Not to sound like a commercial, but this site is pretty awesome. One of my favorite skirt patterns ever was made by Burda, and they’ve officially kicked McCalls’ and Simplicity’s asses. Burda Style is a site with downloadable patterns (priced free to cheap), sewing tips, a blog, photos, etc. You can share your projects with someone besides the old ladies at the fabric store who question why you’d do something so crazy as buy remnants right before closing.