Sunday, June 12 at 12:40pm

This month we held a "Sewing Tea" at Lucy's house. We had about a half-hour to snack on goodies and drink tea, and then we all shared about our sewing history and projects. In attendance were Grama Mary, Loosh, Vita, JoJo & Seslie, Lucy, Brittany, Paula, Felicia & Lucille, and Julie. Grama began by sharing a jacket she was wearing with beautiful pink flower applique on black, that she made in 1981. The wonderful thing about the jacket is that the shape and style was just as relevant today as it was in the 80's, I had no idea she made it so long ago (30 years!). She also shared the child's place-mat apron that she had already made, and that we were going to make as a group project. Hers was so cute with red rick-rack and red handkerchief patterned fabric straps. We asked her how she picked patterns that would go together. It looks like she just chooses to match based on color - since there was a little red in the place-mats she chose to bring out the red with the straps and rick rack. Grama also passed along the cash box that she and Aunt Nina used to use for Mari-Loo. Our first piece of "business" equipment, it will really come in handy when we sell our wares at the Farmer's Market - Thank You so much Grama! Felicia shared about a book called Craft Inc. She explained that the book shared all about crafting as a business. We are going to try to find a copy of this book and share with each other as a group out of it. Loosh shared next. She gave Paula a piece of beautiful flow-y orange fabric and also brought some vintage fabric to share. She brought an apron in the works, red and lovely. I hope she finishes it soon so I can see how she makes her aprons. Loosh shared that the poncho material she bought - cotton - was not well suited for this garment. She and Grama thought that a rayon or other silk type fabric would fall better, the cotton seemed too stiff for her liking. Vita suggested that she wash the cotton and then use fabric softener. Julie said that you could even find sarongs for $10 to make ponchos out of (great idea!). Loosh also shared her dollar finds that she got from the "Fashion Fabrics" store in National City, on the corner of Broadway and Palomar. She got some really cute fringe and yokes, as well as a cute butterfly applique that she gave Paula for her new face-painting costume. She also showed us her "The Softies" book, she's going to make stuffed fur animals. Paula told us about "Red Dirt" shirts, made from dye from the ground. I'll Google this and add the link to the FB wall. Felicia then shared her Christmas skate ornament craft using paper-clips, felt, and yarn. It was cute! Vita shared her scarf made from a piece of black and white flowing fabric she got at Yardage Town. She used the rest of the fabric to make a poncho, she said it was warm despite that it didn't appear solid. She also made another poncho out of some very pretty white with black flowery pattern cotton, she used a crochet yolk to finish it at the neck. She said that if you use the cotton for a poncho, use the 42" wide, if you use the polyester use the 60" wide so that your poncho will fall better. She also shared about the purse pattern she traced onto pattern fabric - used to save your paper patterns. This is a good solution to being able to save your paper patterns from over-use. Also, she is making a purse out of fabric sample squares found in fabric sample books. Very clever idea! In this economy it doesn't hurt to always be on the look-out for fabric sources and also she re-iterated, "Never Throw Anything Away!". JoJo shared a little girl's apron she was given in a bag of clothes for Seslie. She's going to put new straps on it because one fell off. Way to recycle! She also made Ses a pair of PJ pants and a matching pillow case out of cloud patterned flannel. She can make a matching sheet out of the rest of the fabric - how cute that Ses can sleep like an angel in the clouds because of her mom's sewing talents! Felicia also shared about Ravelry.com, a website for the knitting and crocheting community - a good place to connect with other crafters for support and ideas. Brit shared her Batman Blanket, made from yellow felt cut into little bats and sewn onto a black back-ground with "Luke" in the middle in blue. So cute! Lukey is a lucky nephew, his auntie really loves him. She's also making him a Hobb's doll, she found the instructions online, not a pattern - just a way to sew pieces of black and yellow strips together to make the end result into a stuffed toy he will love forever. She is sewing this by hand, Julie was impressed that she was taking the time and had the skill to do so much hand-sewing! Paula shared that she is a face-painter and she loves working with rocks - wrapping them in silver wire. She also is in need of a new costume for her face painting. We threw out many ideas, but the over-all consensus was that she should use lots of color and do her hair crazy! We had a great time thinking about that with her so we hope to see the results of that discussion some day, maybe on a Wednesday evening here in OB as she face-paints for the Farmer's Market. Paula used to make her own clothes (boy I'd love to pick her brain), but since fabric has gotten so expensive and her machine burnt out she decided not to sew any more. We reminded her of some different places you could get recycled fabric or even cheaper new fabric. I hope she picks up sewing again, I'd love to see an original Paula design! Julie has been sewing for many years - she's made many many quilts, garments, purses, clutches, and alters thrift store finds for Felicia (a really cool thing to know how to do, I think I'll try picking her brain on that one too some day). Lucy will get to share next time, tentatively to be held at Loosh's place in Imperial Beach on July 10th at noon. Loosh also let Lucy borrow her Indian embroidery book to look at and copy some things out of. It will be neat to see how the Indians create such beautiful garments. Lucy also gave Brittany the chocolate brown and light blue apron. It looked so cute on her! Lucy will also make a vintage apron out of the fabric Loosh gave her. At our next meeting we hope to get a tentative list of things we wish to sell at the Farmer's Market and start working on those projects, maybe we'll have our very own Sew Lo Mio booth this summer.