X-Marks "Cheerleader" Skirt

[Erisianmonkey]

It looks good. Be glad you tried it on now, and not after you had got everything finished.

BTW- don't worry too much about poking yourself. Every project I've made so far has demanded a blood sacrifice at some point.

[Skweres]

i have the exact same golf bag, and by the looks of it the same clubs! lol

[Alan H]

Been there, done that... the miscaclulations, ripping out premature bar pleats, and bleeding from pinpricks.

It's gonna look good when youj're done, anyway!

[Panache]

The Lovely Flame-Haired Celtic Amazon Goddess is terribly sorry that she has been delayed in the completion of her X Marks the Scot Cheerleading skirt. When not making wonderful garments, playing with our beautiful children, dancing, smiling, and laughing she makes her living as a veterinarian.
As with everything else she puts her hand to, she has excelled in her field and finds much demand for her services. After long hours and many sick pets she hasn’t had quite the energy to tackle this project.

She hopes you will have a little patience.

She promises to come back and finish this as soon as she can.

Cheers

Jamie

[cacunn]

Panache are you saying that her efforts have gone to the dogs and other furry ceatures? Thank her for her effort at keeping all of God's creatures healthy!

[Skweres]

i can wait patiently

[BEEDEE]

The F-HCAG putting her energy into her job and family before the rabble of XMTS is perfectly acceptable and, indeed, more than highly commendable.

Brian

[The F-H.C.A.G.]

I'm baaaaaack!

Sorry for the long hiatus folks, life's been busy.

Now, where were we? I had to add an extra pleat. I actually had to go and get more black material as well, because all I had left was the under apron and that wasn't enough to add an additional inside pleat and the deep pleat next to the under apron. When I went to the fabric store, I could not remember or find the exact same cloth I had before, but who cares anyway right? After all, it's just black fabric and it is the under apron, so will not be noticeable (I hope).

Here, I'm ripping out the hem (and also the sewn up pleat next to the underapron).



Then, I cut the underapron off (leaving enough for another inner pleat) and sewed on the new pleat.



Ironed in a new hem and sewed it down.



And sewed down the pleat edges of the new pleat.



I actually did all of the above on Sunday, but ran out of time to upload and post pictures. Since then, I've been doing nothing much except work until today.

More to come (uploading).

Be well,

[The F-H.C.A.G.]

Today, I tackled the hardest part of the whole process...Tapering. Because I am the mother of small children, I'm supposed to have the patience of a saint. I do not. I swore a lot. There was more blood sacrifice. But, it worked out well.

First, I had to bar tack the bottom of the fell again (recall that I jumped the gun on this and had to remove it all once already?).

So, I ironed the pleats again (because the whole project had been rolled up in the closet for several days and had gone all catty whompus on me), and pinned along the fell.



Here, I'm checking to be sure it is wide enough for my (more substantial than I thought) behind. Sure enough, just over 42 inches. Note the added pleat to the right-it's not quite as wide as the others, but oh well.



Then I slid it up onto the machine and bar tacked the bottom of the fell.



Here, I'm at the first pleat, next to the apron. I'm not sewing the edge of the apron down, just the edge of the pleat.



Then, I sat down with many pins and started to taper. Precise calculations were not helpful, because each pleat had to be tapered differently depending on how the tartan was arranged. For example, I could not taper the pleats that had the yellow stripe centered hardly at all, otherwise I would lose the grey stripes. Therefore, most of the tapering was taken out of every other pleat (as w2f had noted would be necessary a long time ago).

This picture was taken during first attempts. Perhaps you can see why I swore a lot? It's hard to get it to look right. Also, with the addition of one pleat it messed up my symmetry (I do so LOVE symmetry).



I did finally get them to look right, and better yet, the waist was the right size ! It looked good when I held it around my waist (you'll have to take my word for that, as Panache was not available to take a picture).



Now, I have to actually sew down all these pinned pleats from fell to waist, put on the waistband (figuring out how to add a fringed edge to the upper apron) and find myself some blue and white pom poms!

Be well,

[Alan H]

When this is all done, I will gallantly offer to supply the pom-poms. LOL