Behold! Fancy pants!
The pattern for these pants was one of my Christmas gifts. It comes from Liz at The Craft of Clothes, a zero-waste designer. I've really gravitated towards self-drafting and zero-waste sewing in the last couple of years, and this pattern has been on my list for a good six months, so I was excited to get into it.
This post is based off a reply I gave to this Tumblr thread asking about wet-finishing advice for handwovens. The Tumblrite above me gave excellent instructions for gently hand-washing items, a practice I respect but don't use myself. I've edited a bit for clarity and added a few extra things I didn't think of at the time.
What @crow-crafting said is a great approach for most weaving, especially if your yarn is prone to fulling (felting, but with spun fibres) and you want to be able to control that process completely. The only thing I'd add is that if you're hanging it to dry, it can really help to hang it over a thick bar or rod rather than just a regular washing line. Some yarns will take offence to the line and set a permanent crease if it's the first time they've been washed.
Personally, I tend to be more aggressive with wet finishing. I know I will never have the executive function to consistently hand wash whatever I've made, so I wet finish my weaving at least as aggressively as I expect its future washings to be. Which means I almost always do samples before getting into the actual project.
Last month, I spent a week thoroughly cleaning and reorganising my workroom so that I could actually get to all the shelves, and not have my back to the door. I even made space to fit a skinny bookshelf (I can finally have all my books out where I can reach them. It's been more than seven years since that last happened).
Last week, I watched one of my favourite YouTubers issue their now-annual "January is for working on The Pile" challenge. I considered my Piles (what a phrase) and decided this was an excellent use for the rest of January. I went through the mending pile, adding and subtracting as necessary, and updated the running list I keep of the things in there (it's the only way to stop things from disappearing into the aether). I tidied up the cabbage patch, taking the opportunity to go through a few boxes that were stored outside the workroom and sort their contents into piles.
Yesterday, I looked around my workroom (it had once again gone from clean and tidy with actual floor space, to One Big Trip Hazard within half a day), and decided that I have too much bloody stuff.
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| This was almost completely clear twelve hours ago. L-R, T-B: for coleslaw (green), cabbage once deconstructed (yellow), actual recycling (blue), and rag rug bits (red). |
It's a new year, which means that for me, it's time for a new set of annual goals. (These are NOT resolutions. Resolutions are fuzzy and vague, usually cliché things like "lose weight" or "be happier" or "achieve world peace". Goals are things that you can actually aim at, and with enough practice, hit.)
I started formally setting and tracking yearly targets a few years ago, and while I won't call it the cure to all that ails me, it's certainly been a helpful practice. And hey, 'tis the season for everyone's "how I set goals" posts, so who am I to rock the boat?
I usually start this process sometime in December, whenever the urge to wrap up the current year and look towards the new one starts to itch me. (Incidentally, this is almost the exact same process I use when doing monthly goals, just with less introspection/review.)
It goes something like this:
