I had the best intentions this Me Made May.  I was so excited and amped up to participate.  I had to sit out the past few years because of my health so I wanted this MMM to be awesome.  Well, “the road to hell is paved with good intentions (Saint Bernard of Clairvaux).”  Things went off the rails and I know I said I would post weekly on my blog of my MMM wearings but. Life. Health. Etc. (Health Update at the bottom of the post.)

So here it is almost July so let’s get to it.

My original Me Made May 2025 Pledge:

I, Kristin SunnySewing, pledge to wear 1 memade outfit per day with NO DUPLICATES for the entire month of May! I intend to find out why those memades I don’t ware often are not worn.  I plan to keep a journal on what I love about an outfit, what I don’t, as well as maybe what I could change to make it a loved outfit.  Also, this will allow me to find the gaps in my wardrobe and know what I need to sew to fil them. Plus I want to wear every make I have in my current size, all month.  (I am down to my “normal weight” again, so most my older makes fit again! yay)! Wish me luck!! I am beyond excited!!

Me Made May Day 1

Top: Deer and Doe, Plantain, made Sept 2019 (a free pattern!) Pants: Greenstyle, Brassie Joggers, started making Feb 2020, finished Aug 2020. I had to make a TON of adjustments to these pants and I didn’t enjoy them at the start. But I’ve worn them pretty much nonstop since 2020. So, after all the work put into them, they turned out to be a favorite. I would not want to start from scratch again on the pattern though.

It’s raining here in Western Wisconsin today and it’s a cold 51°F (10.5°C). I just woke up and a squirrel was chewing me out so I had to finish taking my MMM pic inside, lol.

Happy MMM day 1!

Blog top: https://sunnysewing.com/2020/01/13/2-tops-deer-doe-plantain-and-jalie-marie-claude/

Link to free pattern top: https://closetcorepatterns.com/products/plantain-t-shirt-free-pattern?srsltid=AfmBOooEt95uAzeavChkzXJQIA00QSOI1BJTZ6n354E88eJ-Vv8f1pBt

Blog bottoms: https://sunnysewing.com/2020/08/14/2-pairs-of-pants-greenstyle-brassies-and-burda-11-2007-122/

Thoughts: I love these two makes. They are both very comfortable. I had no problem wearing them all day. The fabric used and patterns are just a perfect match. I have nothing to change or alter further than what I already did when I originally made the patterns (see those linked above blog posts. The pants are HEAVILY modified). I do think, in hindsight, that I should have worn the top with my gray burda pants as the patches and accents on the top are charcoal. But that is a minor detail. No complaints, love them both. Summary: Love both these makes but separately. Try the top with my blue ginger jeans or maybe my gray ginger jeans or even my burda pants.  Wear these joggers with something else and do I daresay try to make a one size smaller transferring alllll my alterations to the smaller size.

MeMadeMay Day 2

It is still cold here in WI, 51°F (10.5°C). It looks like Sunday the weather will turn warmer to the 70s (21°C) and stay that way all week! Yay! (me above looking for the squirrel that chewed me out yesterday, lol).

Today I’m just lounging around home; laundry, making lotion, doing some database work on my laptop. Basically, I am recovering from being in my sewing room yesterday (chronic illness warrior). Needing to feel comfortable, I decided to wear this today.

Top: Technically still memade. I made the design on my silhouette cameo wayyyyyy back when I was heavily into my heat transfer vinyl and cameo. (Any Outlander fans out there?) The top says “Craig Na Dun, The journey begins.”

Bottoms: This is one of my absolute favorite patterns for leggings. It is Sew A Little Seam, Movie Night Pajamas, leggings part (free pattern!). Like most of us, we have tried a lot of leggings patterns over our sewing journey. These check all the boxes for me and are super, super comfortable. I made this pair in May 2019 and I wear them all the time. I have sewn this pattern no less than 5 times and love them all.

Blog Bottoms: https://sunnysewing.blogspot.com/2019/05/sew-little-seam-movie-night-pjs-plus.html

Previous makes: Made Previously 4 other times: Sept 2019 red wine floral, Nov 2019 Snoopy Xmas, May 2019 blue floral, and May 2019 green capri. and a black pair in Sept 21

Pattern info and sizing: The Women’s Movie Night Pajama is a PDF sewing pattern for sizes 0/2 (32″ bust, 36″ hip) to 28 (50″ bust, 54″ hip).
The pattern is FREE if you find the code in the Sew a Little Seam Facebook group!

Thoughts: The shirt is a bit high neck for me. Maybe I am just used to wearing baggy tops now. The leggings were comfortable most of the day but very hot when I was up and about doing things (like laundry). I love the feel of the double brushed poly, it is so soft and buttery, but it sure doesn’t breathe well and I get so hot when I wear it. I would like to try the leggings in an athletic knit or a bamboo spandex maybe. No complaints on the pattern, I just want to move toward more natural, breathable materials (now that I have an epic size stash of DBP, sigh). Summary: Love the leggings, try a more natural different fabric for them like bamboo spandex. For the top, make more memade tops and add graphics to those (I have in to some in the past) and stop wearing ready to wear ones that don’t fit quite right.

MeMadeMay Day 3

I woke up freezing. Is Wisconsin ever getting warmer?? (yes actually, it is supposed to tomorrow, lol). Today is 54°F (12°C). I am still feeling cruddy from overdoing it both yesterday and the day before. Since I am freezing, I thought I’d just wear soft and comfortable pajamas all day. Lets be honest here, I rarely leave the house, so I do wear pjs most days.

Top: Made Dec 2015. Pattern: Ottobre 05/2011 No.4 The top was made to go with the bottoms. And I thought it would work great. But I quickly realized after I made it that it is about 3 inches shorter than I would like. So my stomach is just barely showing and I prefer a longer length. To be fair, the original pattern had a band around the bottom and I didn’t like how it looked so I left it off when sewing this but foolishly did not add length to the pattern. So it isn’t the pattern’s fault here but my own.

Bottoms: Made Dec 2015. Pattern: Ottobre 05/2011 No.5 These are one of my absolute favorite pair of joggers I have ever made. I have worn these years and years now because they are perfect in every way. They are made of cotton lycra that is so soft and breathable. They are warm but not overly hot. AND they have the best pockets! I need to make more.

Blog top: https://sunnysewing.blogspot.com/2015/12/battle-of-raglans-p4p-vs-ottobre.html

Blog Bottoms: https://sunnysewing.blogspot.com/2015/12/battle-of-joggers-burda-vs-ottobre.html

Thoughts: I am not sure why I hold onto the top, knowing it is just too short, the cuffs too big and the neck too wide. Bottom bands bother me with a seam by my stomach and I am pear shaped so I just don’t like the look on my tops, so its not an option to add a band to THIS top. I mean I just need to lengthen the top in the future but I had another raglan pattern that works better and fits better right away (the P4P relaxed raglan – as seen on the linked post above of the top, comparing the two). I need to chop this top up into something else, but I just keep holding onto it and then disliking it when I put it on. Wearing it all day, I realize the shortness irritates me and I am finally sending it to the upcycle bin to be made into something else. The pants are love. I have always loved them and they are starting to get a few small holes here and there. But I love them! I need to put them on the make more list. I love front patch type pockets like this, they are way better than inseam ones because I like that I can put my phone in my pocket and it stays, where inseam pockets flop around and I can’t stand that!  Summary: Keep the pants, love them. Make more.  Remake the shirt into different makes like undies and use other Raglan top patterns that fit better.

There is the first week of Me Made May! I will try to do the blog post for week 2 next week Friday.

Here is the health update:

In May, the 1st week was my normal. The second week was mostly normal but on Saturday I had a seizure. I still struggle to control my seizures since my brain surgery in 2021. Most of the medications destroy my stomach. I have been through 10 medications now and have had reactions or GI problems to all of them and so I am on this one and it doesn’t hurt my stomach that bad but my liver doesn’t like it and it doesn’t completely control my seizures. Also, every time I try to increase the dose I have bad side effects. So, I’m kind of in this stuck place. Anyway I still have seizures once or twice a month since 2021 I had one Saturday the 10th of May.  I figure, OK, the 11th I’ll just lay low because I usually feel horribly cruddy the next day, rest, and then move on. Well on Monday the 12th I had a really bad seizure, and that isn’t normal for me to have one so close to another one. So I was like what the heck? I’m going to lay low on the 13^th.

But THEN the 14th I had seizure after seizure after seizure. I call them rolling seizures, my neurologist said it was status epilepticus, either way I had to go to the ER because they just wouldn’t stop and the ER apparently didn’t know what to do to stop them (which is ironic because years ago my neurologist said if you have these, you go into the ER, they give you IV Ativan, and then the seizures usually stop). However, the ER called up to Rochester and wanted to wait for their answer before they would do anything so I’d sat in the ER for 7 hours having seizure after seizure after seizure. It was exhausting, extremely painful, and I don’t ever want to go through it again. I don’t know what triggered this. I don’t know why this happened, and then at 7 hours the ER decided the new neurologist on call in Rochester said to give you Ativan so within 10 minutes of them giving it to me the seizures stopped.

Now after a seizure your brain is like Jello, horribly painful Jello sloshing around. It took me quite a few days to recover from this and I also had to increase my current seizure medicine and add more emergency control medicine to my already full medication schedule. I met with my normal doctor and my seizure Dr. and we decided on a course of action. I’m just trying to deal with the side effects of that.  This took me down and out for most of May. I’m still all the way through June feeling disgusting. I have had other seizures since that crazy one in May. I just wish my body would tolerate a medication that could control them but that’s just not happening and like most people with chronic illness I wish I could understand what triggered it, but it’s a mystery like always and so I don’t know how to prevent it from happening again. It’s also kept me off my laptop and out of my sewing room because those two things, even though I love them, tend to work my brain more.

I went back up to Mayo Rochester GI and their GI department is the worst in my area. I am always treated poorly there and gaslighted and I always have to wait almost a year to see them. It’s disgusting. it’s absolutely obnoxious what the healthcare industry has come to and I don’t know what else to say about that. So, I’m just trying to navigate life and figure out how to live some sort of life with the issues I face. Unfortunately, sometimes I will disappear from social media and it’s because I’m suffering and hiding out, or things are not going well. I wish I didn’t have to. I wish life was different. But this is my reality.

I appreciate every one of you who stay along with me, to read my blog posts, to visit me on social media, and I absolutely love reading your comments. I continue with my blog even with breaks in between posts because it’s a way for me to keep track of what alterations I’ve made, what I like, what I don’t like, but also to stay involved with the sewing community that I love so much you all are the best and I am very grateful.  Some of my wonderful sewing friends are like family to me.  You mean the world to me.  And as I said above, I’m not able to really leave the house, so you are my world ❤  I love seeing your makes and reading your blogs and posts.  I love feeling like I belong somewhere.  It gives me purpose.  And that my friends is worth its weight in gold in this human experience we call life.

Hope to post more Me Made Mays next week!

Kristin