Project Pants Part 2!

Thanks to my friend Jess who introduced me to a fantastic sewing blog, I had a nice new pants pattern to try out!  These ones were heaps easier than the first pair I made.  It took me just a few hours to whip them up.

The hardest part was getting around to putting them on Ky for a picture.  Unfortunately I couldn't find a camera that worked today, so I used hubby's samsung tab to take the pictures ... as you can see the stupid thing doesn't take very good shots when the subject is moving.  But if you squint you can kinda see the little fellow trying out his new duds.  Do you like his poses?  (He's following the directions of his baba.)

Project Pants!

I noticed the other day that all Ky's pants seem to have shrunk....!  I thought about letting the hem down on some of the nicer pants so they'd last a bit longer but that thought lasted no more than a nanosecond before I dismissed it as being a tedious and boring thing to do!  Instead, while the newly operational sewing machine is still a novelty to me, I thought I'd make some new pants.   More than a year ago (while I was excitedly waiting for my new sewing machine to arrive....) I found this lovely tutorial over at www.ikatbag.com and have been dying to try it out.  I worried that it was too ambitious for a novice like me but thought "bugger it, I'll give it a go!"  

I decided not to include the lining to make it a little easier on myself.  But that meant altering the instructions which I obviously wasn't very good at doing because I ended up having to use this little thing

a LOT more than I would have liked!

Eventually, even with the help of a certain little boy who climbed on my back, turned the machine on and off, stole my scissors, cut up my material, tipped out my pins, wrapped cotton so tightly around his fingers that they turned purple, hid my quick-un-pick three times, I got the pants done.

There was, however, one mistake that I couldn't be bothered fixing properly:

This messy seam was the result of not attaching the contrasting fabric to the underside of the pants properly (due to my seriously poor skills at altering patterns).  So when the pants are turned up this is what you see.   Not a good look.  Instead of unpicking the whole lot (the quick-un-pick had gone missing AGAIN!) I decided to just trim off the threads and sewed the seam flat.  It turned out okay.  Not exactly professional looking, but not bad.

I really love this colourful fabric!  Do you like the pockets?  I was very impressed with myself for being able to make them, especially the tricky front ones.

And here's the end product being modelled by my little prince.

By the way, what do you think of the "Om" applique I made for his shirt?  Nice hey?

More than 1 & 1/2 years later ...

It's finally working! The sewing machine, that is. After receiving the desperately needed parts from my brother when we met up in Australia a couple of months ago, we took the machine to several machine mechanics to replace the parts. Of course, owing to my luck when it comes to this bloody sewing machine (you might remember this, this and this post about my sewing machine frustrations), none of the mechanics seemed to have any idea whatsoever and we ended up with a machine with brand new parts that still did not work!!!  Finally Murat decided he'd had enough and decided to have a go at fixing it himself. It took him approximately 10 minutes and it was done! Fixed! Just like that! Whoop Whoop!

That was back in February, then we moved, and it was only today that I nervously unpacked the machine and decided to actually start a project for the first time.

As I was plugging it in and turning it on, I half expected the thing to blow up or disintegrate or dissolve into a puddle of shiny slime. But none of that happened. It was still working!

So I had the idea to do something about a hole in one of Ky's t-shirts. A sneaky applique cover-up. Not such a difficult project to ease the machine into. For me it was simply a matter of drawing a shape onto paper, cutting it out, pinning it to some material, cutting that out, pinning it to the holey t-shirt and putting it under the foot of the sewing machine. It was then the machine's job to stitch the fabric to the t-shirt...

It's a guitar ...

A bit crooked but let's all pretend it's meant to look like that.

A close up of the skillful work of my beautiful machine

These are the holes I covered, a result of an overzealous grandmother's stain removal attempts...

Ky's latest "smile!" pose

It turned out great! I'm so happy that I have a working machine. I have about ten thousand projects in my ideas box that need fruition.

I'm never going to be like Martha Stewart

One look at that dusty machine and Kaya was all over it with his cleaning equipment!

It's not that I really want to be like Martha Stewart, it's just that I'd like to have the opportunity to be like her. This sewing machine situation is not helping me in my quest. If you read my earlier posts here and here about what I've gone through to be able to sew, you'll probably have some idea of the frustration I'm feeling. And you might even be waiting to hear how things have progressed. Well ... there's good and bad news. Let me tell you what happened when I again rang Brother in the U.S. to reorder those needed parts that never arrived by mail.

It was a steamy, hot night. I'd just put the baby to sleep and hubby and I had some time to ourselves ... hmm this is sounding like a post quite different to what I wanted to write. Let me rephrase that. The other night, after I put the baby to sleep, I had some time to get on skype to call Brother. It was late, the air-conditioning wasn't working as usual and I was tired. These things didn't bide well for the poor person who answered the phone... The conversation started out well enough with me explaining that I wanted to place an order and I was going to make it especially easy because I wanted to reorder exactly what I'd ordered 3 months ago. The woman told me, "sure! Just let me have a look at your order." Short pause, and then the words that almost caused me to pull all my hair out and throw myself, screaming through the glass in the window, "I'm sorry but we no longer stock internal sewing machine parts." What! The! F@#$!? I almost screamed at the woman and then I almost cried. I was more than a little bit angry when I asked the poor woman what the hell she was talking about, I mean, I'd just ordered those parts a few months ago! She told me they recently changed their system and no longer carried internal parts. However, she was nice enough to find me the number of a service provider who'd be able to help me. Well, that was at least something.

Seriously, are these Sewing Gods really trying to tell me not to use this machine? This is all just too much! Already I'd spent almost as much as the cost of the machine, in parts and I'm still not guaranteed to be using it anytime soon. Eventually, I decided that I was not going to use the bloody machine, instead, I would buy a new one when I got to Australia. But I would still order the parts, fix the machine and then sell it here in Turkey. I should even make a profit because here, the machine retails for approximately US$800 whereas I only paid about US$160 (plus the cost of the parts).

So I called the number she gave me, and this is where the good news starts. The guy I spoke with was so helpful and even though none of the part numbers Brother gave me, matched the part number he had, together (after a couple of emails back forth with photos of the parts) we were able to figure out exactly what I needed. The credit card details were given and the parts were posted that very same day!

Now, once again, I just have to wait a couple more months until I get to Australia, to see the parts, my brother will bring with him. Let's hope he doesn't forget them, lose them, or break them!

Message from the Sewing Gods?

Are the Sewing Gods trying to tell me something?  It seems that these crafty (get it? tee hee) Gods are conspiring against me sewing.  It has now been almost 1 year since I ordered my sewing machine and still I have not been able to sew a single stitch.  See my earlier blog for all the obstacles I struggled with in the first 6 months post order.  And now 6 months on I'm still working on getting my brand new, albeit dusty, sewing machine in a workable condition...  The guy I mentioned in my previous post, who gave it to another guy to look at before sending it to another guy eventually came back to me with a "sorry lady, but the part I need to fix the machine is not available in Turkey so there's nothing I can do to help you" or that's what I figured he said from his facial expressions and hand gestures since I'm still pretty hopeless with the local language.  So anyway, after this conversation and a few tears of frustration, I jumped on the internet and spent a couple of days madly googling the part description to find the part number to find out where I could order it.  I even asked my mother in Australia to try to order it from the manufacturer there.  Eventually I discovered that the only place I could get it from was the official Brother parts and service centre in the USA.

So, after figuring out the time differences and loading up my skype credit I called a friendly guy at Brother and tried to describe the part I needed replacing.  He was confident it could only be one part and promptly put it on back-order for me (of course it wasn't in stock when I called!).  A sense of relief and satisfaction started to settle over me.... that was until he asked for my credit card number and corresponding U.S. address.  I don't have a U.S. credit card!  Bloody hell!  "Oh and by the way", he said, "we don't ship internationally".  Bloody bloody hell!  So now I had to find someone with a U.S. credit card and someone in the States I could ship the part to who'd be willing to then ship it on to me.

Luckily I have 2 siblings living in the States.  I thought of my brother first because I knew he had more free time available to be able to visit a post office.  He gave me his credit card details and even told me to order anything else I might want from the U.S. since I'm often complaining to him about all the things I'm never able to find here in Turkey.  But he advised me not to have the package sent to his address because he was going to be away for a few weeks.  As a personal trainer / health coach to a disgustingly rich family, he often trips off to this tropical island or that luxurious resort on the family's private super yacht.  So I spent the next couple of days trying to get in contact with my sister.  My sister is a famous professional athlete so it's difficult to catch her (because she's so fast ... get it?  tee hee).  She's always racing here, there and everywhere.  But eventually I did get a hold of her and she told me she would try to find the time to post my part when it arrived.  So finally I was ready to call Brother again with all the necessary information.  Luckily they still had my part on order and just to be super sure that the part on order was the part I needed, I again described the broken part.  The person I spoke to assured me that the part ordered sounded like the very part I needed.  So the order was confirmed, the credit card details were given and a U.S. shipping address was provided.  Now I just had to wait.

One and a half months later, the package finally arrived.  I ripped open the envelope and there in my hands was ... a part that looked absolutely nothing like the part I needed!  Aaaarrrggghhhhhh!!!

I called Brother again and explained the situation and asked if I could send them a photo of the broken part from my machine.  And after a week of emails back and forth with 3 attempts of attaching the photo in different ways, we realised that their email system did not allow them to receive attachments...  Huh?So they then offered to email me their official list of parts complete with diagrams.  I immediately identified the part I needed, called my brother to get his credit card details again (because of course I threw away the paper I wrote them on), and confidently ordered the needed part.

My sister received the part in the mail more than 3 months ago and posted it about a week after that.  I'm still waiting to receive it.

Last night I skyped my brother again to get his credit card number (why do I continue to throw it away?) and as soon as the Brother office opens for business I'm going to try again.  This time I'll get the part sent to my brother (since my sister is now especially busy leading up to the 2010 Hawaii Ironman World Championships) and have him bring it with him to Australia where we're all planning to get together for another brother's wedding later in the year.

Until then I'll be desperately praying to the Sewing Gods to allow me to start sewing.  Feel free to join me in prayer.

My Sewing Fantasy - An Ongoing Saga

Ever since I became pregnant with Kaya I've had an insatiable urge to sew...  For anyone who knows me, this is quite an extraordinary statement.  Afterall, I've actively hated sewing my whole life!  I remember sitting in my mother's claustrophobic sewing room as a little girl.  My mother's constant reminders of the necessity of being able to sew, echoing in my ears.  The summer heat stifling.  Sweat pooling in my belly button.  The smell of freshly cut fabric in the air (I bet you didn't even realise fabric had a smell worth mentioning).  Trying without much success to exert even pressure with my foot on the peddle.  The whirr-whirr-whirr of the old Bernina as I push the material beneath the machine's foot.  Then the inevitable whirr-clunk sound as the thread becomes tangled around a pin and breaks the sewing needle...

Every single time I tried to sew something I would either break a needle (or two), knot the thread into an unworkable mess, or run out of thread right before I finished my "creation".   Every single time I tried to sew something it just wouldn't turn out the way I wanted.  Every single time I tried to sew something I would find myself becoming so frustrated I could hardly breathe.  Every single time I tried to sew something I would vow to myself and everyone else within yelling range that I would never ever try to sew anything ever again.  By the time I was 16 I was avoiding any kind of sewing at all costs.  Instead of sewing a button back onto a top, I would have much preferred to throw the whole thing away (not that my mother let me of course).  That's how much I hated sewing.

But then Kaya came into my life, and I developed this insatiable urge to start sewing again.  In the 4 weeks before Kaya's arrival, using my mum's same old Bernina (the one from my traumatic memories), I madly sewed an entire bedding set with accented jungle animals, matching curtains and even a giant soft toy monkey.  And since Kaya's entrance into our lives I've been fantasizing about all the cute clothes I could make for him, if only I had my own machine.

So, in October last year, after almost a year of sewing all kinds of things (in my imagination), and researching the best machine for my needs, I decided upon and ordered a beautiful little sewing machine of my very own.

Little did I know how difficult it would be to get this machine from the shop into my house ...  What a saga it turned out to be!

I made the purchase online from the United States, but unfortunately they wouldn't deliver to Turkey.  So my husband came up with ingenious idea to send it to the cruise ship where his brother is currently working so that when the ship made it's regular visit to Kusadasi (a Turkish port), his brother could post it on to me.

I waited about 5 weeks for the machine to find its way to Europe and onto the ship.  But by this time my brother-in-law (Burak) had returned home for vacation.   So I waited another 6 weeks for him to return to the ship.  Then I waited 2 more weeks for the ship to sail into Kusadasi.  The day finally came but instead of a message telling me my machine was in the mail, I received the bad news that the Turkish customs authorities refused to allow any machinery of any kind into that port.  Huh?  So I started researching postage costs from the various other ports and the location of the post offices in relation to the port (to ensure the least inconvenience to Burak who would be posting the machine).  Finally I discovered a post office in Dubai, right in the port terminal where Burak could easily jump off the ship, post the machine and get back onboard without interrupting his time off too much.  I waited another 2 weeks and my machine was finally in the mail.  Then I waited 3 weeks more and it was here.

I can't begin to tell you just how excited I was to see that white PTT box sitting in my living room.  I didn't want any distractions while I was opening the box so I waited until Kaya was asleep before I even took a peek inside.  I wanted to enjoy the moment.  Two hours after his usual naptime, Kaya finally went to sleep.  I ripped the box open and wah-lah!  What a beauty:

Boy was I going to have fun.  A brand new computerised sewing machine.  I caressed it a bit and pushed some buttons and pulled the thread holder thingy up and down a bit, then I open the bobbin compartment.  Inside was a little bag.  A little bag full of bits.  And pieces.  And funny looking things.  Holy cow!  There were so many little bits and pieces.  How many bits and pieces do you actually need to sew a pair of kid's pants?  Apparently a lot.  Have a look at this:

I started feeling a little bit anxious that this sewing business was not going to be as straight forward as putting a piece of material under the foot and pushing the peddle.  I might even have to read the instruction manual.  And I hate instruction manuals.  I pushed the bag of things away and ignored them.  I would just figure it out as I went along.  So I attached an adaptor to the lead, plugged it in, turned it on and ....

POW!
SIZZLE!
COLUMNS OF SMOKE!
ELECTRICAL FIRE SMELL!

I blew up my brand new little beauty!  After all that it took to finally get it into my hands and I blew it up!  It didn't even cross my mind to think about the electrical supply difference between US and Turkey.  I didn't attach an electricity converter.  And I blew the bloody thing up!  What an idiot!

That was over a week ago and my little sewing machine is still in the process of being repaired.  Nothing is straight forward here in Turkey.  So far it's been looked at by a guy who passed it on to another guy who suggested parts from another guy who tested another part of the machine and then ordered a different part from another guy who assured us it would be ready 3 days later but then when we stopped by 4 days later his wife told us he couldn't fix it and wanted to send it to another guy for another part and it would take another week.  Something like that anyway.

So, in summary, I bought a sewing machine 4 months ago and hope to be able to make Kaya something nice ... one day.