Awesome sauce scarves October 9, 2011

I am sooo tired right now and I have to be at work mañana bright and early after a long weekend, but I’m waiting for the load of laundry I just put in to finish so I can throw it in the dryer and as such, you get an post from me while I wait. (Also, if I don’t post this now it will be like the post about the yummy cinnamon rolls I made for the first time two years ago while I was in Alabama. I documented every step with pictures, even me and Kim enjoying them, and then I never wrote the post. Shame on me.)

I kept seeing this cool gray and yellow twisty-braidy scarf on Pinterest but I never repinned it. Then I saw that a lady, Keight, whose blog I read (and whose name I love so much I’ve shortlisted it on my list of baby names!), wrote an entire tutorial post about how she and her husband figured out how to recreate the scarf, which was selling for $40ish bucks, for less than seven.

Well okay then. I was ready to make it.

Also, she created an awesome tutorial completed with very detailed, clear instructions, pictures, and there’s even the bonus Price Is Right hand gestures in a video if you so wish. As soon as I read the tutorial, I was like, “Even I, who am really stupid when it comes to visualizing this kind of stuff, get this.” And I even got the hardest part, which is sewing the seam on the inside of the scarf. So I decided to do this before I go to Idaho in a few weeks, but there’s only one problem.

I don’t own a sewing machine.

A few people offered to let me come hang out at their homes and do it, but I just hate creating a mess at others’ houses. Fast forward to this weekend, when I was in San Diego with my friend Lindsay. (Amtrak and I were not friends on Friday night. It took me six and a half hours to get from Ventura to San Diego on train — a whole lot more than the planned five hours and two minutes! I could have walked there faster.) Lindsay and I had the brilliant plan to buy some clearance jersey sheets from Target and use her mom’s sewing machine to get some stuff sewn and scarves made. She is doing a craft sale in a few weeks, while I’m in Alabama, and I was gung-ho. So after we got back to Ventura tonight, we left her kids with her parents, hopped in my car, and perused the aisles at Target.

There wasn’t that great of a selection, but we decided on some plain gray and red jersey sheets (both in size cal king, because it’s go big or go home for us, and also because they were the same price as the twin sheets and I’m a firm believer in the biggest bang for your buck), plus two body pillowcases and a regular pillowcase (none of which I can find on the Target website. Fail, Target.) As we were leaving, we saw the clearance bedding and they happened to have a set of bright pink jersey sheets and pillowcases on clearance for $6.24. I didn’t really want to spend that much more, but I would have regretted not getting them, so I did. We both spent about $50 on stuff and then headed to her parents’ house to get started.

It took us about three hours to make the first scarf, but not because we’re stupid. (Well… that’s debatable.) Lindsay had to deal with her kids, and I helped her, and there was dinner involved, and bathtime, and bedtime. It was really an eventful night.

Anyhow, here’s Lindsay about to sew for the first time tonight. This is also mere seconds before she temporarily broke the sewing machine. (You think I’m kidding but at one point the bobbin hated our guts and we wanted to weep. Lesson learned? Looser stitches and less thread tension. Also. Don’t let Lindsay thread the needle because she misses a few steps!)

 

 

The first tube I made! I was so, so proud. (What you can’t really see here is just how HORRIBLE my measuring/cutting was. Seriously. It was so bad.)

 

 

 

Both of the tubes on mine ready to be braided, but dinner calls. (You can see that in the background of this shot.)

Some of the aftermath. We’d already cleaned up a little here.

My scarf! (This is the second shot after I fiddled with the braiding a little bit. Still needs a little more adjustment to perfect it.)

Lindsay and I with our finished projects! We’re making some more tomorrow for a craft fair in two weeks, but we needed to do a few trials runs so we could figure out what the h— we were doing. There were some stitches that we were nervous about (actually just one — the part where we turned the fabric into a long tube) but overall I think they turned out awesome, considering we haven’t used sewing machines in 13 and 14 years, respectively! (Please excuse my diiirty hair, sweaty face, glasses, tired eyes, and horribly “supportive” sports bra!)

A short list of things I learned tonight:

1. Jersey is nice to touch, but terrible to cut. Especially if you’re me. Then you cut “straight” lines like a drunk sailor.
2. Sewing is so much harder than it looks if it’s been a while since you last did it.
3. Awesome tutorials rock!
4. This scarf is easy and fun and actually very simple once you get done with a sample one.

 

Advertisement