Not (quite) dead

As you might have gathered from my frequent references to illness recently, I am actually pretty sick and have been for months and months now. I've been trying to kind of keep off the topic on here, since this blog is part of the cheerful crafting corner of my life that I like to keep separate from the grind of being ill, and keep my whining to a minimum. However, basically, I have a pretty serious illness that is causing me to have to change big things about my life while I deal with it.

Tomorrow I teach my last class of the semester here at my university in Ireland. On the one hand, this will be a HUGE relief as it's been an incredible struggle to get through the term. However, on the other, I'm a bit sad because it'll also be my last class ever at this university, as I am leaving the job, and the country, in order to move home to the UK while I get some treatment and try to get better. This is really not what I wanted for myself or my career or my life, but then, I don't suppose anybody ever wants a serious illness.

But let's talk about the impact on my sewing plans. No, seriously, if you think that this hasn't been a topic of concern to me you are VERY WRONG. At the moment, I am basically not well enough to sew very much or in fact do very much of anything. I do my actual work I am being paid to do in whatever moments I feel well enough or when I absolutely have to because I have teaching hours scheduled, and the rest of the time I lurk about in my apartment either reading stupid ebooks, thinking about sewing, or sleeping. Shortly I will have to add "packing up all my stuff" to that list, although for various reasons I am not actually leaving Ireland for a couple more months even though my teaching commitments will be done after tomorrow.

Buda 08-2013-136

The biggest impact is that with no job to go to, I also don't need to make any further progress on my work wardrobe this summer. This is good to know, because my summer work wardrobe at my current size/weight is basically a void that I had BIG PLANS to do a ton of sewing this summer to fill. However, as you are all aware at this point, I like to make things to wear immediately and don't see any point in making clothes I either won't wear or don't need. So, I went through my summer plans and scratched out everything that was really intended for work, and ended up with not very much left. I also put big questions marks next to some much more complicated projects.

I'm still not sure what I'm going to make instead, though. One thing I've anchored on making is some loose summer weight trousers, but I'm struggling for a pattern I like. The best I've come up with is this plus size pattern from Burda 08/2013, although I would make mine without the crotch vortex print, of course, but I'm not totally convinced by it yet. I want something wide-legged and suitable for a very drapy and floaty pair of trousers.

I also want to make some shorts. My shorts situation is sort of annoying actually. I own multiple pairs of perfectly nice shorts and they are all, without exception, either far too big or half a size too small. The half size too small are the most irritating because of course I can get them ON and even do them up, but they are really not comfortable to wear. I don't have any pattern ideas at all at the moment -- I don't even really know what fabrics I have that I could use for shorts. I might end up supplementing my shorts plans with some fly front casual type skirts, because I got loads of use out of that one beige casual skirt I made last year. That would mean mastering the fly front, though, which is a mildly alarming prospect.

Finally, way back in November I bought some gorgeous shirt linen from the Dublin Knitting and Stitching show that I wanted to use to make some casual tops for summer. I definitely want to make up that fabric, but there's a lot of work to be done before I cut into my very expensive linen metreage. I'll have to see if I have a spell of feeling well enough to work on upper body fitting (again). At the moment, the thought of going through multiple muslins working on darts fills me with horror, but you never know, I might start to feel better later in the summer.

Other than that, my half-formed plans involve various instant gratification knit tops, maybe a sundress, and maybe a jersey maxi skirt. I really liked the stripy skirt in view D of a new McCall's pattern (McCall's 6966) which reminded me a bit of a Long Tall Sally skirt I mooned over neverendingly but never bought because they sold out of my size in the colour I liked almost instantly (the colour I liked was blue and black, rather than the camel/black combo). However, I can't really justify buying a full price McCall's pattern AND 3m of stripy fabric to make a maxi skirt, so I will probably end up making a really simple no-pattern gathered maxi with 2m of solid bright red jersey that I have that has been lurking in stash for a long time now.