Meeting and Mending, Seattle and Portland

The sad news?
No Meet and Mend happened in Seattle.

The happy news?
I met up with Sherry of Petite Over 40 in Seattle and mended in Portland!

Slowly, during my drive up to and my stay in Seattle it transpired that first the venue for the Meet and Mend had to change and then everyone (except Sherry) bailed. That didn't stop us! We went on a boat! And ate a whole package of macarons!

Sherry displays our sea-worthy snack.

Strawberry, the last macaron. We spent way more time gabbing and eating than looking at the scenery.

One of the many ferries in the harbor. You can [not] see how hazy it was from the fires in British Columbia.

I didn't take many photos until we got near the container ships.
Boatloads of #dailytruck components!

Sherry is organizing a Blogger Meetup in early October, and I'm going!
Contact her directly if you'd like to join in, especially if you live in the Seattle area.
I might try to get another Meet and Mend happening, not sure yet.

On to mending...
I was hoping to start sewing during my train ride down to Portland.
Nope.
I checked in at Seattle's King St. Station so late, I ended up riding backwards with no tray table.

The next day, I worked on my first mending project:

All I had to do was sew up the side seams of my ruana to turn it into a tunic.

Ta da!
This was taken at Fred Meyer's. I designed the prints in those men's lounge pants.

What size are these? XXL?

Mending project #2 went on some adventures.

I started with silk buttonhole twist, which now I'm thinking wasn't the best choice -- the knots aren't holding.

The end of the yellow silk buttonhole twist, a little over 4 rows of stitching.

The mending visits Powells.

The mending takes flight.

I have a long way to go on this piece. I'll keep taking pictures of places it goes!

Linking up with Shelbee's On the Edge
Patti's Visible Monday
Catherine's #iwillwearwhatilike

Felt Balls

I mentioned my felt ball obsession earlier this week.

As promised, here are the felt balls I encountered in Portland in June, 2011.

Oh, wait. Those are macaroons from Pearl Bakery 

Necklace with trapped felt balls by Denise Smitherman seen at The Whole 9 Yards 

Decoration on Adrienne's sweater

Oh, sorry, more round food. Olive eaten at Nines Hotel

There were felt balls lurking on the shelves of a stationary shop (eluded capture, but seared in my memory) and a bunch at the Museum of Contemporary Craft. Where I got this felt ring:

I sketched it, I got so excited:

Along with writing down ISBN numbers of felting books that I found at Powell's.

I saved the best for last. The largest felt balls I have yet to see discovered at Una:

Now I want to go back to Portland! 
I was there only two weeks ago, but not long enough to examine the current state of the felt ball invasion.

In 10 Minutes: 6-25 feeling the plaid in portland

click on images to see bigger

I found this plaid wrap skirt @ SMUT Vintage for $16.

It lead me to come up with this:

Indian paisley bling scarf - gift from Kim
green Levi's shirt - thrifted
bleeding heart bakery tee - from the cupcake enabler
skirt
black lace edge leggings - sample from work
witch sox - sock man St Mark's Pl NYC
sanitas brown patent mary jane clogs - NYC

At lunchtime, I added my Eugene Kim hat - it was SUNNY!
I matched a whole block of buildings