Sewing Circle

Sewing Group Members on a Night Out

Nina and Danielle glowing in the green light; photo taken by Barbara

Barbara sipping her mocktail with the glowing heart lemon rind

One of the groups I started last year was a sewing group comprised of three people. Two very eager to learn novices with one enthusiastic and experienced teacher. Even though I am a teacher of many things, this time I am the student. My friend Nina has over twenty years of sewing and drafting patterns experience, and she enthusiastically volunteered to teach me sewing. I have made things in the past with my mother's help, but for some reason, I have some kind of residual negative or fearful feeling around those times when she taught me.  My friend Barbara has a similar experience attempting to learn sewing in her youth from family members, and we both just wanted to get past those feelings and get into the good part of altering and making pieces that work with our wardrobes. 

At about the same time, I had joined a sewing discord specifically for EGL fashion. The intention of the group is to learn sewing skills with project "steps" to teach you how to work with and alter patterns to create accessories and eventually actual dresses and blouses for your wardrobe. There are always teaching assistants around online to help with sewing questions and many of the more experienced members are also into cosplay or historical fashion, so they are used to working with a variety of types of fabrics, trims, and machinery. 

So between the online group and the real-life friend group, I had essentially two accountability teams and I knew where I wanted to go with the sewing projects. The first time we met up as a group, it was more of a repair/alteration meeting where I needed to reattach a bustle in a pair of trousers and Barbara needed to hem some pants. 

Step 1: Non-Fitted Commercial Pattern: Head Bow

The Head bow pattern pieces, A on top with Tails, B on the bottom, and C to the right; Pattern Credit to 20dollarlolita

Step 1 according to the sewing discord is to create an accessory for your wardrobe that is non-fitted commercial pattern with grain lines and notches. They even offered this free head bow pattern to get you started. I printed out this pattern and I was so eager to learn, Nina came over with some scrap materials she acquired and she showed me all the basic steps from laying out the pattern correctly, how to pin it, how to cut it, and how to follow the instructions. We each made a bow with scrap material in the course of an afternoon. 

My first bow with Nina's guidance. I hand sewed on a plastic cameo that came with a long disintegrated hair tie I had been saving in a drawer for years.

If you look carefully, you can see there are two A pieces, one is just slightly less wide than the other. The initial pattern has you basically end up cutting out two A pieces, but you only need one. I made a creative choice to use both of them, but to make the second less wide. This probably would have been more obvious with a contrasting navy blue fabric, but remember, I had nothing at this point as far as notions, fabric, or trims, so this is the best I could do.

This bow is a bit floppy because it lacks interfacing, and really needs to have piece A and A.5 sewn to piece B, so that the A's don't slip out upon wearing. It's also not very big. It's probably the width of one's hand. Very subtle, demure. 

Giant head eating bow using 20dollarlolita's pattern; just accidentally swapping Piece A and B

Months later after I had ordered the material, trims and notions I needed to actually do Step 1 following all the directions for the pattern, I made this entire headpiece all on my own one afternoon. See my intention was to make a red tartan and black head bow and matching ruffle heart tote bag because I have a lot of red tartan main pieces in my alt wardrobe, but nothing other than black to put on my head or for a bag.  Nina and I had started on the bag together, and it took us about three full sessions to make the bag, and then after all the learning from that project, I felt confident enough to revisit the head bow on my own.  I got the interfacing behind pieces A and B, and I even got black cluny lace trims, which I learned how to sew inwards on the edges so that when it was pulled inside out, it would appear as an unbroken trim all along piece B. I even attempted to cut scrap material on a bias and wrap and glue it around a metal headband. It was going so well. 

But as you can see, these bows do not look the same even though they are from the same pattern. It's because I accidentally swapped pieces A and B for every direction. This bow takes up most of your head. I'd say that's a perfect punk interpretation for the pattern. It actually looks really cool, and even the person who designed the pattern said they liked this mistake. 

Step 1: Non-Fitted Commercial Pattern
Ruffle Heart Tote Bag

The finished ruffle heart tote bag

These types of ruffle heart bags are very popular in EGL fashion, but I rarely see ones that are red and black tartan, so I decided to make my own. I purchased a pattern off of Etsy for this project, materials from Michaels's online, thread and other notions from Amazon like the interfacing, wadding, and pins.

While the head bow by itself would have qualified for a completed Step 1 project, the Ruffle Heart Tote bag taught me everything else I needed to know about how to make ruffles, pinning, and ironing seams. I learned so many things during the course of it, I felt a huge range of emotions from delight to various levels of frustration, even with Nina's guidance. New neural connections were happening in my brain as I learned to sew things backwards and inside out to reveal a complete product at the very end. Nina tried to reassure me saying that this project was a bit of a stretch for a beginner, but believed in me the whole time!

Designing the front of the bag

This is the initial idea of the front of the bag. The pattern doesn't tell you about adding a patch or adding lace trims on top. In fact, this little venture was an additional couple of hours of my time, trying to get that lace trim to stay down as I carefully sewed it down after already having fused the interfacing to the back. I also learned that the pins are not facing the correct way, they should be pinned inwards to the center of the heart so that when you are sewing you can pull the pins out before they destroy the needle of your sewing machine. 

Pinning the ruffle to the front, with the pins the correct way

I learned all about basting stitches from making the ruffles for the front and back of the bag. Another time consuming venture by the way. I throughly regretted choosing cotton twill and cotton thread during this step for my project. Basically you're taking a semi-stiff material that does not ruffle easily and putting in a few rows of loose stitches near the edge to pull and then pull down on the fabric, similarly to the way you would pull out a missing drawstring cord in a hoodie or sweatpants. I can't honestly tell you how many times the threads broke or how frequently I lost the basting stitch. The pattern's directions were not very specific either, just saying to try to make the ruffle even looking and to keep doing it until it fits around the heart shaped pieces. I think I did the front one in approximately 50 minutes, and the second one I lost track, as I had to take a few days breaks between the breaking and losing of the stitch.

Making a heart sandwich

After I got the ruffles down, it was time to add the handles in. I purposely chose contrasting red thread for this. It's not the most even sewing, but I did it. And again, it's a punk style bag---it's okay if things are a little off!

After that I had to make the grand sandwich. This photo shows me about to sew the wadding (structural lining) to the inside of both sides of the bag. I never took a photo of the actual black lining step, but that's basically sewn separately and then attached all around the bottom and sides of the wadding pieces with a tiny hole in it at the top. At this point you've got a giant thick heart shaped sandwich that a regular sewing needle may or may not be prepared for. If it doesn't break and you get to the end, you get to pull everything out of the little hole in the lining. It's like a magic trick and to be honest I still have trouble wrapping my head around that part. 

Not your average tote bag---you can see how thick it is on the sides

I imagine there's easy tote bag sewing projects, and then there's this tote bag sewing project. I finished both Step 1 projects in December 2025, and was ready to start using them in my wardrobe in 2026. I was also ready to start sourcing materials for the Step 2 project, which is to take a pajama pants pattern and alter it into bloomers of a style of your choice. I thought it would be a perfect time to get the group together, give everyone a copy of the Step 2 pattern to assemble on their own time, and go out on an adventure, starting at Cate's Sew Modern, a local sewing shop, a Goodwill to check out the textiles for sale (good for bloomers or mock up patterns), and a little social time at Bones & Botanicals, a witchy themed speakeasy in the heart of an otherwise unassuming strip mall. 

Nina wanted to know what we should wear to the speakeasy, and I initially I said black, but then I thought it was the perfect opportunity to test drive all my hard work on my Step 1 projects. 

Girls Night Out at Bones & Botanicals

Danielle's Full Coordinate with both the Head bow and the tote bag

My main piece for my look is a red tartan punk style bondage mini skirt from Tripp NYC. Even though this a printed tartan, it's very sturdy and has 4 deep functional pockets despite the level of purely aesthetic straps, zippers and d rings. I guess I took the bones theme to heart, and added an open shouldered t-shirt with a day of the dead face from the brand Sullen that I've had for years (seriously since probably 2012). To repeat the bones theme, I have medium gray tights with black skulls and crossbones on them. To add a little more black to balance out the tartan, I added a cropped length showman style black jacket from Killstar (which also includes unnecessary straps and d rings, and platform black patent mary janes that have metal rivets and additional metal dangling bits. I found a studded black choker in a drawer as well and you can see in other photos that I was wearing medium length black fingerless gloves. I was going for a vibe that combined feminine elements with an overall edgy execution. 

Sitting inside Bones & Botanicals next to a skeleton themed pillow; Photo credit to Barbara

Somehow drawing the Lady De Los Muertos card in the Halloween Oracle Deck; Photo credit to Barbara

Bookshelf inside Bones & Botanicals offering books to read as well as decks to work with; Photo credit to Barbara

Mocktails over a glowing sarcophagus

All in all it was a wonderful day. Barbara and I picked up some very interesting printed quilting cotton and notions at Cate's Sew Modern. We each got something at Goodwill- Barbara found a perfect King Size white sheet for her bloomers project, along with an entire new spring wardrobe. Nina found a beautiful pink with gold stars dress and I found her a matching gold clutch. Nina and Barbara found a black lace 3/4 sleeve crop top that they wanted me to try on, and it fit well so I purchased it.  At Bones and Botanicals, we were able to purchase snacks as well as cocktails, mocktails, and freshly brewed hot tea from their own house made blends. We spent a few hours there utilizing the various decks on the book shelf next to where we sat and talking about life and I suppose death in my case.

I was really happy to be wearing my Step 1 projects and have seamlessly fused them into other outfits since that point, so I am really glad I finally started learning to sew!  I know what the gaps are in my wardrobe and knowing now that I can alter or make something that truly fits me with support both in person and online makes a huge difference. This year I will be working on the Step 2 bloomers project, but next year I will be making my own dress! Hopefully once I get the basics of EGL patterning and assembling down, I can move into designing my own pieces that are historically inspired!