If you were reading on our anniversary, you saw that Alan brought me to the book store. I didn’t find the book I was looking for but found this one instead, Alabama Stitch Book by Natalie Chanin.

I’ve never heard of it before. It was just luck that there was that one copy in the store and that I pulled it off the shelf. I opened the book and fell in love with this reverse appliqué swing skirt.

I sat there flipping through the pages of beautiful pictures. Stopping occasionally to read about beading, stenciling, deconstructing a t-shirt, and at the unexpected like a biscuits recipe and “loving” your thread. And right then and there I knew I had to have the book. I ordered the book and since it’s arrived I’ve been carrying it from room to room reading it.

There’s a paragraph in the first chapter where she writes about how in the mid-1990s a lot of garment factories closed with businesses moving overseas. It makes me sad.

Ok and here is where I go off on a completely different subject.

I read that chapter and in the back of my mind I think about a link my sister sent me, The Story of Stuff and how whenever I go to Target there is just stuff everywhere. Racks and racks of clothes made by cheap labor in other countries. Clothes we don’t need. Clothes that are inexpensive to buy. I think about how much time and effort it takes for me to make something and it makes me mad.

Do we care less about things when we don’t have to pay a lot for them? When they are easy to replace with more cheap stuff that we don’t need?

It makes me think of the documentary my friend, Veronica, recommended, The Corporation, and how big uncaring companies are everywhere. Companies that do not care about the world we live in or the people who live in it. And then I get mad that I shop at Target. That big stores have things cheaper. That food sprayed with pesticides is cheaper than organic. That I don’t even know where to find a mom and pop store for the necessities.

It makes me sad to think our country is a consumer country. We don’t make things anymore. We buy things. Our economy is based on how much we buy. The government is giving us a tax rebate hoping we’ll buy more stuff to stimulate the economy.

I don’t know where I’m going with this. It all just makes me sad, this fast paced life we live in where everything is easily had and easily thrown away.

And even though I think all this I can’t stop myself from wanting a play kitchen. Even after or especially after I quickly made a sucky drawn one for Isabelle.

She sits down and we pretend to have tea on it. So she thinks it’s a little table, not a stove.

I just don’t want to think about any of that anymore. It’s all depressing. I guess I’ll just sit down and sew all the sad thoughts away. Yeah. That’s it. Sewing. Hand made. With love. By me.

I’m having one of those days where I didn’t get much done. I thought about doing a lot but that’s about as far as I got, the thinking part. BUT I DID scan in the pictures from ISBN 9784579110438.

Here’s the picture from the book of the tank top I showed yesterday. I’ve altered it since then and…it’s so depressing, I’ll write about it tomorrow.

No. Actually, I’ll write about it now. The test tank top in muslin (thank goodness I made a muslin) as I mentioned before was pushing down on my boobs.

The empire style (is that what it’s called) part of it was sitting in the wrong area. It’s supposed to sit right under my boob but my damn boobs are so big I had to mush them in and it wasn’t fitting. The bottom half puffed out unattractively making me look pregnant. I didn’t take pictures of a side view because, oh my gawd, the horror! The picture, from yesterday, didn’t look that bad but in person, YIKES! So I altered it.

I thought I would add three more inches to the top half so there would be more room for the girls. Well it doesn’t smoosh my boobs down anymore. And it doesn’t make me look 8 months pregnant. But it’s still a little tight, just a tad. Then it dawned on me, to measure my chest. That’s when I realized, I’ve gained weight since I first purchased the book. Or to be more accurate, I’ve gotten bigger.

That’s why it’s so depressing. That’s why it doesn’t fit! I made the largest size, 13, and it still doesn’t fit!! Aaaarrrgggh!!!

So now I don’t know what to do. I don’t know if I should alter it more to actually give me more inches around or just give up and try a different pattern.

But what’s the point? Maybe all the patterns from this book won’t fit since the largest size is 13. I really wanted to make pattern #13, the one above on the left, but it doesn’t look like there’s a lot of room in the chest area.

Maybe pattern #10, the one above on the right, has more room? I don’t know. Maybe I should measure the patterns.

Man, I’m bummed. I look at pictures of myself and am sometimes surprised that I look bigger than I imagined. Is that a weird thing to say? Well turns out I am bigger.

So yeah…don’t know what to do now. Oh I almost forgot the whole reason for my post. I got distracted by lamenting about my weight. Here’s what I meant to link to, the rest of the pictures from the book.

Oh I hate being pathetic. I had to give myself a laugh. I looked up “I’m too sexy” on youtube and sang “I’m too big for my shirt, too big for my shirt…” with a little head shake and everything. Yes I’m a goober, a big fat goober.

So you may or may not have noticed that I haven’t been sewing much. Actually, not at all since before Christmas. I’ve been in a sewing slump. I’m hoping this will get my sewing juices flowing. This is the book I bought the other day, the one I was so impatient for, ISBN 4391624206.

I’m thinking about starting with an alligator:

Or maybe a little sheep:

That is when I finally finish the never ending list of other projects I have lined up. Oh and because I don’t have enough to do (wink, wink) here are pictures of the rest of the projects from the book. It is so nice to see what else is in a book before you buy it, don’t you think?