Sew Over It Ultimate Trousers

When I was learning to sew, I stupidly avoided asking the advice of my magical seamstress mothers who had decades of sewing experience under their belts, including long Society for Creative Anachronism careers and a stint at a costume shop when I was a baby.

Don't know why my modeling career never took off...

I made lots of stupid mistakes when I was first starting out that could have easily been avoided or rectified had I gotten over my 19 year old pride and asked for help! Lesson (at least sometimes) learned.

One such mistake was a two-for-one bargain from the very beginning. First: fitted, formal trousers as my THIRD EVER project. Stupid. Second: not pre-treating my very expensive, very beautiful plaid Mood wool suiting.

These mistakes, plus my wobbly stitch lines and "Mom I'm sorry I was stubborn earlier, I really do need your help" fly zip, meant I had a practically unwearable garment. I wore it maybe three times, each making me feel sloppier and sadder than the last. Mom tried to save it, she really did, but I had butchered that poor, beautiful fabric.

I stayed away from pants for a long time, but I'm here to tell you that pants aren't scary after all!! The Sew Over It Ultimate Trousers pattern is amazing and has helped me create the pants of my dreams!

Have I mentioned I love these pants?

FPC Square Neck Dress Hack

I love Friday Pattern Company's Square Neck top. I have 2 already, and keep finding myself envisioning more and more whenever I come across an interesting fabric.

I made plans with my best friend to go out dancing in San Francisco for New Years' Eve, and promptly tore apart my wardrobe trying to find something I wanted to wear, but nothing was quite up to muster. (Is it a coincidence that all of my formal wear is RTW and now that I'm sewing more, supremely unsatisfying? I think not.) 2017 was really rough for me personally and politically, and I wanted to send it off feeling like myself again: sparkly, happy, ready for anything...

Mission accomplished—and how cute is my BFF?!

With this in mind, I started obsessively brainstorming NYE dress options. I thought about pushing ahead one of my #2018makenine projects, a dyed Mito cami, but decided in the end that I really did want that to just be a cami rather than a dress since I don't wear dresses all that often and didn't want to waste fabric on something that would never leave my closet.

I came across this amazing black, glittery jersey fabric at Joann's and instantaneously knew it was destined to be my NYE dress. It took all of 5 minutes to decide on another iteration of the FPC Square Neck top, this time hacked to be a mini dress. Best of all? With some mad couponing skills, I got enough fabric for this project and (soon) a first try at the Watson bra/undies set for $8.