Okay, I have to confess, there are very few lyrics written for this song. Well, there are two (words) and that’s a start.

It was really challenging this week to find a way to etch in the singing parts with no real lyrical material to work from. Was I glad when I ran into the lady who sang the original Star Trek theme? You bet. She agreed to lay down some wordless vocals and she gives the track that Venusian plantation hymn sort of quality that’s been so popular with the kids this year. Whew.

Seriously though, ‘finishing’ the demo forced me to really think about the vocal melody in a new way and although the results were fairly obvious from the existing material, I’m excited to fill in the blanks with words and their syllables and see how that changes things.

I had a great time participating in “Works in Progress Month”. Feeling the emotions, getting really frustrated, not throwing my sitar against the wall - it was all worth it. Thanks for listening.

Who were we kidding? We decided to do a work-in-regress instead. We left Boy’s monster-birds (so as not to break his heart).

Let this be a lesson to all! Erasing feels good!
Erasing is good!

Love,
Ben + Vesper

by Dan Zimmerman

I make art quite a bit. My weeks are filled with art. But having a month-long assignment with parameters a bit more defined than I’m accustomed to (like deadlines!) proved to be inspiring. Idea rumination, trial-and-error, theme-and-variation; these are all familiar artistic processes to me, but it was invigorating to go through these processes with a project requiring sustained focus over a good stretch of time. There was a wonderful interactive element to this project as well. So much of the time artists find themselves working alone. This is certainly necessary, but having folks that you can talk about your work with is also necessary. Batting around ideas with others and discussing the various themes the art would bring up (particularly with my friend Joshua Stamper) was such fun and so helpful. The generous blog comments that came in were also a profound encouragement. I felt like I was back in school again!

It is funny to me how one little thing can be so ripe with implication. The thing that spoke to me about that first photograph was the stubble on my face. Little did I know that it would lead to ‘Branchface’ and ‘Leaveface’ (now that’s letting yourself go!). In all seriousness, this stubble served as a metaphor for the wild. . .for letting nature go about its business. Thinking about nature led me outside.

Autumn is a remarkable season. Just when leaves’ grasp on their branches is the most tenuous, as things are getting colder, as things are pulling into themselves and getting tighter - at that point - colors are at their most brilliant. The same kind of poignant reality manifests itself in movement. There is so much movement in autumn. Leaves are falling or flying, the wind is pushing through trees and streets and houses - all this movement just before the stillness of winter. These things speak to me about the nature of beauty, the nature of frailty, but at the same time suggest another place. There’s an other-worldliness to autumn that is intoxicating.

Now that I have started this series it will be hard to stop! Every painting or photograph seems to suggest new things. Here are the last two pictures (for now). Please enjoy. Onward and upward!

by Anita Santiago

This week I decided to work on the other significant character of the book; my sister’s little house in the woods where she and her little dog live. The challenge was trying to find a way to illustrate a house with some personality. I was looking for a stylized image that captured the character of an Arts & Crafts bungalow in a silhouette style. The silhouette lends itself to the cut paper techniques I’m planning on experimenting with next. Still need to work on the style of the house some more, but it’s getting there.

I’ve really enjoyed ‘Works in Progress Month’. It’s been great fun spending time sketching Mr. Bean and I even learned something - doing lots of preliminary sketches really does help you to gain insight into your subject. Sometimes the simplest things are pretty easy to forget. I look forward to sketching lots of trees and houses over the next few weeks.

Hope you enjoy these last sketches. Thanks for looking!

Hey Folks,

It is hard to believe we’re already at the end of Works-in-Progress Month. We hope you have had as much fun as we have. In the interest of savoring the moment a little, we’ve decided NOT to post everything all in one fell swoop (one swell foop?). Rather, we’re going to post one entry a day, so that you have a whole week of Sounds Familyre goodness!

Make sure you check back everyday to see the exciting conclusion to Works-in Progress Month!

Well, I can’t believe it’s the last week already! Thank you all so very much for your wonderful comments. It’s making this process so much fun. Well, we have a lot to go through to finish up this garment! Let’s get to it!

It’s time to put our zipper in the garment. Usually I would put in a regular zipper into a children’s garment, but I only have an invisible zipper on hand, so that’s what we are going to use. Invisible zippers are not the best zipper to put into a children’s garment. Visually, they are much nicer because they are hidden into the seam. However, they break easily and that isn’t acceptable for the quality and durability that the standard of Mamma Made upholds. Since this is the sample, we can use this zipper.

This is the center back seam you are viewing. See how the zipper is wrapped underneath the seam? It is a really nice look. Just not practical for children.

Okay, we did run into a problem that I had said I was nervous about in my last blog post. I did end up cutting the skirt too short for my taste. Remember when I said it’s all in the cutting? It’s true. I tried the dress on my size 6 daughter and it just hit her knee at the perfect spot. No room for a good hem. I usually have a good inch to turn up. Now we will need to put a “fake hem” in for the sample.

I cut a strip of fabric to go around the entire hem. You sew just 3/8” to attach the strip so you aren’t losing a lot of length. You flip the strip and topstitch. This will give you a crisp finish when you turn and press. Serge the rough edge and blind hem stitch around the “fake hem.” This is what the hem now looks like. Not bad. Of course during the process of “making the sample” you note all the final changes that will need to be made on the garment you will sell.

Time to finish the bodice. I’m cutting lining pieces for the bodice and sewing them to the front neckline first. Under-stitch, turn and press. The under-stitching really lends to a crisp line in the garment. I think it’s important for the neckline to have a nice line.

I’m going to do the same thing to the armscye and turn the lining to the inside.

Once I get the lining smooth and flat, I pin the bottom of the lining under and topstitch from the front on our contrast belt. This will minimize hand-stitching. I read somewhere that you shouldn’t have to hand-stitch anything and that is the sign of a great seamstress. I semi-agree with that train of thought. But you better be really clean and concise with all of your machine work. I think that the inside of a garment should look as nice as the outside.

Time to finish up by sewing our shoulder seams together and then the lining seams. I’m so excited to see what this will look like on a little girl!!!

And VOILA! LE DRESS!

I’m really happy with how the dress came out. It has all the elements of a simple garment with a little surprise and some twirl factor. It’s important to have a simple design with a strong pattern.

Now, for all of you loyal blog followers—A CONTEST! (note: a different contest than the one talked about in the ‘Mamma Made Contest Winner’ post below). Win this Size 6 Sample Dress that you have helped to create! Post a COMMENT to this entry with the perfect name for this creation! Use your imaginations and merge Mamma Made/Danielson/Sounds Familyre together for this very special dress. Even if you don’t win the dress, it will be available to purchase from both Sounds Familyre and Mamma Made. Good luck! The name will be judged by Rachel and the Sounds Familyre committee.

Keep your eyes posted for an amazing collaboration between Daniel and myself for an incredible Easter Dress! Maybe I’ll blog about that too. We’ll see.

Love, Rachel

PS- If you enjoyed these blog posts and would like to read more, come visit Mamma Made Designs: www.mammamadedesigns.com and sign up to receive the latest news and thoughts from Rachel.

This month, the Sounds Familyre blog will be doing a very exciting experiment: ‘Works-in-Progress Month’. We’ll be following the creative endeavors of some of our Familyre Artists and Friends, from start to finish. It will be an invitation “into the workshop” as it were, a unique peek into the creative processes of some very unique artists. Each Monday morning, the blog will feature pictures and sound-clips of all work accomplished the week prior. You’ll get to see things develop from raw, untamed musings to completed pieces exploring the beauty, pathos, and humor of everyday, and not-so-everyday existence; pieces ripe with social-commentary, poignancy, action, and adventure. Something for the whole family!

In week one of this series, I mentioned that the catalyst for writing ‘Piggy-Back’ was a particular rhythm that kept popping up in all sorts of unexpected places.

1 & 2 3, 1 & 2 (3), 1 & 2 3, 1 & 2 (3) . . .

Exhibit A:
This is a short clip from a demo (called ‘Red Scare’) that I recorded last spring. It starts out innocently enough, but then that same insidious 3/4 figure crops up again. It has a happy ending though, as our mazurka-rhythm serves as an effective transition into the next section of the piece.

That rhythm sure is catchy. . .

Now, onto ‘Piggy-Back’. A few subtle changes this week. At the behest of our resident composer, Joshua Stamper, I tried to find a counter-melody to compliment the rhythmic insistence of the principal melody. After quite a few failed attempts (and a downright disaster with a sitar), this hesitant, late-night toy piano line stuck - at least it’s stuck for the time being. I also added a scrapey sound to the transitional section in the middle and some “wow-wow” organ in the chorus at the end.

Here you go. . .enjoy.

Today I brought my gray t-shirt (the one from the photograph that started this whole series off), into the backyard, stuck some branches into the collar, and took some pictures. After that I grouped a few leaves and sticks together, and took some more pictures. After importing the results into Photoshop, I edited the pictures into the original kitchen setting, onto my shoulders.

Everyone, meet ‘Branchface’ and ‘Leaveface’! If you look closely at ‘Leaveface’, you can see my eye, my earlobe, and the corner of my mouth peek through.

Enjoy. What will next week bring?

I’m really excited about where this dress is going. It looks as though the pleat in the front of the skirt is the favorite (and I agree) so we are going to go with that. I took a picture of a dress I made years ago and it helped to inspire me and take our flat design into a new dimension.

This dress has the pleats in front with a contrasting fabric underneath, but the fabric underneath is a bit more prominent than just a “peek.” I wanted to take this concept to our dress, but in a slightly different way. Look how I’m messing with the skirt and the fullness of the white contrasting fabric underneath.

Little girls love full skirts and an easy and cost effective way to get that look is to cut full panels for the skirt and gather them up. The fullness of the skirt depends on how many panels of fabric you cut. Since I was thinking this skirt would be an a-line originally, I’m going to only do one panel of fabric. I will get a bit more fullness with this cut, but not too much.

As we get the front of the skirt ready for the pleats, once again we need to pay attention to flower placement and that the flowers perfectly match in the center front as the pleats touch each other. To get a more puffy “flavor” to the underneath panel, I’m widening the white panel and will gather it underneath the pleat. Hopefully what I’m seeing in my head will be what we see in the pictures when it’s sewn together. I would like to have a fuller, but not too full skirt, and the white contrast fabric under the pleat full enough to make it puff forward and be seen even without a twirl. (Fingers crossed!) This is the fun part of designing. You get to try things and try again. Fun fun.

I’m sewing the white skirt panel to the main skirt panels. I hope this works!

Now I’m ironing the sewn panels and I’m going to manipulate the pleats into the skirt.

Now that the pleats are ironed in, I need to take care of the white panel underneath by gathering it and hoping it fits under the pleats. It does! Yay!

Now that our skirt is mostly in place, it’s time to look at our bodice again. Originally I was thinking of doing a small piping at the waist to off-set the white panel in the skirt. I have changed my mind because the white in the skirt is more subdued with our pleat. I chose to do a 1.5” band of white contrast to separate the bodice and the skirt. I think this brings the white contrasts together as a whole in the piece. I need to sew the band on the bodice now.

It’s time to gather the skirt onto the bodice and see how it looks! You can see from this picture the length of the skirt panel that will be gathered. It should produce a nice looking skirt.

The skirt is on and the shoulders and back are pinned up so that I can take this shot of the dress. You can see how it’s coming along. I’m pleased with the skirt and how there is just enough pop to entice the eye. The fullness in the skirt is definitely twirl-worthy and the white underneath will be shown even more. I like the band too. The one thing I am concerned about is whether I cut the skirt too short or not. I will need to try it on my “fit model” next time around and see where we stand with that.

This blog post was a long one, but as you see we have a lot to get through to get this garment complete. We still have the zipper, lining, finishing touches, and of course the photo shoot with the model. That’s the most fun. I love love love your comments!

Love, Rachel