Up and down the stairs each season

 Well, it's transition time again.  I'm slowly taking my fall decor down and putting it away for another year.  

It makes me a little sad this year because I love fall and always look forward to it and it's rich colors.  

I put the fall things out much earlier than I usually do this year and then I interspersed Halloween with them when it was time.

But now, the cooler weather and gray days are telling me to make the change to winter.  So, each time I have to go downstairs for some reason I take pumpkins or crows, or fall leaf items down with me to put away.  Only a few Christmas things have surfaced - like a Cardinal snow globe and one of my Christmas colored wall hangings.  

We aren't celebrating Thanksgiving at my house this year so no one will notice the difference.

I'm making slow progress on my denim jacket.  I've decided to call it a denim jacket instead of a "Boro" jacket because of some things Katherine of K3N Cloth Works said on one of her lastest youtube videos. 

 She made me think that to honor the people that had nothing else to wear except these much mended old pieces of clothing (Boro means rags) perhaps I should  just mention that I was doing Boro-type mending embellishments to a homemade denim jacket.  I'm also using Sashiko embroidery and applique.

I found these Japanese Rabbit squares when we went to Santa Fe (of all places) and I could buy them by the square or buy the whole piece.  I bought the whole piece but I wasn't really sure what I wanted to do with them  I just know they are lovely. 

Right half

They look yellowish but are deep indigo and bright white.

Left half

They are adorable.  I wondered what the writing was because I wouldn't want to use it on something and have it say something negative.  I found someone who spoke Japanese and they are the symbols for Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter.  

It looks better in real life.

I think this little guy will look great appliqued to the left front I finished piecing and embellishing yesterday.  This sure isn't coming together very fast.  There are so many decisions to be made not the least of which is the actual construction of the jacket.

I kind of lost a week in thought because the left front wasn't turning out like I had envisioned.

I've decided to sew the pieces I want together to make the parts and then actually construct the jacket. Then I will work on the embellishment as a ongoing project.  

Yesterday was my youngest son's 35th birthday.  I remember when I thought 35 was old.

Robin 

Joy and gladness shall be found therein,

thanksgiving

and the voice of melody.

Boro sleeves

Well, this is a work in progress.  I did a chalkline grid on the front for the first embellishment.  It worked okay but I thought I would try pen on the back to see if I like that better.  It is much easier to see but the piece I used to make the grid was larger and I didn't like that as well.

I did an buttonhole stitch around  big hole and then just randomly stitched around it.  My first attempt had the buttonhole stitch backwards and so I had to take all that out and redo it with the overcast on the inside instead of the outside of the circle.

I think it looks like a beehive.  I'm not sure I like it so it might not get used.

This is the pair of jeans that I decided to use for the boro method of mending.  

And here are the boro patches on the leg of the jeans.

This is the embellishment close-up.  It was fun to do.  I'm not sure if I'll do more stitches or not.  It seemed very overwhelming yesterday with figuring out what pattern to use . . . what size?  What fabrics should I use for the raw edged patches?  How did I want to arrange the patches, what stitches did I want to do for embellishment?  It got to be too much and I just left the sewing room and came upstairs to lay down.

But, it didn't take long to find myself back in the sewing room.  I figured out I just need to do one part at a time and not try to plan the whole thing out ahead of time.  Here is the embellishment on the back.  It covered the rips and worn out places but it didn't really repair them per se. 

And this is the right sleeve pieced, patched, and embellished.  I need to unpick all that stitching on the left seam (tedious) and then I want to top stitch the seams.  The one on the left will just get stitched by machine and the right one might get a strip of embellishment.  One thing at a time  I'm not sure if I've finished embellishing the patches or not.  

The thing with Sashiko is you can just keep going until all the blank spaces are full.

Here is the other sleeve in progress.  I basted it down and now I need to decide what stitches I want on top.

This is a fun project.  I wake up each morning with ideas spinning in my head. 

I'm cutting this out as a medium but I hope it's not too big.  Normally I am at least a medium (12-14), sometimes large but I've lost 10 lbs. over the summer/fall.  I had to go on a special diet for health reasons and now I don't know what size I've become.  I went to buy sweatshirts last week and came home with two XS ones.  It doesn't make any sense.   

I  better go get busy with the quilt on the frames because past experience has taught me that the only way to get a quilt done is work on it. 😅

Robin

Also I've been asked what it's like sewing on denim.  I've been doing "Big Stitch" on my recent quilts so it's not an adjustment using a very large needle and sewing with thicker thread.  The Boro approach has you loading up your needle with stitches and then pulling the thread through all of them at once.  I find that very hard.  So, I'm just sewing one or two stitches at a time.  I'm using my regular thimble - not the one suggested in Sashiko instructions.  

Keeping busy

 

I have been wanting to make a Boro type jacket for months.  I got a big 5 gallon tub of dismantled jeans and cut up pieces from my daughter who has been saving it for some future project.  I also got a pair of jeans from my husband that should have been discarded years ago because they are so worn.  But, that is exactly what I want to use in this project.  I finally found a pattern I want to use and it's on it's way.

There are patterns in these wonderful books but they are more blocky and traditional and I wanted something with a little more shape. 

I decided to experiment in making the Sashiko embroidery.  I do a lot of "Big Stitch" on my quilts so I figured it wouldn't be that hard to get used to stitching on thick fabrics like denim.  I drew a grid on the right side of a square of denim (from the stash) with my white pastel pencil.

Then I stitched a basic alternating stitch and with my white Aurifil 12 thread and a needle I had on hand.  I used two threads as instructed by measuring out a long thread, folding it in half and pushed the fold through the eye of the needle.    I'm going to experiment with repairing that hole in the jeans next.  

I have some varigated blue  and some red Aurifil thread that I want to use too.

I'm going to stitch this pattern on the back yoke of the jacket.  This pattern was free online and I've had the package of floss for years.

I must be in a some kind of shaded indigo rut because it's the same colors that I'm "Big Stitching" the current quilt on the frames.  

I went to buy some new sweatshirts this morning.  Who knew Penneys doesn't open till 11:00am.  Here I am waiting outside.    I also found a cute pink purse.  

Hope you're having a good day.

Robin