Projects under construction

Sewing kitty is hard at work

Let's take a break from my political ranting, and get back to what really matters: sewing, grad school, and pictures of cats.  This week is shaping up to be very busy, in part because our department is bringing newly-admitted but not-yet-committed grad students for a visiting weekend, and I'm hosting one, hosting the department wide party for all of them + all the current grad students, and buying booze for said party.  Plus I've got a lot of my own projects floating around half finished.  

The first gratuitous cat picture up top is the fabric I'd like to use to recover our office chairs; this second one is their unfortunate current state.  Two chairs for a grand thrifted total of twenty bucks isn't bad, since the casters are really smooth and the frames of the chairs are both solid, but the upholstery is just terrible.  The ikat fabric up top is a good upholstery weight, and I don't think it'll pick up too much cat hair.

Speaking of reupholstering things, J and I are gearing up to reupholster our yellow velvet couch,  We've reupholstered armchairs before, including the green one here, but the couch is a much bigger commitment, and it has mock tufting.  The yellow velvet has really grown on me, but it's worn off in big patches all over and there's tears in the velvet where the stuffing is coming out.  I think we could get through it in a weekend, but it would mean being couchless for a weekend, and that's where we live most of the time.  And by we I mean my library books and I.

And I apologize for turning this into a cat blog, but short of J holding on to a struggling ball of unhappiness, there was no way to keep the cat out of the pictures today.  Wherever the camera went, he wanted to be, so that's where he is.  Illustrating the cat hair repellent qualities of the new fabrics or something.

So here's a picture with no cat in it:

Return of the Mannequin

Here's fellowship dress #2.  What's with all the slim skirts?  I don't own any other pencil skirts or slim skirted dresses; I don't know where these last two came from.  I also don't know where I'll ever wear this, since it's too heavy to be a summer dress, too sleeveless to be a fall dress, and too short to be a winter dress.  And I rarely wear anything short sleeved when I teach.  

Anyway, this is from the same pattern as the last fellowship dress, with the princess seams closed and turned into regular waist and bust darts.  I'm not totally happy with the dress, since it's WAY louder than what I usually wear, and it's lined with a bright blue that makes it feel a little cartoony to me.  I'm going to let it sit for a few days while I think about it/do some academic work for a change.  

Right now it's at that stage of the project that I was complaining about a while back with my State Capitol research--most of the way through, but not quite sure if it's going to be worth it on the other end.  I think part of the problem with this dress is that I'm happy it's stash busting (I have an entire dresser + full of fabric) and I like the look as an idea, but I'm not sure I'll wear it.

But maybe I can wear it to an archive or something--I just got my first acceptance letter for one of the fellowships I applied for, at an archive in southern California.  I've never been.  Maybe they wear sleeveless, heavy wool dresses in California?  I'm just so happy to have one that I'll wear whatever they tell me.  Two more of these short term ones and I can put off a semester of my grad school funding; if I get a big one I can take off a year.  That might be too much to hope for, though.