Tabula Rasa Jacket #2 and Other TNT Projects

Hello, lovely patient readers, lurkers and the mildly curious.  Some sewing going on here but my own blog reading or writing has fallen by the wayside in the last two weeks.  No dramatic reasons, good or bad, just too many other lovely distractions.  So here I am to play catch up and share a few projects from February.

First up is this outfit from the Fit for Art Patterns Tabula Rasa Jacket.  I made a lined tweed tone on tone version back in August Tabula Rasa Jacket #1 and this is my entirely different one suitable for FL evenings.  

Stitched wrong sides together then rolled hem edged

Thanks to my enormous collection of lightweight silks, stashed from numerous JoMar and Fabric Mart Pennsylvania trips over the last 10 or 12 years, I have plans for several more of these easy to sew jackets.  This one was made to go with black pants and also this black twist top dress which is merely the Jalie twist top Jalie 2788  lengthened and sleeveless.  The fabric is a corded slinky like fabric from Fabric Mart.  Wonderful travel dress and I am sure I will wear it frequently.  
This lightweight jacket is easy to wear although without shoulder pads my low right shoulder (which seems to be sinking lower ever year) does make the right side droop.  I'm too lazy and not vain enough to make separate right and left pattern pieces for this jacket and I figure my vivacious personality and sparkling conversation will distract you, right?  Or maybe the bold fabric combinations will blind you until I leave the scene.

Simplicity 2364

TNT patterns are always fun to sew and wear in a few days.  While Mr. Lucky was up north I made two more Pamela's Patterns Magic Pencil skirts and one of these delightful Simplicity 2364 tops,2364 review my first here in my Florida wardrobe.  

Magic Pencil Skirt from Pamela's Patterns

Now that Mr. Lucky and I are back together in the same state....yes, in Florida and in the same happy state of being...I'll have my chief photographer back as well.  He's such a help around the condo that I'll have more time to sew, than you very much.  (Aside:  I bow in awe to those of you who work outside the home, raise children, care for declining family members AND who sew, take and post pics and blog about it all....) This Tabula Rasa Jacket and Simplicity top were both projects that I started at the sewing retreat in late January.  I have one more to complete, a lovely tweedy jacket, that remains unfinished.  But also only half way finished is my latest reading project, Drums of Autumn ,fourth in a series by Diana Gabaldon.  Almost nine hundred pages and worth every page.  We celebrated my birthday yesterday rather quietly (in the midst of a week of social events otherwise.)  Rode our bikes to the new Trader Joe's in the afternoon then I made a salad that we took to the beach with wine and bread and our books for sunset.  So grateful for time and health and the ability to appreciate our many blessings.  These long distance, virtual sewing friendships are among those blessings to here's a toast to all of us connecting around the world.

Organizing Sewing Patterns

Notebook of skirt pattern envelopes

 In addition to a huge fabric stash, I have a large pattern collection .  How do you organize your patterns?  I  came up with this system a few years ago and it seems to serve me well enough.  I separate the outside envelopes from the pattern tissue and instructions.  Those envelopes I keep in binders with labels:  Dresses,  Jackets, Lingerie, etc.  Then I put the pattern tissue and instructions in quart plastic bags and file them in a storage cabinet by pattern company and numerical order.  Generally this is how a fabric store would organize things: look at the catalog for a pattern you want then go to the drawer to locate it.  Of course, oversized patterns and Burda magazines are the exception to the rule but I have fewer of those to keep track of in the collection.

Drawer full of patterns in plastic sleeves

I used to keep a notebook of sewing projects, making notes each time I sewed the pattern.  I did find this enormously helpful as I started sewing more fashion sewing projects.  Today I don't maintain this notebook procedure as rigorously.  I'm more careful to make a fitting muslin each time and have an adjusted pattern that I can trust.  I also have a better number of TNT patterns that I know fit me and only adjust some design features (collars, sleeves, front edges)  And now that I am blogging more regularly this blog and the pattern reviews are good reminders as to what adjustments I made and lessons learned from each pattern.

Jalie 2788

  My sewing yesterday was focused on items I found in the "unfinished project pile."  I made Jalie 2788 into a navy knit sample dress back in October before making the final version in brown  Jalie twist top into a dress posting.  The navy is too dark a color for me to wear regularly as a dress so I cut it off and made it into a sleeveless top.

I should be working on the March jacket a month but found a tweed bias skirt already cut out yesterday.  So I'm going to work on this skirt and "get 'er done."  Since we've got a major bathroom remodel project going on down the hall (and discovering all sorts of surprises when the cabinets came out) I've decided to focus on simple projects this week.   Next week we should have those surprises resolved and I'll be able to focus on a more challenging sewing project.

Want to see some before pics?  We had a large master bath with huge mirrors and a very yellowed un-used arcylic jet tub.  Big changes coming.  No master bath tub (there's a bathtub down the hall) and double sinks along one wall plus no more bulheads looming overhead with ugly flourescent lighting.   Surprises, you ask?  Well, one sink had a slow leak going on and the other wall will have to be re-sheetrocked since a pipe edge is 1/2 " too wide into the room.

Notice how the old sink was crunched into that corner.

Bye bye yellowed acrylic tub (or planter box,whichever you prefer.)

Good bye bulkheads