Merry Christmas Sewing

Hello! I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and is enjoying some Merry Christmas long weekend sewing! I got to work on my Gingers yesterday and on Christmas Eve. I have the zip in. But I broke a needle yesterday on my industrial straight stitch and although I found all the pieces my stitches were a mess after that. I'm still working on it. Sheesh! After finally getting my Juki industrial overlock working (it was used and missing a part so it kept breaking thread), now this. One step forward, two steps back. Ha! I hope I didn't mess up the timing somehow by breaking a needle. I don't even know how I'd know? But still, I'm getting to sew, sort of!

Here are two of my Boston Terriers in a very happy Christmas picture from a couple of years ago. I especially like the look on Larry's face (he's on the right)!

Merry Christmas weekend everyone! 

Susan

Not Me-Made But Still A Score!

It may seem like I've quit sewing since I've been away from my blog for so long. But oh no! First of all our embroidery business has still been crazy busy with Christmas right around the corner and we've been working tons. I'd love to be amazed at all the people who wait until the last minute to decide they would like something embroidered for Christmas. But I can't because that's soooo something I would do! One year right after Mr. SmileDogstitches and I were first married, we did all of our Christmas shopping on Christmas Eve! No kidding. These people are still a week out, so really I guess they're early shoppers! Nonetheless, we have been quite busy trying to squeeze in all the special orders with our regular business.

Also, my Gingers. Ah...let me just say that I probably won't attempt to make pants again without doing all of the measuring ON the pattern before I cut my fabric and baste my pieces together. You see, in the past when I would sew (no pants!), I would sew something together and if it didn't fit I would just take in the sides until it did. You can only imagine how beautifully everything fit. I think the only proper fitting I ever did was in an armscye that threatened to slice my arm off slowly throughout the day. But now that I'm "taking it up a notch" I want to do it right, short of making muslins (although I've learned to never say never). So after basting my Gingers and finding that the legs were huge and the waist a bit too big, I'm doing more work on them. I have recut the waist and back yolk pieces and taken in the legs quite a bit. We'll see where I end up!

Okay, so every now and then I like to go thrifting. In fact, I have a hard time buying retail these days. Not too long ago I scored this felted wool Gap jacket at Goodwill for $4.50! I thought it would be great to embroider my business logo on (which oddly enough looks almost exactly like my blog logo...how'd that happen?!). 

We also did the back. I didn't know Mr. SmileDogstitches was going to put the phone number on it. At first I thought wow, weird. "So hey, call me, k?" But it is my business number, not my personal number and it's much easier to jot that down than a website address. We only have one area code in our entire state so it's only 7 quick numbers. :) 

So back to finishing my Gingers. I was hoping to be finished by Thanksgiving. I wonder if I'll be finished by Christmas! New Year's? I have lots of other things I want to sew, especially when I visit everyone's blogs! But these are a great learning experience for me.

I hope you're all ready for Christmas! Hard to believe it's less than a week away!

Til later,

Susan