For Christmas, I made scarves for my brother-in-law Mark and for my friend Rich. I thought that corduroy would be a nice soft-but-manly fabric. That may be true, but it was a bitch to sew. Something about the directionality of the fabric made it really hard to work with. A young man I know works with textiles for a living, and he basically said “duh, it sure is!” Who knew? I was hoping these would be prototypes for some mens’ scarves for my Etsy shop, but nope.

Here is Mark’s scarf. That is the “Om” symbol (Hindu symbol for peace). He looked really cute wearing it, but I neglected to get a picture. Here are more pictures.

For Rich’s embroidery, a squirrel was obvious — he hosts a radio show called Inflatable Squirrel Carcass. The issue was making a squirrel that wasn’t too cute. I led a couple of focus groups with men, who all agreed that there should be no acorn nibbling, nor should the squirrel’s tail be too fluffy. I worked a design of a semi-badass squirrel running up a tree.

My sewing machine (as mentioned before) is in need of some service. Let’s not judge the “slight” imperfections of the finishing job!

Again, I neglected to get a picture, though Rich looked equally fetching in his scarf, if I do say so meself. Now, I’m off to the only sewing machine repair shop in the city, and am bracing myself for the three-week repair delay.