smiled, suddenly enveloped in warmth. I’d gotten what I wanted, too. I was home.
DRESSMAKING TIPS TO MAKE YOUR SEWING MAGICAL
1. Always press the fabric at each step of your sewing project. A hot iron ensures a professionally finished garment.
2. Using elastic in a waistband: before inserting your measured elastic, mark it with stitching at the center front, center back, and right and left sides. This way, you can balance the gathers of the waist between the four quarters of the elastic.
3. Fittings aren’t only for professionals! Fit your garment three to four times during construction. Try the garment on both right side out and wrong side out. Mark corrections on the wrong side, but remember to transfer the markings to the opposite side (because you’ll be turning the garment right side out). Not everyone measures the same on both sides, so this is an important step.
4. Fill three bobbins with the correct thread before you start any project. This way you won’t have to stop to rethread when your bobbin runs out.
5. Before you begin any hand stitching, thread several needles with the correct thread. This will allow you to keep sewing, rather than breaking your momentum by having to stop and rethread.
6. One of the most important tips is to enjoy the process. You slip into your creative zone, especially when doing handwork. Sewing can be meditative, and you should enjoy each step of any dressmaking project!
Read on for a sneak peek at the next book in the Magical Dresskmaking series,
Available from Obsidian in February 2012.
June in North Texas is no picnic. It was only seven forty-five in the morning, but the heat index was already at the extreme-caution level. The humidity didn’t help the index . . . or the way I felt. The second I walked outside, the moisture clung to my skin. My curly hair, pulled up into an artfully messy ponytail, instantly frizzed. And I was one hundred percent positive that I was melting from the inside out.
There was nothing to do but grin and bear it. I knew it took a season for a body to acclimate to a region’s weather patterns and I’d only been back in Bliss for a few months. I grabbed a bottle of water before climbing into my ancient pickup truck, formerly owned by my great-grandmother and recently brought back to working order by Bubba of Bubba Murphy’s Repair Shop. The one thing Bubba didn’t fix was the air conditioner, which meant I’d look like a drowned rat by the time I got where I was going. Far from swanky country club material, but I’d been summoned by Mrs. James. Enough said.
I opened the window as I drove, but only hot air blew over me. By the time I made the thirteen-mile drive to the Bliss Country Club, the blond streak in my hair, a trait all the Cassidy women shared, had broken free from its restraints and hung limply down the side of my face. I did my best to tuck it back into place.
The parking lot was bursting, but only a handful of golfers was on the course. Maybe they’d all woken up with the roosters and were already on the back nine. But the second I stepped inside the air-conditioned lobby of the club and heard the hushed and agitated undertones of the people milling around, I knew the back nine wasn’t seeing all the action; every golfer in town seemed to be right here. Seeking refuge from the heat and humidity? Possibly, but the knot in my gut was telling me that something else was going on.
The whispering seemed to stop as I pushed through the throng of people toward the ballroom. Was it my imagination, or was everyone looking at me, and not in a
Like day-old pea soup, the crowd thickened at the doorway to the ballroom. “Excuse me,” I repeated over and over, finally bursting through the choked entrance. The room, complete with the monstrous catwalk, looked just like it had when I’d been here with Josie. Except that the runway lights blazed, which was odd since it was so early.
I’d worn slacks this morning—not my usual clothing choice, but the club had a dress code and I didn’t want a run-in with the country club clothing police. In and out, that was my goal. I wanted to get back to the shop, work on Libby’s dress, fit Gracie for hers, and ponder the ripped gown from Meemaw’s old armoire.
Mrs. James was nowhere in sight. Everything looked just as it had when I’d been here with Josie the other day. Peering at the stage, I spotted my sewing bag, just where I’d set it down and forgotten it. It had been knocked over, the contents spilled out onto the stage. When no one was looking, I climbed onto the catwalk and was just ready to scurry down it when a voice called from behind.
“Ms. Cassidy.”
I spun around. Everyone seemed to be staring at me, but I couldn’t see who’d actually called me. A thread of anxiety slithered through my veins. From the moment I’d walked into the club, I’d felt like something strange was definitely going on, but now I was beginning to think it had something to do with me.
Paranoia? Being a Cassidy meant people had always looked at me as if I was one second away from casting some sort of spell on them, but this . . . this felt different. Less cautious suspicion and more morbid curiosity.
I started down the runway, stopping short when I heard my name again. “Harlow Cassidy?”
This time when I turned around, the runway lights were like a spotlight and Rebecca Quinones, reporter for channel 8 news, looked up at me from the end of the catwalk. She held a microphone at her side, her navy skirt and cream-colored blouse were crisp and unwrinkled, and her slick black hair was a ribbon of silk flowing down her back. I patted my own limp hair and wondered how she withstood the brutality of the weather. “I’d like to ask you a few questions,” she said.
I put my palm to my chest. “Me?”
She flicked a look at the man who stood off to her side. He nodded, flipped a switch on the bulky black television camera perched on his shoulder, and suddenly I knew we were rolling.
“You
I opened my mouth to respond, but before I could answer, she went on.
“The same Harlow Cassidy who owns Buttons and Bows? You’re a custom dressmaker and fashion designer —is that right?”
“That’s right,” I said, the coil of nerves that wound through me tightening their hold. How did she know who I was, and why would she care?
“What’s your relationship with Macon Vance?”
My mind raced. I closed my eyes for a moment to think. Behind my eyelids, streaks of color and memories smeared. “Macon who?” I said. If it was someone from my childhood here in Bliss, I couldn’t remember. “I think you have the wrong person.”
“Macon Vance, Ms. Cassidy. The golf pro for the country club.”
“I don’t know him,” I said as I turned around. I needed to find Mrs. James, do what I had to do to get Gracie on the schedule for the pageant, and get home to work.
I heard the dull thump of rushing footsteps and suddenly Rebecca Quinones was in step with me, albeit on the ground next to the catwalk instead of on the platform itself. “Isn’t that your sewing bag?” she asked, pointing to the end of the stage.
Suddenly I saw that Sheriff Hoss McClaine had crouched next to my Dena Rooney-Berg nanny bag, which I used for my travel sewing kit.
“Y-yes.” Red flags shot up in my mind and my mouth grew dry.
“And what do you keep in your sewing bag, Ms. Cassidy? Needles? Scissors? Tape measure?”
The same items that could be found in any dressmaker’s sewing bag. Criminy, the woman was persistent. I pushed my nerves aside, gathered up my gumption, stopped walking, and turned to face her. “Why do you ask, Ms. Quinones? Do you have a rip in your skirt that needs mending?”
She gave a smile, and I wondered if the effort would crack her makeup. It didn’t. But it did show me that even her teeth were perfect. Straight and pearly white, the perfect contrast to her olive skin. “No, Ms. Cassidy. My
