2021 Year Plan

We are almost at the end of January and I have still not published my 2021 resolutions, so quickly catching up before it is too late and before we finally get some pictures done and I can  publish my 2020 makes. I have quite a huge backlog now, so even though I have not sewn almost anything in January, I can still blog easily for 2 months ahead.

My main objective for 2021 would be a stash reduction of 10m, as usual, and an attempt on sewing even more from my stash. I spent quite some money on sewing supplies and patterns in 2020, including a revision of my sewing machine and a new serger, excused by the pandemic, lockdown etc, however, I currently have a lot of things in my wardrobe and definitely do not wear them as much as I would like to so there is not much point on sewing many things in general. I can already feel it on my January motivation, as I spent my free time on reading and learning new stuff much more than sewing. 

Another big objective is to use scraps. I have a big box of scraps, plus another one with refashion/recycle items. While there is a reason for that and I occasionally reach in them, they keep growing and the 2 boxes will soon not be enough. So the aim here would be to try to use up the scraps for useful stuff. 

A few ideas so far:

- make-up removals (already done)

- yoga colour-blocked clothes or underwear for jersey scraps

- jewellery 

And I might also have a try on some crazy patchwork.

As for the projects, I am not planning anything in particular, I have quite a few fabrics which are earmarked for specific projects (in my mind), so if I get to make these, it would be enough:

- liberty flower leisure dress

- silk casual jacket

- Greenstyle moxi shorts in multiple colours

- black spring coat

- grey ponte 2-piece

Some Other Non-Garment Sewing

This is just to document some x-mas gifts and some non-clothes sewing I did at the end of the last year.

Honestly, it was quite fun to sew something else than my usual dresses, as I was not very motivated to continue adding new standard clothes to my wardrobe, knowing that I only wear my collection of jersey dresses in the end. Full time home office became a norm again at the end of October and we are nowhere close to getting to the office on a regular basis before.... hmmm... end of March or possibly April, I would guess.

However, I got to do some other projects:

In preparation for December, I whipped up a quick Advent calendar for us - nothing super fancy, just 24 fabric bags, sewn super quickly on the serger. But this project used up a piece of black poly I would never ever use for a piece of clothing, as well as some nice ribbon.

I only sticked the numbers with washi tape, so that I can keep the little bags afterwards.

Next were some merino t-shirts for my parents, I actually used the same pattern for both of them, just adjusted the size little bit. I also added a little something on each of the shirts to make them more unique.

Last but not least, the big fashion in my Facebook sewing group this year: the reversible octopus. I used some velvet scraps from my 2 new velvet dresses which was a good and a bad idea. The octopus is very soft, but it was a pain to sew. The fabric frayed or disintegrated very easily and I had to resew several seams, as I was discovering new holes when filling the octopus up.

Also, I was not sure how much it should be stuffed, enough to hold its shape but not too much to be able to reverse it. It took only one evening to make but is rather cute :-)

2020 Hits and Misses

My usual recap for 2020:

As for the hits, it was rather difficult to choose only 5, because when looking at the year, I quickly adjusted my sewing to the new normal and focused on what I would wear immediately. But here are the ones who made it to the top5.

1. Turtleneck dresses - a big hit: here. Worked pre-pandemic, works during the pandemic as well. Such.A.Great.Staple. Also, I used this pattern for so much more than just 2 dresses, for turtlenecks, as well as normal dresses.

2. Merino anything - our Iceland tops, my black sweater. I still have some in my stash, so hopefully will continue sewing with it. It has an amazing drape and is so soft and nice. The real home luxury.

3. The spring coat - while I had no plan to sew a spring coat in these colours, I found the fabric, mostly by chance and chose the pattern from some old Burda. It was the first lockdown project, it kept me occupied and I basically wore it anytime I was going out in autumn.

4. Viscose summer dress - using only a scrap of fabric, I created and amazingly comfy and nice dress. Wore it the whole summer at home and outside.

5. Black fleck dress - in spite of some pooling around the neck, this dress is a secret pyjama looking like a very classy outfit. Soft on the inside, it gets worn at least once per week.

As for the misses, I do not have so many this year which is a good sign.

1. Ochre tencel dress - never worn, honestly, I am not a fan of the fabric touch and the colour is just way to much. Maybe if it was just a top, I could pair it with some dark bottom and it could work. Otherwise, it is just too much of ochre for my liking.

2. The Klimt dress - again, the fabric is not the best choice. I made the mistake of buying a quilting cotton for a dress, which is rarely a good idea. It is too stiff and not comfy enough, especially in 2020. It got worn maybe twice last summer.

3. The black jumpsuit - this was a resolution for 2020 and I thought that having the pattern, the fabric and finally the time to do it, there was no reason not to do it. It got sewn, I learned new things, but even though a jumpsuit could be cool to wear at home, I do not reach for it. First, there is the toilet issue, second, it does not have sleeves which means that I would either be too cold or would worry of getting a sunburn on my shoulders. So it is a version which could work in summer in the office, maybe.

4. Flight attendant dress - I was happy that I found a project for this fabric and I like the collar very much. But it got sewn in autumn and I was not in the office since. 

So that's it, quite a successful year. In total I have sewn:

71 pieces + 131 masks (not counting the ones made for my town)

Out of which: 31 pieces for others!!! That was a big surprise, there are mostly kids clothes, 2 pieces for my BF and a few gifts. 

It also includes 5 non-clothing items, quite a big number as well, actually

As for the used patterns:

35 Burdas (a half!!!, but expected)

9 Ottobre and 5 LaMasionVictor - kid's clothes

3 Knipmode, 3 Closet Core Patterns

1 Butterick, 4 McCall's

1 AppleGreen, 1 Moneta, 1 NewLook

And a few which were just my own mash-ups or following some tutoriels

Baby X-mas

To progress on my overdue posts about x-mas gifts sewn, here is a little batch of baby clothes for a little 4-month guy. 

Due to the second covid wave I had some real bad luck in fabric shopping. I ordered some cotton velvet for me and for the baby and little pieces of cotton jersey at the beginning of December thinking I was way ahead of time. Unfortunately, the cotton jerseys (with very cute cars on it) were out of stock which I only learned mid December. The velvet was another story: it was dispatched from the German warehouse but due to the German lockdown, DHL no longer delivered to France. Fortunately, their customer service proposed to send the same fabrics from their Danish warehouse which I agreed to and the packet finally arrived on 23rd December!!!

Because of all this, I had to change my plans and pick up a cute animal jersey I had bought earlier in the year and not used up yet. I only had about half a meter, so I squeezed in a small body and a full body overall and had almost no scraps left. The body is my favourite Burda pattern and the overall came from this year Burda as well - with footies added.

As for the velvet, I wanted to sew a larger overall from it (Ottobre 2020), so when the fabric arrived, I quickly washed it up, tumble dried and started sewing as well. The fabric behaved really well, fortunately, because otherwise, I would have probably given up.

I finished my sewing on the 24th in the morning, adding press buttons only in the afternoon (I must say I really hate that, I always fix some on incorrectly and I was under time stress so not fully concentrated either). In the end, everything was finished and packed god 3 hours before we left for X-mas Eve, so all is good.

I also added a few bibs as well, as the last time, the parents were crying for not having enough bibs.

Resolutions Review

Since I am a planner and a big fan of new year's resolutions (I do have 10 of them every year and manage to fulfill 7-8 of them regularly), let's review the list from 2020, shall we:

1. Stash reduction - decrease stash by 10m

Almost there - I reduced my stash by exactly 9m, which represents 10% of the total stash at the beginning of 2020, so definitely a win. I am proud of 2020 being the 4th consecutive stash-reducing year.

I managed to use up some old fabrics, mostly cottons, as well as some cotton scraps, as I sewed 130 face masks from my own stash this year. I do not want to say "thanks covid", however, it helped :)

Also, I sewed up all fabrics bought in 2018, please do not ask how I managed that. For all other years, the split is quite even, except the purchases in 2020 where I did not have time to use up everything.

2. New sewing skills - learn sewing with jerseys

A big win. Because of covid and working from home for the most part of the year, sewing jersey was THE THING to do this year.

Merino t-shirts for our winter trip to Iceland, merino shirts for my family for x-mas (I actually made a big order of merino jerseys which helped not achieve my 1st goal completely), casual jersey dresses were the best thing of this year, as this is what I wore the most, so it was the most logical thing to sew. I still have quite a lot of things to blog about, including kid's clothes and velvet x-mas dresses for me, as well as my new sports outfits.

It definitely helped that I purchased a combined overlock/coverlock machine in January. It took me some time to learn to thread it properly and start really sewing with it, but once I have mastered it, I cannot stop. Sewing jersey is just super quick and nice with this machine, I do not even mind switching from overlock to the coverlock mode.

3. Follow the wishlist

• Black winter coat (Burda) - done, not yet blogged though
• Black mid-season coat (Burda) - not done, but I sewed another midseason coat from Burda 
• Pair of jeans (Closet case) - not done
• Black jumpsuit (McCall's) - done, even though not worn as much as I have imagined

2 out of 4, but with me staying at home all the plans got somehow changed, so the result is not so bad in the end.

4. Burda challenge

Hmmm, so I sewed a lot from Burda this year (detail to come in my hits&misses post), but for the exact 2020 number, not so sure. I had to check my sewing excel and the result is actually better than I had thought:

2020 Burda used: March (2x), April, August, September, October (4x), December (2x)

So that is half of the issues received. I have however, had quite some issues with receiving them and they also arrived later than they were available on the newsstands which is quite a disappointment and which means that I am no longer a subscriber and will continue buying an occasional issue now and then.

All in all, that was a great year, sewing wise. I spent a lot of time at home, and sewing actually helped me stay focused and concentrated and as usual, it was a great way to destress after work. In general, I do not consider 2020 such a horrible year, as everybody is trying to suggest, I managed not to catch the virus, and still have my full time job at the end of the year, I feel rather privileged, as the only constraint to that was not being able to travel as much as I would have wanted and staying at home. 

I do not want to go too much into detail, as this is a sewing blog and in terms of my sewing, I have really expanded my skills with my serger, I sewed some more kids clothes and some sophisticated and complicated garments as well.

(beautiful inside of my spring coat)