5k Badassery

Giraffy and I did 3 miles last night, on the official June Corona Del Mar 5k course (hills and all).  Our time was 3 minutes better than last time.  Ha.  So was our moving average. 

Last year, giraffy and I used to do .5 mile on the elliptical and collapse into a hot tub with a beer, completely worn out, saying unflattering things about ellipticals, treadmills, and their relatives.  We also did pretty slow and leaisurely walks on the peninsula, followed by a local serving establishment.  I don't recall breaking much of a sweat ever.  Except the one time, when we walked in the sand - then the sweating freaked us out and we immediately turned back, having only gone may be 1/4 mile past the beer. 

We stepped it up with gym visits this year,  and a really modified, relaxed 'Couch to 5K' program.  Walk 90 seconds, run 30, swear a little while walking 90 seconds, rinse, repeat. 

Now we meet to run practice 5k's.  I'm so pleased and proud of us.  Gym buddy system WIN!  Yesterday we alternated walking and running a block.  I think next week we'll try alternating running 2 blocks, walking one.  I'll spring it on Giraffy and see how it pans out.  Ha. 

The significant others took off in a flurry of heels, and Mr Snork was last seen with a vicious calf/hamstring cramp combination (two different legs), and talking about Mr Giraffy "bouncing like Tigger".   Haaa. 

Butterick 4790 - Walkaway Dress - Complete and Tested.

I wore the finished Walkaway dress to work Monday - it hasn’t fallen apart, and I haven’t noticed any sideways stares. Score. A few people even said nice things about it, and I'm not counting the co-workers who knew I was playing home made that day, and felt obligated to say someting nice, to prevent office awkwardness. 

I am pretty pleased with it. In retrospect, I may have gone with a milder fabric choice. Giraffy shared that it would be good for upholstering pillows. I told her SHE was a pillow.. but, in reality, a screaming bright orange is probably best for sundresses and sheaths, and not fluffy 50’s half gowns. Hard to blend in at your local Flame Broiler at lunch time.

It took me 4- 5 days, a lot of the time spent staring at it and ripping stitches because I am too lazy to baste, but not good enough to not have to baste.

Surprisinly, it doesn’t do any of the nasty things it’s accused of doing by most people – the front doesn’t ride up, and the shoulder seams appear to stay put. There *is* a gaping armhole issue, for which I have read people put in snaps. I thought about trying to dart the sides a bit, but this will require removing bias tape. Yeghkh. The front bit fits really well, though. 

I cut the shoulders narrower and neckline smaller, preemptively, since that was people’s biggest gripe.

I also went back and made the bust darts twice as deep, so the chest area didn’t gape awkwardly.

Made the skirt a half circle + couple inches darted in back. I think the way the bias lays in the half circle as opposed to full circle made the hip/butt area much nicer than full circle had. It also cut the weight of the back wrap piece. I really like the way the skirt turned out.

Made my own (not so straight, sigh) version of bias tape for the skirt front(s).

I cut the front pieces of the orange fabric lower, because I didn’t like the ‘girdle’ look it gave me when fastened high across waist.

Lastly, I ran a piece of cross grain ribbon as the belt – and stitched it to the inside of the skirt at the waist seam, which probably helps it stay at the waist where it ought.

See?  I'm outside.  I took it public.  I ain't ashamed.  :D

I can walk, sit, get in and out of the car in it, etc.  The back is not entirely smooth, but I'm not sure how ti fix that.  I'm really pleased with it, and might try it again with a different fabric - jersey may be?

Stampin Up! and Picking up Hobbies in Driveways.

I woke up late Saturday, and just rolled out of bed early enough (10:30) to meet Giraffy at the Irvine Farmers Market - which deserves a post of its own.  But, there went my plans to frolic garage sales and look for old sewing patterns, which is a tragedy that must be fixed.  After all, last weekend was camping in Utah, and nobody holds garage sales in the desert sand dunes, so, I'm having withdrawals.

We got up at 6:30 (a new record) because somebody advertised an antique sewing machine - and, logically - where there's a sewing machine, there's a larg(er) chance of sewing pattterns.   Jesse doctored me up a thermos of tea (with lemon and fresh mint leaves from the Awesome Farmer's Market), stopped for a Starbucks for himself, because he claims their mochas can not be replicated in a home environment, and I can't argue because he makes me thermoses of tea at 6 am..  and off we went.

The antique sewing machine didn't come with patterns, but there was a black top and jjill skirt I fancied (and dragged home for a $1) as well as some pin striped Gap wool slacks.  They're beautiful, and I can't limit my wardrobe just because the weather in SoCal does not cooperate with my wool/suede/leather obsession.  Not when it's hung in front of me for a $1, anyway.  Plus, we visit my mom in Chicago fairly often.

We were off to the next place, where 'antique' stuff looked promising - I like old sewing patterns, and old things tend to hang out together, and antique and old are often interchangeable, especially where CL garage sales ads are concerned, so, again, promising.  I never found out, though, and will have to live another week with my current stash of patterns (and since currently I make one dress every 27 years, this shouldn't be a problem).  What I DID find, though, was a lady selling parts of her giant and awesome stamp collection.

Do I stamp?  Nope.  I own some stamps, because I've always wanted to, in the same way I own a guitar and two surfboards.  It's a pretty small collection of 5-6 items that Michael's Dollar Bin had to offer.  But this chick had, like, cases of stuff.  Two boxes, and a table, and a tower thingy.  Jesse went to look through the electronics box, and I didn't look up for 15 minutes.  

I n t r o d u c i n g..  my new hobby :

I started out with half that, but ended up going back.  So many colors.  Flowers.  Bubbles.  Must.  Look.  Again.  When we came back, I mentioned that I was going to make my own wedding invitations, and I was nosing around for flowery things that would go with the theme.  C, the owner of all the awesomeness offered to look through her 'upstairs stash' of wedding specific stuff.  And we did.  And she let me pick some out.

I love the 'going to the chapel' stamp!  Yeep! 

"C" makes cards and they were pretty amazing.  The kind of cards you see in little boutiques, I wish I had gotten a couple or at least have taken a picture.  They were adorable and so well made and pretty..   I did, take her phone number though.  She mentioned getting together to may be watch her make cards, so I was pretty stoked.  But, it could have been, like a, "OMG, get out of my driveway already, what ELSE do you want" kinda of thing.  Hard saying.  Still, stoked.

My first handmade stamp card!

After a little while, I moved on from paper.

I've had a collection of sand dollars from NorCal's sand dollar beach sunning on my porch for a while now.

May be I could just send sand dollars as invites?  Might require bubble wrap..

I kinda wanna go back and see what other stuff she has I may have missed.  Is that bad?

Jesse walked away with a little Ipod speaker thing that he's been looking for camping (falling asleep to tent music?  Yes!!)  

It appears that it's in good working order, he was dancing along to some obnoxious 50 cent songs in the garage today, moving stuff around.  Camping AND garage speakers.  Score.  And some headphones.  $2.  I love that he can hang out with a box of electronics and driveway scenery the time it takes me to space out at shiny things, tour somebody's home, and find more things (that weren't even for sale) to drag home and play with.  I think I got lucky with him.  I mentioned the thermos of tea, right?

Sewing pattern fail.  But then I remembered how I scored this for 10c in a driveway couple weeks ago, and it all became OK.

I might sacrifice a few of Jesse old shirts for this one.  Blue?  Pin Stripe?  That is, if tomorrow's Walkaway Dress Debut goes well at work.  If not, I'll call "C", get some stamping tips and forget this sewing thing ever happened.  Hee.  

Camping Hair a Success, Must Collect Bacon Grease (unrelated to hair)

Just like I thought, it was being sneaky and I woke up Thursday morning feeling faintly waxy.  I mentally resolved to chop it all off at camp after the first bike ride.  Then I proceeded to sleep 2-3 hours while Jesse drove, since the 5am roads hold nothing for me but a bad mood. 

However, by the time we drove a couple hundred miles into Utah, and past a Starbucks, I softened up, and as Jesse was ordering out lunch from Wendy's, I grabbed a handful of those lemons they have (for water, presumably) and squeezed them liberally all over my hair.  Then I packed some more lemons into a plastic baggy (for camp tea) along with plastic utensils (Thanks, Wendy's!) and spent some time in the bathroom splashing water on my hair, in a rinsing-combing through combo under some pretty unimpressed glares.  They don't know what it's like.  Desperate times. 

I figured, if it continued to melt down, I had time and a couple more towns with fast food restaurants before the official Middle of Nowhere to barricade myself in the bathroom and squirt hand soap liberally all over my hair (the offical No Poo Fail) before reaching camp and no running water.

It must have been intimidated into submission, or it likes lemon.  Either way, it behaved beautifully Thu, Fri, Sat, and Sunday, and if it wasn't for dust/bugs/ashes, I could have rolled with it Monday. 

Key points:
1.  No Poo Win.
2.  Hair might like rinses. 

I keep the Hair bound up in Buffs when we camp and ride. 

It goes under my helmet and stretches over my neck for riding (I have a bug phobia, and a perpetual fear one will drop down my shirt when riding), and the rest of the time, and since the helmet wrecks my bangs into a sideways mohawk, it's a headband.  Or an eyepatch, when I'm not sure if I have a scrap of contact lens stuck in my eyelid, or if I've finally rubbed a scab into the inside of my eyelid (piece of contact lens, it turned out).  It prevent windblown hair mess, and more importantly, horrible things like getting hair caught in the bike chain??!  The things you read on the internet...

The Buff and I enjoying a day old pork chop:

The Buff and I resting:

I must not have a picture of where it's pulled over my head, tube like, with a face opening.  Not very attractive, anyway.  Effective for bug control.  I also have a wool one.  So.  Rad. 

Oh.  I also used Dr Bronner Magic soap on the camp dishes, during camp "showers", and Jesse used it to semi-effectively rid his hands of the gasoline smell.  That happens, when you spend all night stuffing gas into beer bottles and making makeshift bombs. 

In a semi related story - some girls came over from a campsite over, and dropped some knowledge on me.  APPARENTLY - if you collect bacon grease into a tin can, and then heat that can over fire till it burns purple, and then spear a water bottle onto the end of a LONG (key) stick, and dump water into grease, you can achieve a 20 foot high grease fire.  I am ALL OVER bacon grease for the next 6 months. 

Camping Chronicles, Hair Suspicious-ness.

I'm in the car moving fast toward Moab, UT (stopping in Vegas for the 5 hour night) and all I can think about is my hair.

It was being atrocious, on and off. This last time, it was really magical. Giraffy has taken to rubbing her head with an intriguing mixture of honey and baking soda (I've tried both separately and the experiences has given me very little faith in their teamwork, but she loves it so far), so she offered for me to try the Peppermint Shampoo bar from BlueBonnet Trails, I have been using random bits of soap, like it, and mostly Dr Bronner's. At the height of madness I went out and got Dr Bronners Magic Rinse, which I'm undecided on. I think it might be a splash too oily for my thin, limp hairycles. But it's also a little magical. And expensive. But as a short term "fix", it worked - I'll do oily before waxy any day.
Anyway, the bar, last friday, and it was all pinkness and fluffyness. (Granted + diluted rinse). It's soft, nice, clean, NON waxy, and has lasted 4 good days, started getting oily today, but still very wearble. Then again, the waxy has r e a l l y lowered the bar, but I think its pretty great.
And now, I'm freaking out - we're going camping, which was 80% reason for starting 'no poo'. I got some liquid Bronner (for hair, body, and dishes) and the Plan is to wash tonight and make it till sunday. It's cold in Utah right now. I have washed my hair out of a precariously balanced jug on my tailgate before in 20' and it ain't pretty.
I think I can hear it conspiring. I will wake up tomorrow, at 5am, for the 6 hour drive, and it will be a giant clump of wax. I didn't pack the magic rinse, either. Trying to really pare down this trip, we always have enough stuff to form a permanent settlement out in desert. Anyway. I have vision of waxy helmet head (if I can pry helmet off). I think it lulled me into false hope and is waiting to strike at my weakest. I have very, very little faith in it behaving. It has officially made me crazy.

But I see Vegas lights! :D

(By the way, we're not staying in Bellagio. We're staying at Econolodge, where they let us back truck to window, and jesse can sleep with a firearm pointed at the window, lest someone rattle one of the 19 chains we got running through our bikes and gear. But, Bellagio does look pretty. Ha)
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Walkaway Dress, continued.

So, I measured Nora, and she matched my measurements on the shoulders, and boobs.  The waist is within an inch.  Hips are smaller by 1.5".  And yet, dress on Nora is not the same as dress on me:

Why does the boob area take a vertical shrink?  Anyway.  It's all very girdle like.

I am supposed to be getting ready for a camping trip and leaving for Utah tonight, so I had limited time.  I had Jesse pin up the shoulders, in a fashion that produced least gaping and puckering in the back, and I cut into the front, to lower it. 

This way, a dress on Nora is still not the same as dress on me, but I think the lowered front looks better?  I chopped two inches off the top of the front in cetner, curving out to sides.  It must be the 3 slices of pineapple pizza, in my stomach they're eating up all the slack.  Again, consult Nora and me.  WTF.  Any lower, and Nora's unmentionables would be bared, but on me, I'd probably be above belly button.   I must remeasure Nora, somewhere an extra 6 inches have snuck in.  I am feeling very stumpy-torso-ed. 

To achieve the look on the pattern front picture, looks like front might need even more chopping:

To be continued..

Butterick 4790 (6015) Walkaway Dress Part 1

I got the pattern (finally!) this weekend, rummaging through the unopened stock boxes in the back of JoAnns, and it's supposed to be super cool because you're meant to start it after breakfast and 'walk away in it to lunch".   I started after lunch, and could have possibly walked away in it to dinner, if the neighbor didn't text about a party she was having.  Even though I left early, it appears I can not sew a straight line after 4 jello shots, (jello shots.  true story) so it is no longer a one day dress. 

I was trying very hard to use up some fabrics in my stash (of random clearance fabrics, garage sale finds, things that possibly used to be drapes, etc).  But I needed two fabrics that went well together, which is hard when you shop by colour, pattern, and shock value. 

JoAnn's had:

and

I just about fell over at the sight of bright pink, yellow, orange and red, all splashed about liberally.  I spent a considerable amount of time spacing out and staring at the flowers, to see if I could match the pattern at the center back seam of the circle skirt.  May be if JoAnn's bolt didn't run out 20" too short, I could have.  No matter, though, because currently pinned to Nora, it appears I will need to make it a half circle skirt.  It is a lot of skirt as it is currently.  I could seriously sneak small children into movie theaters for free with that thing. 

It's not put together yet, everything is held to Nora by pins.  So far I have done the front (black) piece, all darted, and it all goes poorly, it might make a nice dress all by itself.  If I make a back for it. 

The back top and bottom/front orange skirt are two pieces that I pinned on.  I could manage the pinning on jello shots. 

I also read the 30 reviews on PatternReview.com, and I am now sufficiently intimidated.  It appears that you need either stellar sewing skills, or boobs to pull off this dress.  As it usually goes, I have neither. 

Stellar sewing skills come in handy for the million alteration this pattern (apparently) needs.  I don't know, it looks OK on Nora.  I have made the shoulders narrower and higher, preemptively, since everyone on the internet who's made one before me has had to do this. 

The boobs come in handy, because, in the apron-like construction of the dress, the front is a small sheath thing, and the back is a giant circle skirt, which wraps around to the front and weighs most of the 4.5 yards of fabric that this dress requires.  So, the back, I hear pulls on the front, making it ride up.  Unless you have boobs, which fit into the darts on the front, and I don't know.. weigh down the waist?  As non haver of boobs, it's hard to speculate as to what they might do.  But, it is commonly accepted by people who have made this dress, that having them is good for this dress. 

I plan to:

1.  Make the back a half circle skirt, and if it's unwearable, I will flare out the front, as well, giving it more weight, and room for knees.  Also, I saw on somebody's blog.. which I can't find now, a version of the dress with the wide contrast hem at the bottom, so I think, 4" black hem at bottom.

or

2.  Keep full circle, still flare the front, and cut both skirts to about knee length.  + the above hem. 

or

3.  Keep it as is, and only wear it in house, like, when entertaining guests.  That way, if it's gaping, a little indecent and funny looking, I'm surrounded by kind and gentle people who will tactfully ignore it.

I'm also thinking a ridiculous petticoat might enhance any and all of these options.  I have seen these at thrift shops, thinking how sad it was I had nothing to wear over one.

I'm a little torn about altering the skirt.  Making the skirt less full takes away from the 50's look, and might make it even more apron-like.  But I also don't think having that much fabric around my hips is going to be a flattering look.  I'll find out tonight. 

I haven't sewn in a while, so I'm all types of excited.  And, I get to use all the random sewing stuff I continually pick up at garage sales for next to nothing.  30 year old chalk pencils?  I think I will.  Turns out they work!  (I have learned the hard way, that 30 year old thread, for the most part, does NOT.)

UPDATE (Day 2).  Instead of bloggying a whole new post.  The dress is still not done.  With the upcoming Utah trip, it might be a week dress.  Oops.  I spent all of yesterday evening re-cutting the skirt. 

I made it a half circle skirt, so, cutting it in half.  I cheated a little because I freaked out and thought it wouldn't be full enough if I chopped it in half, so, it's like a 200' skirt.  Extra 20' are darted on the hips in the back.  It is plenty full, still.  I got that idea on a vintage sewing website I found, I hope to have their chapter on skirts memorized at some point:

The half circle skirt has grain running down the sides, which makes it fall flat on the sides, and bunch up in the middle and back.  I'm not sure why, but it works.  It ends up rippling uniformly all around.  (I also have the extra darted fabric in back).  Cutting it the way pattern indicates with full circle, the grain runs down the center front and back, causing those areas to lay flat (good thing) but bunch up on the hips (I looked like a truckload when I put it on, which is what spurred the skirt modification before the dress ever had a chance to come together).   I am guessing, and with pettycoats, in the 50's they wanted the ballgown look.  I'm trying to avoid it. 

All the chopping at new waistline will have also brought up the hem 3" or so, which pleases me.  Right side hasn't been chopped yet.  I folded the front in a bit so you can see the "look".  The way it hangs by itself, it looks like a solid skirt. 

 

And the back view:

It is still a ridiculously full skirt, so I don't feel like I've completely changed the pattern.  Next up is the center back.  When I put it on, there's some gaping happening, everywhere.  It appears if I bring up the shoulders (like all the 30 reviews said) it gets better.  The waist sides and the armpits should come  up, too.  The armholes will need work also. 

2 days and counting. Ha.