Author: 459856pwpadmin

Last week's mini heat-wave had me itching to be out in the garden and I considered myself lucky that, despite all the running around that seemed to piled on my schedule, I managed to get out for the better part of a couple of days before the weather turned cool, and scheduling demands once again interfered.

Now, there is much to do out in my neglected patch of earth:  flower beds that need to be cleaned out and reclaimed, trampled mud around constructions sites, a brown and overgrown front yard; but I did not attend to any of these.

 Instead I wandered down to the old vegetable garden, abandoned since the end of the season in 2006.  When I tried to open the gate, a task which took considerable effort as it was entwined with dead vines and rasberry canes, this is the view that greeeted me:

I was overwhelmed.  I sat down on the clam bucket I used for gathering weeds and garden detritus and generally considered if I really wanted to tackle this job.  I almost turned away.

I had considered abandoning the vegetable garden, just hiring someone to rip out the fence and come in with a back hoe and turn it all back into level ground and patchy lawn.  I am not by nature a gardener, although when I am gardening, I am fully engaged in the activity.  I will not live in this house forever.  If and when I move I may not want a large yard and there are plenty of other things here that need attention.  Growing vegetables should be the least of my priorities.

And yet.  When the sun came out and the temperatures became balmy, I immediately started thinking about getting my hands in the dirt.  But I wasn't thinking about growing flowers, much as I love them.  I was thinking about vegetables; specifically, I was thinking about peas.  One of the great joys of Spring for me is waiting for the snow to melt off the vegetable garden, which is usually the last part of the yard to hold on to the snow, a little plot of property that is cold in the winter while also being one of the hottest, sunniest patches of the yard in summer.  Then, as soon as the snow is gone and the ground is dry enough to work I would plant peas.

I usually try to get my peas in by Saint Patrick's day, my own little personal celebration of green.  I didn't make it this year, but I did have them planted by the weekend.  Peas don't mind frost or even snow.  If the weather is unusually cold they take a little longer to grow, if it is mild I get to harvest them a little faster.  There is nothing like the early pea crop, in mid to late May.  And there is nothing quite like peas eaten within an hour of being removed from the vine.

I still have to clean out the flower beds.  I will get that done in the next week or so, even though it is colder now.  But I am thrilled by the promise of peas.  I plant flower beds and landscape the yard because I am picky about how it looks, and I don't want the same over-used cookie cutter yard that I see everywhere around me.  I garden because I love art and form and color, not really because I love to garden.  I want my yard to be an expression of this love, not to look like every nice yard in the neighborhood.  I am also far more willing to live with my own idiosyncrasies and failures than I am willing to accept mundane mediocrity.

I plant vegetables however because I obsess about food.  I love to cook.  I love to eat.  I care about the raw ingredients that appear on our table.  When I started gardening, farm stands were fewer and further between and there was no weekend farmer's market.  I don't need to grow as much now, I can easily buy what I need in season.  But I can't buy peas right off the vine.  I can't usually buy peas in May.  Most of the peas come in during June, and if we have a cold spring my peas come in in June as well.  But if we have a hot spell in May or June, and this is common, the peas are worse for it.  It is worth the risk to me, to savor those few precious spring peas.

 It took me one day just to clear out the path and dig up branches and roots in one small 5' x5' planting bed.  It took me another day to double dig that bed, and amend the soil and get it ready for planting.  After all that, putting in the peas was easy.  It doesn't look like much, but it felt like such an accomplishment.  Now I just have to wait for them to sprout.

Oh, and I have to clean out the rest of the garden.  I need to clear some space for Fava Beans next.  And work on the flower beds as well.

Little bits of color started to appear last week.

The days were warm, in the 70s.

 

It is only March.  I am sure there are several cold days remaining.  After all, our last frost date isn't until mid-May.  

 

Of course, we all hope that the warm weather is here to stay, that this will be our reward for putting up with last summer which was cold.  It has not escaped my attention that this past week was warmer than most of last summer.

Spring hit me rather hard last week.  

The temperature was gloriously warm.  The sun was shining, and suddenly all those lovely, newly fitting winter clothes seemed dark and dreary and drab.  Oh I am sure there will be opportunity to wear them yet.  I am well aware that last week was warmer than most of last summer, but spring fever was upon me.

Unfortunately spring clothes are still in short supply around here and I had no real intention of making them all.

 I had already ordered a stack of tees, having discovered that I had only one long sleeve cotton tee, a wardrobe necessity.  The one in hand was a deep blue-purple, nice but limiting.  A supply of black and white was immediately necessary, and few flattering colors wouldn't hurt.  Luckily I quickly discovered that J. Crew's "perfect fit" tees did, indeed, fit me perfectly.

But then, with the warm weather I was itching to get to work in the yard, which has been long neglected.  I refuse to garden in St. John wool knit pants however, or heels, and more shopping was in order, namely for basic pants to get me through the summer working in the yard and running in to town to get mail or make a quick stop at the lumberyard or garden supply store.  

Nothing fancy was required, just jeans and/or chinos.  I could make them.  I have made jeans, although not completely satisfactorily, and I wanted jeans that functioned but in which I also felt comfortable going to town. I also wanted my jeans now, not three muslins from now so I went shopping. Perhaps this is too much to ask, but luckily I continue to be able to find nice jeans.

 In fact the day I went jeans-shopping last week, my first stop ended up being my last stop.  I walked into the Gap, pulled two pairs of jeans off the shelf in two different styles and made my way to the dressing room.  Both pairs fit fabulously.  

I ended up with two pairs of "Always skinny" jeans, one in a dark wash for going to town and one in a medium wash which will hopefully function for all casual activities.  I've been without dark wash jeans for a few months now, and I've missed them.  I seem to have come late to the appreciation of dark jeans.

As for the medium wash.  I promptly got online and ordered two more pairs as they only had one pair in the store in my size.  I've already hemmed the first pair and worn them in the garden all weekend.  And I am quite grateful that The Gap uses a fairly standard jeans-type topstitching thread so that the thread in my stash matched the thread used on the jeans.  It really bugs me when the stitching at the hem does not match the rest of the jeans, even in the garden.

As for the other pairs, they too are necessary, even though I am trying to get away from buying too many multiples.  After all I would like to have two pairs of jeans lest one pair be covered in mud or grass or what-have-you, and I prefer not to have to wash my jeans every night if I am working in the yard.  Every other night is often enough.

And I also need a pair to leave long to wear with heels.  Yes, I wear jeans with heels.  I wear medium wash jeans with heels.  I used to feel guilty about this.  I am far too prone to guilt.  I don't wear my dark wash straight (read skinny, although the skinny jeans are not nearly as skinny on me as on the model) jeans with heels, but I do wear the medium wash jeans.  It finally occurred to me that my issue with jeans is not dressing them up by wearing a dark wash, my issue is using jeans to dress a more formal garment down.  I wear the medium wash jeans to take the formal edge off a too formal or too dressy jacket so that I can wear it around town without feeling like I've gotten all gussied up.

I am completely relieved to have that settled in my head.

 I also came home with a pair of dark wash boot cut jeans. I haven't had a pair of dark wash jeans since November when I finally recognized that my old pair was unflatteringly large and I have missed them terribly. They are my preferred silhouette, along with trouser jeans, as they make my legs look longer.   I don't really need multiples of these.  Or perhaps I wish I did, because I think I could live in them.  But I don't, need them that is. And having too many pairs of the exact same style is boring, except when they are needed of course.

A nicely fitting pair of chinos seems to be  more problematic.  Perhaps I will end up sewing those.  But then again, perhaps not.

The problem is, if shopping is so easy, a couple of issues pop into my head:

If I can go to a store and get clothes that fit and I like easily, why should I bother trying to reach my weight loss goal?  Isn't the whole thing about feeling comfortable with myself?And if I have clothes that fit and flatter, I tend to feel comfortable with myself.   Of course that is the same thought that got me started gaining weight in the first place. 

Secondly, if I can buy jeans or chinos, why should I sew them?  Luckily I live in an age when I can run to the store and buy manufactured clothes.  I do not have to literally clothe myself and my family.  This is a good thing.  Besides I would rather sew something I enjoy sewing.  Actually, finding clothes I like is rather liberating.  It takes the pressure off.  That sense of desperation, of not having something to wear is gone.  Now I can just enjoy.

What a relief.  Suddenly I don't worry about style.  Who cares?  I think fretting about style was a symptom of something else.  It is not that I don't worry about these things; I love clothes, they are never far from my brain it is true. And I still think about what I want, what would look good, what goes with what.  But I don't need to force the issue.  I know what I like.  I know what I don't.  There is enough room in the world for all of us to be whatever we wish.

 I finally realized that the basic dichotomy that follows me in everything I do and love remains a constant.  I love the simple.  And I love the incredibly ornate.  Simple predominates, except when it doesn't.   Simple, isn't it?

I think I was trying to be something in-between, something not me.  I was trying to pain that picture and then trying to live up to the portrait I had assembled.  Not so simple at all.

I realize I need jeans again.  I mentioned somewhere that I was going to need jeans soon, when I reached a certain goal.  That point has come and gone.  And spring seems to be approaching rapidly.  I need jeans.  I need simple clothes for every day. I need clothes I can wear to work in the yard.  If they are also up for going to the post office all the better.  I have been known to work in the yard in some baggy old worn out thing that I loved but with which I was not quite ready to part.  That is no longer a possibility.  Those old things are gone.  Really, they were too big to wear anyway.  I don't need to hang on to the past.

And now Spring is coming and I cannot live in cashmere and wool forever.

Isn't that why I was working on a shirt muslin?  yes.

Isn't that why I was working on pants?  yes.

Am I going to sew everything I wear?  not on your life.

Seems like it may be time to get a move on.

I'm still sorting and assessing and putting my life back to rights.  In my bits and pieces of spare time, I've moved from the closet(s), which I haven't finished, to the rest of the house: cleaning, sorting, rearranging, and settling, with a rather hefty dose of negotiating going on as well.  It is a slow process, but worthwhile.  I think of it as a rather grand spring cleaning, and it was long overdue.  

But while I was involved in spring cleaning, Spring seems to have actually crept in unannounced.  I wasn't quite ready.  After all I just found all those lovely wools to wear. 

Luckily I do have choices now, and one of my projects has involved figuring out how the bits and pieces that remain can work together, and what I actually am missing and need in my wardrobe as well as what I have to work with. 

With the return of warmer weather and the promise of spring clothes I am also finding the remnants of TNT patterns past.  The trick is to reassess them now and see if they retain enough appeal to be reworked to fit my figure as it is now.

Take this long jacket.  This is made from an OOP Vogue pattern by Sandra Betzina, 7022, which is a princess-seamed cardigan jacket.  I had made it several times by the time I made this long version.

This iteration was made nearly 7 years ago and was part of my (step)MOB outfit.  The matching dress no longer fits; it is too small through the bust and too large through the hips and thighs.  The coat, however, is not bad.  It is actually a little too big, probably the only reason it does not pull through the bust, and if I were wearing it buttoned over a simple and thin sheath dress the sizing would be obvious.  But it works worn as a duster with pants or jeans and it will get me through part if not most of this season.

The fabric is really interesting in this coat.  It has a woven raffia like appearance on the surface, but this is just a surface effect of a knit fabric.  The fabric was from Cadena of Spain and I purchased it after seeing the same or similar fabric used in a collection of suits by the Italian house Mila Schön around 2001 or 2002.  The fabric grew with excess manipulation, although it steamed into shape beautifully, it shed little bits of fiber everywhere, and it snags easily. But it is beautiful.

 Here is the pattern picture. 

The question is whether I would use this again.  I don't need jackets for work, but this is a basic, if boring, shape. I really think I feel better and therefore look better with a bit of tailoring in my garments and this gives me the feel of a cardigan with a little extra structure.  But whether it works or is dowdy will all be up to the fabric and the fit.  I think it can be pulled off.  The pattern will need some alterations for my new shape, and it desperately needs to lose the shoulder pads.  It may work best for me in the longer length, but I will need to play with the muslin to be sure, and for me, it will all depend on the fabric.

What I am uncertain about right now is whether I am looking at this pattern realistically, or if my judgement is clouded by the jacket I am wearing and my love for it.

As for my needs list, this outfit, for all that I feel right at home in it, the following notes were added to my file:

New white shirts that fit: (muslin was in works — finish and make shirts)

New Jeans.  These are getting too baggy to wear but for the most casual of days.  They will make good jeans for yard work after a replacement pair has been procured.

Replace the coat.  I like the feel and structure of this more than a long cardigan.  Look for soft, interesting fabric, that lend a more casual feel to this tailored jacket. Check fabric collection for a suitable replacement in a shade more appropriate for current coloring.  Check patterns for dusters and long jackets. No rush, this one will get me through most of the spring.

 I've been cleaning out my closet.  This time I am being really brutal.  I must love it.  I must love it on.  No settling.

I am finding that I had forgotten how nice I feel in nice clothes, that I like tailoring, that I love a beautiful dress and heels, nice ladylike flats too, but especially heels.  I like dressing up.  Where have I been?  How could I forget?

Oh yes, I remember now.  Caregiver.  What a terrible word.  What a terrible style.

 I want to repudiate caregiver style.  Oh wearing jeans has been good for me.  I have learned to be casual; this took a long time, and there are days this is all I want.  But more often I want to be in a suit or dress and heels even though this is not the wardrobe expected in my life.  

One must gauge the climate.  One must also gauge the temperature of the woman, and find a meeting point where both coexist in comfort.  I am working on this; slowly yet, but working nonetheless.

I want to wear what I want simply because I want to wear it.

 I'm not far enough along in the closet restructuring to report anything, but I have been inspired to look at the fall collections.  Of course I started at the top, with my favorite, Chado by Ralph Rucci.  You must go look at the collection.  It is amazing.  Almost every piece is gorgeous.  The man is a genious.  Obviously I am stark-raving-mad for this collection.  I like it so much I have looked at it over and over.  I like it so much I haven't looked at anything else.

 I am so inspired I'm loopy.

 There are so many things here that speak to me.  Some are ideas for things to make.  I'm not really planning direct knock-offs.  I stopped that years ago, I'm more interested in stealing inspiration, and Ralph Rucci's work is all inspiration.  Besides, my skills aren't up to creating some of these things, not yet, perhaps not ever.  

But my love of this collection goes beyond just wanting the clothes, and yes I do want them.  It goes beyond just dreaming of making the clothes, or using them for inspiration.  This collection reminds me of something fundamental and basic that is in my style, something with which I had floundered for a while. 

If style is also a reflection of who you are, of the place you want to mark in the world, when the world throws you for a loop it is conceivable that even style can get lost.    But to deny one's style is to deny a fundamental piece of oneself, whether that style be "high" or "low", combat boots or Christian Louboutin.

I love these garments in and of themselves.  They are perfection.  They remind me of what I like, they remind me not to go down frivolous paths following whims.  

Sometimes I just look at something and say that is how I wish clothing could be, how I wish life could be, the life for those clothing.  

Aspirational.  

 Inspirational.

Clothing that makes me wax philosophic. Not a good sign.  Did I not tell you I was loopy? We all know I am not good at philosophy, and I am worse at writing about it.  

Did you know that in college I was told that I "write badly very well", and that I should write the blurbs that you find on the back of novels, enticing the reader to open the pages?  

It is true.  But it is not correct.  I let my mind wander far too freely to write blurbs.

Even in the context of these fabulous clothes my mind wanders beyond "where could I wear this" and "how could I reproduce that" and thinks of blurbs.

These are dream clothes.  They are not clothes for driving the garbage cans up the hill, or doing all those other practical things.  I don't think dreams need to be practical.