I've been tortured by four yards of green gingham recently.
Oh, it's pretty enough fabric. The green is my favorite shade. (I say my favorite color is teal, but this Granny Smith green is everywhere in my life: my kitchen cabinets, my car, several vintage dresses...) And it has the prettiest ribbon stripe running down it. See?
I bought it on eBay several years ago. And here in L.A., now that the weather's gotten warmer -- stop laughing, rest of the world, we do have seasons here, they're just subtle -- my head is spinning with dress pattern and fabric combinations. But green gingham? What had I been thinking when I clicked "bid"?
I love wearing bright colors in the summer. But -- I'm 41. And it wasn't "mutton dressing as lamb" I was worried about as much as "grown woman dressed as a four-year-old." I'd gotten to the point where I decided I'd have to give the fabric away. Then I remembered that I had Simplicity 5349 in my pattern collection and thought that View 2 with the white collar might work well:
Still I doubted it. Could I wear a gingham plaid? Maybe the time had passed.
Then I had The Green Gingham Dream.
In it I saw a friend of mine wearing a green gingham dress. It was one of those weird dream situations where for some reason I couldn't talk to her directly, but in my dream I exclaimed "Staci has shown me that green gingham CAN work for spring! I have to tell her!"
Funnily enough, a few days later I actually identified the dress my friend was wearing in the dream -- it's View 3 from this vintage 60s pattern, Simplicity 8611:
I'm "meh" about the pattern. Making it in my green gingham stripe seems like it would result in the stuff of nightmares -- but maybe my subconscious knows something I don't! At any rate, I'm pretty sure there's a pattern out there for me and my green gingham...and isn't the search half the fun?
What patterns and fabrics have appeared in your dreams? I won't ask "if" -- I'm pretty sure if you're reading this blog, sewing makes a regular appearance in your dream world...
Oh, and my friend? She's got a fantastic sense of style that's all her own, but I wouldn't say green gingham is a part of it. I sent her an email declaring her the Green Gingham Oracle, and I think she's still too stunned to respond.