hello I attempted a sewing vlog

Okay, well, I don’t know. I hope I’m in focus, we’re gonna find out. Hello, I am back here. Again. It’s been a really long time since I have done this, because I haven’t felt like it. But I suddenly, I’m suddenly feeling like it. A year ago, almost exactly a year ago, because I– it was Thanksgiving, I went back to my parents house for Thanksgiving 2019. And while I was home, I decided to fish out a sewing machine that I had gotten as I think a Christmas present when I was maybe 15 or 16. And I never learned how to use it. Like with the sewing machine came a class, I think like it was like a one or two classes that I was supposed to go to. And I like missed the classes. And then I felt really stressed and anxious about the sewing machine. So I like hit it in the back of my closet.

00:50 - And there it stayed for who knows how long. I must have attempted to use it at some point because when I dug it out, it was missing a bunch of stuff. But anyway, point is a year ago, I got the sewing machine out. And my mom who is fantastic – she like made her own wedding dress, she made all of our costumes when I was a kid. She spent the weekend like teaching me how to sew. She walked me through all the basics of like actually using the machine. And then we took a trip to join fabrics and we bought some fabric and like a McCall’s learn to sew for fun pattern. And at the end of all of that I had made this skirt covered in Christmas dinosaurs, which I’m quite excited about because it’s it’s now that time again, it’s now time for me to wear the Christmas dinosaurs once again. So while we have been in our houses, unable to go anywhere, see anybody I have been sewing basically like that’s I’ve been I’ve been working on that skill. Behind me is my my couch quilt. I love it very much. It’s my bisexual space quilt, but it’s also my couch quilt, because it lives on my couch.

01:53 - Lately, I have been making a lot of clothing. And I made this right here, this Flamingo dress. It’s, I don’t know, your dad on a cruise. And that’s been really, really fun. But also it’s like there’s a level of wanting to, I don’t know, share this thing with my people. But of course I can’t. So I have been doing a lot of like Instagram stories that are also just really long. And you know, I don’t know, I apologize to many of my friends who have probably muted my Instagram Stories now.

02:24 - But like some of my friends, you know, it gives us something to talk about. It’s like something do catch up on because, you know, like, how are you is the worst fucking question you can ask somebody right now. But like, what have you made lately, like, I don’t know, there’s like, there’s there’s a, there’s an opening, there’s something for us to discuss. I would like to maybe try to do something a little bit longer. And so that is what this is, I am going to attempt to document myself making some clothing.

02:50 - Again, I don’t really know what I’m doing. Like, I got that sort of initial tutorial. But otherwise, I’ve basically been, you know, on my own figuring it out from YouTube videos. And like, occasionally, maybe calling my mom and being like, I don’t understand what this means. Do I really have to do that step? But like, that’s just, yeah, that’s the extent of my knowledge. So if you do know things, there’s a good chance that you will see me making a lot of choices that you’re like, why did you do that? Why did you do that thing when you could have done something else instead? And that’s fair.

03:24 - Feel free to gently let me know in the comments. If you’re mean to me, I will be sad. So don’t be mean to me. So, uh, that’s, that’s that that’s what we’re doing. That’s what this video is. Unless the thing that you’re going to tell me to do differently is to make a mockup. Because no. This fabric, I’m gonna be making a shirt And I’m making a dress out of this…I don’t know there’s a bunch of like, fun looking animals. I’m using like pre existing patterns.

I’m not like getting wild here making my own stuff completely. So the shirt that I’m making is going to be this guy right here. C this pattern but like, number C. I already cut out the pattern pieces. I’ll, like have The Voice on. But I’m just like cutting out my little pattern pieces. And for the dress I am making this guy right here. C design C, which is the one that’s in the picture. So that’s what I’m doing.

04:12 - Like the idea is that I will now because it is cold, like probably wearing that long sleeve shirt underneath the dress. But like you know later when it is warm, I can wear the dress by itself. I didn’t really think through like the transition process of going from my living room to my table over there. That’s where I’m gonna cut the fabric. My sewing machine is in my bedroom over that way. We’re just… [snaps] one step at a time. Okay, so the first thing we got to do is lay out this fabric. I lied.

I think probably the first thing I should do is look at the instructions. Make sure I really know what I’m doing. For all the markings. I use these water soluble pens. I’ve never had problems with these, but it never hurts to check. Just…[pen dabbing fabric] Well that didn’t go as planned. Yeah, cool. That’s coming right up. But now I’ve made a mess. This will be a really good time to be listening to an audiobook, except that I am currently using my phone to record. And that’s also what I used to listen to the audiobooks. So…

05:22 - [blows raspberry] So what I’m doing right now is…. the sleeve, I wanted the sleeve to be longer. And it specifically it says to lengthen and shorten it right here. You don’t want to just lengthen it at the ends. Like I could see there’s a level where like, Okay, well make it longer. Just keep keep it going. First of all, it’s not like straight lines, like it’s continuing to angle.

And so that means it’s, it’s like, the idea is that this is your wrist 05:52 - here, right? So you don’t want it to just keep getting more narrow, because then it will not fit your [unintelligible] wrist. Probably could have just done it that way and ignored the instructions, because it’s like it’s a pretty wide open sleeve. But it doesn’t matter. I’m doing it. I’m following the instructions. I’m doing this right. So that later when it all goes wrong for me, I can say, “Look at me, I did it right, followed the instructions, it’s still bad.” I realized that I had a solution to my listening to stuff while using my phone to record. But also being able to stop the music to say things problem. I am done cutting everything out.

07:17 - At this point, it’s time to– I was gonna say it’s time to go to the sewing machine, but that’s not true. It’s time to start pinning stuff together. It’s currently a little after 11, so part of me feels like I’m gonna – yeah, I’m gonna wait. Making progress. One step done. Day two, is off to also an incredibly late start, I started pretty late yesterday. And then today, I slept in very late. And then when I finally got up, I had to go and do the seasonal changeover for my tires. And that was like a whole to-do took a lot of time. So now, like five o’clock, it’s almost five o’clock. I’m playing among us with some friends at six, so I really only have like an hour right now. But I think I can at least get started. Like, you know, making sure I know what steps I’m supposed to do, reviewing the instructions and pinning everything together. I might even get a little bit of actual sewing in there.

08:18 - I had big dreams of completing this whole project – like the shirt and the dress – this weekend. That is feeling a lot less likely at this point, because the dress is going to take me a really long time. I looked through the instructions already. And there are a couple things that I was like I don’t I don’t really know what’s going on there. So you know, it’s fine. Okay, six o’clock, now. I have just finished pinning. The next thing that I have to do when I pick this project back up again is sew along all these edges that I just pinned – twice.

09:14 - So sew once and then so again because there’s elastic running all through it. Front casing: done. Day three! Days one and two were pretty short days. Today, I’m like really for real gonna have most of the day. It’s Sunday. I slept again, but I’m going to be getting started like noon so I’ll have like a lot of time but I have nothing else that I have to do today. I am almost certainly not going to actually get the dress done today, but I think I’ll be able to get pretty far.

10:03 - So I did wind up working on the shirt a little bit more last night, after I finished the game – not a ton. I think I’m pretty close on the shirt. The outer fabric and the lighting are sewn together. I have the casing for the elastic. I think at this point, I think my next step actually is cutting it inserting the elastic, and then like stitching it all like sewing it all together– Oh the sleeves I have to put the sleeves on at some point too. All right, well, you know maybe another couple hours, like two hours, it should take me to finish this, and then I can get started on the dress. I can at leastget it all cut out today. Oh man. Yeah. Okay, I’m gonna have a lot left on the dress. Maybe I’m not gonna get that far on the dress. Also, I just want to say that while this whole process has definitely been like slowing down, the sewing a little bit, maybe been a little more of an impediment than help.

10:57 - I am really glad that I have been doing it, because it has forced me to actually get dressed every day. I have not been…I have not been doing that. Like I get dressed if I know I have a meeting, and even then I’m usually wearing like a sweatshirt dress of some kind. So I don’t know…this has been good. So maybe everyone else is right. And I should be getting dressed every day. But also, it’s so hard. For now, for these three days, glad I did it. It’s looking like a shirt! It’s a little bit more crop then I think I had anticipated it being. But I don’t know, man, I’m liking it. It’s not, it’s clearly not done. But I feel optimistic about how I’m going to be about the finished product.

12:14 - I definitely wish that I had spent more time on the elastic. But not, like I don’t care enough that I would actually like rip this up and go back to that step. It’s like, it’s fine. It’s just sort of, you know, a note to self, if I wind up trying to make another shirt like this at some other point in time. Or just like a lesson to carry with me into future projects, which is kind of you know, that’s that’s been the journey. Okay. The shirt is done. I finished at like 3:30, so I guess that means it took me like twice as long as I thought, which is pretty standard for my ability to assess how long anything will take. When I finished the shirt.

I was hungry, so I ate lunch and then I lay down on the couch and watched a movie and then fell asleep on said couch. So here I am now having not actually used this whole day to sew things as I had planned. Also classic, you know, big ambitious dreams confronted by reality. Anyway, I am going to take this over and start cutting – I don’t know why I keep gesturing around my apartment? Anyway. So I’m going to head that way to my kitchen table to cut all of the pieces out for this, and you know, give myself like a game plan for what I have to do tomorrow.

14:17 - I’m pretty confident that I can get everything cut out tonight, including the interfacing and also probably iron the interfacing on? OK let’s go It is now Monday after work. I had originally hoped that I could be done with all of this yesterday, if I had been like super quick about it. Today if I was slow. At this point, all I did yesterday was cut out the fabric. I mean that took forever, but that’s as far as I got. So I still have quite a bit to do I’m also just like super exhausted and drained because you know I had a whole work day and now I’m trying to, I don’t know, do things? No.

15:05 - All that to say, I don’t know how much I’m actually gonna get done tonight. I’m gonna do my best. Bodice front and back pinned together: outside. Bodice front and back pinned together: facing So the bodice is coming along really nicely. It’s a little after 10, I did not think that I would be this far along. Like I feel like I’ll probably be done in an hour? But! I would be done in the next like 20 minutes but it’s actually gonna take me like an hour probably to finish it because I need some some critical errors with the straps.

15:59 - I should have enough leftover fabric to just recut the straps entirely. That is what I’m going to go do. I’m gonna remake the strap reattach – or I guess attach the remade straps. Stitch the facing to the bodice and then understitch that, and the bodice will be done. Okay, I lied before and it was actually 11 not 10, but I was right it did take me an hour basically. Now the bodice is done! It is midnight now and I should just go to bed. However, I was looking at the instructions and the skirt stuff is all really easy. There’s a couple things I have to do with the the patch pockets on the front. Like it’s just attaching the skirt is in three pieces; there’s two front pieces because it buttons down the front, and the one big back piece. So I think that I am going to try to get all of that done tonight. This means I’ll be up until like one o’clock in the morning which is bad. I’m just so close to being done.

17:12 - Then tomorrow I’ll have to do is maybe attaching the skirt, and then I think it’s just buttons? Oh and the instructions – I did not actually see the the step for attaching all of the, like bringing the straps to one another. It’s possible that I…now that I’m looking at these are actually quite long? I think I may have done the straps for D instead of C. Oh no. D was like a tie. They were like tie [straps]. Whatever this is…this is…Yeah, this is. That’s what I did. Fuuuuck. Yep, that pieces definitely D. I feel like I can picture it now. 14 It’s straps for D. [frustrated noise] Oh well, this is fine. They’re gonna they’re gonna be little, little tie… little tie straps. That’s great. That’s one less step actually that’s amazing. So anyway, I’m gonna go work on the skirt until either I feel that I have to cut myself off, or until I get tired. Whichever comes first. I’m now on day 5, maybe of this sewing vlog, I think? I didn’t get quite as far as I had hoped last night. But honestly, I overall did more than I thought like at the beginning of the night, it was just in that final hour, I maybe dreamt a little bigger than I should have.

18:46 - There’s just a lot of ironing and like back and forth steps with the patch pockets. So that ended up taking a little bit longer than I thought it would. And I sewed down the seams on the skirt. So like the back and front pieces are all attached. The first step tonight is going to be the basting stitches for the top of the skirt. And then pinning it to the bodice and sewing that down. And then I think I should be ready for the buttons? No, that’s not true because there’s facing – there’s facing on the skirt that I have to do as well. So I have a couple more steps before it’s button time. Which like I’m excited about because I feel like once I’m onto the buttons, it’s basically done. Anyway, today is December 1, which was kind of my goal for having this done BECAUSE a year ago today, I made that dinosaur skirt. So I wanted this to be sort of my, like, one year later project, but it’s maybe a little bit too ambitious to hope that I will finish it tonight. I feel so close.

But when I actually think about the number of steps that are left I’m like, 19:55 - “oh yeah there is actually…there’s actually quite a bit going on here.” So I don’t know. I’m going to get started and do as much as I can. When I was attaching the facing to the bodice, I only attached at the top but I was also supposed to attach it here, along the sides. When I was stitching the skirt to the bodice and I had lined up this edge with the – where the button is. So right this is the this is the front center of the bottom is lined up with the front center of the skirt, right? Except the front center of the skirt is finished. And this is an unfinished edge. I don’t actually know if you can tell, if you can see it…

that’s a [blows raspberry] unfinished e 21:10 - So I ripped up a little bit of the skirt. I had to rip up enough that I was also releasing some of the gathers, because it’s going to need to go a little bit further out than it was before. Like I it right here, right? It’s going to lose some to the seam allowance when I reattach it [the lining to the bodice]. I also realized that I can’t just like wait till later to do the slipstitching on this one, like I am doing with the shirt, because that has to happen before the button stage. It is the last step before the section labeled finishing in the instructions, so that’s very exciting. So anyway, I’m off to fix that. I’m pretty sure I have fixed it.

22:25 - One day, I just want to like do a thing and be like, “Wow, I did everything right. And it turned out just like I expected.” So now what I have to do is sew the – hand sew – the bodice facing to the bodice. And what that’s going to do is bury all of this. Right, so there’s this big [indistinct noise] In addition to the grand journey that I’ve been having… doing this, I’m also having a journey, figuring out how to do this. What is a vlog? It is almost one o’clock in the morning. Again. I am obviously about to go to bed. But! Tomorrow, when I come back to this, I will finally for real, for real, be on the buttons step. I keep thinking are they coming? Is it buttons next? No. But now, yes. And then I have to hem it, and then it’s actually done. But for now. I’m going to bed. This is it. This is the last day. It is currently five o’clock on Wednesday. I just finished working for the day. And I am ready to finish this.

23:49 - All I have left to do is hem the dress and sew on the buttons. I should be able to do that in like an hour or two, that shouldn’t take me that long. [deep breath] Fingers crossed. But I feel, I’m feeling good. This is feeling doable. Also, this is the first day that I’m not wearing something that I made. I took more days to do this than I thought I would and I have made it back to my standard fare of comfy sweater and sweatshirt dresses. I’m gonna go finish this dress. I will be back in like an hour or two for me probably like 10 to 15 seconds for you watching this video. And I’m done.

25:16 - This combo of the shirt and the dress is obviously not like… it’s not quite what I was expecting it to be. So this is not a thing that I think I’m ever going to do. I like the shirt a lot, I will definitely be wearing it a fair bit this winter. The dress I also like but it is quite a bit too big for me, it’s not as easy to tell with the the shirt on underneath it. But it’s, it is definitely too big for me. And of course, I made my mistake with the straps. When I first realized that I made the mistake with the straps, I thought “okay, maybe at some point down the line, I will attempt to, find a fix that won’t require me to actually rip open the bodice” (because that’s a thing that I really don’t want to have to do) However, in order to take it in, I really do have to like, rip open the bodice. But all of that is for another day. I’m gonna, I’m just gonna call it. I’m gonna say that I finished both of these projects. They are they’re done. This dress is totally wearable, especially for now because I would not wear it without a shirt underneath it anyway, because it’s winter. Maybe with an actual sweater underneath it.

26:23 - It’s a really fun dress though, and I’m excited about it. And I feel like it’s just a bunch of little things that I did here that were better than the way that I have done things in the past. Part of the appeal of doing this – and, you know, posting the stuff that I’ve been posting on Instagram stories and whatever – is documenting that journey for myself. Like being able to say, “Okay, here is where you started, and like, look how far you’ve come!” And okay, yes, I still have very far to go. There are so many ways that this could have been better. But like… I don’t know, like I’ve made progress. I’ve made a ton of progress in this past year. It’s just really exciting to…

I don’t know put on this thing that I made and [sigh] 27:12 - The process of trying to make this video was honestly more of a journey than trying to make the dress or the shirt. I have no idea how long the video is that you just watched. I know how many hours and hours and hours of shit I have filmed that I will not use. So thank you for sitting through this video. Anyway, however long it turns out. Okay, bye. .