It’s been a week since DD and I have returned from our belated European honeymoon (we got married in October) and I think the jet lag has finally worn off. Yay!
We wanted to pack super light for this trip since our original plan had us hopping around to 9 cities within 4 countries in 2 weeks. Well, we kind of deviated from that and instead went to 13 cities within 5 countries in 2 weeks! We’re not the kind of people to ever take a relaxing vacation. There’s too much to see and do! So we had to figure out a way to pack for 2 weeks for 2 people in 2 carry-on sized luggage.
I know I didn’t want to sit on a plane for 10+ hours in jeans, so I busted out this plain black maxi skirt:
It’s from McCall’s pattern M6966. I like how there’s no fold-over waistband so everything stays in place. I used a black spandex cotton from GirlCharlee.com that’s a nice mid-to-heavy weight fabric… but it’s a cat hair magnet!!
And for an “in action” shot:
It was pretty good for hauling myself through half of Europe although I was always paranoid about the hem dipping into random Euro puddles or the skirt billowing into a Euro toilet. Blech.
And yes, I WILL share a select few of the 1,685 photos I took because what’s a vacation without boring people with your photos? Although some are pretty exciting if I do say so myself… celebrity sightings, stacks of human bones…fabric shopping… let’s do this!
We landed in Brussels, Belgium the first day and proceeded to hop around Ghent, Bruges, and Antwerp, too!
While we were in Antwerp, we decided to hop on over to Delft, Netherlands in the afternoon. I wanted to go because 1) some of my ancestors came from Holland and 2) I wasn’t sure if we would ever be able to come back! It was definitely a cool place, but what made it totally worth the trip (and made my entire honeymoon) was RUNNING INTO RICK STEVES randomly at a restaurant!!!
As one of my friends said, “You’ve just won Europe.” How crazy is that?! I watched his show to get all pumped about Europe and bam, there he is. And he’s SUPER NICE. We interrupted his beer-drinking and he didn’t even mind.
Next stop was Paris, France!
Paris was beautiful and crowded. Sooo many tourists– and I had no idea it was so popular with the Japanese. Our hotel was in the “Japan Town” section with all kinds of Japanese restaurants and clothing stores (Putumayo FTW). I was tempted to shop, but reminded myself it’s time to focus on European things!
This was my first time eating foie gras. I feel bad about the way it’s produced, but hey, when in Rome (Paris), right? It was actually better than I expected. It tasted like mild cheese/butter. Not a whole lot of flavor and the texture wasn’t gag-worthy.
So before our trip, I did some research (AKA sewing-blog-stalking) and read about this area in Montmartre that’s a sewist’s dream come true. There is a street lined with fabric stores and it seems as though Les Coupons de St. Pierre is a favorite. They sell fabric in 3-meter cuts for a decent price. DD was a trooper as it was out of the way of our sight-seeing route and we were on a tight schedule to get back in time to go to the Louvre. It’s tough doing Paris in 1 1/2 days!
The fabric on the left is a semi-stretchy bottom weight cotton for pants or a dress. It’s navy, not black. The right is a floaty cotton that may turn into a blouse of some kind. for 6 meters of fabric, the cost was 30 Euros… which was only $40 USD. Pretty sweet for Parisian fabric! Of course these may sit in my stash for a bit until I find the perfect pattern for them and tighten up my skillz so they don’t go to waste.
Next we went to Germany: Stuttgart, Rothenburg, Neuschwanstein Castle, and Munich. Whew!
Germany had the most beautiful landscapes in my opinion. DD enjoyed the food and wine very much. German wine is actually better than their beer, oddly enough. Too bad 80% of the wine produced in Germany is consumed in the same town it’s made. Sigh. Share the love, Germany…
The last stop on our whirlwind was the Czech Republic: Prague and a random day trip to Kutna Hora.
Prague was an interesting place. It felt like a mix of Paris and New Orleans- beautiful but kind of dumpy in some areas.
Now for some fun creepy stuff… we went to Kutna Hora, about a 1-hour train ride from Prague, to check out the Sedlec Ossuary. It’s a “bone church” decorated with 40,000 skeletons. Real skeletons. RAWK ON!
Phew thanks for sticking around! We had a great time and saw so many things. It was definitely a trip of a lifetime and I hope we are able to return someday. I would love to hit up the UK next 🙂
Till next time, sewing fanatics!
-RED
Sew RED-y 
I am so jealous you got to go to Les Coupons!!! Can’t wait to see what you make with those beauties!
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There were some pretty sweet apparel fabrics in there. The store right next to it (which I first ran into, thinking it was Les Coupons and to get out of the rain) actually was bigger and had more of a variety. But I stuck true to my dream! 😀 That whole street is lined with fabric shops! UH-MAZING.
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