Denim Duster, Dinner Group Valentine Surprise

I bought this duster seven or eight years ago. And two or three years ago, I decided to take all the silk ribbon that I had bought to embellish another jacket [butter-soft charcoal grey wool, bought while Firstborn and I were driving back from Idaho with the car I inherited from Mom], which I subsequently gave to Middlest one cold winter when she was more Rubenesque than she is now.

This has been an off-again, on-again project; it has been waiting patiently on a hanger for at least two years. And now that LittleBit’s second Firestarter is nearly done, I am somewhat in the mood to sew. I spent about an hour and a half last night, vaguely listening to A Midsummer Night’s Dream and tidying the edges on the first lapel. At the moment I am not sure where the bag is that holds the rest of the lace and the trim. This could get interesting.

Today I started this when I was sufficiently awake to find my glasses.



A book cover for this year’s Relief Society manual, from fuchsia Ultrasuede® that my sister gave me for my birthday almost 20 years ago.



It’s not quite done; I need to dash over to Secondborn’s after water aerobics tonight and get the alpha beads to spell out my friend’s name. And I want to pick up a bit of ribbon to stitch in at the top, so that she may mark her place.



It’s adjustable, because some of the manuals have a year’s worth of lessons, and some have two.

Here are more pictures of the duster-in-progress. The lace comes from a tablecloth that I bought at the antique mall where I also bought my fainting couch [AKA the Chastity Bed], and the sleigh bed for Secondborn when she was a senior in high school, because she was the only child still at home for whom I had not embellished a hand-me-down twin bed. I promptly and diligently put the tablecloth into storage, because we were living in Hell’s Half Acre La Casa Cucaracha substandard housing, and I didn’t want the bugs to get to it. [Hey, I figured out how to do a strike-through! Woohoos all around!]

Once in storage, it was promptly and diligently gnawed on by mice. Just flat broke my heart to take it out of the bag and see it in shreds. And as I am too frugal to simply throw away all that hand-knotting, over the years I have incorporated it into other projects. I made four placemats. I put lace cuffs on Christmas stockings. And there were enough unchewed edges that I am appliquéing them to the duster’s collar [now mostly embellished] and lapels [very much works-in-progress].

Like the farmer dealing with a butchered hog, I am using everything but the squeal.



I am also using beads and pearls leftover from Firstborn’s wedding.



And more of the star buttons that I used on the lapel.



Here’s the last shot, for now.



Can you bear to see more mug shots from backstage after West Side Story?



And we’ll close with a silly one:



And BTW, her sisters and I are not the only ones who think she would have made a better Maria than the **alto** who was chosen.

OK, I’m off to get ready for work.