Recently a friend hosted a Stitch’n’bitch at her house, with the stitching being sewing and the bitching being much-missed in-person conversations. I was looking forward to it so much I reorganised the stash the week before and picked out four potential projects to do on the day. One required making a pattern which requires concentration so I figured I should do that beforehand. Then I figured everyone would be wanting to cut their fabric at the start, so I did that too.

A few days later I decided to also cut out the pieces for another project, which was a make-it-up-as-you-go kind of project and needed my full attention. It was a petticoat with a lot of fussy gathering, so I got that part out of the way. Which left only a few seams to do. I figured I only needed three potential projects to do on the day and finished it.

On the day I started with the pre-cut project – a pair of pyjama pants:

Once they were done I cut and sewed a pair of shorts:

The third project was another pair of shorts, but it was evening by then and I decided I’d done enough. I’m not 100% sure I want to make shorts from that fabric anyway.

The next day I tackled another project: two nightdresses in organic cotton knit that I picked up on sale when I was only supposed to be buying press stud tape to fix our doona cover. It was a good discount! And my old nightdresses are developing holes.

The pattern is a simple knit dress design I made years ago for a costume. I’d lengthened and adjusted it for fit, and cut the pieces for one dress, during the week.

When I went to cut the second dress I ran out of fabric. I’d assumed I’d get both fronts and backs across the width. Is it me or do fabrics seem to be narrower these days? I wound up cutting the front in two pieces, divided at the waist, and had to abandon idea of pattern-matching. Thankfully, only Paul and I will ever see these close up.

All in all, I got five projects finished in less than a week, and only one of them counts as a new garment added to my wardrobe (underclothes and nightclothes don’t count). Two were made of fabric from destashes. I’m still feeling inspired but getting a warp on the Lotas and cleaning the house have priority this week.