#mmmay18 week 1, part 2

Day 4: Tina Givens Madeline Slip bodice with self-made skirt - all refashioned from 4 men's plaid shirts from By-the-Pound Goodwill... finally a version of the plaid babydoll dress that's been in my head since 2014 has been made real.  Making it out of old plaid shirts turned out to be infinitely better than trying to collect scraps of fabric over the years.  I saw these near each other in the bin and a lightbulb went off that made the project come to fruition really quickly.  I liked the Madeline slip bodice because it had straps that could be a different plaid and the bodice could be cut from a shirt from, to use the buttons strategically. Leaving elements of the shirts, such as the button and cuff plackets, pockets, etc made it even more fun + a great nod to the ubiquitous 90s flannel shirts.

Day 5: My shorter Dottie Angel frock with an old hand-knit cardigan from back in 2014. I got that yarn for free for being a test knitter for a pattern back in 2005 and then I didn't knit it up until 2014 because I wasn't crazy about the color.  However the yarn is a dream.

I don't wear it often, but found it is one of the only cardigans I own that is a good length and shape to layer over the Dottie Angel frock, so it's recently come back in rotation just in time for Me Made May.  I made a second black one from this same Southwest Trading Company Oasis soy silk & pattern but I tried to modify the pattern to a V-neck instead of a curved neck and my pattern hack ended up sitting really far on the edge of the shoulders... as you can see in this picture.  I recently found 5 left-over skeins from this project and decided that, after May is over, I will frog the black sweater and use all the yarn make a new cropped black cardigan that I really like... because this yarn is yummy and definitely stands the test of time... and I need more boxy cardigans that sit at my natural waist to wear with loose-fitting dresses.

Pause to say:  WOW - it was hard to look back at those older blog posts and see how thin I was back then and remember how I thought I was really fat at the time... but now I am a lot heavier than I was back then. I have thyroid issues that make weight loss difficult and weight gain easy, and I was stress eating a lot at the end of my old job and through the moving process. In 2017 I gained a lot of weight and have managed to stop gaining (which was actually a big accomplishment) but I haven't been able to budge the scale to lose weight.

I know losing weight cannot be done by watching eating alone for me.  For my body, I have to get a lot of strenuous exercise too.  I really want to just dive into exercise... but now I commute over 2 hours a day and time is an issue.  My old routine was exercising right after work & that doesn't really work with my new life/job and the time the other people in my family eat dinner (which is a big deal for them.) I get home at 7pm now and dinner is on the table when I walk in the door... and I never end up exercising after dinner... I *have* to think of something... but I also want to be okay with my body how it is in each moment... because self-hatred doesn't do anyone any good + life is short.

DEEP BREATH.  Inhale. Exhale. Regroup. Whew...

Sewing for myself again & doing Me Made May again has brought body issues up for me and has helped with them too... I got inspired to experiment with a fashion style I've loved for a long time because the pieces I was enjoying wearing were boxier, looser, more forgiving of changing shapes... and more about enjoying garments that worrying about what my body looked like.  I did my first FBA recently - never thought that would be an issue for me.  Stuff like that... it's different.  It can bring up negativity - but the sewing actually makes it better... because I can fit things to my body and enjoy that I've made them and they are interesting and beautiful garments - so I feel happy in them even if I don't feel very happy in my corporeality at the moment.

Day 6: New Look 6305 - the first one I really liked (second make of the pattern.)  I freaking love these dresses - I could have an army of them in different fabrics wear one every day throughout the year and be pretty content. In fact, 4 of my 7 outfits in the first week of Me Made May were New Look 6305 hacks!

Day 7: Here's the last New Look 6305 of the week... most recently made.  I hacked the sleeveless version of the bodice for this one - the skirt is two pairs of by-the-pound hemp and linen pants and some vintage napkins + lace trims and some burgundy linen from my stash that I had cut a pattern out of years ago and never stitched together.  It was inspired by Mori Kei and really a delight to make.  I worry that it looks a bit costume-like, but I wore it on errands on my day off, over a refashioned lace tee and got several enthusiasic compliments from regular looking people... so it must not be that weird.

(btw: the tee used to be one of those "cold shoulder" open style tops... but I changed it to be more like a classic tee.)

And that's a wrap for the first week of #mmmay18.