Are you ready for a preview to my next series?

Starting next Friday, I'll be sharing with you summer sews. Sews that make you think beaches, sunshine and fruity iced drinks. Strawberry Daiquiri anyone?

Truth is, I actually hate summer and it isn't quite summer here in Central New Jersey. That doesn't matter, because summer is coming and I need to be prepared. The one thing I do LOVE about summer though is the clothes. Shorts and tank tops, swimsuits and floral dresses, LOVE IT. You can get so much more from your fabric in summer.

So what can you expect from this series? Summery sews for me and my girls. But before we get started, there's a really important step, The Purge.

What is the purge? The purge is when you go through your closet and you Kon Mari all the stuff. If it doesn't bring you joy, then away it goes. This is extra important for me this year, because if you remember from my Resolution Tank blog post, I've lost a LOT of weight in the last year. And that means most of my clothes don't fit.

So with more than a little bit of fear and trepidation I started trying on EVERY SINGLE THING in my closet and dressers. It was hard being critical of what I previously wore. It was hard seeing bad fit and poor color choices. It was especially hard realizing that I used to wear those clothes. That those sizes were my sizes once upon a time. During my weight loss, I went from a nice neat rectangle body shape to a very pronounced inverted triangle. So things that used to look good just looked disturbing.

For example my favorite pattern from last year, the Patterns For Pirates Free Spirit Tank now makes me look like I have chicken legs. I'm going to miss that pattern, a lot. :(

The big purge left me with not many clothes left in my drawers. Most of them are now strewn across the floor in my bedroom. I'll need to go through them a second time and see what I can salvage for fabric and what is now just trash. I think that's a much harder step than the trying on stage.

This week over at Capsule Sewalong, I was actually asked to share what I have left in my drawers. So here we go:

Not much. My long sleeve drawers have a TON of black shirts. A few bits of color. I won't be working on that right now, but I'll definitely keep in mind that my long sleeve clothes NEED color. mostly what is in here is from my Raglan Series. That's a LOT of raglans!

My short sleeve drawer has been decimated. I have 6 shirts left. 3 of them are black rtw shirts. 1 is technical not a shirt but a Mouse House Creations Julia Cardigan.The other 2 are Patterns For Pirates Layer Me Ups. Definitely need to fill this gap. And fast.

My sleeveless drawer is also very nearly empty. The few that I kept don't fit great, but they're good enough. I've got 2 Winter Wear Designs La Croix, 2 Patterns 4 Pirates Layer Me Ups, a Jocole Quick Dress as a top, a RTW camisole and a EYMM Everyday Essentials. The last 2 don't even belong in this drawer, so that makes 5 sleeveless tops.

I was able to keep a bunch of skirts from last year which means I can get away with not sewing any skirts, at least until the rest is done. I also learned that circle skirts are a big fat no for me right now. There are just no curves for them to skim over, so it just ends up being too much fabric hanging off of my non-existent hips. What is here in this drawer includes 3 LLK Perfect Petal Skirts, 2 Jocole Pencil Skirts, a Jocole A-line and 2 TDD Chocolate Chip Skirts. At least this drawer has some color!

Much to my surprise, my shorts did ok and I have enough to skip out on this step for now too. I will eventually come back and redo these though. The fit isn't great, but it is good enough. On the bottom left you have my booty shorts (Jocole Leggings with a 1" inseam) for wearing under skirts and dresses. The top left is my casual, I don't care, I'm comfy shorts. Those include Jocole Wide leg Pants in shorts length and some RTW stuff. On the right are my good ones. My RTW Capri length jeggings, 2 pairs of Pattern Emporium Hepburn Shorts and 2 pairs of Jocole Capri Length Leggings.

My favorite dresses are now all completely gone. Every single one. Even my favorite one from last year, the Sisboom Carolina Mae. Thankfully, I've already finished 2 One Puddle Lane Miss Ruby Tuesday's. I'll be doing at least 2 mods to make a cross over dress from this too, so there's a win there.

-I'm really happy to report that starting on March 31, I'll be beginning a Dolman Pattern Series. That means I'll be able to fill in my t-shirt gaps really quickly. I'll need to come up with 1-2 shirts that are NOT dolmans, but that's far easier than looking at my 5 short sleeved t-shirts and trying to figure out where to go from here.
-I'm really thankful that my Winter Wear Designs La Croix will still be able to work for my new body shape. I kept a couple of those and will sew up 1-2 more because I really like the shape.
-I'll definitely be using the Patterns for Pirates Layer Me Up in rotation. Now that I've fixed the arm, it is the perfect top for me.
-I need to find a few woven tops that I can use for summer. I think I'm almost done with my Sisboom Tortola Muslin. I'll try to share that with you soon.
-I need to find at least 1-2 more knit tops to fill my wardrobe. Something versatile and not as tight as the Layer Me up.
-I need dresses. Especially woven dresses. I'll need to browse pinterest for a while to find what I'm looking for.
-I'm still pondering a good swimsuit. Katie Lee of Creative Counselor shared a great Vogue Swimsuit with me this week that caught my eye, but I'm not sure if there will be enough support in the suit for me to not look ridiculous. Plus, it is a paper pattern, so it may be a big fat no because I hate tissue paper.

Lastly, of course, I'll still be sharing some sews for my girls. You may have already seen my 40 Garments in 40 Days Series. Of course my eldest will only need a few small things to finalize her wardrobe (like a couple of swimsuits). And my younger 2 will have tons of hand me downs, so they'll get a few pieces but not full wardrobes as well. I like including their sews since sewing for me can be very time consuming in the muslining process.

Planning it all out like this helps make the process seem less scary and less overwhelming. Have you planned your summer wardrobe yet?