Done for the moment, lol

 

So, this is the finished 2nd skirt...the one that I took wedges out of to reduce the fabric at the waistline by 40".  It was still a pain to gather, but at least it was somewhat do-able.  I ended up making mongo darts in the back, too, so that it was even all around.

The third skirt was made out of another piece of fabric; when I ordered it, I thought it was just two slightly different weave patterns on the same type of fabric, but the 2nd piece was MUCH lighter and I was able to gather the whole 180" to the waistband.  It helped that  the 3rd skirt was for a larger lady, and the waistband was about 5" longer. but the fabric was so much more cooperative.

So that was 3 adult skirts.  I packed up and headed to church as soon as I finished the girl's skirt around 12:30 this afternoon, and I didn't take time to get pictures.  It went together much easier; I was gathering christmas-print quilting cotton; the only problem was my own bone-headed boo-boo.  I put the skirt on and did a quick look at the gathers; they all looked straight and even so I cut all the gathering threads off and sat down to put the elastic in the casing.

And promptly realized that I'd put the wasitband on inside-out, with the opening for the elastic/drawstring on the OUTSIDE instead of the INSIDE.  And I had cut off the extra gathering thread.

I put the seam allowance down and zigzaged all the gathers down, then very carefully removed the seam and gingerly flipped the waistband around and pinned it back down.  

It worked. Whew.

1st dress rehearsal...the basic costume check...is tomorrow.  I already know I'm going to have to make another skirt but we didn't have measurements for the young lady so I'll grab those tomorrow. She's very short so, as not to overwhelm her, I'm only going to use 2 panels on the skirt instead of 3, so it will be easier to gather.  

Hopefully I can get it well started tomorrow night after rehearsal.  This is tech week...not going to have much sewing time.

In other news, the dye job on the subtle Christmas sweater came out well; that's a color I can wear without folks asking me if I'm ok, lol.  BUT there is a bit of seaming on the sweater, particularly on the neckband and...it was sewn with cream polyester thread.   So it didn't take any dye and it shows a bit in a couple of spots.  

Ah, well, it's in the back, lol.

SO...On to Tech Week!  Opening night is Friday...