Happy Belated Mother's Day!

My Mom With My Son Anders After His Orchestra Concert Saturday Afternoon

Good Monday Morning, and Happy Belated Mother's Day to all of you moms and grandmoms out there.  I hope you all enjoyed your special day as much as I did mine.  My husband Bernie was finally up to attending church with us for the first time since his heart surgery last month.  Our pastor preached a fantastic Mother's Day sermon about the nature of God encompassing both paternal and maternal qualities and the many ways in which mothering -- not just fathering -- is a reflection of God's love for us.  And I got to sing a beautiful duet during the offering!  The service is available online here for anyone who's interested: http://gospelstream.tv/christelca.  (You have to choose the "View On Demand" tab and then scroll down to the 5/14/17 Contemporary service.  If you don't want to watch the entire service, you can skip ahead to where the sermon begins, 23 minutes into the service.  My duet with Todd is about 52 minutes in).  And of course, if you're local to Charlotte and you're looking for a church family, I'd LOVE to see your smiling face at Christ Lutheran on Sunday morning!  I'm a choir junkie so I sing at both services, the 8:45 AM Traditional Service and the 11 AM Contemporary service.  If you do visit, please find me after the service!

The Sanctuary at Christ Lutheran Church

After church, my mom came over for an afternoon of Mother's Day Mimosas and sewing.  We took the hem on my VOX choir dress (Burda 6911 with modifications) up by a good 2 1/2".  Since the rayon jersey is heavy and stretchy, the dress was originally so long that even with my highest stiletto platform pumps I was still stepping on the hem.  Now it's a much more versatile length that I can wear either with heels or with flats.

Burda 6911 Dress for VOX Choir Performances

I was able to just slice off the original deep hem with a rotary cutter and do a new 1/2" coverstitched hem.  I cut 1/2" strips of fusible tricot interfacing with the stretch going the same direction as my dress fabric, fused them to the raw edge (through a damp silk organdy scrap that I could see through), and then pressed the hem up at the top edge of the interfacing. 

1/2" Strips of Fusible Tricot Interfacing and Silk Organza Pressing Cloth Scrap

Interfacing Fused to the Wrong Side of the Skirt, to Prevent Coverstitch Tunneling

Fusing the Interfacing In Place Through Wet Silk Organza

My coverstitched hems are still not as perfect as RTW, but I'm getting better at them.  Now that I know to stabilize my lightweight knit fabrics so they don't pucker and tunnel between the rows of straight stitches on the right side of the fabric, and I know to clip the seam allowance of the intersecting seams and flip the hem seam allowance in the opposite direction to reduce the bulk that I'm stitching across at the seams, I'm about 80% of the way there.  My ongoing coverstitch challenges are keeping my project perfectly straight as it feeds through the machine so my cover stitches remain perfectly parallel to the folded edge all the way around the hem, and maintaining the stretch of the fabric so I don't get popped stitches over time from taking the garment on and off.  I've heard of people using Wooly Nylon thread in the looper for a stretchier coverstitched hem, and I can try that next time, but the biggest difference I see between my insufficiently stretchy coverstitched hems and the stretchier coverstitched hems on my RTW rayon jersey dresses is that they are using a shorter stitch length for their coverstitch.  Since the looper thread kind of zigzags between straight stitches on the wrong side of the hem, it makes sense that shorter straight stitches would put more looper thread between each straight stitch, resulting in a stretchier hem.  The hems are fine on this dress, especially since the skirt is so full at the bottom, but I would need more stretch for the hem of a close-fitting knit top that I'm pulling on and off over my head.

After rehemming my dress, my mom and I took Lars shopping for some costuming and prop items that he needed for his theatre class, and then we wrapped up the day by going out to dinner with Mom, Bernie, and the boys.  I can't imagine a better Mother's Day!  ...Well, yes I can -- same day, but without the boys squabbling and kicking each under the table at the restaurant.  Will they still do that when they are adults???

Yesterday I ran around picking up prescriptions and taking first Anders and then Bernie to doctor's appointments and a bunch of other errands.  Bernie's surgeon says he's doing well considering his heart surgery was less than four weeks ago, and he was cleared for driving again.  Yay!  He is still out on short term disability at least through the end of May because he's still weak and tires too easily to be traveling for work and doing site visits, but he's headed in the right direction.  We're so thankful for that.

Today I've got some paperwork to catch up on in my office, but I'm hoping to squeeze out an hour or two in the studio either before or after taking Anders to his violin lesson this afternoon.  Have a fantastic day!

Mother's Day Flowers: What's Blooming Now

My sons and husband took me to the garden center yesterday to pick out some new annual and perennial flowers for Mother's Day. As usual, my eyes were bigger than my flower beds, so we had to get creative about finding homes for some of the new plants, like this lovely fuschia snapdragon lookalike that we had to squeeze into the Flower Dump. I don't remember what it's called, but it's a perennial and it likes full sun.

I picked out these fancy geraniums to add to pots on my front steps. The purple pansies were planted there via bird poop. I'm sure the birds did this deliberately to thank us for all the bird food we've been putting in the feeders all year.

Bernie has a weird aversion to cannas, which I can't relate to at all. They are tall, dramatic, and bloom pretty constantly throughout the summer. Since I'm the Momma and I get to pick the flowers on Momma's Day, I chose these unusual peachy-pink cannas with splashes of yellow...

...as well as these yellow cannas with splashes of peachy-pink. I have some red cannas from last year in big pots on the front steps. This summer, I want a wild mix of colors. It will be interesting to see how the garden develops as all of these plants begin to take off.

Last but not least, I wanted to share these yellow irises in the Flower Dump that Bernie rescued from a nearby property where the house was demolished to make way for a new subdivision. Aren't they pretty?

Happy Mother's Day, everyone!