all make our choices. I live online here, in some discussion boards, and I share trips my husband and I take in our plane on another blog. That's enough for me.

What ignited instant obsession and drove me back here is this chair from Anthropologie:

One of these would sit by my marble table, the one that was once my single woman's tiny apartment dining table, but is now a perfect garden table, tucked among plants that tower over both table and chair, hidden.

Only one chair, though. Two would lessen the uniqueness.

I'm growing more gardens. Since spring, been building a raised bed behind our sunroom that will someday cradle a patio in its own outdoor room between walls of foliage and flowers and the windows of our sunroom. Where our cats will probably be sitting, inside but longing to be out, meowing and whining. Thus marring the peaceful gardeny ambiance. Of course I will get up from the Anthropologie flower chair and let them out, but they must roam, and as I follow them, I'll soon be out of sight of the flower chair and my coffee on the marble table will go cold. But I love my cats and I'm happy when they're happy, and I can always return to the flower chair which will sit waiting for me, surrounded by a garden of brilliant color in the summer, but really designed to glow in waves of burnished red, orange, yellow, purple, and brown in the fall, and stay standing all winter. I love autumn gardens.

Beautiful autumn gardens don't just happen, they have to be planned that way. My shade beds look barren after the hosta leaves go mushy. They're not so wonderful to look at then. But the garden outside the sunroom must be beautiful over four seasons. It will be unavoidable to see from the sunroom, close to the house. So someday we can drink morning coffee out there in December and see snow sitting on little brown puffballs and fluffs of grasses swaying. I love the strong shapes of plants like millet. I might install witch hazel, so in January and February we get the promises of spring even before the daffodils.

Struck With Sundial Obsession

Well doesn't time pass so fast. Been too busy for blogging. Still busy. But tonight any busy-ness was waylaid by trying to track down an armillary sundial for a new raised garden bed I'm building. Before I got the current issue of This Old House and saw the armillary sundial in it, I never knew these things existed. But now, life has changed. I must have one. Apparently, life just won't be the same without one of these on a pedestal:


I am attracted to objects that hint of travel, globes, time passing slowly. Maybe because that's the antithesis of my daily life: going to an office in the same spot on the planet and racing the clock all day. Now tonight I lost all track of time chasing a new object of wanderlust. My blog title is still appropriate. Some things don't change.

So where did these come from and what do you do with them? Here's a nice explanation. And a Naples, Florida publication has an upscale explanation with armillary sundial eye candy photos.

I love the looks of these because they're both a little different than the mass produced versions in Google Images:

Other people like these enough to steal them. Or they steal them to serve the one-of-a-kind purchase market for hungry people like me who want a piece of another place, another time.

Speaking of another place and another time ... I've gotta get back downstairs to doing some cleaning I was supposed to do earlier. But this was a nice journey. Time to share ideas here more often, too ...