More Bags and Sneak Peek #10

You know you may be sewing too much when...you lose your patience trying to feel for the darn foot pedal to wake up the computer...when you should have been reaching for the mouse instead!

Yes, dear online ohana, I hate to admit it, but that happened to me this past week.  What can I say? Tis' the season for mass quantities of sewing, eh?  I've been primarily focused on bags for my Etsy shop.  I wanted to be ready for Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and the Christmas season in general.

You may be wondering why I decided to open an Etsy shop.  After all, it does divert my sewing efforts from garment construction, which is my passion, to sewing as a job.  There were two reasons.  First, I love all the aloha fabrics that you can find here on the island, and I wanted to be able to share them with others via a classy, useful, finished product.  Although batiks can easily be found off island, I just love the way they look with linen.  However, to support my local economy, I do try to purchase them here as well.  Second, I am a stay-at-home mom, having left the profession of nursing about 2 years ago.  Even though my DH is super awesome about supporting my little sewing/blogging adventure, I wanted to be able to contribute to it financially as well.  The shop helps me do that.   

For those of you interested, please use or share coupon code: CYBERMON for the next three days to receive a 5% discount before shipping.  Here are some of the new prints that were added this past week.  You may recognize that some of them are repeats from my last bag post.  Thank you so much to those of you who have supported my little shop with your purchase or by sharing my link with a friend!  Don't forget, there will be another bag give-away in December for everyone who is a fan of Aloha and Linen by MushyWear on Facebook.  Keep your eyes out for that! 

I hope everyone who celebrated Thanksgiving had a fantastic time this past weekend!  And I thank you all for your comments on the pink snake dress!  I am looking forward to wearing it this upcoming Saturday when I attend a holiday party with my DH.  Justine, from Sew Country Chick asked, "What kind of coverstitch machine do you have?"  I have a Janome Coverpro 1000 CPX.  I am really happy with it.  I bought it last year around Christmas.  There are a couple of things I've noticed about it.  It tends to sew better with larger eyed needles for most of what I sew, therefore I use the size 90/14* ELx705 needle.  It also seems to sew more consistently with Maxi-Lock thread, but I sometimes use Gutermann polyester thread when I want an exact color match.  Using this type of thread may require a couple of tension adjustments, so I always do a test run before I sew with it on my garment.  One time I threaded my machine with the upper thread holders turned backwards, and it didn't perform well at all, so it does have to be threaded correctly.   
*Updated 11/29/11: The 90/14 has a bigger eye than the 80/12.  I had originally mentioned the 80/12 as having a bigger eye. 

Sadly, I have no fashion sewing to share today, but I do have my next  project underway, along with some top-secret Christmas sewing!  I am using Simplicity 4273 to make a pair of wide-legged silk pants.  I will be pairing them with a simple linen top.  Here is the pattern and fabric for the pants:

Surprisingly, I found the silk locally.  I think the weight will be nice for flowing pants.  So...how is your Christmas sewing coming along?