Me-Made-May 2014: My Pledge and Days 1-5

Surprise! After nearly two months of blogging inactivity, I'm back! I've been busy sewing and have lots of posts lined up once I have some time to edit photos.

First, though, is Me-Made-May! I made my pledge on the sign-up post on So, Zo at the last minute, and never had the chance to blog about it. My pledge is:

I, Shannon of Adventures of a Young Seamstress, sign up as a participant of Me-Made-May '14. I will endeavour to wear at least one me-made/mom-made/refashioned garment each day for the duration of May 2014. 

To clarify what I mean by refashioned, I mean refashions where I completely re-worked the fabric into something different. The irony? I don't actually have anything like this in my wardrobe at the moment. I do, however, have lots of garments like this planned, so I wanted to include them in my pledge in case I get around to doing any of them before the end of May.

I decided that my somewhat reworked or altered clothing, as well as thrifted clothing, would be a bonus, but not something I would include in my pledge, since that's pretty much all I wear anyways, and I wanted to push myself.

So... let the MMM'14 photos begin! I've split up my photos so far into a few posts, to keep each post a little shorter. Hopefully by the end of this weekend, I'll be caught up in my posts.

Thursday, May 1

Dress: Me-made (Sewaholic Cambie)
Cardigan: Consignment (Jackpot)
Shoes: Hand-me-downs from a family friend (Naturalizer)

The weather was unusually warm for the start of May! In fact, this was the first day this year that I didn't wear tights. I thought it was the perfect occasion to show off one of my favourite ever me-mades!

I also love this cardigan... you'll be seeing a lot of it this month, trust me! It's angora and quite a bit shorter than the rest of my cardigans, so it looks way better with skirts and dresses, but it's still super cozy. (I didn't actually wear it for more than about 5 minutes today, and took most of my photos with it off, but none of them looked that great.)

On a side note, looking back at my first post about this dress, I just realized how much my hair has grown! Funny how you don't even notice these things until you look back at old photos. 

Friday, May 2

Shirt: Me-made (self-drafted, unblogged)
Skirt: RTW, somewhat refashioned 
Cardigan: Consignment (Jackpot)
Purse: Mom-made
Shoes: Orthaheel

This was the day of my band trip to Whistler! We went up there for a music festival, and it was beautiful! (Yes, I was wearing a skirt and sandals, in Whistler, in May.) Unfortunately, I couldn't stay for the whole weekend because something else came up, but I was able to be there for our performance and spend the day in the village. 

I forgot to take a photo specifically for this outfit, but I thought I would include this photo because there's a story behind it. This is my friend Shannon - we call ourselves Shannon Squared. And the waterfall? It's called Shannon Falls... so this is picture is of Shannon Cubed.

This shirt is one I made ages ago (I wore it in this post), and it's seen better days. It was super cheap material to start with, and it's now really pilled and stretched out of shape. It's an easy shirt to just throw on, though, so I wear it a fair bit. The skirt used to be a dress, but it got too short, so I made it into a skirt (although it's getting a bit short again, only now there's not much I can do about it). The cardigan is the same as yesterday's (I told you you'd be seeing it a lot...), and the bag is one that my mom made me as a gift a couple years ago. It's my go-to purse (especially with tendinitis), since it fits a lot but doesn't get in the way.

Saturday, May 3

Camisole: Mom-made (self-drafted)
Skirt: Me-made (Sewaholic Hollyburn, unblogged)
Cardigan: Consignment (Jackpot)
Tights: Hue
Boots: Steve Madden

The weather turned chilly and rainy again that day - I took this photo during 5 dry minutes. 

There's not all that much to say about this outfit... the skirt was made pre-blog, but I've worn it in this post and mentioned it in my year-end round-up as well. 

This camisole is another one of those items that is far from perfect, but gets worn all the time. Camisoles just don't seem to work for my body - I have to pin them to my bra straps to stop them from falling down, and shortening the straps only causes them to ride up in the back.

Oh, and I didn't even notice that I wore this cardigan three days in a row until I looked at these photos. Oh well. I honestly see no problem with wearing the same stuff multiple days in a row, and I don't usually even notice when I do.

Sunday, May 4

Shirt: Me-made (Sewaholic Pendrell, heavily modified)
Cardigan: Thrifted (Nicole Bridger)
Pants: RTW (Lululemon)
Socks: Gifted, handknit

I'm almost ashamed to post this picture. Why? Well... yoga pants.

These are my "weekend clothes". If anyone from school saw this, they probably wouldn't even believe it... I don't think I've worn yoga pants to school (or in public) since grade 9. 

I was hoping that MMM might be motivation to wear somewhat nicer clothes on weekends, but I was sick and tired this day, and it was rainy and cold (hence the indoor picture). So, yoga pants.

Monday, May 5

Dress: Me-made (Colette Ceylon)
Tights: Smartwool
Boots: Steve Madden

I'll add one more photo to this post than I was originally planning, just so that I end on a positive note. 

It was still cool that day (but sunny), so it was the perfect time to wear my wool dress! I love this dress so much, and I wish it were better suited to the weather we're having now, so that I could still wear it for MMM!

Also, this photo shows the colour way better than my original post. It's so much more vivid than it looked in the first batch of photos!





















I'll end there today, because I've run out of time to write. I'll try to get the rest of my photos up this weekend, and then keep up with them a little bit better.

Are you participating in Me-Made-May? How is your challenge going?