New Look Pattern Haul

Hobby Lobby will no longer be carrying New Look patterns. On my way to a wedding shower brunch yesterday morning, I stopped in at our store and looked through the clearance rack to see what I could find. All of the New Look patterns were $0.99.

I have plenty of patterns, so I confined myself to just a few—mostly dresses, a couple of hoodies, and one baby pattern that features a technique I might want to use to develop a serger class.

I am not sure what is going on with this clearance. I hope this doesn’t signal a trend by Hobby Lobby to downsize its fabric department, especially not in the face of the Joann Fabrics bankruptcy. I have had good luck with New Look patterns, although their size range is limited and I’m at the upper end of it.

The wedding shower was lovely. The bride is a member of the large family that helped found our church, and even though her immediate family worships elsewhere in the valley, she is getting married in our church’s sanctuary. I am supposed to be the pianist. I’ve known this young woman since she was about three years old, because she and DD#2 took dance lessons together.

The bride is on the left, DD#2 is on the right. Hard to believe this was more than 20 years ago.

I had fun visiting with my friend, Cassie, at the shower. She’s also part of that large family and lives up by our church with her husband, five kids and pigs, cows, and chickens. We have no shortage of homesteading topics to discuss. Her kids are in 4-H. I gave them a Singer Spartan sewing machine last year and Cassie said they have gotten a ton of use from it.

I came home after the shower and spent an hour puttering around the greenhouse and garden. The weather has been absolutely gorgeous lately. I moved hoses around and the husband and I walked the perimeter to see where the fencing needs to be repaired. The cucumbers and melons seeds I planted a few days ago have popped up. Unfortunately, a system is supposed to drop down from Canada on Tuesday and put us back down into the 40s for a few days before warming up again. I need to get seed potatoes this week. Planting those is on the schedule for next Saturday.

And I worked on the Emerald dress for a few hours before dinner. Despite the simple design, it’s a bit fiddly. I am not sure it will make a good class unless we do the top version. It would be difficult to have students cutting out large pattern pieces on the bias. There is a lot of staystitching, understitching, and edge finishing. (I finished the edges on the serger and sewed the seams on the machine.) I’ve gotten as far as attaching the neck facing and one armhole facing. I still have the second armhole facing and hem facing to finish. That probably won’t happen until mid-week, because today, tomorrow, and Tuesday are full, but I’ll be able to take advantage of the crummy weather to stay inside and sew.

When I say “fiddly,” I’m comparing construction of woven garments to construction of knit ones. I can whip out a knit top consisting of five seams and a hem in a couple of hours, so I forget that clothing made from wovens takes longer to complete. I think I’m going to like the dress, though. The Brussels Washer Linen has been a dream to work with.