Stashoholism Confessional: Fabric Mart Bundled Me In

I had gone a while without ordering fabric from the internet--my last order was in July, knits from Fabric.com. But I opened one too many Fabric Mart emails, and they enticed me with their sale on ponte knits. They were doing a promotion for a free 10 yard bundle with a $75 order. It's amazing (or horrifying, depending on your perspective) how quickly you get to $75. While I definitely enjoy carefully selecting my fabric, dreaming up projects for them, the anticipation of waiting for them to arrive, there is something about a mystery bundle that is too much fun.

I have no idea how they select and package their bundles, but the times I have received one it seems almost as though they look at my selected order and actually make an effort to give me fabrics I will use. And they did an excellent job here!

The pick of the litter is the rayon print in cream, hot pink, and black. I immediately saw it as a pussybow blouse, and then I thought "Why make a blouse when you can have a dress?" I am hoping I have enough fabric to make the Cynthia Rowley Simplicity 2305 dress with a tie neck.

The navy and green print is a polyester knit; you can't have too many of those. At least, I can't.

The black fabric is a nice lightweight high quality glossy cotton. This was extremely fortuitous. One of the items in my selected fabrics is a black cotton "lawn." I need a lightweight black cotton to make bias tape and for lining pieces where white batiste won't do. Well, the "lawn" is actually a heavy-weight faille; a wonderful fabric, but not at all suitable for the purpose for which I ordered it. The bundle fabric is exactly what I was looking for.

The pastel print rayon is not my style and not great quality, but it will be perfect for muslining lightweight projects (maybe my sari silk?).

The only thing I won't find a use for is the khaki/beige knit. It's a nice heavy knit and it appears to be pre-fused with a lightweight interfacing (in other words, the black side cannot be used as the public side). It would be perfect to make a waterfall cardigan or unstructured knit jacket. I do not wear brown, ever, and if I were ever to wear brown it would be rich brown, not khaki. This fabric is too close to the color of my skin.

If you would like this beige/khaki knitfabric, sign up for the giveaway drawing in the comments. I'm limiting to US only; so sorry to my international readers but this heavy fabric would be quite expensive to ship internationally. As usual, you must have commented on my blog in the past six months to be eligible.



And here is what I actually ordered. I love the faille knit in black with blue print. And such a steal at $1.99/yd! It is high on the list to make Butterick 5677 (on sale today for $1.88!), the colorblock dress, with black.

I was hoping the blue in the faille print would match the midnight blue ponte next to it, but they are completely different colors so no go there. LOVE the midnight ponte. I haven't decided what to do with it yet. Maybe Butterick 5559, the Maggy London with the pleats radiating from the side seam.

I mentioned before that I passed my yellow and gray fan dress Simplicity 2754 on to the Goodwill, as it never stopped feeling like a nightgown to me. I liked the pattern a lot, though, so I got this pink and gray rayon knit fabric to replace it. The bad thing about new fabric is that it pushes planned projects to the back of the line. The good thing is that it is inspiring to sew up. So all that remains on this project is the hem.

For my long awaited animal print dress, I will use Butterick 5672. I have high hopes for this pattern. It is a nice basic shape, but the pleats give it a little extra interest. This animal print rayon knit appears to be the same thing as the Style Studio Stretch Rayon I got from Fabric.com in July, as Fabric Mart had a different colorway of the print I got from Fabric.com in their selection. It is a nice weight and appears fairly stable (with a little bit of growing at the hem). I'm not sure it will totally work as a slinky number like this; it is stable but not the type of fabric that will stay highly fitted. We'll see.

The next rayon knit print is to match some purple satin from G Street to make an outfit for my mom. I'm not sure she'll love the bright bold print, but I think it will be cute on her.

The fairly unappealing olive textured knit is to underline the gorgeous olive sweaterknit I got from Golden D'Or in Dallas last Christmas. I wanted a similar color, not a flesh tone, to underline the sheer sweaterknit and this is the first time I've found something that will work. I have been puzzling over the content of that sweater knit, btw. It burns to a hard plastic bead, but the smoke isn't thick and curling and it doesn't smell like poly. I pre-washed it by hand and when wet it is clear there is some wool in it. Woot! I think it is a wool/nylon blend, but no guess on percentages. I am kicking myself for not getting some of the hot pink, too!

The last is the cotton "lawn," which, as noted above, I speculate is really faille. As far as I know, lawn is a smooth, lightweight weave. This fabric is quite heavy (bottomweight at the least; it would be hard to wear as a dress), ribbed along the cross-grain, and has a sheen that made me suspect that it was actually poly--I was pleasantly surprised when the burn test said all cotton. I don't wear a lot of black. I think it looks good on me, but when I'm reaching for something to wear I am almost never in the mood for darkness. So I was contemplating whether to keep this. However, I think it would make a spectacular less-than-formal suit with a Chanel-style jacket. I don't see myself doing the full Chanel treatment, but I have McCall 6041 and it gets good reviews on PR. I will not, however, be "making it crafty." I see black-on-black grosgrain ribbon trim for this. Very chic.

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I have been doing some snoop shopping for Fall! I can't wait to talk about all my ideas (in addition to these--my sewing time delusion is going strong). What's appealing to you right now?

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Thank you for the advice on the project that reveals itself to be a fail midway! I ended up finishing the dress. Love the style, and it was good to make this "muslin," which showed me a few needed fitting tweaks. I will try to take photos this weekend and show it to you next week.