And my entry for Sew Retro’s bimonthly theme: A Little Summer Something.

It’s a 1950s wrap dress, made from a lime green and blue printed linen and lined with a nice yellow linen. I’m making a blouse, as well, from the same pattern, out of a light yellow linen, but as you can see, the dress can be worn without a blouse.

The dress also has little matching shorts, which feel like they go practically up to my armpits in comparison to where today’s waistlines are.

Randy had some plain Tshirts that he wanted me to dress up for him. I made him some practical ones with the Swing Des Moines logo and the Second Sunday Swingout logo. Then another swing-dance related one using some art I found online.

Then I made him two that are strictly for fun - The man with the yellow hat from Curious George and an octopus.

While I was at it, I also made myself a shark shirt (I picked this red shirt up for 99 cents at Goodwill a while back) and a Curious George shirt.

Then, what the heck, Wally got a Curious George shirt, too.

awww, aren’t we cute.

I know the graph shows that this is completed, but we decided it’s not done. Notice something odd in the picture?

The footrest is taller than the chair. Yes, we have put four giant bags of stuffing in that chair and still it is not full enough. I’m going to order more shredded foam, then also take in the cover a bit to make it smaller. Hopefully, that’ll do the trick, because I’m getting a little sick of this project!

I finished up Case #3 yesterday, and also put the finishing touches on Case #1. Suffice it to say, I will NOT be making these for sale any time soon! I still have enough foam left for one more case, but I’m going to store it away for a few months. Something tells me I’ll be desperate enough for something new and fun come January that making another of these will seem like fun.

For case #3, I made it a cube like case #1, but I sewed it with the seams on the outside, then covered the seams with bias tape. It doesn’t look altogether bad, though if you look at it closely, you can see that it’s kind of rough in places. The perfectionist in me wants to fix it, but most of me wants to just be done and call it good enough. So - it’s good enough.

I liked the fabric a lot, but I think I’d like it better on something else. It kind of made this project look a little old-lady-ish. Ah, well, it’s not altogether bad.

And here is case #1, finished. Just added bias tape around the top edges.

Well, the two summer skirts from my to-do list became one summer skirt, with an option to complete another if I have time early this next week.

I really like this skirt. I’s fuller than most of the A-line skirts I make, fun and lightweight. I used a skirt I already own as a template. The template skirt is made from a heavier material, which I guess pulls the side seams down enough that the extra allowance made for the hips is not noticeable. But on this lightweight fabric - super noticeable. So I went down and removed the extra hip fullness as soon as I took this photo!

I got the idea for the hem detail from a skirt I already own - one that was purchased from one of the expensive mall stores (on clearance for 1.50!). My skirt is not an exact copy, but it’s definitely similar!

I started out making a case with 6 sides. It actually would have worked out really well, except my serger has some issues with the thread in the loopers breaking and that led to some kind of wonky, crooked seams, which made the whole thing look kind of amateurish. (I still need to finish the edges with bias tape.)

So I was going to just try again, but with a few changes (including making sure I stayed on top of the looper thread issue), when I decided to completely change the design and ended up with this. (please note, I was trying to crank this out without my husband noticing I had slipped back down to my office, lol, so I skipped ironing the fabric. the wrinkles REALLY show up in this pic.)

I like it. It’s got small handles for ease of carrying, a large pocket on one side for papers or a notebook, and a smaller pocket on the other side for the cord or other accessories. It closes with a zipper.

I ordered myself some anti-static foam from the Foam Factory where I got the shredded foam for the chairs, and it’s about 1/2 inch thick. I had originally decided to make the case like one would a fabric box, and slide the foam in after the case was assembled. Then I decided to just sew all the pieces together, with the foam sandwiched in between them. I’m not sure that was a great idea for design #1, but it worked out really well for design #2.

I’m going to make a third version/attempt this weekend if I can find time - a different way of assembling the boxier first attempt. I have plenty of foam left, and we’ve got a few laptops around here that could use protection/transportation.

After I completed this chair, Wally walked into the room, saw it, and said “oh, wow, look! a chair!” Then he flopped all over it and stayed there for the better part of the evening. I guess that’s as good a review as I could have hoped for!

It’s made from a commercial pattern - McCall’s 9665. It was fairly easy to sew up, but the cover does not stay all tucked in there around the seat like it appears in the pattern envelope photos. The pattern envelope recommends purchasing the cushions needed for the chair, but the company that made the special-order cushions has gone out of business. Fortunately, the pattern also includes directions for making your own cushions.

The pattern recommends just stuffing the cushions with fiberfill, but I had leftover shredded foam from our giant beanbag, so I used that instead. It makes the cushions nice and sturdy. The other alteration I made was the zipper. Technically, the cover is supposed to have a massive zipper around three sides of the bottom so you can get the cushions in. Well, having just completed the giant beanbag covers and dealing with those massive zippers, I was not only all out of massive zippers, but I just plain didn’t want to be bothered. So I left one edge of the bottom piece open, inserted the cushions through that hole, and just sewed it up. If I need to wash the cover, I’ll just rip out the stitching. I can always replace with a zipper later if I need to.

I picked the fabric out a long time ago, and you can see my major design difficulty - I cannot mix patterns. One pattern, two solids for me! But I think it looks nice - kid-friendly without being kiddish. And, apparently, it’s quite comfortable.

So this is where we stand with the giant beanbag. I have the covers done. I have the inners done. I just don’t have all the foam I need, and I’m waiting for it to be delivered. (I inadvertently left my first order of shredded memory foam inside its packaging, all compressed, for about 5 months. Apparently, that’s bad for the foam and it really didn’t ever poof back up to its original bulk.)

I hope this is as nice as we’re hoping it will be. I’m afraid it’s going to be much shorter than we were envisioning, and larger around.

I would post photos, but it all looks like just piles of fabric at this point.