Toronto 2015

I went to Canada this year with a few of my friends to check out what Caribana was all about and hit OVO Fest at the same time. If you're not familiar with Caribana, it's the caribbean carnival hosted in Toronto every year. And OVO Fest is the 2 day music festival that Drake hosts every year on the same weekend! 

We stayed in an AirBnb right in the middle of the city!This is a mini photo dump of some highlights of the trip. I like to keep some of my travel memories to myself ;-) but I'll caption the photos below to give a little bit more info of the things what went on!

Enjoy!

Needles & Fashion Sew Social Meetup!

I'm back here to share a few photos of the meetup Jenese and I hosted for the Facebook Group she started, Needles and Fashion. Jenese has such a generous heart and her creativity is pretty out of this world! This is the 3rd DMV Area Meetup that she's let me organize. This one was more involved though because the first two were just food and fellowship. This time, though, we found a space and told all of the attendees to bring their sewing machines and fabric to sew something together!

It was technically the DMV Area Meetup, but we had people come as far as Richmond and Philly to participate! We had 10 ladies make their way in addition to me and Jenese with a cameo or two from Jenese's young one. We had breakfast from Panera (bagels, coffee, and pastries) and a Caribbean cuisine lunch/dinner featuring both jerk and curry chicken with rice and peas and a side of salad. 

We were able to giveaway goodie bags with our usual N&F Meetup frame (not pictured :-( ) and also stuff it with copies of information about sewing techniques that I got from another lady in the group, LaToria, that I had the opportunity to meet the day before. I was gifting her a sewing machine for her new full-time business as a sewing teacher and she gave me TONS of information to give to the ladies that would be attending! She also gave me my hearts desire in yardage of black and white waistband interfacing. She really was just the sweetest lady. If you're in the DMV area looking for a personal sewing teacher please let me know and I will get you in touch with her. She teaches a number of ladies in the Facebook Group and they always rave about how awesome she is.

The pattern that Jenese picked to do the sewalong was the Sewaholic Robson Coat. Much of the time spent was putting together ALL of those pdf pages and cutting the pieces out lol. The ladies brought such interesting fabrics to make the coat with! One even had gold bias tape to bind the insides. It was exciting to see everyone's different styles. Unfortunately, no coats came out of the day, but people that brought other projects to work on were able to make good progress or finish what they came to do.

We did our usual 1yd challenge/swap and Jenese gave away a ridiculous amount of fabric yardage to each person that came.  We also had a pattern swap/giveaway with a full variety of different patterns and pattern sizes. Also, I had one of my best friends, Ahlora, make strawberry shortcake and red velvet cupcakes with sewing decorations for the event. They were AWESOME! and if you're in the Baltimore area looking for sweet for your next baby shower/birthday/graduation/etc. don't hesitate to check out her blog or email her directly at sugarlovedesserts@mail.com. (yes MAIL, not Gmail lol)

It was such an honor meeting the different women that we interact with so much on the Facebook Group. We had a good time talking and singing and learning from each other. Maybe that's why we didn't finish any coats?? lool That's probably the perfect reason and it was an awesome time! My only regret is forgetting to take a group picture!! I'm still so mad about it smh but you live and learn. I'm looking forward to planning the next one!

Check out the pics I was able to capture below!

Shirtdress 2 Ways - McCall's 6124

Hello, Lovely People! I have a couple of posts backlogged but I wanted to get this one in by the deadline. There are a few reasons why I chose to make a Shirtdress for August. The first one is that Ruqayyah started a Facebook group and the first sewalong for the group was a Shirtdress. Second, Michelle contacted me about working together for the TMS challenge this month (Two is the Magic Number). She suggested we make the same pattern or different patterns but the same fabric or any other combination. 

First let me say, I was honored because I'm still surprised that people actually read my blog! Plus Michelle is the winner of the Rippin' Ain't Easy sewing competition run by PrettyGirlsSew as well as one of the judges for the 2nd round of The Super Online Sewing Match run by Sew Mama Sew.

I more than happily accepted and suggested we make Shirtdresses out of African Print fabric. We decided on McCall's 6124, picked a day to meet and set off to make our garments! The deal was done!

Shining White - McCall's 6647

Hiiiii friends! I can't believe I've been away for a whole MONTH! So many things have been going on and I definitely haven't been sewing the way I THOUGHT I was going to be lol. I made my last garment on July 25th and hadn't touched my machine until this past weekend. Fortunately the absence will result in a couple more blog posts because I've been on the move!

This post is about the dress I made for my 25th birthday party! I ended not being able to celebrate my birthday ON my birthday because I was participating in wedding festivities so I ended up having a party a couple of weeks later. It had an All-White theme so you KNOW I had to make something special!

Stashed - Vogue 1247

Well, I've finally decided to catch up with the pack and make a community favorite. This is Vogue 1247. I've actually made this pattern before but I made the blouse. This is my first time making the mini skirt.

And when I say "mini skirt" that's and understatement for my 5'9 height. I knew from other reviews and just by looking at the pattern envelope that I would need to add length but I only had 1 yard remnant from JoAnn's to work with. The remnant is labeled "Davi Fuschia Hibiscus Tro 44"". It's 100% cotton.

25 - Ankara Birthday Skirt

....Orrrr 300 months old. Whichever way you put it, I'm a quarter of a century today!

I'm so excited for this birthday! I feel like I'm a certified adult adult today lol. I've grown ALOT this past year. I made a few new friends and lost a few old ones. I traveled like my money was long and didn't have any regrets. I've progressed at my job and put myself in a position to be doing what I want to be doing with my company. I've spent more time with my family than ever before. I've learned more self-control, patience, and love. Hopefully my 25th year will exceed the past!

Windy Remnant Kimono

Heyyyyyy guys! I was on a roll last month with getting projects cranked out and I'm not trying to slow down now. I went to California this past weekend to and I wanted to make something for my trip since I never really do vacation sewing. I needed something super easy because I didn't have a lot of time to make anything. After rummaging through my stash of remnants, I found this pretty chiffon and decided a kimono would be the quick project I was looking for.