Bringing back Brownie

Made from size XL T-shirts, and entirely hand-sewn



At one of the pre-season games at Brown's stadium this year, I noticed several little girls wearing the cutest cheerleader dresses, and I decided right then I had to make one for myself. The fabric store didn't have jersey fabric in the right colors for the Cleveland Browns, so I had to use T-shirts. When I started, I wasn't sure of the logo I wanted for the front, but was considering using a Brown's helmet I had saved from an old shirt of my husbands.



After un-seaming the shirts (dark brown, orange and white), I needed to work out how to cut them down to size and give them a shape. I experimented with a white shirt, and settled on some princess seaming with inverted pleats around the waist. Once I had worked out the plan with the white shirt, I executed it on a brown shirt.


The length of the shirt was too short for a dress, so I sewed together strips of orange and white to make a border and increase the length.


Now that I had the dress basically constructed, I started work on the logo. I decided that the reason the Browns have been having such a hard time of it is because they abandoned the Brownie, and I thought that bringing back Brownie would bring them luck. I made the logo out of appliques.

The appliques applied to the bodice, before I added embroidery detail:

After embroidering the logo, I finished and detailed the neckline and armholes. This is the dress nearly finished, but before I applied ric-rack to the hem (which is shown in the picture at top). I'm pleased with the ric-rack, I think it adds an extra "brownie" touch. :-)
A close-up of the final logo and neck detail.
The dress was finished and worn for the first time last Sunday...the Brown's first win of the season! Coincidence? I think not! :-)

Three crystal bracelets

Variations on a theme, an idea I had on how to use beads to construct a base row of adjoining square shapes, like links in a chain, upon which I could set a row of crystals.



The first was done with glass beads reclaimed from old jewelry, so that I could work out my idea. For it, I used milky white beads for the base row and violet fire polished beads for the top row. For the next bracelet, I used black seed beads to construct the "link" row, and used reclaimed clear crystals for the second row. The third bracelet has clear Swarovski crystals forming a base for a row of colored Swarovski crystals. This was the bracelet I had envisioned to begin with, and had worked out the method to execute, a slow gradation of color in crystal, from yellow at one end, moving through orange, and ending at red on the other end.

All three bracelets were strung using nylon beading thread, and have magnetic clasps.

finished allergy mask

This mask is the first "garment" I've created entirely from my own design, not a modification of someone else's pattern. I started by taking measurements between various points of my face, but couldn't get the shaping of the mask correct until I also traced a silhouette of my profile, which seemed to give me an additional dimensionality I was missing. The fit of the mask is important, because its function is to filter the air, and gaps around the sides of it would defeat the purpose. The final design does fit my face perfectly, while allowing room to breathe and to speak.

The mask is constructed of two layers of silk habotai, with a thin inner filter I removed from a purchased disposable mask. It is completely hand sewn with silk thread. I was concerned that the inner layer might shift, and thought of quilting the layers together, but instead came up with the idea of embroidering on an animal face to prevent shifting, so, the face has a practical purpose and is not just decorative or silly. But I admit the animal face is also amusing to me, besides making me laugh its a bit of a social experiment to observe other people's reactions to me when I wear it.

Overall, the mask works great, much better than any other mask I've used. It's very lightweight and comfortable, and it amuses me so I don't feel so bad about having to wear one. But I'm very happy to say that the allergy shots I've been getting for the past several months have helped me immensely, so now that I have this wonderful mask, I hardly need to wear it anymore, and if all goes well, I won't need it at all someday soon! :-)

A play dress refashion

Who says play dresses are only for little girls?! I refashioned this pink and white color block dress mainly to modify the top, which was too revealing for my comfort. I combined the dress with an old J. Crew polo shirt.



After removing the collar and cuffs from the shirt, and the skirt from the bodice of the dress, I used the spaghetti straps of the dress to trim the sleeves of the shirt. I modified the crew neckline of the shirt into more of a scoop neckline, edged it with dark pink from the dress bodice, and then hand-embroidered a stylized flower applique (made from an old white T-shirt) to the front. The remaining dress bodice material was used to make a waistband for the skirt, which I lined with white woven cotton reclaimed from some old curtains. After attaching the skirt to the new top, the play dress was finished with some additional embroidered details around the neckline and on the skirt. All the sewing was done by hand.

allergy mask

I'm allergic to Alternaria, which is a ubiquitous mold, a natural part of fungal flora almost everywhere in the world. The spores are airborne and found in the soil and water, as well as indoors and on objects. As it is an outdoor and indoor mold, it is present and growing year round. As an allergen, it is unavoidable.

While I've been able to control Alternaria in my home, going outdoors in Spring, Summer and Fall can cause me to have allergic flair-ups. Luckily, the micron size of Alternaria spores is relatively large, and therefore masks are an effective way to reduce exposure while out-of-doors. That is, if one is comfortable wearing a medical mask in public...the attention I've attracted while wearing one hasn't made me feel comfortable. It makes me feel more of a freak.

So, I've set out to fashion myself a mask that won't incite panic in the general public. I've already taken measurements of my facial contours and worked with different design ideas to come up with a pattern that will give me a custom fit for my mask. I've marked the pattern pieces onto white silk fabric, which will make my mask lovely as well as functional for filtering mold spores out of the air I'm breathing...

slow progress

I have been working on my reverse applique project, and although it seems to be going very slowly, I am learning a lot along the way. I began by working in the way I've read the Cuna Indians execute the technique using woven cotton, but then had to adapt it to make it more suitable to the knit materials I'm using. I've also decided that it's much easier to sew up a jacket from scratch using fresh material and a pattern than it is to recycle and refashion existing garments...but I'm not after "easier". :-) Working on ways to solve the challenges of this project is teaching me so much, sparking so many ideas for future projects, and is so energizing, I'm having trouble sleeping at night!

Beading

Some bracelets I made last month, playing around with peyote stitch. The first, on the far left in the photo, was stitched in what was basically a tubular odd-count peyote. It was done in orange and violet beads, around one of those colored elastic wristbands all the kids are wearing these days. I came up with the idea after seeing some beaded beads done in peyote that were strung on a cord, and thought that if I worked them directly around the elastic wristband, I would avoid having to use a clasp. Peyote stitch is very stiff, and makes nice stiff beads, but I found that by weaving it "three-drop", with nylon thread, I could extend the length of the bead as long as I wanted, into a tube long enough to circle my wrist, and it would be pliant enough to curve around the wrist.

I wasn't quite happy with the way the nylon thread was visible, and so next, I tried playing around with peyote and a clear, monofilament line. I found that by adding a "floating" bead, the peyote stitch became quite elastic, which was a big surprise. The two middle bracelets in the photo were made that way. In both, I alternated bugle and seed beads, resulting in a triangular-shaped tube. It's elastic enough that the wristband I used in the center of the tube for the first bracelet was totally unnecessary. I made the blue and silver bead bracelet first, before Christmas, and then another one in red and gold beads on Christmas Eve. I wore it to a party that evening, and when a niece admired it, I gave it to her. On Christmas morning, I made one in green and silver, and again gave it away that day when someone noticed and admired it. In both those bracelets, I put a slight twist in the triangular tube before connecting the ends to form a circle, which made them look similar to the double-helix structure of a DNA molecule. I don't have pictures of either of those bracelets, and then the fourth and final bracelet I made using this technique (the gold and violet one in this photo), I connected "flat" as I did with the first one, so you'll have to take my word on the DNA-looking thing.

The bracelet on the far right in the photo is the same stitch, but done in the opposite direction, with the bead sequence of short-and-long beads inverted! It has no elasticity at all in the opposite direction, so I made it with a little larger circumference, as a bangle bracelet.

The molas of the San Blas Cuna Indians of Panama are inspiring me to try some reverse applique.

My thought is to turn an old sweatshirt into a jacket. I love the complimentary combination of orange and blue, and have chosen an old orange turtleneck to line the blue sweatshirt.


This is a sample I did to try out the technique, and my choice of motif...not a traditional Mola pattern, but an image of a bird borrowed from a work by Escher. I thought Escher's work would be awesome rendered in reverse applique.




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