Sweatshop

In honor of Labor Day, I’ve locked myself in my sewing room for the past several days, busting out as many back-to-school clothes for Rana as I could. She started 1st grade on the 1st. You may wonder why I waited until the last minute and the reason is because we were waiting to see which school she would end up going to. One requires uniforms, the other does not. The uniformed school would not know whether there was a place for her until the week of the first day of school. So see —  this time my flurry of activity was not due to procrastination. And it really was a sweatshop up there: that room has no windows and if I turn on a fan it 1) will blow all my pattern pieces everywhere and 2) blow the electrical circuit. Even having the iron on at the same time as the AC is dicey. So I just swelter and come out for air every now and then.

Here is a catalog of what I accomplished between Thursday and Saturday:

These are a fine wale corduroy with elastic waist and patch pockets on the rear end. They gave me a little bit of trouble in the rise. When Rana first tried them on, she said, “Hey, these are Jasmine pants!” I was thinking more along the lines of Hammer pants, but it was the same basic silhouette. We got the crotch raised and the bagginess taken out of the legs so now she won’t look like a miniature Persian rapper.

This is a wrap-around jumper made from embroidered twill. It’s a nice weight for autumn/winter and looks nice and crisp for school. I used my machine’s lone decorative stitch for the hem and was pretty happy with how it turned out.

This little blouse came from a 90s pattern with funky patchwork and an exuberant collar. I scaled the collar width down by half so now it looks like a sweet scalloped flower instead of a clown suit. I also added elastic to the sleeves and topstitched the button placket and collar to give it a little more visual interest. It also helps it look less homemade.

These pants are in a black brushed twill. The outside is really soft! The pattern called for the appliques and cuffs, but I had to change the cuff design to accommodate my one-way print of tiny hearts. I designed the pockets myself.

I’m about halfway through making another little blouse, this time in blue and with a regular Peter Pan collar, but I’ve set that aside temporarily to churn out a few items to build up my inventory for my near-future etsy store! I’m excited about getting it all together and I’ll be sure to let you know when it’s up and running. The plan is to take photos of everything this week and then hopefully have it live next week.

My time is up down here. The sweatshop is calling. And, if you really do have a job, be grateful.