Plan D

Yes, I've been hanging out on Instagram, but since I don't like reading long narratives on Instagram, I decided to take myself back to my blog to tell you about this project.

I call this the Plan D or Give Me Liberty & Give Me Dress. This has been in the works for years.

It started simply enough. I wanted to recreate Alicia Paulson's dress: the Folkwear Patterns Afghan Nomad dress made with different patterns of Liberty fabric. I spent some time collecting the fabric; the main fabric (if we can call it that) was bought at Liberty London in 2013. The other fabrics were bought on a trip to Mood Fabrics with my mother a year or so later.

I have to say, when I first started the dress, I thought, "This is going to be the most beautiful dress I've ever made!" I decided to do French seams and patiently worked my way through the pattern.

Unfortunately, I was not pleased with the results.

With the Empire waist and a high and tight neckline, it just wasn't working for me. So I decided to go with Plan B - modifying the bodice of the dress. I think I gave it a couple of shots before I put the whole project on a time out.

Fast forward to this year, and I've got a whole new system of keeping track of my sewing and knitting projects - a three-tiered system using a sports analogy: active roster, the bench, and the farm team. Anyway, what I was calling the Afghan Nomad Dress at the time made it onto the list, and I knew I had to either resolve it or retire it. There was no way I was going to let all that Liberty fabric languish.

So welcome to Plan C - the Cappuccino dress from Lisette & Co. I've made it once before. I call the first one my Acid Trip Deer Hunter dress.

I carefully took apart the Afghan Nomad Dress to salvage what I could of the fabric, and then I set to work making it come together. What's probably important to note here is that I did not make a muslin for either dresses, which, yes, could've saved me a lot of time. But hey, where would this blog post be then?

Again, I patiently and carefully sewed the dress (let go of the French seams this time). Excited to have it finished, I brought it home to try on for my partner and a friend of ours. Ack! It was too tight over the hips! (#covidass) I also felt like it was a little short. So back to the studio and Plan D.

I'd already done a full bust adjustment (something I'd blown off on the first one and regretted). To make the dress fit, I put godets in the side seams and then added an additional band around the bottom to lengthen it. There was a bit of fiddling since I was making it up along the way, but I have to say, I'm glad I persevered. Otherwise I wouldn't have this happy-making dress.

And here it is - Give Me Liberty & Give Me Dress:

Makers gonna make.

What I'm Wearing to Teach Today: Going Through the Motions

Sweater: Boxy, knit by yours truly
Dress: Alabama Chanin, sewn by yours truly
Tights: Unknown
Boots: Blundstones

What I'm Wearing to Teach Today: A New Dress

Dress: Melow par Melissa Bolduc
Tights: Unknown
Boots: Aquaitalia

What I'm Wearing to Teach Today: Stepping Back Into It

Dress: Sacai
Tights: Wolford
Boots: Aquaitalia

What I'm Wearing to Teach Today: Tone on Tone on Tone

Sweater: Patch (pattern), knit by yours truly originally for the ladyfriend
Skirt: J. Morgan Puett
Tights: Hue
Boots: Maison Margiela

What I'm Wearing to Teach Today: Freeing the Freak Flag

Sweater: Sunday Sweater pattern, knit by yours truly - I call it the Orange Creamsicle
Pants: J. Morgan Puett
Boots: Maison Margiela (mom-me-down)
Socks: SmartWool

What I'm Wearing To Teach Today & Yesterday: Two-day Version

Today:

Shirt: Paul Smith (belongs to the ladyfriend)
Vest: self-drafted pattern, knit by yours truly
Skirt: Rohka
Tights: Hue
Boots: Timberland (thrifted from Mom)


Yesterday:

Dress: Aida Barni
Vest: Dolce & Gabbana
Tights: Hue
Boots: Timberland (thrifted from Mom)

What I'm Wearing to Teach Today: Muted Floral

Dress: Lauren (Ralph Lauren)
Turtleneck: Akris
Tights: Hue
Boots: La Canadienne

What I'm Wearing to Teach Today: It's About the Textures

Sweater: Hudson pattern, knit by yours truly
Skirt: Casual Connection (thrifted)
Tights: Hue
Boots: La Canadienne

What I'm Wearing to Teach Today: Proper Comportment

Sweater: Beeswax pattern, knit by yours truly
Skirt: Brooklyn pattern, sewn by yours truly
Tights: unknown
Boots: Aquaitalia

What I'm Wearing to Teach Today: Contemplating My Next Move

Dress: Haat
Turtleneck: Three Dots
Tights: Target
Boots: Aquaitalia

What I'm Wearing to Teach Today: Sometimes I Just Need to Move

Dress: Junya Watanabe/Comme des Garcons
Tights: Target
Boots: Brunello Cucinelli

What I'm Wearing to Teach Today: Don't Walk Away

Dress: Emmelle
Turtleneck: Three Dots
Tights: Wolford
Boots: Brunello Cucinelli

What I'm Wearing to Teach Today: Let Me Think About It

Underdress: J. Morgan Puett
Overdress: J. Morgan Puett
Tights: who knows?
Boots: Aquaitalia

What I'm Wearing to Teach Today: They Let Me Come Back

Dress: Morgane Le Fay
Shirt: Ralph Lauren
Tights: Wolford
Boots: La Canadienne

Blogging While Traveling - It's Harder Than It Looks!

Really? It's nine days later?! Yikes!

So, we'd planned to stay in West Yellowstone for two nights and explore Yellowstone National Park. However, there was an unexpected snowstorm, and we decided it was in our best interests to avoid the area and set our sights on Thermopolis - home of the world's largest mineral hot springs! It was a great consolation prize! We first treated ourselves to the free hot springs, courtesy of Hot Springs State Park, and as we decided to stay in the park, our hotel had its own hot spring as well. Twice in the hot springs! If only every stop had a hot spring to relax and restore us!

Look! There's a sign!

Thermopolis was a charming little town, with a surprisingly good Thai restaurant. It continued to feed our appreciation of Wyoming.

There were buffalo, too!

From Thermopolis we headed to Bozeman, MT. We had a hotel reservation in Missoula, and I wanted to see my old friend Carolyn, but we were still concerned about possible snow. Thankfully, it mostly bypassed both Bozeman and Missoula!

Sure, we saw some along the way -

And then there was this, in Bozeman

But by the next morning, the roads were clear, and the snow that remained was on trees and lawns.

Great sign in Bozeman

Another great bit of Bozeman

Seeing old friends is another great thing about a road trip!

In Bozeman I picked up another skein for my Find Your Fade shawl, which I'm calling the Traveling Fade since I'm trying to make it with yarns picked up on our travels. It was from Mountain Colors, a yarn company out of Corvalis, Montana. I picked up a skein of Raven Ridge yarn in Missoula. This was a yarn I was totally unfamiliar with. The shawl is coming along nicely. I think, however, that it will be on pause while we're in Fort Bragg since we're not actually traveling. Also, this will give me an opportunity to work on the other projects I have with me.

Here's the shawl in progress. I've already added the lighter colour (from Raven Ridge) and am currently wondering whether I'll stop at a yarn store in Eureka. I just had a full weekend at Knit City where I shopped for other projects; I don't know how far I can push my traveling companions' indulgence of my yarn habit...

There's a lot to see along the way, and sometimes one simply takes a picture out the car window.

I know we're only up to days 5 & 6, but that feels like a lot for one post. We'll be settled in Fort Bragg soon, and I promise to catch up then!

Wyoming! Who Knew?!

We're making tracks! From Sioux Falls we drove to Rapid City, SD. Unfortunately our hotel was horrid, designed with a pre-Glasnost Soviet frame of mind, but one should expect there to be a few dogs in the bunch. Since then we've done much better, but let's not get ahead of ourselves.

Despite the accommodations and the weather (drizzly/rainy), we made it to two stops in Rapid City worth seeing - The Dinosaur Park and the Chapel in the Hills.

The Dinosaur Park overlooks the city and was a Works Progress Administration project, which made me love it more. It's pretty amusing as the dinosaurs are not meant to be "realistic."

Then we made our way to the Chapel in the Hills, which is an exact replica of the Borgund stave church in Norway (hit the link and find out what that means). I wasn't sure I'd be impressed, but the all-wood structure is really beautiful, and it was easy to see why there were going to be three weddings taking place there that day.

Our goal for the day was to see Mount Rushmore and the Crazy Horse Memorial. We lucked out that the rain lifted, and the clouds cleared so we could actually see Mount Rushmore. Unfortunately, the Crazy Horse Memorial was blanketed in fog, so we didn't get to see that.

We like to call this "Liss with Little Edie"

We spend the night in Buffalo, WY, which we all loved! Our hotel was great (we ended up talking with the owner the next morning at breakfast; the owner, by the way, described himself as "left of Bernie," which made our hearts swell even more), and we had dinner at the Occidental Saloon where legends such as Calamity Jane and Butch Cassidy once had a drink. We were lucky to see Taylor Corum perform, and his countrified version of Purple Rain was great. Wyoming made us love it!

No Cheese Castle, But a Car on Fire (Road Trip Days 1 & 2)

Hello? Is this thing on? Yes, it's been awhile since I've posted, but now we're on a massive road trip that will last until the middle of December. Instagram is great for little posts, but if there's going to be more than just a little banter, the blog will be the place for it (because I can't stand multi-paragraphed Instagram posts). That doesn't mean every blog post will be accompanied by extensive narrative, but there will probably be more pictures.

We'd wanted to go to the Mars Cheese Castle outside of Milwaukee, but it closed before we got there. We did, however, see a car on fire on the opposite side of the highway, which felt a bit like an attraction. I've never really seen a car in flames before. Quite dramatic. Unfortunately, I don't have a picture to share with you here, just an image burned into my mind.

As Julie, the cruise director, I've been in charge of all the accommodations, and I have the feeling the bar was set high with our Milwaukee hotel - the Hyatt Regency - which I scored on Hotwire. It was quite nice and had this crazy sculpture in the center of it.

Before we left Milwaukee, we went to the Milwaukee Art Museum, which was a beautiful building. I took a couple of pictures from the interior, but you should look it up to get the full effect.

We had to do the speed tour (needed to get to the Spam Museum before closing!), but what we saw was great. We definitely want to spend more time in Milwaukee.

A Donald Judd piece based on the Fibonacci sequence

No Cheese Castle? How about Mousehouse Cheesehouse? That was our consolation prize. Filled with Wisconsin cheese (we bought some three-year old cheddar and Thai red curry cheddar), it was pretty impressive.

I've also been trying to buy beer (so surprising) and have a mixed six pack of Wisconsin beers ready to try. Unfortunately, we only have so much room in our car, so here's a picture of one of the beers I left behind (the name of my memoir?).

But our main goal was the Spam museum in Austin, Minnesota. We managed to get there with half an hour to spare, and frankly, it was worth the hustle. The museum is free and has all kinds of interactive displays. One of our collective favourites was the international section, which featured commercials for Spam in South Korea, Japan, the Philippines, and more.

If a whole can is too much, you can get singles!

This Japanese version is too cute; I could've sent the recipe to myself, but I didn't

Austin was a cute town. It reminded me of Paducah, KY as well as many of the small towns in Iowa my dad and I rode through on Ragbrai last year. A pleasant surprise was the number of Mexican restaurants there. The lady at the Spam gift shop gave us a great recommendation, which was a bonus!

Not the Mexican restaurant, but a great sign

Our destination for the night was Sioux Falls, SD. Had we known we could've seen the 60' Jolly Green Giant in Blue Earth, MN, we could've made a meal of the day - hah! Couldn't resist that. Who knew there were so many museums dedicated to commercial foods? Who knew we'd want to see them?

On our way to Rapid City, SD tonight, with lots of stops planned along the way. Unfortunately we're also going to have to change our route due to an early snow storm right where we wanted to go. Julie the cruise director will have to get on that tonight.

Happy trails!