simple things for simple mind (1 year late, pt. 4)

we’re at the end of summer 2021, nearing autumn. (ha, finally, some progress with this catching up thing!)

after traveling around the world inside my head with the clothes i sewed, it’s time now to keep things simple.

i picked up a lovely cashmere knit fabric the previous winter (about 1,2 m long and 1,4 m wide), thinking i’d make a simple butterfly shirt to make the birds on the print shine. it should have been a super simple sewing project.

self-made shirt and culottes.

when i was cutting the fabric, i didn’t get a single clue what i was in for. it was all nice and flowery (or birdy, in this case) until the first time i put the fabric underneath my sewing machine’s presser foot. then, the nightmare began.

i mean… guys: stay. away. from. cashmere. knit.

it’s the most horrible fabric i’ve ever handled!!!!! it stretches and stretches and stretches and never seemed to get sewn the way i wanted it to, like, ever!! ugh.

what i thought was going to be an easy breezy project of 30 minutes tops turned to be a 3 hour gig.

i think you can see how i’m still holding a grudge toward this blouse by the fact that i only took these pictures. don’t get me wrong, i love wearing it. i love the feel of that smooth and comfy cashmere knit, and when people saw me wearing it, they said they could tell it’s a high quality fabric.

this picture is here to remind myself of what was the hardest part to sew in this project. it’s the darn neckline.

emphasis on the word ‘fabric’ though. i’m sure they can also all tell it’s got crappy craftmanship. 😝

oh well! at least it’s done now and i’ve been wearing it on repeat last autumn/winter.

another simple project i did before the cool air started to blow last autumn was this shirt.

self-made shirt, Mango jeans.

i got this French terry fabric years ago, and because of the bold print, i’d been thinking long and hard on how to best show it on a clothing item. the print reminds me so much of a Marimekko print, even though it’s not.

in the end, i chose to do the same type of shirt as this Frenchie and pancake ones.

for the bottom frills, i used the last scrap of dotted tulle fabric i had to make 2 layers of frills, and of course it wasn’t wide enough to create the kind of frill i wanted. i was also kind of sorry that i only got 1 print repeat of this fabric… if i got 2 repeats, it would’ve been enough to make a dress. this one was only about 80 cm long, hence the limited style of clothing.

just like the birdy cashmere shirt, people around me would say that this shirt’s fabric is so nice. but yeah, i know that the sewing is just so-so.

so basically this is kind of a sorry post. 😅 but the good news is, i still wear these shirts a lot, even if the craftmanship isn’t anything special. they both–as with all of my other self-made clothes–are ‘feel-good’ clothes because i made them myself and that’s what’s most important, right?

and as long as i am still able to sew, this is enough to keep me and my simple mind going. 😊