It's craft, Jim, but not as we know it

I'm no Martha Stewart, that's for sure. There are piles of stuff in my house that eat other things, like single shoes, and cellphones, and important bits of paper. Unfortunately, it seems that the rot has also set into the file structure on my computer...as in, I haven't the foggiest idea where some of my pictures have ended up. Since I couldn't find any crafty ones, I've had to resort to a little bit of pictorial randomness...a last little taste of NZ summer. I'm going to tell myself that it's vaguely related to craft, because as the weather here has been getting chillier, I've been thinking a lot about what I'm planning on sewing for autumn.

So...I really need some new clothes. Well, technically, I don't, since I can't currently close my drawers as it is; but you know how it is. I REALLY need some new clothes. For someone who professes a love of sewing I am embarrassed to say that I pretty much live in a wardrobe of clothes from Glassons. Give me a racerback singlet and a pair of jeans and I'm ....well, I'm looking the same as I did yesterday. And the day before that. But enough, I say! Time to get serious ;-)

One of the main reasons I wear so little of what I sew (apart from the fact that so little of what I sew actually gets finished) is that stuff tends not to fit. So, in order to remedy this, on the advice of the wise and expert Maryanna-from-across-the-road, I've booked myself into a Palmer Pletsch fit workshop at the end of the month. Woohoo! I can finally find out from an official source all the ways in which my figure is imperfect (oh joy) and start to factor in my big-bum-overly-wide-shoulders-no-boobs statistics into all my sewing endeavours.

This autumn, therefore, I am pledging to myself to make at least 4 things that I will actually wear. I'm mulling over patterns at the moment, but so far I'm thinking some kind of hoodie; some comfy jeans/cargo/mum-trousers type things; a couple of skirts to wear with boots; and some kind of funky-casual dress to wear with boots. Hopefully all stuff that will fit into my playdough-and-spaghetti encrusted lifestyle. Functionality...bah. I've never really been all that good at that part of sewing. Most of the stuff I made pre-kids was pretty, going-out type stuff. I even (partially) made a black, beaded corset as a kind of wearable muslin before making my wedding dress. Deluded? Me? I mean, I know life before kids did involve a much more exciting social life, but a beaded corset? WTF? Maybe I should dig it out of storage and wear it to make some cheese on toast for the kids, just for a laugh. Now that would be a sight indeed.