Tuesday Project Roundup: Sewing For The Gym

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Since I started lifting at the gym four days a week (HELLO YES DID YOU KNOW I LIFT WEIGHTS NOW? LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT IT), I’ve found some holes in my workout wear, namely that I didn’t have much of it other than yoga leggings and an open back tank.

Fortunately, someone I follow on Instagram (An Elemental Life) did a Stories highlight of companies that make activewear patterns. From her, I found out about Greenstyle Creations. Their Tie-Back Tank was really similar to the solitary tank I had and liked; I had a yard of panel print leftover from this maxi four years ago*;  and so I went for it.

I wasn’t brave enough to take a picture of this at the actual gym last night, but I get braver there every day (or at least four times a week)

Verdict: It’s great! (And SO much easier to sew with a serger; that maxi was all done with a mock overlock on my regular machine and I remember it taking forever.) It stayed in place during a workout really well (even doing back extension!)  and the knot is easy to tuck up into the small of your back for floor work. I made the high neck option with the bands and it only took me an hour of sewing time.

 

 

*I know I still look pretty un-muscled in these photos, but compared to how bony I was four years ago, I’m really happy with what all this time at the gym is doing. Also, I’m going to be so in demand for helping friends move, pushing stalled cars, rearranging furniture, etc.

It’s Monday

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Be sure to clasp the hand of your loved one and gaze at them sweetly.

(Especially if they left you ALONE for FOUR DAYS last weekend, then you’d better not let them out of your sight and maybe you need to sleep on their pillow for good measure.)

Friday Links

By in Friday Unrelated Information, Sunday Night Conversations 1 Comment

1. I haven’t posted a Sunday night conversation with my friend in a long time because we’ve gotten out of that Sunday night call habit and into a monthly dinner habit, and it’s just too hard to write all his sayings down in a restaurant. But we talked this week and he’s still a source of quotable quotes.

I was telling him about the Glacier trip and how nice it was to just sit on a rock at the edge of the river and not think, and he said,

“Oh I know the joy of escaping your worries and your own psyche…I should write a book about it.”

[pause]

“But it would be a short book, because I haven’t been able to do it, really.”

2. Maybe not the most scholarly, but this was an interesting piece about textiles in Viking culture.

3. Via Kottke, a deeply informative story about who’s actually using “food stamps” and what they buy. Being picky about what I eat, being able to cook decently healthy meals, being able to shop when I want–it’s a luxury.

Thursday Poem

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When we go back to Glacier I think we’ll have to camp, because I would love to see those lakes and mountains under a full moon. This snippet came through from Pome recently and I imagine it would be like this.

from Interlunar

We have come to the edge:
the lake gives off its hush;
in the outer night there is a barred owl
calling, like a moth
against the ear, from the far shore
which is invisible.
The lake, vast and dimensionless,
doubles everything, the stars,
the boulders, itself, even the darkness
that you can walk so long in
it becomes light.

Margaret Atwood (1984)

Wednesday Project Roundup: Another Nikko Top

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I can’t stop making easy sleeveless summer tops and I’m ok with it. This is another True Bias Nikko in some really nice crisp cotton rib from Mood. (It was actually one of the suggested fabrics when the pattern was introduced.)

I made my first one at a size 10 and had to take it in quite a bit (trust the negative ease!) so I cut this at an 8. But this cotton isn’t as tightly ribbed as my first fabric so I ended up having to take in another half an inch on the seams under the arms so the armholes wouldn’t gape. (I think I also stretched out the armhole facings a little when putting those on, and the cotton just didn’t spring back like the rayon.)

Regardless, I’ve realized that I love a high neck sleeveless top and this is a great pattern. It looks like something you’d find in Madewell, except it really is made well because you made it yourself.

Glacier!

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August is Vacation Month over here and we kicked it off with a lightning trip up to Glacier National Park for our friend’s 40th birthday. Yes, we spent two out of four vacation days driving there and back, but it was worth it to get a taste of the park. This place is ridiculous, it’s so beautiful. We’ll be back.

The Best Universe

By in Frank Herbert

I don’t talk about my love of Frank Herbert’s Dune universe very much because it’s just too hard to explain, but this piece from The Outline does a good job summing up why it’s hard to sum up and why it’s the best thing to love: The Only Good Online Fandom Left is Dune. 

Beyond that, Dune is not a corporate cash cow, and being a fan doesn’t carry with it that icky feeling you’re doing an unpaid PR internship for Disney or AT&T Time Warner. You’re not being cultivated when you make a Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohaim Appreciation Thread, the way you are when you do something similar for, like, Harley Quinn or Groot. Nor are you helping billionaires whitewash their crimes if you point out politically positive aspects of the series, like its environmentalism or its bone-deep skepticism of leader cults.

Also, the article linked to the Dank Dune Memes Twitter account (yep) and it’s my new favorite thing. There never was a more accurate image for me: 

Halfway

By in Uncategorized

It’s Lughnasadh/Lammas/the mid point between the summer solstice and the autumnal equinox today. This week I’ve noticed that we don’t have the lingering evening light past 9:00 anymore. When Toby gets me up at 5:30, it’s a lot darker.

The glorious lamp of heaven, the sun,
The higher he’s a-getting,
The sooner will his race be run,
And nearer he’s to setting.

(Don’t take the advice in that poem literally, of course)

Summer Of Basics #2: Hiking Pants

By in sewing, Tuesday Project Roundup 3 Comments

I’ve had my eye on a pair of Patagonia “Happy Hike Studio Pants.” The style looked interesting for the trail but I wasn’t sure I’d like it enough to pay $79 to try it. Mostly, I wanted to see if I could make a convincing copy, so they went on the Summer of Basics list.

Well, what can’t that True Bias Hudson pant pattern do? I didn’t even modify it, just sewed it up in technical fabrics–a durable stretch woven from Rockywoods and nylon ribbing from The Rain Shed  for the waistband and cuffs (I had to get swatches for a color match–this is “Gargoyle” DSW and “Foliage Green” ribbing.)

The only change I made was to deepen the pockets by two inches and add a phone “holster” inside the main pocket, so my phone doesn’t move around as I hike.

 

Overall, it’s a pretty close approximation of the Patagonia pair. The Hudson pattern has some more fullness and I cut my waistband taller, since I thought I might want to fold it over when not wearing a pack. The Patagonia fabric  probably has a lot more drape, though. This durable stretch woven isn’t all that stretchy, so up until wearing these on a hike I didn’t think I would like them–too much fullness for too stiff a fabric (they don’t look like much on the hanger). 

 

But that wide ribbed waist is so comfortable under a pack, and those pockets are so functional, that I was totally converted. I don’t even care if they’re “too” full, they’re my new favorite hiking pants.

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