One down, four to go!

Good morning, neatniks, slobs, and vicarious downsizers.

So I did it -- I sold a sewing machine yesterday!  I am loathe to tell you which one for fear it might be your favorite and I don't want to cause a ruckus.  OK, it was my Singer Genie.  I know many of you love the Genie and I loved mine too.  But I never used it.  I have three other Singers, albeit without the irresistible flower-power details. 

One of my strengths -- and potentially a weakness too -- is that once I set my mind to do something, I do it.  OK, sometimes I do it.  Well I have set my mind to cut my sewing machine collection in half and keep only the machines I use.  The machines I'm selling (on New York Craigslist; I don't do shipping with things this heavy) are all in excellent shape, I'm just tired of having stuff around I don't use, tripping over sewing machine cases, and vacuuming the dust bunnies that collect behind them.

I have someone coming to see another machine today, plus a lamp and a mirror.  Like I said yesterday, I'm on a roll!

I hope you will still visit here at Male Pattern Boldness when I only have six or seven sewing machines.  It'll still be just like before, only less cluttered, aside from all that vintage luggage.

And now dear friends, I must ask about the clunkers.  I have two: a Necchi Lydia with a broken cam shaft that only sews straight stitch and an ulcer-inducing vintage Huskystar serger 535D serger that cost me many days' work to thread and set up correctly, only to go all wonky when I tried serging through eight layers of denim a little more than a year ago.  Then I gave up on it.  It's mechanically fine but might need some tuning up, I'm honestly not sure.  I refuse to invest another minute in that machine and now that I have my Brother 1034D, I don't need to.
 



Should I try to sell these machines or just bring them to the thrift store, or the curb?  The Lydia is gorgeous and a great mid-century display item but I'm all through with display items now that my living room is a sweat shop.

Sad to say, neither machine has brought me much joy and in the case of the Huskystar, considerable agita.    

I can't tell you what a thrill it is to declutter.  It's not about the money; at this point, I would practically pay someone to take these off my hands or rather, my kitchen floor.   The universe even placed a two-drawer Sterilite plastic container unit in my dog-walking path yesterday afternoon which I'll use to store...gee, I'm not even sure.  Still, what is that but a sign that I am on the right path?

And now, the moment you've all been waiting for....

Whoops, wrong photo!  From this...



To this.



Big improvement, no?  (That Brother sewing machine in the background should be gone by week's end.)   I think so.

OK, I must go back to decluttering; wish me luck.  And then, perhaps someday soon, I might actually get back to sewing!

Have a great day, everybody!

UPDATE (1:20 pm): Sold another sewing machine -- Yay!

Mastering the Sewing Mess

Friends, I am on a bit of a decluttering roll -- some might say obsession -- here at MPB headquarters.  I am committed to downsizing however I can.  I have Too. Much. Stuff.

Can I interest you in a slightly used chihuahua?  Two?



The last four days have been hectic, with family dinners, guests (hello, Mom), travels, and new eBay purchases -- all related to helping me declutter of course.

Some might say these items will only bring more clutter.  Some would be wrong.  Look at this lovely vintage luggage set and tell me these aren't the perfect vehicles for organizing sewing supplies, storing Cathy's burgeoning accessory collection, or perhaps putting away some summer items of my own.

This is of course the seller's picture, someone who obviously doesn't know how to art direct vintage taupe.  (NEVER photograph with flash, on beige carpet, or against dusty rose wall.)  It's no wonder there was only one bidder.  (Guess who.)

Meanwhile, back in reality, every time I walk to the refrigerator, I am confronted with this:



I suspect even you are growing tired of seeing this cluttered kitchen table, where I can barely squeeze myself (let alone my sewing project) to make a buttonhole with my Singer Spartan or attach an invisible zipper with my Viking.  This surface is going to be reorganized and it's going to happen today.  Will you hold me accountable readers?  I ask very little of you.

When I see photos of other sewists' sewing spaces (courtesy of Denise of The Blue Gardenia), like Robin's below, I just want to cry.

No doubt Robin is a classic anal retentive type and not much fun to hang out with, but just look at that order.  It's hostile if you ask me.

Consider Sigrid's sewing room.  If you're thinking sickeningly antiseptic, you're right!  An affront to us all.

And this takes the cake -- Myrna's sewing room.  So calming, so zen.  Do you think any real sewing goes on here?  Nonetheless, Myrna wrote a book about setting up your sewing space and you can buy it here.  What unbelievable arrogance!

Where's the creativity, that's what I want to know, the gemütlichkeit? 



Is the opposite of anal retentive, anal expulsive?

Anyway, I have made progress in my organization.  Look how I've been storing my extra patterns:





I love these collapsible fabric boxes and they come in groovy prints.  At the Container Store.

Readers, we're running out of time.  I must start organizing.  And then reorganizing.  And reorganizing again.  I like the idea of One thing comes in, two things go out, but is that sustainable?  In the end isn't one left with less than nothing?  Think about it.

How are your organizational skills, dear ones?  Do you long for a less cluttered lifestyle but can't resist stopping every time you drive past a garage sale?  Have you considered getting a job at Goodwill just for the employee's discount?  When you see a sewing space like Robin's, do you want to knock everything on the floor and stomp on it...or am I the only one?

Jump in -- but don't trip on anything!

Decluttering: Part 2

Readers, I must provide some backstory to yesterday's post.  I used to have a lot of clutter -- no, not clutter exactly.  Stuff.  And I've gotten rid of tons of it, primarily on eBay and Craigslist, but also through donations to thrift stores and just throwing stuff out.

Here's an eensy weensy taste; thank goodness I took pictures!

Vintage TV sets, and the phones, readers, the phones...








 



Danish modern barware.



Funky decor items; I could write a book.


 





Fifties dinnerware.



Miscellaneous.









But there's more, friends, much more.  I have discarded hundreds of record albums.  But I still have quite a few and I don't even have a stereo set up anymore.



So you can see why I need to get rid of some of those sewing machines (I fear my Elna Grasshopper may be first to go.).  And I still have many more items hiding in closets and cupboards I now need for all my sewing paraphernalia.  I still don't know where to store my sleeve board, for example.  Where do you keep yours?

Readers, thank you for allowing me to unburden myself this holiday weekend.  I know it's a lot to handle and probably stirring up difficult memories for many of you.   You probably long for more sewing projects and less catharsis.

Now that we've returned from Michael's parents, I must go to the flea market later and see if I can find more Samsonite luggage to store things in.

And who knows what surprises may lurk there?  It is the holiday season, after all!

Arabia Ruska dinnerware for four, anyone?

One small step in the struggle against entropy!

Friends, one of the leitmotifs of my life is the continuing battle against chaos.  It's challenging, living in a Manhattan apartment, no matter how spacious relatively speaking, to find room for two chihuahuas, twelve sewing machines (fourteen if you count the sergers), two adult men and a glamorous cousin who likes to crash at a moment's notice and rarely picks up after herself.

That's why I am so excited to share with you my most recent eBay impulse purchase which arrived not an hour ago.

It's a vintage Samsonite train case that to me epitomizes the glory days of jet-age travel and all things Doris Day.  It's for Cathy.  Well, rather, for Cathy's mess.

You might think that a model would take great care of the tools of her trade.  Not so, readers!  This dusty old Glad bag may look neat, but it's constantly turning up in the most inconvenient places, it's Ziploc unzipping and spilling its mainly-expired, five-and-dime-store contents all over the place. 

But thanks to my new purchase, look:

The bag goes in the box...close the lid.  Perfection!

I love these old Samsonsite cases and can't stop thinking of all the things I could put in them, half of which I would buy simply to put in the case.  Which would sort of defeat the purpose.

Meanwhile, friends, this weekend I am considering actual downsizing.  I think -- think -- that it's time to pare down my sewing machine collection.  It's not that I don't love them all, but I hate having things around I don't use and it has become increasingly apparent to me that at least four of them have never been sewed on for more than twenty minutes.  I'll let you guess which ones.  

Stay tuned to MPB as I decide which to keep and which to re-introduce to the vintage sewing machine market.  It's a nail-biter!  Will your favorite make the cut?

The weekend is here and we're off to Michael's parents -- not quite the glamorous excursion that warrants a Samsonite train case -- but at least we won't have to cook.

Have a great day, everybody!

Straight Skirt for Mom: a Holiday Drama

Mothers.  What can you say?

I don't even remember the genesis of this skirt project exactly.  Did I offer to make it for my Mom (Sonia to you) or did she ask first?  Who knows and at this point who cares?  Somehow it was at the top of my sewing queue; I knew I had to have it completed by early December so my mother could wear it to a friend's grandson's bar mitzvah, to which (she claimed) she absolutely positively could not wear pants.

About a week ago we'd bought the fabric -- a nice quality black poly crepe and matching acetate lining -- and yesterday I dedicated most of the morning and early afternoon to making a muslin for my mother to try on when she came down to our apartment later in the day, from where we'd cab it to relatives in the East Village who host Thanksgiving every year.

I drafted the skirt myself using Dorothy Moore's Pattern Drafting and Dressmaking book.  I know some of you own this book and some of you don't think it's so great, but I like it and find it easy to work with.  I like that you only add the seam allowances when you cut your fabric, like a Burda pattern.





I used a pink cotton-poly sheet for my muslin, and it all came together easily.



It has four darts in front, four darts in back, and a kick pleat.



Still without waistband or side zip...



Around 3:15 pm, my Mom arrived.  She tried on the muslin (top photo) and it looked good.  No major changes needed.  Then she tells me that the bar mitzvah is Saturday -- this Saturday.  She must have told me earlier and like so many things she says, I just tuned it out.

She was spending the night and leaving the next morning (i.e., today).  So in the hour before we had to leave for our holiday dinner, I hustled, cutting the black crepe and getting as far along in the project as I could.  Needless to say I attended Thanksgiving unshaven.

By the time we left, it looked like this:



 

Obviously some pressing of darts is needed (and it's still in two pieces), but not bad for a rushed hour's work.  I'd forgotten how shifty poly crepe is; it's a much more difficult fabric to sew with than a cotton-poly sheet.  It's also hard to mark for things like darts.  I used tailor's chalk and did the best I could.  Only after I'd drawn the darts on the front panel did I realize that the fabric has a right and wrong side and I'd drawn the darts on the right (which is to say, wrong) side.  So I had to wipe them off and draw them again.

I hate hasty sewing. 

But it would all prove unnecessary, friends!

Long story short: it became increasingly clear throughout the evening that my mother didn't want to go to this event in the first place but didn't know how to get out of it.  Her knee has been bothering her more of late and she's going to have to have a knee replacement, but she didn't want to offend a close friend.  Michael and I convinced her to do what she needed to do for herself and that, given that the event was her friend's grandson's bar mitzvah and she didn't even know the grandson, she wasn't going to ruin anybody's afternoon by not showing up.

Using her best phoning-in-sick-to-work voice (odd, since the excuse was a bum knee and not bronchitis, but an old habit) she did what she had to do and freed herself from an obligation. 

So after I'd hustled with the poly crepe and rescheduled my mother's ride home today to give me more time to complete the skirt, lining, zipper, etc., I now no longer have to make the skirt by Saturday.  And I don't intend to.

An awful lot of drama for less than a yard of poly crepe, no?

Readers, two questions:

1) Do you think women have a harder time extricating themselves from unwanted obligations than men?  I mean, Michael and I were both like, If you don't want to go, don't go!  This seemed like a foreign concept to her. (Then again, here I was, stuck making a skirt for my mother...) 

2) Would I have had an easier time cutting my fabric and sewing my darts if I'd used wool crepe instead of poly?  I'd actually looked at black wool crepe in the store, but it was thin and cheap looking.

That's it -- easy.

Hope those celebrating holidays are enjoying them and didn't overeat last night.  As for the rest of you: do you ever sew for your parents?  Is it a pleasure, a pain, or a little of both?

Have a great day, everybody!

PSYCH: Fresh to death nicknames

Funny promo for Psych, stringing together several of the bizarre undercover nicknames that (fake) psychic detective Shawn Spencer gives to partner Burton Guster and, sometimes, to himself:

USA - Psych: Nick Names


Related links:
PSYCH vs. THE MENTALIST
Check out this nifty PSYCH widget
Watch PSYCH episodes free online!
Watch CASTLE episodes free online!
MONK: Mr. Monk and the Computer
Thrill of it All: Detectives: SHAWN SPENCER and "GUS" GUSTER (Psych) by William Rabkin
Thrill of it All: Detectives: ADRIAN MONK by Lee Goldberg