Winners and two NEW giveaways!

The winner for January's patterns is: Sharon!

The winner for February's patterns is: Nina!

Please email me your mailing addresses to mollysewsblog/gmail/etc/etc/ and I will try to mail them this week! Yay!

Ok, on to the belated March and April giveaways. These are all vintage children's patterns, which are not everyone's cup of tea, but if you have kids or know a tiny kid you want to sew for...then these are for you!

March is for the small child and/or doll for a child:

 You have eight patterns ranging from doll size to size 4. Simplicity 4560 size 4 skirt and jacket, DuBarry 5924 size 4 skirt and jacket, Simplicity 4114 size 4 overalls and jacket, and Simplicity 9584 clown-baby jumpsuit dealie.

 Simplicity 1809 for a 22" doll layette, a different Simplicity 1809 for a 8" doll, Hollywood 1511 for sz 1 year jumper/bolero/blouse, Simplicity 6208 for 60s style Barbie doll clothes.

 If those look appealing, leave a comment about March's giveaway.

On to April, which is seven patterns for larger children.

 Simplicity 5524 for a girl size 12, Simplicity 8127 for girl medium pajamas, Simplicity 8292 for boy's size 14 robes.

 Simplicity 5732 girl's size 8, Simplicity 5417 girl's size 8, Simplicity 3212 girl's size 10, Butterick 8255 for a girl's 10/bust 28.

If any of those look appealing, leave a comment about April's giveaway.

I will ship anywhere. Leave a comment to enter by Thursday, June 5th!

Belated Giveaways: January and February

I finally made something, but it is patternt esting so I can't show you. School is almost over, only three more weeks! I am finally feeling relaxed, the weather is getting nicer and nicer and now I will sew some cute stuff. I organized my sewing area, packed away my Vogue coat until the fall, and went through all my patterns to see which ones would work for Spring/Summer. These are all patterns that I know I will never make, so they will be my belated giveaways starting with Jnauary and February. :0 

This is January's giveaway: Please note, these are all teen patterns and are very tiny! I'm talking 28-30 bust. So if you are tiny, or have a tiny tween daughter or really enjoy pattern grading, these 8 patterns are for YOU!

 Close-ups below: 1940s patterns McCall 4062 for a 30 bust, and Simplicity 1221 for a 29 bust.

 60s-50s-40s: McCalls 5936 for a 31 bust, Advance 9423 for a 30 bust, and Simplicity 1180 for a 29 bust.

Tangent:
People email me from time to time trying to get me to sell /scan and email/copy and give them my Advance 9077 pattern, for an adorable sundress, which was one of my first projects I ever posted on my blog. I don't know why this pattern in particular is so important, but there is a picture of Marilyn Monroe wearing a similar dress, so maybe that's why?

I have no plans on selling it or doing work for strangers, but maybe people should consider similar options like the Advance 9423 in the center. Only the sleeves are different, all the other pieces are identical. Maybe one of the independent pattern companies should recreate it, certainly people think it's cute.

 Simplicity 6159 for a kilt style skirt for a 23 inch waist, Simplicity 9375 for goofy overalls for a 22" waist, and McCall 8073 for a goofy puritan look I think a 31 bust.

 So those are "January's" giveaway, now on to Feb!

Feb's giveaway is for six patterns for a 32 inch bust and are kind of a random mix of things...

 Simplicity 7423 jumpsuit, Simplicity 6973 wardrobe pattern for knits, Simplicity 9164 peasant dress.

McCall 6814 coat, McCalls 6018 pyjamas, Simplicity 6498 for more knits.

If either of these options sound appealing, leave a comment and make sure to say if you would like January (tiny) or February (32 bust). Enter by Wednesday, May 28th if you're interested. I will ship them anywhere.

Thanks for looking at my (not yet abandoned) blog!

Highs and Lows in New York City

We went to NYC during my Spring Break to see Andrew's fam and celebrate his dad's birthday.

While there, I had the opportunity to go to Mood, delight of delights!

Chicago is just starting to sort of become spring, but I am ready to sew some cute dresses and things! So I went looking for lightweight, happy fabrics with Andrew's sis. It was so fun.

I bought four pieces of fabric, one and a half yards of each. That's a reasonable amount of fabric for me to make a spring dress from, I think. Simple ones at least...

These two are both cotton knits: one is brown and white with a sort of plant print. The other looks like snakeskin print on a black background with the print in pink, purple and blue. It's cool.

 Close-ups:

 The one on the left is a cotton knit in a sort of tie-die pattern and the one on the right is a silk chiffon. It's animal-print-esque wiht pastel pink, green and coral. Me likey!

 Close-ups:

 The low, low, low of sadness:

I was walking around and it rained a little bit and the leather loop on my purse strap gave up the ghost and snapped. Now it is safety-pinned together and I am so sad. La tristesse.

All of the leather is very brittle and now its cracking. Any thoughts? Just use it until it all breaks? Condition it and pay to get the loop fixed? Buy a new one on Etsy and have the same thing happen in a month. I have grown to love my picnic basket and it has earned many compliments. Plus, I feel like a level-10 hipster carrying it around.

I got new glasses, too(new lenses in old glasses). I will post about them soon. I bought them at an estate sale in New Orleans, pre-2009, as they are NOT on my blog! How am I supposed to remember things if they are not blogged and searchable? Yikes.

Scallop Hem Pencil Skirt

This was my final project for January, which I am just getting around to posting. I still haven't worn it because I don't like it very much. I saw another teacher wearing a cute wool skirt with a sort of scalloped hem and I decided I would try to make a similar skirt. I had extra wool from my coat and lining and a zipper, so I whipped it together in a day or two. Then I put it on and was disappointed.

 I did not even attempt to look nice for these pictures. The blouse and heels do make it look better than in person.

Andrew's photographic genius.

 The zipper pulls apart a little bit.

 The scallops are too bulky and somewhat uneven.

 It is fully lined....

Bleh, I may as well put it in the giveaway bag now because I know I will never wear it.

And...I sewed nothing in March! Hopefully April will be more productive. It seems like (knock on wood) our endless winter might be coming to an end, and that would make me want to sew some cute Spring dresses and such!

Maxi Dress II in Old San Juan

I wore my second Mission Maxi several times on the trip and it was perfect! On our last day in Puerto Rico, we had time before our flight to walk around old San Juan. Andrew took these pictures at both of the forts. It was so sunny and hot that I ended up walking around with it hitched up to my knees.

This dress is the same size as the green one, but it looks less suggestive because the knit is thicker. I bought the fabric at JoAnn at the end of last summer. I had been eyeing it for most of the summer, but they priced it at something like 29.99 a yard, which is absurd for a knit! So the bolt lasted until the end of summer, unsurprisingly. I bought a yard and a half on sale for 30 or 40 percent off. So not any cheaper than buying a dress, but the print is absolutely beautiful. Looks like they still have some here. It's shades of blue and green and reminds me of fish or a lagoon or something. 

 I keep thinking the waist could be a little tighter, but I don't need to look like a sausage... I did lose five lbs on my "get ready for Puerto Rico diet" which consisted of the shocking ideas of drinking less beer and eating less food. Maybe slipping and sliding and trudging through the snow every day helped too. Thanks, Winter!

 I am super happy with this version. I will probably make forty more, so get ready!

 You can sort of see the back above.

 How I wore it for most of the walk around. It also turned out to be National Dog Day, so there were dogs everywhere and all kinds of things going on outside the fort. Lots of kites too.

Thanks for looking and everyone should buy the pattern; it is so easy to make and looks so good, while being comfortable and awesome!

Estate Sale Loot: a wicker purse

On Saturday, we went to two estate sales. It has been a long and cold winter, so we haven't gone for months. Especially since it is "a thing" here to make you stand outside in a line as they let people in one by one. That is always annoying, but the cold makes it unbearable.

This wicker purse reminded me of something Camelia Crinoline would have, so I bought it to sell on Etsy. Andrew said it was ugly and looked like picnic basket, so that made me want it more. As I carried it around the sale, I grew to like it. Now it is my purse. It makes it easy to find things because it folds open like a suitcase. I feel like a giant hipster carrying it around, but oh well. Only five dollars!

I also finally sold all of my Swirl dresses on Etsy and now I listed some estate sale fabric I will never use. Go check it out, if you're interested!

Mission Maxi for Puerto Rico!!

At some point in the last year, we decided we would go to Puerto Rico for my 30th birthday/our 1st wedding anniversary. So we went for a long weekend at the end of February and it was AMAZING! We had so much fun and the weather was beautiful!

I knew I wanted to make the Mission Maxi pattern that my mom had given me at Xmas. I had a big piece of thin green knit fabric and I decided to use that as my muslin. This pattern is a piece of cake and it came together so easily- really, like you can cut it out and sew it just a couple of hours! The "muslin" turned out so nicely that i ended up bringing it along to wear, too.

I will post about its twin a little later!

 These pictures were taken at the hotel we stayed at, El Conquistador. The knit is a tiny bit too thin, as it shows every lump, bump and line of underwear. I do think I will buy a racer-back bra to wear with these, because strapless bras are so annoying.

ye olde bra line

I am pretty happy with this dress, and I will post about the second (even better) version later!

These two dresses were the only things I made in February. The endless winter is not inspiring me to sew, and school consumes a lot more of my time than subbing did. I am having so much fun teaching French now, so that is perfectly fine for me! I hope to make myself sew more as the weather warms up and I can wear the things I make. I think everyone loves sewing for Spring and Summer, am I right?