I am so tired.

As the first day of the four-day weekend, I took my friend to the fabric warehouses in Dallas for her birthday. She'd never been, so it was fun. We spent most of the day there, with a break in the middle for a huge lunch at Red Lobster. I'm still very full!

Although I wasn't really looking for anything, I bought the most. At Golden D'or I found a bolt with two yards of a really gorgeous silk brocade. The ground is an eggshell/tan, with a pattern of foliage in sage and flowers in pink, blue, purple, and yellow. The colors are rich and jewel-like, not faded. It's not the same design as this gown, but it's a similar effect. What can I do with two yards? Anything besides a jacket? (It's a good thing there wasn't enough for a sacque - at $18/yd it wasn't unreasonable, but I haven't budgeted for a big gown!)

I also found a green print that has a very 40s look - green flower shapes on a background of small green dots, some of the flowers made of fine stripes. It's a lightweight fabric, too, so much better suited for dressmaking than quilting cotton is. It was $3/yd. At the same place I found a really adorable tropical print. The ground fabric is a darkish gray/sage, which I'm not wild about, but it's got ocean liners and palm trees, and little huts on tiny islands, and pineapples and guitars - and those colors are white, gray, tans and browns, and two shades of pretty green, and two shades of pretty pink! It's SO cute. There was not much of it at all, alas - less than 2 yards. But I may be able to eke out a skirt, or definitely a shirt/top of some kind. And it was in the $2/yd section, and the lady measuring just call it one yard. I can deal with it for $2!

Best Fabrics, which used to be at the corner of Harry Hines and Perth, just moved across the street on Harry Hines into a bigger store. I just happened to look closely at one of the few wools they had - navy blue cavalry twill!  Some of you remember the vintage jodhpurs I wore to the Safari at the Zoo last year:




These fit me wonderfully in the waist and hip, but are ludicrously short in the legs. I could add at least 3" both above and below the knee. Even my Bro. No. 2 knew the solution - take them apart and make a pattern! They're pretty generic and don't have tricky tailoring, so it would be pretty simple. The big thing that's been holding me back is finding cavalry twill. It's still made (obviously) but rarely labeled as such, and while the double twill is obvious in person it's hard to see online. And I've also dithered about what color I want. The green is great; but tan is more traditional AND more adventure-y; and navy is my 1940s base neutral. So this takes it out of my hands. And not only was it $10/yd, they're having a 25% off sale on everything because of their move! Yay!

So of course I want to make those now instead of finishing the Pesky Pannier. :p


Anyway, I was way too tired by the time I got home to sew much. But I did use my last package of dye remover on one of the lengths of lace I got in my shopping spree several weeks ago. It's a very fine cluny-type edging, but unfortunately distinctly ecru. Which will look lousy on my white undies. But the dye remover seems to have mostly worked. It's not pure white, but I think it's just barely off-white. That'll do.

Now I think I'm going to set my hair in sponge rollers. I'm getting tired of not curling it, and the hot rollers are a hassle and just don't give much curl after three days.