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After two weeks of housesitting, and a great deal of confusion over too many weekend plans, I ended up staying home and sewing. Well, and enjoying some friends-getting-an-apartment-celebratory-cocktails and movies, but you know, whatever. Most of the weekend I was stitching away. My mending is almost entirely caught up (except for a hem on some wool winter slacks and replacing a liner in another pair of slacks that I probably won't ever actually replace and the slacks will sit in my mending pile until the end of days), and I made myself a superfun and flippy new skirt.
As the days have been getting hotter and hotter, I have been wanting some easy-to-wear, lightweight, mostly-doesn't-touch-my-body clothes that aren't completely ugly or falling apart (like last summer's hang-out threads). In my scrap basket I had a bunch of unbleached muslin that I think was once some "curtains" an old landlord had stapled to the wall, completely unhemmed. Cripes, I've lived in some shitholes. Anyway, I obviously replaced the curtains and kept the fabric. What better than unbleached muslin for summer wear? Cheap, easy, and forgiving. After just a couple of hours I had turned it into a gored skirt (v. flattering) with a nice wide waistband with a channel for a drawstring waist (no zippers in summerwear!). Then I spent hours and hours while watching a Project Runway marathon hand stitching the hem. Is there anyway to get a decent looking, machine stitched hem? Because for a simple, easy, quick skirt like the one I have in mind hand stitching is much too time consuming. Of course, I'm thinking the waist tie will be a handknitted i-cord (maybe with some dangly beads or something), but I'd much rather sit and knit than hand sew something. Anyway, pictures to follow.
There's a Threads magazine article about machine-stitching a blind hem...if I have a second to unearth my back issues I will try to let you know what issue it was in. However, having attempted it, I can say it requires some serious machine-handling mojo to actually get the technique to work.
You could also try a rolled hem foot for light fabrics. This took me some getting used to, but now that I've gotten the hang of it, it's quite useful.
Hilatron, thanks for the tips! I'll look for this Threads article. I really, really hate handstitching hems.
Keep up the great work on your blog. Best wishes WaltDe
