summer
remember that amazing spring weather i was telling you about? well, it's going and summer is on its way. i'm not happy. i do not like summer and when it is here i complain about it. a lot. i try to stop myself but i just can't. i'm miserable when i'm sticky and hot. i think i have reverse seasonal affective disorder. do they make that? if they do, i've got it.
my summers in new york usually go like this: run air conditioner full blast, try try try to get the girls to love being inside. shows! forts! projects! books! treats! tumbling practice! games! dancing! anything! until i finally give in to their incessant requests ("let's catch the sunshine, mommy! come on! nice and warm!") and go to the park. while at the park i sweat more than any female should, squint, wish oh wish that i could tear all my clothes off and sit in a garbage can full of cool water like i did when i was a kid, try to stop the girls from burning their little thighs on the red-hot slides, come home with a headache, and dream of living in a world whose temperature never rises above 78 degrees. . . i'm dreading the summer days ahead.
of course, there are things that help. the red hook pool often saves the day. free, enormous, cool water, giant wading pool complete with sprinklers, ridiculously strict rules about what you can wear and take on deck thus making everything clean and the pool offensive-shirt-free. i love you, red hook pool. except when you are too full of people and won't let desperate me and my girls in. then i hate you. i also hate you when we have to get out because sombody has gone #2 in you. although, that really isn't your fault. but can't you come up with some rule?. . . oh wait, you already have, rule #2 (ha!) : "No urinating or defecating in the pools." clear and concise, well done.
and then there is the beach. sand to scoop and pile, cool breezes, waves to watch and occassionally jump into. i love you, jacob riis beach. except when it's so windy that sand is pelted into my eyeballs and gets stuck to my watermelon. then i hate you. i also hate you when the helicopters overhead fly so low that i feel like i need to duck to avoid decapitation and poor eve is huddled in terror under her towel with her arms over her eyes and head, just waiting for the torture to end.
but, happily, there is one saving grace of summer that i just can't hate, no matter how low the helicopters fly and regardless of the bowel movements of others. and that is a good summer dress. an entire outfit in one fell swoop? heaven. minimal contact with the skin? perfect. nice air flow and circulation that almost lets me forget i'm clothed? brilliant. summer dresses, i love you. and, conveniently enough, i just happen to like making you. for little girls there is nothing easier than whipping up a simple little summer dress. and for myself, even if i don't have a dress pattern that i love, but a shirt pattern that i do, i just lengthen the shirt and, voila! a dress fit for a middle-class, stay-at-home brooklyn mom.
here are a few that i've come up with in preparation for the hideous heat ahead:
vintage fabric from the humane society thriftstore in brookings, oregon. $0.50. i wish i had enough to make something for ruth and myself.
i actually made this last year for eve, but it fits ruth's little body perfectly now. the strapless is really darling but just about as practical for an 18-month-old as you'd think. however, i refuse to put straps on this one. for the 1 minute and 20 seconds she wears it before pulling it down around her waist, i am absolutely in love.
one of ms. wendy mullin's patterns again. that inset is a little tricky, but manageable. this is an example of a shirt pattern that i lengthened. i also did a little sleeve alteration- opted for making cap over the flutter in the pattern. i've been concerned it looks too much like a hospital gown, but this picture makes me sure that i really do like it.
this is from a vintage tunic pattern, with some adjustments like buttons and little cuffs, inspired by (fine, copied directly from) alysha's adjustments to the same pattern. who doesn't love a dress with pockets?
summer, i hope you're gentle and kind to me this year. but if you aren't, at least my girls and i will have some cute dresses to wear that just might stop me from complaining for the first 20 minutes i'm outside.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007 at 07:21PM
Reader Comments (6)
your sewing skills are amazing. I love your blue dress, no hospital gown thoughts entered my mind at all!! I'm with you on the summer thing, but as you know it only gets real bad here during the heat waves, then it's head for the hills!!! (or the beach, or the mall...)
katie i just cant get over your cute sewing. seriously, i think about it everyday and i want so badly to learn to sew. i want dresses like the ones you made for yourself - so cute! Also, i sympathize with your summertime woes. Houston is starting to heat up. Magically, we've had a long spring. Houston usually doesnt get a springtime except for 8 minutes during a day in March. Then it's on with the heat and humidity. gross. sticky, suffocating, and gross. I'm with you.
Agreed, hot summers suck!
Great dresses- all of them! I epecially love the rick rack on the girls' dresses. I love anything with rick rack.
Where did you get your 'vintage tunic' pattern? It's a super cute dress.
the good news is we can go to the fabric store and make as many dresses as we need to get us through it!
I LOVE both of those dresses... You're built by wendy one looks so much better even than hers on the website, great job!! I want one just like it!!
i love those sandals! where did you get them?