duck bucket sewing

My dermatologist yelled at me. "You're doing a good job of protecting your face," she said, "but you have quite a bit of sun damage around your neck and shoulders, and you have got to watch your arms and hands." Then she zapped two not-precancerous-yet-but-they-could-be-someday things on my arms. AUGH. Skin cancer freaks me out. My mother has it (as do a bunch of my other relatives — we're pasty!) I've seen what she has to go through — surgery after surgery, even chemo at one point — and I never, ever want that if I can possibly avoid it. So I buy vats of the highest SPF I can find, wear UPF t-shirts and sun hats and all that. But I draw the line at wearing long-sleeved shirts in the summertime. I've tried, but it's just really uncomfortable to go out in 90-degree heat in long sleeves — especially in polyester UPF fabric. Plus, they don't cover the backs of my hands, where age spots and other things are starting to show up. Enter: Al...

I went to the PR meetup at Fabric Place Basement in Natick on Saturday. I met Deepika and some other lovely PRers. It was great! Janice, the manager, even showed us around the back room. Deepika (on the left) was wearing a Deer & Doe dress with fabric purchased during the last meetup. Jenny (I'm not sure who she is on PR) showed us her shoemaking process, too. I'm inspired to try making some espadrilles at some point. Hmm, I do have some Donkey Kong cotton from JoAnn... Here's Jenny and someone whose name I didn't catch playing around in the button bin. She self-drafted that shirt! I also met someone who's working on the same Cynthia Guffey jacket pattern I am. She was also at the sewing expo in Worcester. How funny. I bought some linen and a couple of zippers for the jacket. Should be just about ready to go. Woohoo! Anyway, so. It was fun and I'm definitely going to try and make the next one if I can. In other news, it looks like I prob...

I guess I did Me-Made May, if you count the one me-made scarf I wore nearly every day in Belgium and the Netherlands. Here it is in Keukenhof, with Miffy: And in Maastricht: "Well, you always take pictures of *me* eating," says Tom. I also got a major haircut in Antwerp: Which makes me super-duper happy. I've been waiting forever to get it cut because I knew we would be in Antwerp again and I really wanted to go to Toni Kalin, because he did such an awesome job last time. It feels one hundred million times better. I have more to post, but I'm working on two city guides for Seamwork, so I'll most likely post some sewing and fabric shopping-related stuff once they go up. :) In bummer news, Harley goes back to the vet for more surgery AGAIN Monday. We got back from the trip and found two new basal cell tumors. They're going to be more aggressive with the surgery this time and follow up with radiation, so I really really hope that does it. ...