I just arrived in Portland today for Quilt Market! Quilt Market is a trade show for the quilting and sewing industry to show off their new fabric lines and products to shop owners and press. In addition to seeing The Fabrics (one of my favorite reasons to go!) I get to meet tons of great people who are all passionate about sewing. I know this may be strange for me to say as a person whose business is almost entirely online, but there is still absolutely NO replacement for meeting people face to face and talking shop in person. I have gotten invaluable advice, feedback and information at each Quilt Market I have attended which in turn has really helped me grow my leetle business. Which feels less and less “leetle” every day, actually. The other fun thing about Quilt Market this time around is that Cloud9 will be previewing Fanfare, my new line of flannels (coming in August), which I am BEYOND thrilled about, and all of the Tsuru Geranium Dresses are here on display as well. Yay!!!
One thing that’s been really fun for me is making things to wear on the floor when I go. You might not know this, but almost exactly a year ago I was stitching up the very first Washi Dress in Rashida‘s awesome washi tape fabric the night before I left for my first ever Quilt Market. It wasn’t until I wore the dress to a Quilt Market event last spring and got so much positive feedback from everyone on it that I realized that maybe I should try to do a women’s pattern. When I got home, I started working like crazy on it. That’s where I was a year ago, pre-Washi-hype. It amazes me sometimes to think about that, in retrospect. It’s a little crazy, actually, how much has happened in a year, and I have to tell you that I feel nothing but gratefulness to all of you guys, for how you received that pattern and helped make it a success.
The Washi Dress is a pretty hard act to follow, but I did make a few new things to wear to Quilt Market this year, including this cute little dress that I wanted to show you today. Melody brought some samples from her new line for Kokka, Ruby Star Polka Dot, to Camp Stitchalot a couple weeks ago, and I ended up swiping a little over a half a yard of this awesome arrow print. I’ve been dying over this design (and if we must be truthful, the whole line) ever since I first saw Melody’s sneek peeks on her Instagram. It’s debuting at this Market, so don’t worry you will see tons of pictures of this in my Instagram feed. I’m also completely in love with the ridiculously awesome Staple Dress April made for Melody out of the blue version of this print too. Maybe Melody will wear it at the same time and we can be twinsies.
Anyway, when I realized I had just enough fabric to cut it down the middle and make a little dress out of it, I was suddenly crazy inspired to design something super simple that would really show off the print. I wanted the lace yoke to be see-through, so I didn’t line it, just bound all the edges with off white voile. There’s no closures so it just pulls on over my head, but it’s roomy enough that it works. I hope this does the print justice. I also left the selvage visible at the bottom on purpose so that people could see Melody’s name and the name of the line, and I la-la-LOVE how that looks! That idea was totally a brainchild of my Michigan homegirls at the last local meetup where I started working on it — you guys are awesome for suggesting that I leave it, I’m so glad I did!
This is way more leg than I will ever probably show with this dress, ACK. Hot-cha-cha you guys {*a little embarrassed*}. I think I will be wearing it with skinny jeans underneath instead. What do you think? Do you love this print as much as I do?
The weekend before last I had the privilege to teach at Camp Stitchalot, a sewing retreat here in Michigan that is hosted by my friend Brenda over at Pink Castle Fabrics. I finally got my photos uploaded and labeled today so you can experience the fun and awesomeness vicariously through my photostream.
I was thrilled that Katy Jones, Melody Miller, and Rashida Coleman-Hale were also “counselors” for the weekend. We had so much fun together, and it was great to get to know these incredibly talented ladies a bit more.
Katy (pictured above), who is just as hilarious and endearing in real life as on her blog, has already written a couple of posts about Camp that are really great — so if you want to get a sense for what the weekend was like, you should really read her posts here, and here. She really summed it up for me with these words:
“Camp is all about hanging out with like minded people and not feeling like a nerd for wanting to sew non-stop for 3 days.” – Katy Jones
It’s so true. It was amazing how much sewing 30 people produced in three days. The thing that really made this weekend so amazing and fun was hanging out with so many different, fantastic people: women of all ages, sewing abilities, and interests. We had so much fun together. The sewing is great, but the experience of making new friends, talking, and laughing together is rather more important.
You can peruse my photos in the gallery below; if you click through to each one there’s more information. You can also view my whole Camp Stitchalot set together.
Registration is also open now for Camp Stitchalot August 2013, so you if can, don’t pass up this opportunity to sew, sew, sew your heart out this summer! The counselor lineup is amazing for that session, as well (geared more toward quilting rather than general sewing this time around), and there are sure to be even more fun weekends ahead from Pink Castle.
Last week it got up to 80 degrees, and we pulled out the kiddie pool one afternoon…and I started making shorts for the kids. I was a little disappointed because I had just finished these velveteen Parsley Pants for Clementine during Kids’ Clothes Week and had figured I’d get at least a couple of weeks of wear out of them before we had to put them away for fall. But (thanks, Michigan!) now it’s cold again. I had to pull all my plants inside last night, and there is a freeze warning out again tonight. So it’s appropriate that Clementine has been wearing these for the past three days straight.
Wouldn’t you wear them every day, if you had a pair of pants this awesome? These were inspired by my friend Emily’s velveteen pair for her daughter Phoebe (first pic in this post).
A genius stroke with the pattern matching across the back seam, if I do say so myself. Not on purpose, of course. I can only pattern-match when I’m NOT trying.
I made a flat-front waistband and pouch pockets (both are options in the pattern) with a double gauze lining. Even though it looks like I might have used piping around the edges of the pockets, I actually just cut the linings a bit larger than the pocket and rolled them outward around the edges. The results are okay…this is really “cheater piping,” but it looks pretty good.
Though she wore it once with the pink shirt (a puff-sleeved Flashback tee, tutorial here), here is the actual ensemble we’ve been privy to here at our house for the past three days. I’m going to make her throw these in the wash tonight. And that yellow striped shirt? I made that too (more on that, soon)!
For you to sew!
about Rae
Hi! I'm Rae, Head Boss Lady of Made By Rae Enterprises. I love to sew. This blog is a showcase for my crafty stuff.
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