Now exclusively blogging at Meg In The Kitchen.

Thanks for your readership, friendship and support. Now on to my new adventure!

So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, goodbye!

I hate to go and leave this pretty sight

So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, adieu

Adieu, adieu, to yieu and yieu and yieu


After careful consideration and a brief affair with Typepad, I've decided to consolidate to just one blog. From here on out, you can find me here. I will only be posting at In The Kitchen from here on out. I am officially in Get Ready For School mode and it was always my intention to transition to just that blog. I will leave this one up, but it's been removed from my profile.

Follow me to Meg In The Kitchen. Allez cuisine!

Meg On The Runway

I've been sewing again. This time I've been making clothes. I can't tell you how nice it is to have something custom made to you own measurements. There's no adjusting or tugging. It sits the way it should.

First up, we have a reversible wrap skirt. I was inspired by this Sew, Mama, Sew! tutorial. I realized that I have a wrap skirt pattern, but in the wrong size. It's McCall's Stitch 'N Save M4348. I laid it out on wrapping paper, taped it down and added a few inches here and there for my measurements. Wrapping paper works great as pattern paper. I buy a box of it at holiday time from Target. You know they have those $10 boxes with 4 rolls and ribbon? There's always a roll I don't like and never use, so know we have a wrap skirt pattern on ugly Christmas paper.



The wrap skirt I made is maybe a tiny bit big. I hate wrap skirts that offer very little coverage in the front. I think next time, I will lose an inch on both front pieces. This pattern I had was for a back piece and two fronts, so three pieces all together. Therefore I can use the back to make a regular skirt, if I want. I like this skirt a lot, but it's heavier than I thought it would be. I think it might be best for spring and fall, rather than our hottest summer days.

Up next we have the fruitty skirt. I love Alexander Henry fabrics. More than I can say, really. When I see a fabric that makes me squeal with delight, it's usually an Alexander Henry fabric. This one is called Apples and Pears. I am very proud to say that I did not use a pattern. At. All. I cut a rectangle the width of my bottom measurement and the desired length. I folded it in half and cut a small triangle off the side, from the top down. I cheated with store bought bias tape instead of hemming the top and bottom. I added an invisible zipper, which is slightly visible. I realized when I was done what I did wrong on the zipper, so I know for next time. I also added darts to the back too. I really love it. I based the measurements on a denim skirt I have from the Gap that I love. I think it turned out pretty well.


Finally we have the new love of my life. The Wide Leg Lounge Pants from Amy Butler's In Stitches book. I love this book a lot. It's one of the few sewing books where I feel I'd make enough of the patterns to justify buying it.


This was my first pair of pants. Again, I laid out the pattern on the ugly Christmas wrapping paper. I did modify the pattern a bit. I shortened the legs and added about 4" of solid colored fabric with piping. (Piping! I know! Shut up!) The pants are outrageously comfortable. The fabric is another Alexander Henry fabric, my favorite in fact. It's so amazingly soft. I will live in these pants. I need to hurry and make a few more. I found it interesting that I only used a little more than half of the fabric required. Because of the print, I was able to lay it out sideways (or East/West). One thing I might change on these and future WLLPs will be to add elastic to the waist, maybe instead of the drawstring. When she says "wide leg" she's not kidding. It's a straight line down from the waist to the bottom hem. The wider you are, the wider the legs are. If I hold them up, they look like clown pants. Once I put them on, my ample booty fills them up nicely. I will never buy pajama pants again.

Ps. About the blue t-shirt that doesn't match anything...it's laundry day. I swear.

I'm baaaaaaaaack!

And I have an orange quilt top.

Observe:





The fabric was bought from Trina of Trina's Doings from her Etsy shop. I really love these fabrics. You should check out her blog. She makes amazing quilts! I left the three fabrics I liked best in one piece. The flowered fabric is my favorite. And, yes those are VW vans in there.

I just need to add batting, a back, and quilt! The back will just be white. I haven't decided what I'll do for the binding yet. I think I'll take it with me to JoAnn's and pick something.


My name is Elvis Lee and I approve this quilt.

My little knitter.

Just wanted to pop in and say hi. I'm behind on a couple posts. Here's why.



To clarify, this is what he should look like.



I was supposed to be out of town this weekend. Elvis was going to stay with some friends of mine while I was gone. In return, I went to stay with them and watch their kid on Monday night. Elvis came along. He did beautifully. What a trooper that guy is! Unfortunately, at approximately 3:18 AM he woke me up. He was throwing up yarn. Traffic cone orange cotton yarn. That he had been playing with on Sunday. Can you say freak out? There was still some he was trying to barf up, but unfortunately he'd swallow it before I could catch it. I rushed him to the vet as soon as they opened. The plan was to give him fluids and laxatives and see if he could poop out the rest. No dice. So...Little Buddy had an emergency yarnectomy yesterday. The vet pulled 4 feet of yarn out of his small intestine. I picked up the 2 feet he barfed up. For those of you playing along at home, that's 6 feet of yarn.

He came home today around 2 PM. He's been going back and forth between sleeping hard and walking around the apartment. He's been locked in a cage for a few days now, you see. He's eaten a little and seems to be doing well. Somehow I think he's going to recover from this before I do.

You really need to see this.

My precious...my precious, or I seem to have turned this into a sewing blog. Sorry 'bout that.

My sewing machine has been acting up on me. It's a great little machine, really. It has metal parts, it's mechanical, it's a Singer. It's been a great beginner machine. The tension has been a little wacky and I'm not sure I have a way to adjust it.



Last night, I spent a few hours on the Singer website trying to find the manual for it. No dice. I was getting frustrated. My attention started to wander. I began looking longingly at new machines. I began comparing new machines. A few months ago, when I had a job I would have just bought something without thinking about it. Things have changed. I don't have a job. I have no business buying a new machine. I should just get a tune up on mine and move on. And then I saw this.


Automatic needle threader? Automatic tension? Blindstitch Hem Foot, Buttonhole Foot, General Purpose Foot, Overcasting Foot, Rolled Hem Foot, Special Purpose Foot, and Zipper Foot all included? 39 built in stitches? I can lower the feed dogs (teeth-like thingies that pull fabric) and do stipling (quilting)? Variable stitch length and width? Surely they kid. I couldn't afford this machine. Maybe I'll talk to my parents about it for my birthday.

I start surfing the Interweb looking for prices. Most places had it for about $300. Ugh. Too much. It would be a bad idea to pay a half of a rent payment on a new machine. And then I found it. HSN has it for $200.

I sent a link to my mom. In the 60's and 70's, she made her own clothes. When my parents divorced, she supported us by taking in sewing for people. She ultimately expanded that little business into doing custom home decor stuff for people too. She made good money doing it. She made almost all of my and my brother's clothes when we were little. She made me a prom dress. She made me clothes in high school. My mother knows sewing. She knows sewing machines.

Nine emails later, I was pretty sure I wanted to buy it. My best friend called me. I talked to her about it. We talk to each other about really big purchases. If one can justify it to the other and make it sound sane, then it's a good purchase. Before I went to bed, I sent her this email:

Okay. I think I am going to get it. Here's why.
1. It's regularly $300. HSN has it for $200.
2. It can do loads more than my current machine. It has something like 39 stitches, including several kinds of button holes.
3. It can do what a serger does (or what I want from a serger) without having to buy a second machine.
4. I can lower the feed dogs so I can do free motion quilting.
5. I can sew knits on this machine (goes with #3). This means I am not so limited with fabric choices when making clothing, which is something I really want to do.
6. It is all mechanical which means it will cost less to maintain. Also, the thread tension is automatic. Should only need a tune up from time to time.
7. It is a beginner model with the features of a more advanced model.
8. It includes 5 or 6 different feet which are about $15-20 each retail.
9. My mother agrees with all of this. Mary Ann knows sewing machines.
10. I have the money now.
11. My sewing has improved greatly. I think I've grown beyond my current machine which is acting up on me.
12. Making presents or items to sell will be easier and look more professional with this machine.

I updated my Facebook status to "is going to sleep on it." I went to bed. I tried to sleep. I really did. At 1:00 AM, I bought the machine. Here's what Mom had to say this morning:

Congratulations! It does seem to be a nice machine. It is full-sized, solid, heavy (important for stability), has the important features that your current machine doesn’t have (including automatic tension), and should do anything you’ll want to do on it. It is mechanical. That simply means you will manually do a couple steps to set things up where you would push one or two buttons on an electronic machine (the “next” level). Electronic machines have more things that can go wrong – specifically the electronics. Above the electronics are the computerized machines which are and can be programmed to embroider, quilt, etc. That’s basically the difference. The machine you bought – at a great price – has a lot of desirable feet included too. Happy sewing!

I have Mary Ann's blessing. My Facebook status says, "doesn't need to sleep on it. She bought the sewing machine." There's a store in town that sells used machines. I'll see if I can sell mine.

Today's project, or I told you I was bored.

I've figured out that sewing is something I can do fairly easily with this bum knee. I sit at the sewing machine, I can sit at the kitchen and cut fabric, and I can sit at the ironing board and iron if I need to. Sewing also gives me a sense of accomplishment, which frankly, is otherwise lacking from my life at the moment.

Here's what I made today.




there's gold in the fabric. i love how shiny it is with the flash

I got the "pattern" from Kelly at Drago[knit]-fly. You can find it here. Her tutorial was super easy. I made a miniature version because I had the piece I used as lining fabric left over from a project I'll post tomorrow. It was just the right size to use with an 8" zipper I had on hand which matched the outer fabric I had on hand that I don't like that much and was willing to sacrifice if it didn't work out that well. Don't you love it when a plan comes together? My only modification, aside from the size, was to leave out the interfacing. My machine is giving me trouble these days. My thread tension is all wacky and making it hard to sew more than just a couple pieces of fabric.

The more I look at the bag, the more I like that fabric. Thanks, Kelly for a great tutorial! I'm looking forward to making more of these in the larger size.

And now for something completely different, or Caution: Sewing Content!

Amanda Jean at Crazy Mom Quilts is having a 9 Patch Quilt Along. I'm joining in the fun. I bought a Honey Bun from the Hello Betty line of fabrics over at the Fat Quarter Shop. It's a 1930s reproduction. I'm not one for pastels normally, but I really like the 30s repro fabrics. The Honey Bun is a roll of fabric strips 1 1/2 inches wide by the length of the fabric, in this case it's 44". One thing that has kept me from trying quilting in the past is the cutting of the fabrics. Buying fabric that is mostly pre-cut is great! All I have to do is cut strips 4 1/2 inches long. Yay! I bought this smaller size for a couple reasons. It was on sale for $14 and this is my first quilt. I am just not ready to tackle something larger. I will have 100 blocks in the end, to get a 10x10 quilt. I will cut white muslin to go around each one, to end up with a block that's a total of 5 inches square. The Honey Bun came with strips of solid colors as well. I plan on using that for the binding. (I just mistyped Honey in that last sentence as Homey. I found that funny.) (It's okay if you think I'm crazy.) I will use a piece of white muslin for the back. I'm going for easy here, people.

Without further ado, here's my progress report. I have a total of 66 blocks so far. Each set of two strips makes 6 blocks, plus 4 individual blocks. I've done 11 sets so far, with five left to go. This will give me only 96 blocks, but with the extra squares left over, I can piece together the 4 extra blocks to get me to 100.

Mack was back!!!

Mack was back today! Yay!

The first day he came to pick me up, I asked him who he was and what company he worked for before I got in his car. Safety first, right?

Today he tells me he's going to tell me a story. He begins by reminding me that his 94 year old mother lives in Kentucky and he calls her every Sunday. He apparently he told his mom that I questioned him before I got in his car the first time. Her reaction? "She done exactly what she shoulda done," in my best Kentucky accent. Mom apparently gives him the what-for because his company doesn't provide them with any IDs and they should know better. She got all fired up about this and he had to tell her to "simmer down" at some point. We had a good laugh about it.