Malotke Sews

Two samples pictured: Seeing Grey & Red Oxide Stripes. Part of Spoonflower 's design to sell process involves you ordering samples of your designs to then double check and make sure everything printed the way you wanted. I had designed a handful of patterns, ordered my samples, and eagerly awaited their arrival.  Once they came I was both excited and a little disappointed. Two of my designs, pictured to the right, came out beautifully. I love the colors and the stripes printed really well. No visible errors. My other two designs I had gotten samples of weren't quite what I expected. My blue plaid was very very tiny and the plaid part of it was invisible, same with my pink plaid. They are essentially solid color fabrics, no vibrant plaid like it was shown on my computer.  I approved the two that turned out well, Seeing Grey and Red Oxide Stripes , but with the other two I am trying to figure out if it is an error on my part or Spoonflower's printing process. I&

Marking Suspender Buttons Chugging along with my alterations before the Costume Parade. After the first round of fittings my alteration list included: Pace: take in dress, hem dress, hem pants, add decorative buttons to pants Dalton: sew fly shut on underwear, add decorative buttons to pants Gin: add snaps to front of dress, fix the unfinished seams on over jacket Dray: take in pants, add suspender buttons Chas: hem pants, add suspender buttons  My list was not overwhelming, it was actually very manageable. I tried to space everything out with one task per evening as a goal. Despite setting manageable goals I ended up making a lot of progress on night one and then avoiding doing anything until the weekend. In the end it worked out because I did finish everything on Saturday (Costume Parade was Monday 24th).  Adding Buttons to Pace's Pants Having a few extra days before Costume Parade lets me break out my steamer, iron a few things, and get super organized be

One of the designs included with my machine is a cat sitting in a teacup. Kind of odd but pretty cute too. I didn't have the colors listed for the design, so I trued my best to make a realistic looking cat. Using purple scrap fabric, I got the hoop ready, and started off with white for the cup part of the design as well as some features of the cat. I then chose a navy for the details and outline, pink for the shading and flower, grey for the cat's body, orange for it's face, and green for the cat's eyes and the leaves.  It took 42 minutes for the machine to create this design, but it turned out really great. Definitely shorter than if I had to do it by hand! I am really enjoying making my way through the designs included in the machine. Some are very random, like this cat in a teacup, while others are pretty standard like different floral designs.   Final product!

I found a great zombie pinup girl fabric at Joann Fabrics. It was too unique to pass up on! Using a pattern I already own I decided to make a very basic sleeveless dress.  It pairs two of my loves: a tailored look and a quirky fabric.  Because I purchased the fabric without a project in mind I didn't have enough to make the entire dress out of the zombie fabric. I chose a plain black cotton fabric for the lining pieces as well as the front two side panels and the back two side panels (so basically the sides of the dress are black). I also chose a black zipper for the dress. I really enjoying just making something simple and fun for myself. While it isn't necessarily something I can wear to work, it will definitely get worn! After I finished sewing it all together I tried it on to mark the hem and it was way too big! Apparently my measurements I took a few months ago are no longer the same. Instead if just altering it then and there I elected to wait until Septem

Malotke Made is on Spoonflower! You can find our design studio here: MalotkeMade . There are currently two fabric designs available for purchase: Seeing Grey and Red Oxide Stripes. Seeing Grey is comprised of grey striped circles in different sizes with some overlapping. Red Oxide Stripes is made up of grey, red oxide, and white stripes. Both can be printed in the different types of fabrics Spoonflower has to offer such as Cotton, Modern Jersey, Velvet, Chiffon, and so many more! Plus, both designs are available as gift wrap or wallpaper. So far I'm pretty happy with my Spoonflower experience. Their website is user friendly and they have an excellent blog with lots of great project ideas. If you have any questions just leave a comment below!

I am currently the Costume Designer for the show "Trestle at Pope Lick Creek," directed by Saskia Bakker. It's at the Station Theatre in Urbana, IL. The performance dates are: Thursday, July 5–Sunday, July 7 Wednesday, July 10–Sunday, July 14 Wednesday, July 17–Saturday, July 20 It's a small cast of 5 and there are some small costume changes made on screen. It has been pretty fun to dig into the historical aspect of the 1930s as well as working with such a small cast size.  Pictured left is an image of my first pulls before fittings (ignore the zombie pinup girl dress on the mannequin).  I have already had my first round of fittings and only need to make a few minor alterations such as hems and adding some buttons for suspenders. At the moment I am only in need of some shoes.  It's been quite the experience to not need to make any costumes from scratch. It's also kind of weird, I'm still getting used to the fact that I will not be making costume

Army of machines New embroidery machine is all set up. After registering my new machine with Brother and reading all about it I decided to just start trying out the embroidery designs that come with the machine. Using some scrap fabric and thread colors I don't typically use (because I really just use black thread lol) I started testing it. There are a handful of fun designs already loaded into the embroidery machine. First off was a pair of butterflies. Pretty short time, about 3 minutes, and just one color. After that I decided I needed to try switching thread colors with designs, so of course I elected a spooky design of a bat, skull in witch's hat, and ghost! Overall the machine is very user friendly, has a lot of good designs installed, and because it has a USB port, has so much potential for whatever you want to embroider. I originally got it to add customization to products for Malotke Made , but it will be nice to just add some fun touches to apparel pieces as we

Malotke Made, LLC is now up and running! Want to stay in touch with the company's progress? Check out our social media accounts and other adventures we're running!  Find us on Etsy:   MalotkeMade Check out our social media accounts: Instagram - @Malotke_Made Facebook - @MalotkeMade We're also on Spoonflower if you're in need of some fabric! You can find our design studio here:  MalotkeMade . We currently (June 2019) have 2 designs available - Seeing Grey and Red Oxide Stripes .