A Dress Is Like A Casserole

Wednesday was an extremely successful sewing day. I'd cut out a pajama top the night before and sewed it, cut out and sewed a pair of my favourite Burda 7400 pants, and cut out an OOP V1634 dress. Thursday was a stuttering day. It wasn't until the evening that I finally made progress on a completely different project. The dress was a fail.

 

What I really like about this pattern are the seam lines and the belled shape. What I don't like is the sloppy, too big look you can see in the image below. That's why I didn't buy the pattern until it was on clearance. If you compare their image to my wearable muslin above, you'll see that I gave the neckline more shape, narrowed the shoulders, raised the shoulder point, and used a three quarter sleeve with a higher cap. For my height, I also took 1" off the length and for my pear shaped body, the bottom band is in the same fabric to avoid a widening horizontal line. 

I've worn the dress several times and it's really comfortable so I decided to include it in my workshop wardrobe. A dress is like a casserole, all in one go, just add garnish. That makes it easy for travelling. 

The fabric I chose was this black/grey knit and I wanted to subtly highlight the seam lines. First, I tried top stitching with lime green and then with cream and both looked like a mistake. After that, I tried hand stitching with pearl cotton and again, not such a good look. Eventually, I couched this yarn along the seam line. It's black and silver not black and white as it looks in the image. The little bit of metallic looked fabulous and was just enough however...

... the fabric was not the best choice. It has far too much stretch for the design and while the first seam went okay, the second one was stretched out by a good six inches. I knew I'd be fighting my way through the entire garment and that in the end, it would probably hang wrong so I unpinned all of the individually cut pattern pieces, put the fabric sections aside to figure out how to use them for something else, and went shopping for a different fabric. There wasn't any in my stash. There wasn't any at Fabricland.

As much as I am grateful to have a fabric store in the town where I live, I wish this one would spend more energy on fashion fabrics as opposed to quilting ones and that the buyer would purchase more cool and less warm colours. Plus, the stock needs to be turned over more. The owner says it's because there isn't a demand for fashion fabrics but when the stock stays the same for - literally - years, the many of us who do sew fashions go elsewhere. Case in point, next week when I'm out of town and near another Fabricland, I'll look there.  

For day 4 of the 100 day button project, I wanted to explore the idea of irregular dots. I made snakes in grey and white and wound them around a black core. And I learned that this is hard to do and creates cracking and that you need to know the exact number of snakes and not overlap them. I had too many.

For each button, I cut a 1/2" length from the larger snake, stood it on end, pressed down to a consistent depth, and attempted to smooth out the edges which wanted to continue separating. 

I wasn't entirely successful and some of the finished buttons have sharp edges. I will sand them and decide if they need filling or whether I'll just keep the ones that didn't crack. I'm not thrilled with these and I did learn a lot. That's the point. 

The last time I was at the optometrist, she gave me a third prescription. I'm in the 5% that can't wear progressive lenses or bifocals so I have a distance prescription, an intermediate prescription which is what I've been using for handwork up until now, and the new one is a near prescription so I'll be able to see small details before, while working on the piece, when I can fix them, rather than later, when I look at the picture. 

Getting older is an interesting thing. I like the wisdom and the confidence. I like this time to focus on my own growth and creativity. I like the freedom to come and go. I like many, many things but I'm not so fond of others like needing stronger glasses and... hearing aids. I haven't mentioned it before but I went for a hearing test a few months ago and, no surprise, my hearing was compromised.

I got the first set of aids and found the style quite fussy when combined with changing my glasses constantly. The arm of my glasses kept catching the wires that come from the inner ear to the back of the ear where the main body of the aid sits. Since I had 90 days to change to a different option, I ordered some other ones and they came on Wednesday. These are custom molded and sit right into the ear. I like them better and I've realized...

... this is permanent. I am hearing impaired. Hearing issues run in my family so it's not a complete surprise. My grandmother went both deaf and blind as she aged and I always thought if I had to pick, I'd choose deaf so I could still see and create. Now that I have no option, it's not as straight forward as I thought. Hearing aids don't return your ears to how they used to be. It's a new normal. I'll get used to having something in my ear but sound will forever be different and ongoing, I will need to ask people to speak clearer, not louder, volume isn't the issue, clarity is.

I'm not there yet emotionally. Even as I type this, I'm panicking because hearing impairment is a disconnecting issue and I believe life is about relationships. It's people that matter. It will take a lot more work on my part to show up, to be present, to constantly deal with the unknowing of others, and to not become forgotten or left out. Life has had many tiring battles and at the moment, this feels like another big and unwelcome one.

Thankfully, I'm introverted, have engaging activities, and have always been more of a 1-1 person and not very group oriented. I can still have good conversations which are one of my favourite things. Movies, theater, and concerts aren't so much of an issue as they're not something I do often. I tend to read rather than listen. Most of my friends have been completely surprised when I tell them I now have hearing aids. They hadn't noticed any signs of deafness. This, I guess, is good. Thank God for the healing, nurturing, destressing nature of creativity and this, my favourite season with so much studio time. I'm working my way through this hearing shift. 

Talk soon - Myrna

Grateful - that hearing aids even exist