Smonen

I sat down yesterday morning with a cup of coffee and the intention of writing a post to you, and then realized that though I don’t believe in jinxes, and I didn’t really think I could make myself fall down by typing about what a great ski trip we had, I do really hate revising writing and so I put it off until now, simply in the interest of not needing to delete a post about how awesome it was and instead write about how charming the Ski Patrol is and how sweet the doctors in the emergency room in Banff are, and how much less scary it was to be airlifted out of the Rocky Mountains than I thought it would be. Turns out that I’m out the other end of the thing, totally intact.

We skiied during the daytime, with me taking lessons and Joe off doing wild man things, flinging himself off the top of mountains and doing double blacks, while I timidly made the transition from green runs to blue ones. I had a very nice instructor named George, who consistently told me that I’m a much better skier than I think I am, I’m just too nervous. “Relax” he told me over and over. “You just need to relax.”  I’m not sure I have the trick of it yet, because all I did then was really concentrate on relaxing, and I don’t think that’s what George meant, and there were moments (more than one, I’m afraid to report) where I stood a the top of a slope George wanted me to ski down, looked at his intentions, the steepness of the thing, how far you would fall to the bottom with a misplaced ski, and cordially looked him in the eye to say “What the actual f**k, George.”

Still, at the end of the three days, George presented me with a certificate outlining my skills, and confidently decreed that I could ski any groomed run. “Any” he said, as long as I managed this elusive relaxation. I looked at my card, and immediately noted an error. Muttering, I approached George, and explained that I wanted him to tick off the box that said I could manage small jumps. He looked at me a little confused, and I reminded him that he’s been on lifts with me, surely he’s noticed that I’m five feet tall, and that means that getting off a lift isn’t a simple matter of standing up.  I have to jump. (This made for a dramatic first dismount from a lift last year, by the way, when the instructor told me to wait until my skis touched the ground, then stand up. Never happened. I almost went right round the thing.) “George,” I proclaimed. “You’ve seen me. You know I’m jumping. I want that box. That’s a jump. Tick it off.”

George agreed, though even now I’m unclear on whether or he truth thought it was right, or was just a little frightened of me. He sat down, put a proper checkmark in the box for small jumps – and added a little note. “On lifts.”  He also told me that skiing with me had been a lot of fun, but in the comments on my report card, I noted that it just said “Been a lot skiing with you this week” and at first I thought the “fun” was just missing (he had several to fill out) but I’ve been told before that I’m rather “a lot” and I wonder if George is breathing a little easier now that I’m headed off his mountain.

In between death defying runs down the slopes, I knit. I had lots of time in the mornings, and in the car on the way places, and at dinner, and in the evenings,

and I’m happy to report that the first little border on the baby blanket is done, as is the second larger one, and today on the way to the airport I’ll finish charting the third, big one, and by the time I get home tonight, it should be well started. I’ve big plans to apply myself diligently to that thing over the next week, try to really break the back of it. There’s more than 680 stitches to a round now, so progress feels like it’s slowing down all the time, but it’s still a lot easier than skiing.

Yes, it is I, Sherry The Mediocre Seamstress, back with another post about sewing something while half wanting to fling the machine out the window, and then acting like a triumphant American Gladiator when I’m finished, parading around all sweaty and half clothed in full peacock mode. Behold, I have transformed one boy’s duvet cover into two.

The issue was simple: my BFF had inherited her husband’s boyhood set of twin beds for their son’s bedroom. They had been using just one in their old house, but now had room to set up both in their new house (which is just a block away from mine! INSERT ALL THE EXCITED EMOJIS!).

But alas, she had only one duvet cover (from Garnet Hill a few years back) and it was no longer for sale. So to get a matching set, she assumed she’d have to buy two new ones. Then I swooped in with waaaay too much enthusiasm and basically begged her to let me take the original duvet cover apart and see if I could turn it into two duvet covers. If I failed, well, she was planning to buy a new matching set anyway. And if I succeeded, well… I could feel like I was finally earning my keep after all the delicious meals and root beer floats she has been stuffing into my pie hole since we met 16 years ago in a tiny NYC dorm room.

Step One: Get cocky, quickly followed by an enveloping sense of dread. Because it’s going to freak you out to clip your friend’s property in half. Even if she’s laughing and taking an iPhone pic while it all goes down.

Basically I perched on her kitchen stool and used baby scissors to slowly work my way around the perimeter, just clipping the little threads that hold the front side of the duvet cover to its back side (I didn’t actually cut any of the fabric). Much like a seam ripper, this worked slowly but surely, and soon enough I was left with two almost identical sides (one had button holes and one had buttons, but otherwise they were the same).

Obviously, the duvet cover has to have the same patterned or colored fabric on both sides for this to work (essentially, you’re dividing it and then marrying each to a large flat sheet in the color of your choice). We went with white cotton flat sheets, which I grabbed at Target for $8 each. The key is to match the fabric type whenever possible (sewing two 100% cotton sheets together without any stretch makes for a more cohesive duvet without any puckering) and then just choose a color that works with your pattern or color.

Oh and get the flat sheets a size up from your duvet. I got full-sized sheets for these twin-sized duvet panels because the sheet needs to be AT LEAST as wide and as long as the duvet cover panel, or it’s going to look majorly wonked.

Step Two: Wash & dry your flat sheets a few times (to get any shrinking out of the way). Then lay out your sheet with the duvet cover panel on top and trim the sheet to be the same size as the duvet cover, leaving an extra inch around any side that you are cutting, which will probably be 2 of the 4 sides (the other two won’t have a cut edge because they’ll maintain their original hemmed edge). That extra inch on those two sides is so you can hem/finish them for a clean look and to prevent fraying (just fold over the last inch of fabric on that side and stitch that fold in place with your machine). You’ll want to hem any cut sides BEFORE you join the sheet to the duvet cover.

Feel free to have a chihuahua inspect your work as you go.

Step Three: You’ll then want to stitch THREE out of four of your duvet cover sides back together (all but the short side that has existing buttons or button holes from the original duvet cover). But you want to do this INSIDE OUT, so your seams are hidden inside when it’s right side out. I basically placed the duvet cover pattern-side-up on the machine and then laid the white sheet face-down against it (making sure I was lining up the sides that are the same size with each other).

You’ll essentially be left with a GIANT PILLOWCASE, which will look amazingly clean and neat when you turn it right side out (even if your lines aren’t perfectly straight, the duvet insert will fluff in there and all will be forgiven). But what do you do with that open end? You know, the one that stays open so you can stuff the duvet insert in there? Hmmm…

Step Four: Feel your anxiety ratchet up, but then investigate the situation. The original duvet cover had left only about 1/3rd of that side open in the middle, so I turned everything back inside out again and sewed those outer corners together the same way I had done the other three sides, leaving just the middle third of the duvet cover gaping open.

Step Five: The original duvet cover had used buttons to close the gap, so it meant by splitting them apart I had one cover with buttons (but no holes) and another with holes (but no buttons). So on the latter, I just sewed these brown buttons onto the white side wherever there was an existing button hole on the patterned side. A moment of silence for John’s old pair of cargo shorts that heroically donated these buttons.

Oh, and the trick here was to sew the buttons on the INSIDE hem of the white sheet, that way you can button it in a way where the duvet cover sort of folds over itself to hide the buttons. I feel like that’s weird to explain / show, but if you’ve ever had a duvet cover like this you’ll know what I mean. The buttons and holes basically hide themselves so it looks like this when you button it:

Step Six: Now the other duvet cover (the one with buttons, no holes) scared me a little more. I had never made a button hole before, so I just winged it after staring at the “pro button holes” on the finished duvet cover I had just completed (side note: I really hope someone finds this post by Googling “pro button holes”). It appeared as if someone had just made a small slit in the fabric and then did a bunch of little knotted loops of string around all sides of the opening so it wouldn’t fray or rip over time. I’m sure there’s a fancy term for that kind of stitch. Maybe knotted whipstitch?

So after I made my little slit I basically just did tons and tons of looped knots around the entire perimeter (I went around it a few times over to make sure it was all nice and covered so it hopefully wouldn’t have a bunch of frayed strings sticking out after one washing). They weren’t nearly as lovely as the pro button holes (#SEO)…

… but they worked like a charm. And once the buttons were tucked into the holes, well, the buttonholed duvet cover looked just as good as the buttoned duvet cover – which was a giant relief since there were more than a few moments of doubt.

So that’s how this girl (points to self with thumbs while grinning the grinchiest grin you’ve ever seen) made one duvet cover into two – all without actually launching the sewing machine out the window. Not gonna lie, there were a few threats of that happening, but it’s is still sitting pretty in the guest room.

Also, in case it wasn’t clear from the photos, her son IS OBSESSED WITH DINOSAURS. As in, he can name like 10,000 and thinks I’m hilarious when I say things like “oh is that a brontosaurus?” (“no Aunt Sherry, that’s a brachiosaurus! And this is an apatosaurus and this is a plesiosaurus!”).

And aside from grabbing those playful little shark and dino wall heads and a new T-Rex lamp, the M.O. of the room so far is just trying to use what they already have – like their existing rug and an old woven side table as the nightstand. And I’m happy to have helped by magically (if by magically, you mean semi-nervously and sweat-i-ly) turning one lonely duvet into a matching set.

To check out more of my love/hate fueled posts about sewing, here’s how I:

• sewed a patchwork quilt for my daughter
• made a little stitched quilt for my son a few years later
• sewed a beanbag pouf (Burger is hilarious in these pics)
• made curtain panels for the dining room (it’s easy!)
• used two cloth napkins to make accent pillows
• made a drapey pom-pom-fringed canopy over our daugher’s bed

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