Thank you, everyone, for the sweet birthday wishes. My daughter and I spent the day together getting our hair done and working on wedding stuff. Then there was the fabulous party and a wonderful dinner — fried rock cod, tortellini with roasted vegetables, salad, and that amazing cake. I was feeling pretty happy in that…
I turned 64 on Monday, and tonight my sister, Sally, hosted a fabulous birthday party for me. A wonderful time was had by all, and I received amazing gifts from my family (more on this later). This particular Beatles song was released when I was 20 years old, and I remember thinking at the time…
Amazingly, this is the first apron I’ve made with a sort of quilt-type design. I’ve had these vintage petal quilt pieces for a long time, and an apron seemed like a good use for them. The rounded petal shapes came in two sizes, but by the time you turned in a hem, they would have…
When I was growing up, we lived in a traditional two-story house built in the 1920s, where you walked right into the living room with no foyer. The living room and separate dining room were large, but they were the only public areas of the house. When I was a teenager we moved from Oklahoma…
This apron was inspired by a pattern envelope I saw somewhere online and now cannot find, or I would give credit to the original. The pockets on the apron are so cute, and although I thought they would be fairly useless, they actually aren’t that bad. I would sure like to read the original pattern…
Why didn’t I think of this a long time ago? Elvis is always destroying his store-bought collars, which are made with some really horrible synthetic fabric that shreds like crazy when he scratches his neck. I was going to pick up another collar at the pet shop, but this morning I decided instead to make…
Emily wanted a longer apron because I made a short one for her last year. For the most part I copied an old Advance pattern (4998) which I saw on Flickr. I decided to take the zig-zag border up the back of the apron as well, because the bride and groom fabric is only 36″…
If we had a square dancing bridal shower guest, she would probably like this apron. Somehow I had it in my head that each ruffle should be twice as long as the previous one, so the bottom ruffle is 5 yards, and the apron is quite a bit heavier than the others. The green floral…
When I was little, May was my second favorite month, because four important events occurred — May Day, my birthday, Mother’s Day, and at school we got to crown Mary, Queen of the May. My sisters and I loved to make baskets of colored paper (or just plain paper we colored with crayons), fill them…
It’s appropriate that this is apron 13, because it was a nightmare to make. Just about everything that could go wrong, did go wrong. The apron idea was inspired by 4 leftover reproduction hankies from apron #1. I knew I wanted to make a handkerchief hem, but it took me longer than it should have…
An apron with an apron! This is an old Wilendur napkin that I thought looked cute with the red printed gingham. Although this is a pretty simple design, it took longer than any of the others because of the hand stitching. I tried a little chicken scratch embroidery on the hem, and the binding on…
These are really special aprons, because they’re made with some of my vintage French and German fabric. I don’t usually hesitate to cut into old fabric pieces, but I have been collecting these for awhile now, and I have only used two little pieces before these aprons. I purchase these prints from one of my…
Thank you so much to everyone who made comments on my aprons — I am really pleased that you like them. My mother had an apron with a pocket border around the bottom, only hers had a sleeveless top and a very short pocket border just below the waist. I always liked that apron, but…
Making these aprons is a lot like putting together a quilt with vintage fabric. Substitutions and compromises must be made along the way, although I enjoy the challenge of putting something together with stuff I have on hand. When I go to a fabric store to buy something particular for a project, I am often…