arahith

A pile of black fabric pattern pieces still pinned to brown paper pattern

And since that's all I can do on the pants til tomorrow's mail, it's onto the shirt!

Pinned fabric pieces with elastic inside them

The same pieces but sewn together

The same pieces but turned right side out so the elastic extends out the corners to create the back portion for built in suspenders

The same piece after pressing and topstitching.

I'm making build in under shirt suspenders because I'm now fat enough that belts don't like to work but I don't want falling down pants. They'll zip to attach to the waistband of the pants.

However because I had to get 3in separating zippers custom cut I'm still waiting for them to be delivered.

A very messy looking notebook of to do steps for this project and a sketch of the pants

Same notebook different page, this one showing a flow chart of what is left to do

Sat down and wrote out my next steps in minutia. Sadly my handwriting is shit so I'll never have those beautiful aesthetic notebook shots.

Two of the calf part of the pants resting on a sewing machine. One has pins in it.

The pinned piece going through the sewing machine, showing off the tight area I had to work with.

The hemmed bottom of the pants

The cuff being attached to the leg using just so many pins

welp i forgot to post more yesterday but I did get the cuffs on! Because the boots are so tight I want a well fitting calf to the pants with some even stretchier fabric to like shrink wrap it to my legs. I attached the stretchier part by gathering it with a method I call using 1 fucktillion pins.

Anyway I've got to break for food, apparently coffee and a single string cheese is a shit breakfast

The mid progress pants being tried on in front of a Christmas tree

Flat felling yet another seam but this one is more awkward with fabric bunched up out of the way of the needle.

Nows a good time to try them on before you lock that seam in with the flat felling (only possible on this one cuz the pant legs are roomy and short! Don't try to otherwise! It was still a pain this time!)

The bottom edge of the inseam showing the pattern pieces not matching up.

Sewing the inseam from the center out to keep the other seams lined up perfectly

After that is the inseam! I l managed to get the front pieces an inch shorter at the bottom than the back despite this not being a problem with the mock up?? At least I can just cut it down? But what the fuck. I always sew this in 2 parts, out from the center each time to make sure the seams line up

Close up of finished pants to check against as I work. They have a trans pride belt

Another close up of a sewing machine about to do a flat felled seam but this time the pins are on the correct side.

After the side seams the next step is butt and the bottom of the crotch! I flat felled these as well (pro tip: bring pants down to double check your work against as you go! Def helps with the fly) Here's where I started putting the pins on the correct side and finally remembered to change my needle

A sewing machine close up on the needle which is over to the side and about to sew parallel to an existing seam

The finished flat felled seam!

Close up of where I didn't keep the stitches parallel and had to suddenly move the needle over creating a jagged seam

Pic of the back of the seam showing the back fold not fully caught so you can see the raw edge

Fuck up tax! The first two pics are things going right (tho don't sew with your pins trapped underneath! That's part of why my first seam looks so shitty!) and the second two pics are my fuck ups. (don't worry I'll pick them out and fix them)

Black fabric with pins and a small zig zag stitch

One side of the seam allowance trimmed back

The other side of the seam allowance folded under to hide the raw edge and create a flat fell seam

Anyway the fabric I'm using has more stretch than I realized so I'm kicking myself that I still don't have a working serger. Instead I'll have to make due with a zigzag stitch and a stretch stitch for the flat fell seams. (cut down one side of seam allowance and fold under the other to hide edges)

Pattern pieces pinned to black fabric on a sewing table set on top of short bookshelves

The same pattern pieces but cut out now on a kinda messy kitchen table with an open laptop in the background.

The same kitchen table but with a sewing machine set up on it and YouTube going on the laptop.

The best mug in existence beside the sewing machine and in front of more pattern pieces.

Cosplay thread time! (I gotta get myself a ring light tripod, then I can take vids and just ramble in real time)

But anyways I cut out the pieces for Drifter yesterday (thanks new cutting table!) and this morning I set up my space to actually put stuff together

Yeeeeeeeeeep hate that one the most

I get this with my boss a lot. The hands off is nice sometimes, but mostly it just means I'm floundering in the dark and what she actually wants comes as a surprise.

Things that are good about the weather letting up: get to leave the house FINALLY

things that are bad: so much snow to shovel and I don't have a good coat cuz it only gets this cold every like 3rd or 4th year

HAP BIRF!!!!!!!!

But it's a goal of mine this year to get better about documenting and sharing my progress on my projects so that they actually feel like they exist, so once I start on the actual construction you'll get a bunch

no pics cuz my phone didn't charge last night and I had to rip apart the shirt portion to modify the paper pattern.

the satisfying feeling of thinking you're drafting a pattern wrong but pushing through to mockup and then fitting and realizing that yes, you do actually know what you're doing!

Happy 84th birthday to Hayao Miyazaki :-]

I have no idea who designed it, but every time I use it I feel connected to and thankful for this random person who designed such a perfect cup and somehow made bits of my life so much better in what seems like an inconsequential way.

I didn't know I had quite such specific taste until I got this one. My friends bullied me into getting it since I had been on the I don't *need* it train, and I'm so glad they did. Every time I sit down with it it makes me happy and I wanted to analyze what makes it so perfect!

The same mug, held aloft.

The thin walls and slight outward slope cool my coffee just a hair faster which is perfect for me. The handle might be mass production standard, but it fits my fingers perfectly.
It makes me so fucking content every time I drink from it. Thank you tiny Japanese grocery with tinier home goods section

The same mug, closer shot.

This mug is literally perfect for me: small enough to fit in my tiny child hands, but light and airy. The pattern is ever so slightly indented with just a hint of friction to the slightly matte black glaze. The white sections are translucent and glossy.

The most perfect mug in front of a plastic plate of eggos. It's small and slender for a mug with repeating, slightly textured black and white geometric pattern.

So, big picture-wide? Not important at all. But fuck the big picture, it's the small things that are important! and this? This is *the perfect mug* and every time I use it I am so fucking happy.

Doesn't help that I'm alone at work today either (we got a monster of an energy bill this month and between being sick and trying desperately to save for the next anime con, I need to work as much as possible now) (tbh so much of my anxiety would be solved with a better paying job.....)

I don't like new years. I think it's something about the way it forces you to zoom out? Like I can find so much joy in individual moments, in small things, but my combo of bad brain means that when I look at the bigger picture it's either anxiety over the future or depression rewriting my memories

Strip of leds, lit up cyan with one part lit up white

Hahahahahha I have no idea how I did it but I managed to modify this code enough to do what I need! (this only took like 2 solid days of desperate confusion)

or NOT. i got an esp32-s2 instead of esp32 *facepalm*

This is more a soldering practice and "can I finish a project?" practice than anything. I'm just stringing up a bunch of individual leds and messing around to see if I can get wled to work so I can control them from my phone. Should be a nice simple warm up before setting up my sword, but we'll see

A small computer board held in an alligator clamp with soldered wires coming off of it

Ok so I *can* actually still solder! My iron just isn't powerful enough to reliably do 18g, which is disappointing, but 30g will be fine. (I had been putting off practicing because it hasn't been working at first and I thought I'd completely lost a skill after neglecting it for a decade)