12-gore denim skirt

The other evening I drafted a pattern for a 12-gore skirt following the instructions found here.  The next day I cut gores from worn out pairs of jeans!  Now I have a gorgeous denim gored skirt.

I used 1 1/2-inch wide elastic in the waist and designed it to sit on my hips rather than my true waist.  I’m so short waisted that if I wore bottoms at my actual waist…well, it wouldn’t be pretty!  I plan to reuse some of the original belt loops so I can wear a belt with it…let’s just say that a toddler and an elastic-waist skirt are a recipe for disaster!

You can see a few places where I removed pockets before cutting my gores – adds character, don’t you think?  And a skirt without a pocket is simply ill-conceived, so I reused a pocket from one of Hubby’s pairs of jeans.  Now I can carry my cell phone when I run errands!

A New Member of the Family…sort of

Meet Santa Budurdo, the newest member of our family.  For some reason, Miss M and Little Guy have decided that a pair of nose glasses (usually combined with a brown curly wig) is the costume of “Santa Budurdo.”  The imagination and ingenuity of children will never cease to amaze me!

Queen-sized Country panel quilt

A few months ago I was given some quilting panels featuring country style scenes of houses, barns, churches, and schools.  We’ve been wishing for a large quilt to cuddle under on the couch, so I designed a quilt around the panels and set to work.

Now quilting is not my forte!  I got the thing assembled without too much trouble, but trying to quilt a queen-sized quilt on a regular sewing machine falls somewhere between insanity and a feat of strength!

I pieced the back as well since fabric doesn’t usually come in “queen size.”  I bought quilt binding to finish it off ‘cause by that time I was ready to be DONE!  I took tons of shortcuts and there are loads of imperfections, but at least now we have a usable quilt!