The "Kevin was a Girl" Ensemble

I have another post to share over at The Sew Weekly.  It's Academy Awards week and our inspiration could be any character from a film or any film that's ever been nominated or won for any category. I settled on Kevin the bird from the awesomely sweet and funny movie Up!  I was not featured this time (and really wasn't hoping to be with the cruddy pictures I provided), but you can see my contribution here.

Time to start looking for a remote shutter release after the failure of this shoot.  Running back and forth in those heels in timed shots was perilous.

Jumping on the Renfrew Bandwagon

 I apologize for the cell phone mirror pictures.  My face is badly broken out and I'm having some no-makeup days to give it a break.  I didn't feel like doing a whole styled photo shoot just to have my head chopped off.  I do definitely want to show you some outfits, though, eventually.

I splurged.  In so many ways, the Sewaholic Renfrew was a splurge for me.  I haven't spent more than $10 on any one pattern in the past, so $16 (+ shipping!) is a hard number to swallow... and for what?  A T-shirt pattern!  I can buy t-shirt's at Target for $3 on the clearance rack that I like perfectly fine.
But...
somebody bought some stuff from my shop so I had some PayPal money and I kept getting emails about the pre-order for this pattern with a free shipping code.  Then I started to see the testers' creations pop up.  And I got more and more curious.
I finally decided I couldn't really rationalize it, but that I would just splurge.  I ordered the pattern on the last day of the pre-order and it shipped very soon afterward.
JoAnn Fabrics was opening soon and there were sure to be a decent selection of knits and maybe I could catch a sale or get a coupon.
And that's just what I did.  I went opening day to the shiny new JoAnn's and got some purple knit at 40% off.  Then I came home and made this the next day.

I was so thrilled (despite having cut the pieces with the stretch going the wrong direction) that I wore it to church the next day and immediately threw it in the wash that evening so it would be ready to wear again.  Cost of this shirt - $23

As I was thinking about getting dressed half-way through the day today, (yes, I was in my pj's until after lunch) I was very tempted to go grab my purple cowl t-shirt again.  As I was tidying up a bit, I discovered this forgotten yard of knit fabric in my stash and immediately knew that I MUST MAKE ANOTHER RENFREW.  I whipped this one up in about an hour while my girls were napping and get this, I used LESS than a yard.  Isn't that fabulous!?

New cost analysis:

purple cowl - $15 (half the price of the pattern plus the cost of fabric)

apple scoop neck - $6 (half the price of the pattern and free fabric from stash)

And now it's not seeming quite as expensive.  Big sigh of relief and two cute t-shirts for me!

The "No, I'm Not the Plumber" Jumpsuit

What was the Muslin of Hope mentioned in the previous post almost turned into just another project to dash my hopes.  I'll let you read about it below in the post that was featured today on The Sew Weekly.  Yes.  I was a featured contributor today!  I've been following along with the weekly challenges (the button challenge for two weeks ago was my "Please Strangle Me" Blouse and I also did the make this look challenge, but haven't blogged it yet) but I haven't actually submitted any posts as a Sew Weekly contributor until this jumpsuit.  I hope to submit good enough posts to be featured a few more times this year.
Here are some pics, but go on over and read the actual feature for yourself.  I'm just tickled.