I didn't make it that far ... but here's what I did get done between about 11:30 this morning and 6:00 tonight.
First I cut out all the pattern pieces and pinned them to my fabric. This took a lot of time, for several reasons. First, my fabric was 54" wide rather than the 45" called for in the pattern. If I had any math sense, I may have been able to figure out how much less I needed, since the fabric was wider, and not have had to get the whole 6 1/2 yards. But I'm not that mathtelligent, so I just got the 6 1/2 yards. Consequently, after first pinning the pattern pieces out according to the pattern schematic, I realized I could save a lot of space by rearranging them ... so I did. (I also had quite a bit of fabric left over, but I'm sure I'll find a use for such nice twill).
Finally, I was ready to start cutting ...
... this part always makes me nervous. I'm always afraid, what if I screwed something up? At this point, I'm totally committed ... if I screwed up, it'll be too late to fix it once I cut everything out.
Eh, whatever. I cut them out, and then laid out the back and one front side on the table, to begin brainstorming my embroidery coup de grace. (The material is all black, it just looks all different kinds of shades in these pictures).
But I wasn't really getting inspired from looking at it this way, so I decided to put at least some of the coat together. I figured I could envision my embroidery scheme better that way, and it wouldn't really make it any harder to embroider some parts of it ... like the skirts.
Then I got paranoid that the sleeves might not fit, so thought I'd better do them to make sure, before I invest any time in embroidery. I got one done ...
... and it fit fine, but by then I'd pretty well lost steam (it was getting close to 6:00) so I called it a day. My one-armed pirate coat is hanging out awaiting further developments.
One small project I might have been able to start on tonight, embroidery-wise, is the cuffs. But I needed interfacing to begin putting them together, and I hadn't gotten any at the store yesterday. I thought I had some, but it turns out I didn't have enough. I don't want to embroider through the interfacing, but the way this pattern is set up, there is a cuff set with interfacing (the 'facing' cuff) and then a cuff set without interfacing (the 'outer' cuff), which you then sew together, turn right side out, and use as the cuff proper. I don't want to get that far before I do the embroidery, but I do I want to put them all together at least pinned, to get a good idea of exactly where on the cuff the embroidery will be most effective, and how much space I have after seams. To do that, it would be easier to work through the process in order, and that would have required putting the interfacing on the cuff facings to proceed from there.
Had my mind been clearer, I may well have been able to figure it out without the interfacing, but ... it was getting late, I was hungry, there'd been rum, and I'd been working on it for over 6 hours. I decided anything else I did at that point was highly susceptible to serious screw-up, and my best bet was to call it a day, and relax in front of the TV knitting (and probably watching Pirates of the Caribbean 3!).
Meanwhile through much of this, I'd been throwing together a pot of beef stew. It's funny - I learned to make beef stew from my mom years ago. Then for a long time I couldn't get it to turn out quite right, and was always futzing with it. But the more I futzed, the worse it turned out. This time I really wasn't in the mood to cook, and was just tossing stuff at the pot on my downstairs breaks from sewing on the way to or from the bathroom or to make another drink ... and this is the best beef stew I've made in a long time. Apparently it doesn't like futzing.
I'm so psyched about getting to the embroidery on this coat!! But I know I have to take it one phase at a time, and do each one well, if I want the whole thing to really turn out nice, and not just look trashy. So I'll be patient, and work through it. I need to get interfacing, and finish the front facing before I can hem it ... then I can start planning the embroidery for the 'skirt' panels. And I need to figure out the cuffs, and then I can start embroidery on them as well. I'm also going to be embroidering up the front facing and around the neck, and that part I could probably start on any time, although it might be wise to decide what type of fasteners I'm going to put on the coat, and get them, so I can plan my embroidery around them.
There's still a lot of prep work before I can get to the embroidery. Not to mention, finding or making up designs for the embroidery itself.
For tonight, though ... looks like it's back to finishing the Log Cabin Blanket. And a big ol' woo-hoo to that.
You want the Futzless Mom's Beef Stew Recipe? Here ya go ... but remember ... this is totally futzless, so if you're not comfortable cooking this way, either bite the bullet and give it a try once, or move on to something more precise. But I'm telling you ... all the years I tried so hard to make this beef stew "right," this is the first time it's turned out this good, and this is exactly how I did it.
Mom's Beef Stew
about 1 1/2 lbs stew beef (give or take a chunk or two)
about 3 carrots
about 3 potatoes
a can of peas
some water
some cooking oil
some flour
a heavy pot
Cut the beef into pieces you'd like to see in your stew. I use scissors for this. Trim any excess fat.
Pour some cooking oil into the bottom of the pot and heat it up.
Dump some all purpose flour into a gallon-size ziplock bag. Throw in the meat, shake it up really well. When the oil's hot, open the bag and pull out handfuls of the meat, with whatever flour you happen to grab with it. (don't try to get all the flour, but don't make a serious effort to shake any flour off the meat, either). Toss it in the pot. Let that cook a little while, then use a spatula, wooden spoon, or whatever you find handy to stir it up a bit.
Continue to cook and stir the beef with flour until it's mostly browned. Stop before it burns.
Put hot tap water in the pot till it covers the beef by about an inch or two. Cook this for 2 hours. Once it starts boiling good, turn the heat down and adjust until it's mostly simmering. Keep a lid on. Stir often. Keep it simmering. (Usually when I make beef stew it doesn't stick; this stuck horribly and had to be stirred a lot; however, as I mentioned, it turned out better than usual, so I figured it was worth it).
Go do something fun for awhile. When it's been almost 2 hours, peel 3 carrots (more or less) and chop them into about 1/2" rounds. Throw those in the pot, stir again, put the lid on.
About 25 minutes later you're going to add potatoes, so sometime before that peel 3 or so potatoes, and chop them up into more or less bite-size pieces. Toss those in, stir, put the lid on.
At various points in this process shake in quite a bit of salt (if you like salt; if you're on a low-salt diet, I'm sorry ... do your best). A generous portion of pepper wouldn't go amiss, either. Stir often, since - as I said - this version seemed to stick more than usual. (I think it was the excess flour; but that's what makes it thick and stewy - so it's worth it).
When the potatoes have cooked about 25 minutes, open a can of peas. Now you can do two things with the liquid in the can: if your beef stew is just about the right thickness (and if you played loose with the flour, it should be), you can drain the liquid into the sink. If your beef stew has managed to get too thick (hard to imagine) you can dump the liquid from the can of peas in with the peas. Either way, dump in the can of peas and stir it up. At this point it's basically done ... just leave on the heat and stir long enough to heat the peas (about 5 seconds).
If the stew isn't thick at all, you did what I'd been doing wrong for years - not enough flour at the start. This is where I start futzing, and usually bugger it up. The only fix for it I've found out at that point is to make a flour and warm water slurry, and add it to the stew. It will probably thicken it up some, but it always detracts from the color and flavor when I have to do that. That's why this pot turned out so well - I didn't have to do that this time. So remember - lots of flour at the beginning.
There ... that's my N0-Futz Mom's Beef Stew. If it's excellent, thank my mom. If it turns out like crap, it's your fault.
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