The calendar says it is Friday.  I completely missed Thursday.  Thursday was a day of much interesting stuff, an aha moment and a fair bit of fun.

Fun as defined by this knitter/sewer/ordinary schmo.  I cast on the landlord's blanket the other day, Tuesday I believe it was, and with my very very desultory knitting the last few days, am ready to do the first red!  

I had to stop knitting on it last night because according to the pattern, I was there, and the next row should be red.  I did not have the red yarn right near me, so I set it aside to knit on a sock.  Yes, a sock.

Most of the day was spent setting up a pattern again.  The first time I did a pdf print at home pattern, it took almost forever to get it put together.  It is starting to go faster now and I have two things ready to sew.  Both of them are more of a muslin than an actual pair of pants but I would rather know the fit than ruin nice recently purchased fabric.

The fabric I am using for a muslin has been marinating in the fabric cupboards for a while and is in no way shape or form related to muslin.  I had it and I had a huge quantity, originally enough for pants, a skirt and at least two tops.  It is a nylon fabric we used to call parachute cloth.  It used to show up  in clothing lines like Tan Jay and was marketed as being uncrushable, almost instant drying and perfect for travel wear.  The plan was to sew myself basic wardrobe pieces that would look good even after being stuffed in with baby things for the times when we came up to visit Brian's family here in Edmonton.  

I just wanted to have something where I didn't look like the poor relative from the farm.  And fyi, we were the poor relatives.  As the fabric went out of style, it stayed in my fabric pile simply because there was lots of it and I felt certain that someday, somewhere, I would find something I needed it for.  This is it. 

Pants are getting critical because one of my stalwarts, a truly lovely pair of linen pants that I got about eight years ago, is on it's last legs.  I was on a call to mom and dad the other day when I felt a little give in the fabric on my leg.

When it happened, I felt for sure I could do one of those nifty embroidery things to cover the problem, butno.  Each of the fold lines on both legs are see through and will simply not survive.  I did think of darning each wear area but there are a dozen little lines all across the fabric on both legs.  Keep in mind, these were one of the two pairs of pants that I think of as my good pairs.

I am pretty sure that this nylon isn't going to last very long as pants.  I can't see the fabric not stretching in high stress areas.  At this point though, if I get a couple weeks out of them as pants, I win because they will have already done one job as a muslin for pants from nicer fabrics and a second as clothing till I get the nice fabric cut and sewn.

Wish me luck today. The plan is to sew both pair up and then to make any changes required and then to move forward to cut out at least one of the two from better fabrics.