Finally! My Pattern Review 2013 San Francisco Recap

View from my hotel room

Finally darlings, it's the Pattern Review 2013 San Francisco Recap, Kyle style.

Thursday:  Dinner and registration.  Sadly I took no pix but I finally got to meet PR member marec who has commented on so many of my pattern reviews.  Very cool to meet her and meet some new folks too, plus catch up with my PR conference peeps.

Friday: Vogue Fit Goddess Sandra Betzina spent much of the day talking about fit. Of note, you don't have to make a muslin of the whole garment, just your "problem fitting" area.  Interesting.

Me in McCall's 6078 and J Stern Design Jeans, with Fit Goddess Sandra Betzina

Loved that Sandra brought muslins of a shirt, a Chanel jacket and her Craftsy pants in all sizes.  I learned the size C Chanel jacket fits with really no alterations, and the C pants fit well in the butt and waist (say what??  that's awesome!) and just need to be taken in a little at the hip.

Here's one of the many pattern exchange tables:


I brought 19 patterns. Broke my promise to not take any but I only took one; the Colette Clover pattern. I could not resist a $20 pattern that I was planning on buying!

Lunch was with Rose in SV (so happy to see her again!), SunnyGal Beth (so excited to finally meet her and tell her how I love her invisible zip tutorial. Plus she provided loads of Oahu recommendations!), Neefer (so nice to meet you) and moi with my stitched-at-the-last-minute "Keep Calm and Sew On" bag.

We had fun with the step and repeat.

me and Bonnie


Jacqui and Deepika in the PR downloadable Summer Street Dress 
Fri night was the big group dinner out.  There were loads of raffles.  Look at what Elnora won!

Yes, we walked back to the hotel with Elnora's new pattern peeking up out of her bag the whole time.

Saturday: Saturday we broke off into smaller groups for shopping.
Jacqui tears into the knits aisle at Stone Mountain.
Like Lee mentioned in her recap, I too suddenly had the urge to see Stone Mountain and Daughter fabrics after Sandra Betzina mentioned the store every few minutes on Saturday. Marci drove a carful of us out there!   Thank you Marci!

Thankfully that was our first stop, and was several other carfuls first stops as well.

Lee and I had a nice chat in line. My cord jacket is Simplicity 2508. 

Here was the line.

This was the only fabric I bought in SF, for which I was very proud.


Amity (who had so many nice things to say about my blog!) and her Minoru jacket



Me and Deepika, founder of Pattern Review

Me and Claudine, I think we were the only Jersey girls in attendance.
Next we hit up Discount Fabrics:

This is where they had $2.98 denim!

But I was pacing myself and didn't buy anything.

We had lunch in Berkeley; Janice, Marci, me, Jacqui, and Connie.
Then we went to Lacis which is a museum and supply shop.

This is what I bought at Lacis:


But Lacis had all sorts of things, including "heads" for making hats.

Then over to Blue Moon where I didn't buy anything, then Fabrix, where I bought zippers that were 25 cents each. I thought the metal zips were a great bargain, and would be good for when I finally get around to making zipper pouches.



And then there was Britex.  It was my sixth fabric store of the day, with four floors of fabric with prices in the luxury range (like, $49, $79, $99 a yard, and UP. Elizabeth said she saw fabric there for $249 a yard.  Two hundred forty nine dollars!  a yard!).

At that point, I was fabric fatigued. as usual. I was also feeling quite smug. I had only bought 15.75 yards in SF. But now that I have concluded my grand fabric tour of Hawaii and California, and add the numbers: 15.75 Stone Mtn and Daughter in SF
9.00 Kaimuki Dry Goods in Honolulu with MushyWear
9.50 Gwen Couture in SD with SEWN
2.50 at Discount Fabrics in SD with SEWN
The total = 36.75 yards.

Sigh. Still better than 47+1 free yard  in NYC last year.

Thank you to Bonnie, Connie, Kathy R and Deepika, and all volunteers who made it such a great weekend!

PR weekend is in Austin next year May 2-4, I totally encourage you to attend!  Start saving and planning now.  TexStyles (and Leslie in Austin) will make sure we have a blast.  I guarantee it.

Other resources:
PR weekend 2013 Flickr pool

My recap of PR weekend 2012 NYC
My recap of PR Day 2011 Austin
My recap of PR weekend 2011 Chicago
My recap of PR weekend 2010 Philly