Bangkok Goodies

I'm going to tell the story of our Bangkok trip in two posts: what we I bought and what we saw/did. First up, what came home with us. I packed a duffel bag inside one of our suitcases in preparation for all the fabric I planned to buy. The third luggage allotment ended up being used for something else (more on that in a minute). A few grocery items also made their way into our suitcases (grape jelly and Crisco among them).

Jill's Quilt Site is a blog by a woman living in Bangkok. She has great information about fabric shopping in Bangkok. I printed out her fabric market map and prepared for a big trip. Sadly for me, the day we went to Chinatown (where the fabric market is) was Chinese New Year. Oh what a stupid mistake! Most of Jill's favorite shops were closed. The ones that were open carried similar items to what I can get here in Xiamen. I left with only a few notions:

Although I felt a bit blue, I was able to console myself with numerous trips to a bookstore near our hotel. It's been six months since we've been to an English-language bookstore and this one was fantastic. And not just because of our period of draught -- it was a genuinely great bookstore -- very similar to a Barnes & Noble. I lost track of how many trips we made there. Each of us accumulated a stack of books, which made packing a little tricky. Here's my stash:

It was here that I bought my first copy of Burda magazine. I was so excited to finally have a copy of this magazine in my hands. There are two dresses and a boy's blazer (do I dare?) that I'd love to make from this issue:

I had better luck with fabric on Sunday when we went to the Chatuchak Market -- one of the largest weekend markets in the world. This market was so much fun -- they had practically everything you could think of from clothes, housewares, fabric to pets. I got lost several times, even with my Nancy Chandler map in hand (I have a terrible sense of direction). After wandering around the fabric section for far too long, I finally bought these Thai silks:

And these cotton prints:

During a walk to the grocery store, I discovered a little family-owned fabric shop on the same street as our hotel. They had an adorable collection of modern prints made in Thailand. First I bought the rabbits (it is the year of the rabbit, after all, and then I went back for the other one):

Now back to that third piece of baggage. Instead of a duffel bag stuffed with fabric it turned out to be a box. Containing this:

I'm now the proud owner of a serger! I spotted it in a department store while buying a hand-mixer (to replace my Chinese one that literally blew up). It's a Janome MyLock 204D and so far I love it. I was able to thread it pretty quickly (watching The Young and the Restless while doing so probably slowed me down a bit). It stitches so fast that it kind of scares me. I've been wanting a serger for awhile now and it was on sale and we had a coupon so it seemed like the fates aligned. Well, until they told me that they didn't have any in stock. They said if I paid for it they would deliver it to our hotel on Monday. I said I'd just come back on Monday (I mean really, who would do that?). We went back on Monday morning and there was the box -- waiting for me! I originally thought I'd get one in the states this summer and bring it back to China and then I remembered the voltage issue. I'm so happy that I found this one. Now I've got to get sewing...

So that's the shopping from Bangkok. Up next, what we saw and did during our holiday.

Crepe dress debuts in Bangkok

Hello my lovelies, so sorry for my blog absence! We're currently in Bangkok -- today is, sadly, our last day. Bangkok is absolutely the bee's knees and I'm going to miss it. Hopefully we'll come here again.

I'm sure you're dying to know the status of my crepe dress. I had to move along without the sew-along in order to finish it for our trip. I took it for a spin to a cute little chocolatier where we indulged in dark chocolate fondue.

I'm not completely satisfied with the fit of this dress. I cut the pattern in size 2 and the top is too big, even after some alterations. I ended up ripping out the seam that attaches the bodice and skirt so I could play with the bodice a bit more. I cut off some material on the bottom and sides -- maybe two inches off the bottom and 1/2 inch or an inch off each side (I didn't keep any record). The shoulders could stand to have some material pinched out of them too but I got tired of messing around with it and it was trip time. The dress feels a little drab; a combination of the brown color and linen reminds me of little orphan Annie (although Chris points out that she did not wear a brown dress with a blue sash).

Probably my favorite part of the dress is the pockets. I'm a sucker for a dress with pockets, aren't you?

My least favorite part is definitely the facings. I just don't like facings; a lined dress would be much nicer. I pinked the edges of my facings to get the least bulk showing through but you can still see the line that it creates around the neck. 

Right before we left for Bangkok, Dagim asked me to make him a shirt to match my dress. I had just enough leftover fabric and time to squeak out a shirt using Sew Liberated's Woodlands Shirt pattern.

There are many details to share about Bangkok -- from a bicycle tour through the city to breakfast with an orangutan. Rest assured, a good amount of shopping was done too. Including a couple yards from this yummy display of silk:

Goodbye, Bangkok!