I sew. Not especially well, but not terribly either. My Mom is an amazing seamstress and if I’m ever 25% as good as she is then I will be happy. She made all my horse show clothes when I was a kid and all of my formal dresses for dances. I think she actually made all my clothes until about junior high. Teachers used to oooohhhh and aaaaaahhhhh over my outfits at school. I always thought they were really weird until I got older and realized what they were ooohhhhing and aaaahhhhing about. The clothes you buy at the store just aren’t that well made. Mom always scoffed at the formal dresses at stores and how uneven the hems were and most weren’t lined. No way was her daughter going to a formal dance in one of those ghastly things. I still have some of those dresses. My favorite is the black lambskin dress she made for my junior formal. It was suede so it didn’t scream HOOKER like a smooth leather dress of the same style might. It looked more like velvet.

I digress, as usual. I have my Mom’s first Bernina sewing machine. It is the best machine on the planet, hands down. It doesn’t do a bunch of fancy things, but it does what it does very well and has stood the test of time. The thing is as old if not older than me.

The best sew-chine ever

I did some sewing projects for 4-H when I was a kid. God bless my Mom for having the patience to teach me to sew. That had to be brutal because I’m confident I was not a good student. I never got very into it then, but in college I did make myself a few duvet covers and pillow cases. Now that I’m a grown-up I see the benefit in making my own clothes and some house wares. If I make my own gowns for events then I’m sure to not see anyone else in the same dress. How embarrassing when that happens! And now that I’m riding and starting to show horses again I’m making some of my riding clothes. Do you know that a custom hunt coat for showing runs at least $500 and most are closer to $1,000?! I have absolutely no intentions of making one for anyone else but I could save myself a LOT of $$ by making my own and no one else will have one like it.

Lately I’ve had an issue with a dog (Bunny) eating my pajama pants. I leave them nicely folded on my sweater chest and come home and half the leg is eaten off. I’m now down to just a couple pairs of pajama pants. I’m going on a couple trips in the near future and I don’t think anyone wants to see me wandering around in just a t-shirt so I pillaged through my fabric collection recently and cut out some new jammy pants. Today I finally made the durn things.

This is the pattern. No, I’m not Learning to Sew, but that means they are easy to make.

Cutting out the pattern pieces and the fabric generally takes almost as long as sewing the actual pieces together. I like to cut out the fabric and then sew them together on a different day. I have a tendency during projects like this to get to a point where I just want the thing done so I hurry and inevitably mess up something. Making these pants only took a couple hours. It was a nice way to spend a Saturday morning.

Putting the pieces together

The next time I use this pattern I’ll add a little to the tushy and make the waist shorter. I don’t know where I got it, but I’ve got some junk in the trunk. I measure a full 2 sizes smaller on top than I do around my hips. I don’t have a tiny waist so it isn’t terribly hard to fit things since I’m so straight, but making my own clothes allows me to get stuff to fit better.

Sewing on the waistband

Voila, I have new jammy pants! I still need to add the drawstring, but I didn’t have anything at home so will need to buy some ribbon or something. I think this fabric is fun. I’ve learned my lesson and put my clothes in the closet now so these should last for a while. My next sewing project is a dress for a friend’s rehearsal dinner at the end of May. I was going to make my dress for the wedding, but needed a long dress and was running out of time picking a pattern and fabric. I’m hoping to make something like a Mexican muumuu, but appropriate for a dinner party. We shall see!

My new jammy pants