Utility Apron

 WISDOM GAINED: Nothing like dyeing fabric to make it come to life. And nothing like topstitching denim to drive you crazy!

This was a detour project. Back in December someone posted a link to a really lovely utility apron, and this was just sitting in the back of my mind. And then March is the upcycle contest at Pattern Review, and this seemed like a good project for that, made of old jeans. The pattern is Pellava apron by a small Etsy vendor called March20patterns.

As I was deconstructing the jeans it occurred to me that the jeans in question probably should have been donated, rather than taken apart - they did not seem to have anything wrong with them. Not sure why they made it to the not good enough to donate pile (they were not mine, incidentally).

Is the finished project as lovely as I had envisioned?  Well, the jury is still out on that. It is like making some yummy dessert that you keep tasting as you cook. By the time you go to serve and eat the dessert, it no longer holds the same appeal!

As I was putting them together I realized that the large pocket panel was too close in colour to the main panel, and that it looked quite drab.  It was a somewhat darker blue, but not enough contrast. So I decided to use the Indigo dye kit that I purchased in the Fall to darken that piece, as well as the strap pieces. 

I just want to do a bit of a rant here about that dye kit. It is misleading. It is an indigo-colour dye kit, and not true indigo. Interpreting the fine print does confirm that, but the large print does not!  I had already discovered that. I have not written a letter to the RIT company yet to complain... I decided that since I have it I might as well use it. I also was not going to do shibori tie-dyeing, but I thought I did want a mottled look. I just wrapped some elastics around scrunched up bits of the fabric, and thought that would do it. YES - I have done shibori dyeing before, and I know what effect this can give. However, I did not expect there to be this much contrast. If you look at the photos, it is hard to believe hat the underlying colour was actually blue. I also threw in the lining piece, which was a yellow and black buffalo plaid remnant. Made it green, of course. All told, the decision to dye the pocket panel really elevates the project, though!

So I gather all of my supplies; I had read the instructions several times; I had HOT hot water for the dye bath, and another basin for the colour fixative. I had the gloves on, as instructed.  I added the half cup of salt to the hot water, opened the first bottle and SOMETHING SHOULD HAVE TWIGGED  but it did not twig, because, if you know anything about indigo dyeing you know that the dye itself is colourless - it turns blue when it encounters oxygen. So I poured in this COLOURESS bottle of liquid, and tossed in the first item (the buffalo plaid) and then thought... wait. .. is this indigo dye after all? No, of course not. I had thrown the fixative into what was supposed to be the dye bath! I quickly snatched out the fabric, heated up some more water, got some more salt, and started over again, this time using a DEFINITELY blue liquid. Burning question was how would the salt affect the fixative bath??? I still don't know! Just glad nothing exploded!  (In fact, in spite of copious rinsing, my fingers still got blue-tinged as I worked with it; so it needs another wash. Or maybe another fixative bath?)

This project took a bit longer than expected. It was supposed to be a short detour. The top-stitching was hell. Good practice for the jeans, which are in the queue... I had to stitch through some thick layers, and the top thread kept getting caught up in the bobbin casing. Which created birds nests underneath, made it impossible to get the needle up to remove the fabric, and then left a loose thread in the middle of a row. Does that happen to anyone else, or is it my super-curse? the vertical lines on the pocket piece are done with the triple stitch, and worked a bit, except for when it didn't!

Installing the snaps was new to me, too. For some reason I have snaps (I have a bunch of that kind of hardware in a bag; these were housed together in an old Kodak film cannister which contained all of the little tools needed!) At first I could not get it tight enough, but advice from the peanut gallery had me place it all on the basement floor (instead of the work bench) and got them on! 

This is March Break - one project done. Next up is to continue on the jeans fitting, and to actually begin the silk noile jumper (already muslined - looks great! Should be an easy sew - but those can be famous last words). And still have to finish fixing the Gosling shirt (for Montreal daughter's beau), which is giving me headaches. And finally just added to the queue a skort for live-in daughter. One that she is unlikely to wear, much, but I can always hope!