I frequently jest about my ineptitude with a sewing machine. Today brings it to a new level of foolishness. Once again reminding me why I generally stick with knit and crochet.

Ever since middle-school I’ve had machinations of becoming an amazing sewist and designing my own clothes. AND LOOKING SO CUTE AND STYLISH AND ENVIED BY ALL THE POPULAR GIRLS. Spoiler: this never happened. In the summer before 8th grade, 1994, my mom and I purchased 3 different fabrics, a light beige solid (that clashes with my super fair skin), a beige backed floral, and a stripe with all the colors of the solid and the floral. We started sewing a babydoll style dress, they were ALL THE RAGE, in the solid and the floral. In retrospect, WHAT WAS I THINKING with these colors…. I still have the pattern in my pattern box, BTW. My mom helped me with all the easy stuff, until it came time to fold over the hems and SEW IN AN INVISIBLE zipper. Then she said I needed to finish on my own. Seriously. I barely knew how to use the machine. And I don’t even know if she owned a zipper foot. Well. The project is still in the same state of unfinished as it was in the summer of ’94. I can sew in an invisible zipper now. But literally have no inclination to finish this ugly dress. Its truly the worst.

Which brings us to today. That stripe? Oh yeah. I STILL had a 3 yard cut languishing in my stash of fabric. I was going to turn it into lining fabric of fabric face masks that I’m sewing to donate to local schools. It looks like an old sofa. Or some hideously dated curtains. The spouse and I were discussing the awfulness of it one afternoon when it dawned on me. IT NEEDED TO BECOME ANOTHER PAIR OF PAJAMA PANTS FOR ME.

This afternoon, I got out a lounge pants pattern and set to work cutting and ironing and sewing. I also decided to make them fancy, by sewing french (enclosed) seams. Do you know where this is going yet? I cut out the pattern for the large, and set to work. My french seams look pretty good. No raw edges on the inside. I was excited. Before I went ahead and did the waist casing, I tried them on over my jeans.

OHHHHH!!!! They stalled at my BUTT. You see, I neglected to factor in additional selvage for my frenched seams! Whoops! After dinner, I tried them on again, without my jeans. With some wriggling, I was able to get the pants on. SOOO snug in the hips, but plenty of room around the waist. I think if I had tried to sit down it would have ended disastrously.

Not all is lost. I have a PLAN! Since the waist elastic casing isn’t in yet, I’m going to just add additional fabric to the back. And maybe the side? Nothing to lose. I have a lot of extra fabric at my disposal. Fortune favors the bold, and whatnot. Since they are lounge pants for me, they will never be out in public. Interesting come away: had I sewn them in a knit with a little stretch, they would have been PERFECT. Perhaps I need to sew with knits?

With unfortunate matter of the pants not fitting, there is a MAJOR WIN. My stripes line up almost perfect! And I have finally used my earliest stashed crafting material. Seriously, this has been through 7 moves, 3 cities, and 2 states, spanning 3 decades. Being rid of this stash feels GOOD.

I also ironed 14 small child sized mask that I will finish up next week. Its going to be so easy to finish them now! Honestly, why am I so resistant to ironing?