I’m continuing my self-set challenge to make something inspired by every issue of Threads magazine I own. I originally intended to take them in chronological order, but I must admit here to skipping a couple of issues already. There were (are) projects I could do in them, but they were more time-consuming than I’m looking for right now. Quick and dirty is the answer at the moment.

So I’ve moved on to Issue number 62, from January 1996. Here I found a design for an apron, and since I don’t possess an apron that seemed like a reasonable project. Also, I’m going to a fabric painting/printing workshop next weekend, and an apron is on the list of supplies to take. Normally I just tend to wear old clothes and accept that they get dirty or painted or whatever, but an apron is probably a good idea.

I also intended to use as much as possible out of my stash for these projects, but in the interest of speed I did buy supplies for this project. A stripey blue and yellow heavy cotton, and some yellow twill tape. I thought of using some print scraps for the pockets, but decided to stick to the one fabric. Here is the result.

Apron

I broke one of my cardinal rules with this, in that I didn’t preshrink the fabric. I thought, it’s an apron, it doesn’t have to fit, won’t matter if it shrinks a little. And it wouldn’t have mattered, except that I decided to use the fabric sideways on the pockets, to get a bit of interest. The fabric obviously shrank more on the lengthwise grain than the cross grain (which is expected I think), and the pockets now have little puckers at the edge, because the pocket is shorter than the underlying fabric. You can see in this photo:

There is a slanted pocket near the

pocket

top for glasses, and a small pocket on the side for a pencil, along with three other pockets. There is also something which I couldn’t at first understand. The article suggests a piece of twill tape along the inner hem of the apron, to make what it calls another large pocket. This puzzled me, how can this be a pocket, but then I figured out that you can take hold of the piece of tape and lift the hem of the apron so that you can carry things in it. Like the archetypal farmer’s wife collecting eggs from the hens, or apples from the orchard. Not sure how often I’ll use that feature, but I’ve included it anyway. Just forgot to take a picture, so you might have to imagine it for now.
I’m also unsure about the fact that the apron is made from a double layer of fabric, as suggested in the article. It saves some hemming etc, but I’m worried it might be too hot now that summer is coming here in Australia. Perhaps another apron needs to be on the to-do list.
I’ve decided to give my challenge a title, in common with all the best blog challenges, Me Made March, Self Sewn September etc. Mine is ‘Threads magazine – Inspiration in every Issue. I’m already looking into the next issue to decide on a project. I think I might be able to get extra kudos, since I can possibly use this to finish an existing UFO – double whammy!