Miss Me?

Oy! What a couple of days it has been! Sorry to be out of touch, but I have been up to my eyeballs in alligators while searching for the swamp plug. Here, I'll let you in on what's been happening. DH's company is just about to lay of 20% of the staff, so he's been going crazy on a personal and professional level. The likelihood is that he won't be let go, but sometimes that's not a good thing, you know? And two senior members of his department (he was the third) left the company 2 months ago, so he's been a crazy man trying to keep up with the workload.

That means that yours truly gets to do the baseball playoffs runabout. Both kids are still in the playoffs (Gawd, please, when will this end???) No really, I'm thrilled for them. Really I am... Really. But between that, work, and getting my latest BeSewStylish.com post in the can, life has been a little hectic, you know?

But I'm still around. And I'm just about to start on another dress for my niece. This time I'm going to make her a HotPatterns Tee-Shirt Dress.

I'm going to make it from a cabana striped jersey I have in a bright pink and white.

She picked it out, and I think it will look adorable on her!

Alas, there are only so many hours in a day, and since I signed on as a contributing editor to BeSewStylish, I can't keep all my usual balls in the air, so I'll be bowing out of The Sewing Divas Blog. I'll still post here and at BeSewStylish.com. I will continue to be an avid reader of the pearls of wisdom that my Darling Divas disperse. And I'll always be a Diva. After all, I did coin the term, "La Sewing Diva, C'est Moi!"

Happy Sewing!

Another 'Just Go'

Gigi, Phyllis and I went to New York this week, and among other things, we went to the Museum at FIT. While we were there, they had not one, but two spectacular exhibits: Ralph Rucci, the Art of Weightlessness, and She's Like a Rainbow: Colors in Fashion.


Wow, these were absolutely beautiful, not-to-be-missed, and completely free! exhibits that were open to the public. The "Colors..." exhibit is displayed on the main floor. The etagere at the entrance to the exhibit houses an original Yves Saint Laurent "Mondrian" dress from 1965. When you enter the exhibit, you are greeted by a pale pink ruched Charles James gown that is a marvel of engineering. The exhibit, which is physically compact, but chock full of fantastic fashion from three centuries, explains the psychology of color and its application to clothing throughout the centuries. It also displays brief histories of dying, textile weaving and accessories manufacture that help illustrate the technologies through primarily the 18th to 21st centuries that made advances in textile manufacture possible.


The other exhibit is a special collections retrospective of Ralph Rucci's work. Rucci is a vastly underrated couturier. He is the first American since Mainbocher to be invited by the Chambre Syndicale to present at the couture collections.

This exhibit, showcases at least 90 pieces up close and personal. The catalogue claims 150 pieces, but maybe that counts separates. Any way you count it, GO! One of the wonderful things about this exhibit is that you can get close to, and in many cases, right under the pieces, Several gowns are hung 10 to 12 feet above the floor to give viewers a good look at the underpinnings and construction techniques, all of which were flawless.


One of the other Divas is going to blog extensively about this exhibit, so I won't steal too much of her thunder. But for goodness sake, if you are in New York, get thee to 27th and 7th and see these exhibits before they end.

She's Like a Rainbow, Colors in Fashion runs through May 9th, 2008
Ralph Rucci, the Art of Weightlessness runs through April 14, 2007

Happy inspiration!

Das Loot

Whew! What a whirlwind tour. Honestly, thirty-one hours is simply not enough time to do New York properly! Gigi, Phyllis, and a couple of other friends and I all met up in New York. What a spectacular time. We walked and walked until, as Phyllis so aptly put it, "the dogs are barking!" My feet are still tired, but happy tired!

Where to begin? Well, let's begin with the end products. The booty (in the piratical sense, not the more modern usage). The wonderful thing about New York is that you can spend weeks there and still find little gems. Since we had such a short time, we spent it with our proven favorites, and as always, they were the best. So as the days go on I'll add more about all our adventures here and on The Sewing Divas, but for now, look what I got!!!

From Kashi, whose walls I was able to actually see for the first time, ever:
Two beautiful silk velvets. The one on the right is burgundy. The one on the left is actually bright red with a gold backing, which gives it an iridescent tone.
Heathered rayon modal jerseys. So soft!!!
An amazing designer dark wash stretch denim and a lovely brown eyelet

Oh yes, stash reduction suffered on this trip.

From Rosen and Chadick, tropical print silk jersey. These will make my summer tee shirts. Oh baby, life is too short to buy cheap fabric, and here is your proof!
Nothing "patio clothes" about these knits.

And from Pacific Trims, bag hardware to die for. Along with buttons from M&J Trim for my HotPatterns Cape Jacket, and some taupe leather stripping from Kashi.



Here's a sneak peak of dinner with the Divas:



Keep a look out, there's more to come.

Happy sewing!

Resolved!

Vale 2006, and good riddance. This was the year I lost three members of my family, lived under the Sword of Damocles until September, when my BIL died and sent his daughter to live, not with me, as I was expecting, but with his heretofore non-existent sister (that's a story that requires a pitcher of strong dirty martinis and a lot of time to re-tell). My uncle Joe died of cancer, and my cousin Tommy, who never touched a cigarette, died of lung cancer at age 49.

But 2006 is now history, thank God, and I'm looking forward to 2007. Which brings me to my resolutions. I don't do resolutions very often, mostly because I stink at keeping them. Besides, I already work out religiously, and my diet isn't horrible. I don't smoke, I try to be reasonably nice to people (2006 was a difficult year, though, for all the above reasons). But I do spend too much wasted time on non-productive activities.

So this year I have two resolutions that I want to try to stick to (don't tell Sister Celia about the dangling participle!). The first is to work hard to take my sewing skills to the next level. I am awed by Sewing Diva Els' abilities. She is a couturiere of the first order, in my never so humble opinion. I study her posts and techniques and I am always picking up great information. Check out her posts at the Sewing Divas Blog. Her work with leather is truly amazing, just like the rest of her work. There are others whose work I admire and am going to emulate, too. Lots of others. The rest of the Sewing Divas, of course, some of the folks over at Stitchers Guild at Artisans' Square, and many of my blogging friends. I am going to spend more time studying works of past and present masters. So to start the year off right, I'm going to visit the Fashion Show Exhibit at the MFA in Boston, and the Ralph Rucci retrospecitve at the museum at FIT in New York.

My second resolution is to spend less time in the online sewing forums and more time at my sewing machine actually making stuff. That's kind of hard, since sometimes the forums are a lot of fun, and at other times they have the macabre fascination of watching a train wreck. There have been a lot of train wrecks at one forum in particular in the last year, and I think that was the beginning of the end for me. I'll still take part, but I really want to spend more time actually sewing.

So, my dears, I wish you all a very happy, healthy 2007. May the year bring you peace and happiness, and get out there and sew!