OT: My new GranDOGhter

I see German shepherd in there -- we had a shepherd when I was a kid which was very small for his breed -- he'd been the runt of the litter, and this doggie reminds me of him.

Thanks for the lovely compliment. Raechel (the SMDGD) does take a nice photo but trust me, she can be totally hell on wheels a good bit of the time!! Also, Aspen is a she doggie, not a he. I tell my DSonIL, just like I tell DH, they both have a harem, just not all humans -- LOL! CiaoMeow >^;;^<

PAX, Tia Mary >^;;^< (RCTQ Queen of Kitties) Angels can't show their wings on earth but nothing was ever said about their whiskers! Visit my Photo albums at

Congrats on the new addition! She looks like a happy dog, and a not much shedding pooch - which after the amounst of white stuff I'm finding everywhere seems like a blessing. I'm sure she's thrilled to have a girl of her own, and a family.

AH -- but you guys forget that I am a professional seamstress. People have been paying me to make this stuff for about twenty five years. What can I say, I have gotten fairly good at it and fast too from all that practice -- LOL. It'll really make you frown when I tell you it took me about eight hours to make the dress -- cutting fabric, construction, finish work etc. :-)! Disgusting isn't it? Then again, the dress is just a front and back with sleeves so there were only five pattern pieces to it. And for who asked, I got the fabric at Joanne's in Lizard Land. DD and I picked out that one, a sheer with snowmen, one with holly and a fourth that was sort of a sheer plaid. We laid the bolts on the cutting table and let the SMDGD choose the one she liked.

On 10/30/06 11:08 AM, "Tia Mary" wrote:

I'm not surprised that it took you only 8 hours. It's not huge, and with a simple pattern, voila. It does look nice. OTOH, I'd be happy to be sewing something that wasn't complicated these days...Today or tomorrow is the day I'm going to finally finsih my new bodice sloper, so I can fit it, then do the sloper for the "original" design - which I'd like to have all drafted, and put together in the trial version before class. I have to find some light/drapey cheap stuff to do that - as I splurged on the gorgeous rust & black silk Devore velvet for the real creation. And found black silk chiffon to line it and am not cutting into that until the fitting garment has been done, fitted and I can redraft the correct pattern.

I'm just amazed that you're done so far ahead of the holiday - you must be doing more ;^)

Lots of fun. I, OTOH, have had 3 days in a row at the fabulous G-Street Fabrics - once to pick up the velvet with the 30% off coupon (1/customer/day). Then, Saturday - with my "client/friend" for whom I'm doing Breakfast room and kitchen curtains. After much ado - we picked a lovely abstract leaves print (she doesn't like "flowers, fruit, nuts, tea pots, red, little patterns...). But, there was some lovely deep cinnamon color that matched the glaze coat on their newly painted kitchen, so.... And, of course, as there were 2 of us, I had to also get some lovely, green and rusty with some golds and fuchsia in a stretch velvet - yummy to touch. Great. And nice lovely braid to trim the tie-backs with. Go to her house. Show one of the DDs the fabric - rest of family not interested. Go home.

8:30 PM - phone call "they all don't like the fabric - can we return it and find something else?" So, ends up we deliver bolt back to them (all 11.5 yds) then we go to Dim Sum at Chinese restaurant in same SC (home of the DC sniper shooting of the FBI lady), figure it'll take them awhile, and finally find family wandering, overwhelmed through aisles of decorator fabric. Amazingly - the husband (my old officemate) actually has seemingly better taste, or a better eye for these things than his wife - who likes very, very, bland stuff. DH says it's because she's out of the comfort zone - as she's a brilliant analytical person who is quite well known in the Artificial Intelligence world - so when dealing with something unfamiliar - it's overanalysis - so she's wandering with paint chips, a 2" tile, a 4" tile, and looking way up close to see if the colors are exact. My DH is rambling around pulling down several feet of fabric and draping it and telling her to look that way. A fun time. But, we did find some interesting small curlicue pattern, and...brown textured microfiber ultra-suede that I'm going to trim them with, and the original braid matches. But, to be sure - we went to the quilting section. Talk about overload. Did find a print that kind of couples the 2 fabrics, so now I think I'm going to do the brown for the tiebacks, and the curtain border, and do bias-strip curlicues appliqued on top of the brown. So, the 6 hour projet is now going to take a bit longer, I fear. But, at least they're happy. And I didn't kill them - though the folks I know who work at G-Street were laughing at me. One of my classmates that works there just kept saying "you might as well work here" .

ellice

Hi,

Oh how sweet they both are, the grandaughter and grandog. I think they could be right about shepherd cross lab. I guess the colouring comes from the labrador.

We have a springer cross lab and she looks like a short legged black lab.

Tomorrow I am going to get my first look at our new pooch. She is only

9 days old and again is a springer spaniel cross lab. Spotty this time though not all black.

I'm going to take the video camera along and take some pics.

Regards,

Carol

Tia Mary wrote:

ellice wrote: I'm not surprised that it took you only 8 hours. It's not huge, and with a

This is terrible -- you shouldn't be allowed to talk about this type of fabric supplier!!! I only have Joann's and a few home dec. fabric places -- VBS! I won't even talk about the trouble you are going through with the garment fittings & adjustments. I know what you are talking about and I FEEL your pain. DD is a large woman and when we went to look for a pattern for her wedding gown, she fell in love with a Vogue pattern -- of course -- LOL! It only went to a sz 20 and she was about a 24 at the time so I had some serious alterations ahead of MOI. Add to that the whole dress was cut on the BIAS and it got to be a lot of fun. The gown was a shimmery satin with lace overlay on the bodice and sheer lace sleeves. The satin was only about $10.00/yd but the lace was just a few bucks shy or $200.00/yd (at Joanns)-- and I needed three yards of it! Fortunately for MOI, Joann's was still printing 50% off coupons so I got the lace for a veritable pittance -- LOLOL! Anyway, good luck with all the fittings, etc. Keep us posted and take a photo when the garment is finished, OK? CiaoMeow >^;;^<

PAX, Tia Mary >^;;^< (RCTQ Queen of Kitties) Angels can't show their wings on earth but nothing was ever said about their whiskers! Visit my Photo albums at

Sorry - not gloating. It's one of those things that sometimes you forget to appreciate. The Joann's here is simply terrible - at least the ones I've been to. However, there are a couple of Hancock's which used to be Minnesota Fabrics, and they're pretty decent. For decorating stuff, they often have mill end runs that normally aren't sold retail like that to the consumer - so they're about 1/3 the price. But, there's also a lot of whatever. I buy my linings for curtains there, and some deco fabric, accessories, and they do carry some Mettler and Gutterman - and there's always some sale, with a

40% coupon. With G-street around, I tend to use them for garment fabrics, and quilting. There are also several good quilt shops within about an hour or so. I'm kind of picky about fabrics if I'm going to sew, hence, I'd rather pay a little more for great quality fabrics - but then, I don't sew a lot of "casual" stuff - though I'm doing some casual, artsy type suits (had a splurge on Vogue patterns at 75% off at Hancock). I don't like the quality of the fabric in the quilting cottons as well at Hancock, though I did buy some really nice cottons for summer garment sewing - not investment clothing

- but fun.

A couple of years back, my DA had a quilt in the AQS Nashville show (you may vaguely remember me talking about this;) and I went with her for the trip. It was great - I took some interesting classes, did way too much shopping, etc. But, at the luncheon - IIRC for those with quilts in the exhibit, etc

- the keynote speaker was Jinny Beyer. My DA spends way too much time alone, she's very attractive - retired surgeon - but has the need to really do the always topping someone's story - which I think is from living alone, and not socializing as much as she should - lots of e-social contacts, but not so much in person - she was a shy kid, and it shows wierdly in a 65 yr old, Anyhow - at our table of 12, the ladies were very nice, and all talking about stuff - next thing - my aunt blurts out "my niece knows Jinny" Well, yeah, her shop is about a 20 min drive from the house (it's 5 min from Puckster's vet). They all started ooohing and aaahing - and when I told them that my 2nd ever quilting class was at the shop - for many sessions - and she even came in and gave us personal attention, etc. they were just thrilled for me. Brought it home - while I was kicking my aunt to shut up, at the same time I had to realize that all these talented women from greater, middle America were really envious of this little thing, and that they did such beautiful work while relying on a heck of a lot of on-line shopping.

So, anytime you want to visit - or if you're having a hard time finding anything - LMK. They're generous with swatches.

I had never really thought about doing slopers before, but when I agreed to do some custom sewing for my Indian friend, it seemed like a good class to take - making a sloper. So, I did the bodice class, and then the pants class. Honestly - I finally learned a bunch, got the textbooks on Pattern Drafting & the art of Fabric Draping by Connie Amaden-Crawford - worth every penny (plus she was here for a few days and I did some short course/lectures and was able to get the books from her at wholesale price). It really made a difference for me in fitting. The first commercial pattern I went to use, made the adjustments that I saw based on my sloper pattern, and the muslin was 90% right on target. Just needed a little bit of adjustment. And pants now, the sloper fits so well that it's pretty easy to take a commercial pattern and make it look as if it were done for my particular size. So, now I'm committed to doing fitting garments on anything in pricey fabric. The more casual things - I'm okay adjusting the pattern, and doing some fitting

- but not on the expensive silks, etc. It just doesn't take that long to do the muslin - and I find that then remarking - or drawing a new pattern (I end up using the pellon with the grid or dots) if I'm going to do it again - else, the big roll of tracing paper works just fine - is pretty quick, and then I'm not worried doing the real thing.

And Vogue zises are what they are - not anything bigger. I don't even look at the size number anymore - just the measurement and go for the one that will fit the biggest part, then adjust as I need to.

I'm sure it was gorgeous. Such a lot of work to do wedding gowns. The lace must've been spectacular - good thing about the coupon! Well, actually - I did look at your stuff on your webshots page - some mighty fine sewing there!