Teaching and Learning: The Santa Monica T

Maybe I should just stick to teaching hats. Think about it. Hats more or less fit, minus or plus an inch or so. A beginner can make a cap from start to finish and feel a sense of accomplishment, plus have something that FITS and is cute to wear.

But clothes? Is it possible to make students happy? Can they walk out of the classroom more pleased than peas about what they made? That it doesn't have the homesewn look? That it looks better than something bought at Marshalls, Target or Kohl's? I think this is nearly mission impossible even with a beginner pattern and basic instructions.

The reason I say all this is I had a workshop on the Santa Monica T yesterday. Fantastic pattern in my book. Easy. Four pieces. Hardest part is the dart in the shoulder. All three of my students finish constructing the top, but I'm not sure even one really likes the final product. Two found the top a little too snug. The third walked out mad when I ruined (I wasn't trying to really) the neckline in the last ten minutes before the store closed. The tee was really looking good up until that point. Nice ease, great fit. I offered to do twin-needle top stitching on the neckline. This is an advance technique, something I wouldn't even expect most sewers to know. So I got down to business, whipped out the Wash-Away Solvy. Cut it into strips to use under the stitches. Oh boy, this neckline was going to look great. This tee, out of them all, was going to be the best. The star of the show! So in true "Project Runway: ("You have 10 minutes left!") fashion I worked on that neckline. Got nervous when a needle broke over some bulk. Luckily I had an exact replacement ready. Yippee! Threaded up the needles, and finished it in the nick-o-time!

I held it up. The neck opening looked massive. Like a crater crashed into the pattern. Uh oh. More boat neck than crew-neck. More Marcel Marceau and less Marilyn Monroe. My student looked at it. She was not happy. "I can't wear that," she said. I suggested we could put some stretch lace on to close up the neckline. That didn't go over well. "This was a $100 day, " she complained. "I spent $45 on the class, another $12 on the pattern, another .... on the fabric, and $5 for someone to watch over the dog. I always take classes and come away with something that looks homemade."

She gathered up her stuff, and walked out the door. I felt terrible. I followed her. I apologized and told her the next class would be free if she wanted to take it again. That seem to please her.

In retrospect, we should have staystitched the neckline. But I'm going to blame the instructions here rather than myself. There was nothing about that in there. What do you expect with a cotton jersey? That stuff grows!

So can I say I'm having second thoughts on teaching how to make t-shirts? I'm set to teach the Santa Monica T more than a few times this summer. Maybe teaching something as personal as a top was a bad idea. You know leggings - that's hard to ruin. I think. Underwear? That seems pretty straightforward too. But a t-shirt? What was I thinking?


One of my students modeling her version of the Santa Monica T in a stretch lace knit. $3.99 a yard at Vogue!

Probably the best part of my day was getting on this train. I was able to board within about five minutes of leaving the store. It was freezing and I wasn't dressed properly, but within another seven minutes or so I was inside my apartment.
Yeah, when I really wanted a Guinness to sooth my wounded ego, instead I had a ride on Metra. Sewing teachers, how do make the most of a day that doesn't go quite the way you want? I do have ideas on what I'll do differently next time, but it's Memorial Day today. I don't want to work the brain too hard now.

Stretch Lace Fabric Lady Strikes Again

Apparently most of us on the same wobbly wavelength as far what we're making last week. Like 5 of you, I'm also making a top, although I hadn't really planned on it. This past weekend was beginning to look like a bust in the "Look what I finished!" crocheting and knitting departments, when I decided I just needed to get a cranking on another Santa Monica Tee using fabric from my collection. I knew exactly what I was looking for when I went fishing in the sea of plastic bags filled with fabric in my closet. I plucked out this particular stretch lace, yet another score from Vogue Fabrics remnants department. It was a small piece ( 1 1/2 yards, 40 inches wide) that tested my creativity and ability to streeetch a piece of fabric in one little corner just so that I cut a complete sleeve. But I did it and I still have plenty of leftover fabric for the bodice on another top. (Incidentally this remnant set me back $4.49 pre-tax sometime in March of this year).

Here are more notes on this particular pattern:

• I cut out an extra small on the top and went two sizes up toward the hips. While I know I'm small on the northern part of my figure, a size small would at least give me a little more wiggle room and ease for my arms. Right now, I feel there's negative ease on this tee, but at least overall I'm radiating positive vibes. That's what's most important.
  

• I'm really happy with the twin-needle top stitching on this top. There's very little tunneling (which makes me think of a prairie dog traveling just a few inches underground) going on. Yes, I dropped the tension to a 2 and I used Lite Steam-A-Seam2 (the 1/2" x 20 yards version) to make the neckline fold under nicely prior to sewing it, I was prepared to get a little tunneling, but this time around I got none. Zippity zilch! A pleasant pre-Fourth of July surprise in my notebook. It might be the fabric, my pre-holiday sewing disposition, the alignment of the planets or who knows what else.
  

• I trimmed the neckline before I stitched it down just so it wouldn't be so tight in a 1940s "This is so fitted I can hardly breath" sort of way. See any of the blouses from that era to see what I'm talking about.

• The back is inside-out. Oops. Which means the scratchy part of the lace is against my back. Good thing is that the wrong and right sides of this fabric almost match. So no one will notice except my skin. I'm wearing a camisole so it's a little more comfortable. As long as I wear this top over and over again, that's all that matter. Yes, I can proudly say I did sew my "Made by Mary Beth" label inside.
  

This is the last time I'm sewing this pattern for a while. But scallop-edge stretch lace fabric? Bring it on. I was eyeing some more here and there. Once I get a little more spending money and make a Volkwagon-sized dent in my fabric collection, I'm buying more of this stuff. It rocks for tops. If I can force myself to trace the Jalie t-shirt pattern I bought back in December, I'll use some for that. I'm also thinking of using my scraps on this local pattern. But no more of the Santa Monica Tee for a while. Besides, I'll make some tops that really test my creativity and challenge me in a way that Hamlet does when he's charging down the steps with me following him in my wicked wedgies.

However, the Santa Monica Tee satisfied the need to make something new to wear, but I'm still aching to get started on a knitting project that will take me through the Fourth of July weekend. I need something that I can do while I'm on the super-crowded train to the fireworks on Thursday, idling on a bus to Summerdance on Friday, and then some. It would be nice to have something actually completed knitting by Monday that I could happily upload and say, "It's not a swatch, it's not a bust, ...it's a sweater/skirt/Swiffer cover!" Actually, the only thing that's holding me back is the purchase of the yarn, not ambition. Since I'm determined, I'll probably get something going that gets my heart singing. I'm also thinking about doing some back-to-back days of sewing this weekend at Vogue Fabrics since I'm doing the staycation like so many other Chicago denizens. What are your sewing, knitting, crocheting plans for this weekend?

Be a Voyeur - Sewing, Knitting Books On Your Bookshelves?

What is it about peeking at other people's bookshelves that's so intriguing? I can't really explain it myself, but it's certainly appealing even when I'm in a restaurant such as this one which is decorated with books cut in half. Yes, that's right. These books, which were in otherwise great condition - no stains, no dog-eared pages not even a musty smell, were sliced in half, right through the back and front covers, just so they could fit a set of shallow shelves. Even so, I had to pick these ruined books off the shelf and read them. I wasn't the only one, all my other friends at the table did the same thing to pass time until we got our order (they got the burgers; me, I had a humble bowl of chili and a Guinness.) It was so frustrating to pick up a cookbook which had some appealing German recipes, but the instructions were incomplete thanks to at least one over-enthusiastic decorator but not very appreciative reader. I mean I'm ok with giving away my books, but not destroying them if they're in good shape. I suppose halving a book makes it less marketable, so restaurant patrons are less prone to walking off with them after they've consumed one beer too many. Still!

Which brings me back to my own shelves. They're pretty small, compared to my pals'. I've always been this way. I didn't bother to buy too many books even as a precious fourth-grader, because I had the Glenview Public Library a block away. That's not to say, I didn't buy my share of Scholastic paperbacks at school. I did. But even so, my collection was so little and could be all contained in the shelves above the secretary desk in my bedroom. It just didn't make sense to spend all my babysitting money on books when I could borrow many for free easily. That way I also had left-over money for candy. As I got older, I started to buy my own clothes. Even then I was frugal - I remember the first outfit I put on lay-away at Fashion Plus in a nearby shopping mall.

In recent years, I haven't bought as many books, let alone read as many as I did as a pre-teen. I blame a lot of that on the Internet. Then when I do buy a book, I'm very practical about it. I can only justify books that I will use again and again. So you can imagine how guilty when I bought "Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day". I assuaged my guilt by reasoning that I couldn't find the book at two libraries, so I was going to use my Borders coupon so I could read it now.

More recent purchases have included Wendy Mullin's "Sew U," last year it was "Sweaterbabe.com's Fabulous & Flirty Crochet" (I wanted it for several patterns, which I have to try). Further into the past, I bought a "Blueprints of Fashion" book, which is actually helpful when I'm thinking about how I might want to alter a vintage 40s dress. I've also bought some out-of-print sewing, knitting books that I know will be quite hard to find at the library. I actually was reading a compilation of 1920s-late 40s knitting book when there was a black-out recently in my apartment. I sat on the couch by a window, and read away until I got bored enough to actually leave my place.

That brings me to books I do want to borrow. I've got "Romantic Hand-Knits" on hold at the Rogers Park branch library. Someone else in Chicago (who could that be?) actually has the book at the moment. I really, really wish this person would return the book as soon as possible, so I can check out this book. Now as a child, I don't remember putting too many books on hold. Why would I? There were so many other books I could read while waiting for the One to be put back
onto the shelf into its proper, decimal system order.

But I'm an adult now who doesn't read nearly as much as she should, so one book on hold feels like forever, kind of like how I feel when a favorite band sets up to play but takes its time playing the first set. That just makes me so restless! "Romantic Hand-Knits" on hold is the knitting version of my "let's get the music going so I can dance!" anxiety. It certainly tests my patience in a way that Hamlet often does when we go outside so he can go to the washroom.

"Romantic Hand-Knits" is set to be returned any day now. With luck, it'll be back by tomorrow, the official beginning of summer. I'm not sure how I'll be notified - an email, postcard or a phonecall? So the next few days will be filled with suspense, but not the creepy Halloween-house variety. To keep myself from getting antsy, I visualize the book in my hands, a smile on my face. What a better way to launch a new season filled with sunshine, laughter, friendship, lots of creative projects including at least one from this book?

What sewing, knitting and crochet books are on your shelves? (By the way, I'd take a picture of my collection in my grandmother's bookcase, but my camera insists on using the flash when I take pictures indoors. The flash bounces off the shiny book covers and doesn't help with my quest to have really great photos on this site. I could pull out my favorite books, stack them up in a pile outdoors and take a picture, but what fun for you would that be? There isn't that covert "Oh, let's see what's in her medicine cabinet. Oh my gosh, she's taking St. John's Wort! She must depressed and won't tell me about it!" I'm just saying. Instead I give you yet another version of Santa Monica T. Aren't you just bored with the pattern on my site already? This top despite the twisty twin-needle top-stitching at the neckline, is one my favorites. It works with a job-interview plain Janet skirt and jeans, just not both at the same. The sheer knit makes it supremely comfortable even when it's extraordinarily hot.

Sunshine on an Overcast Day

There was a time when I didn't like overcast days. I found them depressing. They were a cause (an excuse) to sneak off to bed early and despair over life, men, life and men, in that order. Now that I've rediscovered photography with my generic (and I mean generic), dinosaur-age Kodak EasyShare C530, I've come to love those days without the blazing sun overhead. Those times are perfect for photos. You don't have to worry about overexposure, overheating, over-shadowing, and over-anything. Cloudy days are a photographer's friends. In fact, now you're likely to catch me muttering, "Oh, good! I can take pictures!" if I see clouds gathering to gossip. The larger the group, the better. But dark isn't too kind for photography, and ominous is a clear sign to take cover because a tornado or thunderstorm might whiz through.

The pattern: The top you see above is yet another rendition of the Santa Monica Tee. (See I don't always knit, contrary to my Twitter sidebar.) This particular project was extremely easy since all the edges were already finished. The only stitching I had to was at the neckline, darts, and underarm seams. Done! Now since this was a very sheer and fragile knit with a whizbang rose emblem in the middle, I did have to take care sewing. Sullivan's Fabric Stabilizer was very helpful (spray, stiffen fabric, spray more until fabric is office cardboard-thick. Sew. Wash out stabilizer). I used the Wash-Away Solvy at the neckline. Otherwise, I think this lovely fabric would have been chewed up and spit out by my charmed Viking Husqvarna!

The fabric: A remnant from Vogue Fabrics. It was a really small piece. I snatched it up as soon as I saw it, but it languished in my collection until about six months when a little flourescent lightbulb went off....Use it with the Santa Monica T! Center it so the flower's at the bust (as you see it's not quite...I'm not entirely thrilled that it falls below.). Use scalloped edges for a hem!

The background: Those clouds you see? Those are painted on the exterior walls of my condo near the door that leads to the laundry room. You'll be seeing more of this cheery and childlike skyline in my photography, they're the perfect backdrop!

The lesson: Use the finished edges on your fabric for your hem. Saves time sewing and makes your clothes look ready-to-wear. (But you don't really need a lesson. This is more of a tip.)