A fall-plaid skirt

A stash-busting, fall coloured, plaid skirt! This beautiful wool plaid has been hiding out in my stash for years. After the moth infestation I went sorting through my boxes just to ensure that everything was moth free and came across it. Amazing what you forget you own. As soon as I saw this plaid I knew exactly what I was going to make.

Inspiration came from Lladybird's beautiful and bright circle skirt and from Andrea's gorgeous half circle skirt over at four square walls (I love those skirts!).

There was only just enough material to make a half circle skirt, and amazingly enough I was able to match the large plaid pattern. That took a lot of plaid tracing and measuring, and I had to repeat the process three time because I couldn't believe my luck when I realized that it would work.

The zany-zipper dilemma was sorted. I had to remove the invisible zipper and refit the waistband of the skirt. Instead of re-inserting another invisible zipper (had I mentioned that the first one broke?), I decided to go with a bright red 'regular' zipper from my stash because the wool was too thick folded over to allow the invisible zipper to do its thing (that would be ZIP).

If anyone out there knows of a really great online 'regular' zipper tutorial, please give me shout. I've figured out the invisible ones, but perfecting the normal zippers still seems to be beyond me. I am content in the fact that the red zipper does not standing out, but please try not to notice the lumpy-zig-zagging stitches that hold the zipper in place.  :)

So, with a lot of hand stitching to ensure the bright red zipper was hidden as much as possible, I now have a finished fall skirt.

Math revisited...

  "Why will I ever in my life need to know the formula for the circumference of a circle!?!" Little-Squirrel asks.

"Well one day," answers Big-Squirrel from the future, "in the distant future, you will want to make yourself a skirt and that darn formula will help you calculate the waist and the diameter of a whole skirt!" 

Little-Squirrel just rolled her eyes. "Sure, whatever."

Guess what? I number-crunched my very own half-circle skirt! It was not as complicated as it sounds, though, I did enjoy math as a kid. I will try to explain without making it too complicated...

I measured my waist (plus 2 inches) for the half-inner circle; only half the circle is my whole waist measurement. And then doubled it to get a whole circle's circumference.

Then using the handy-dandy formula C=2πr, I calculated the radius of the waist and made a small circle with that radius from paper (inner circle in diagram). I folded the small circle in half and decided on the length of the skirt. I measured the length from the edge of the half-circle and drew another larger circle, cut the smaller circle away, and there it was: my very own, made-for-me, pattern.

The waist band was two long rectangles. I attached them to the slightly gathered skirt-waist by sandwiching the skirt between the waist pieces (right sides facing in), stitching, folding them up and hand stitching the top edge (I didn't want any top stitching to show).

I added a lining using the same (but shorter) pattern  out of a lightweight white cotton and inserted an invisible zipper. Hand stitching the hem took awhile because of the rounded edge of the skirt, but I enjoyed several Olympic track events and some swimming.

I am really thrilled about this skirt. It's a nice light weight for the summer and it feels just so great.

Using up old scraps.

I have boxes of scraps. Yes it's true. Some are even just big enough to SQEEEEZE a top or skirt out of too!

I was able to make this Sorbetto from a blue plaid shirting cotton (I think). It's very thin, so I doubled the bias tape (bright!) on the bottom. My muslin was too short, so I added a strip on the bottom with the plaid on the bias. That's my favourite part actually. I also lowered the bust darts, which were too high to start. I followed a tutorial on BurdaStyle for this, but only lowered them on the final version...oops...too low now. I cut out a size 4 on top and tappered down to a 0 on the bottom (!). I find it very hard to believe that that is a true size 0.

I'm going to attempt making one for my mom from an old blouse of her's.

Next scrappy project is the free paperbag skirt tutorial from Suzannah Adventures in Dressmaking. I used some smoky-green, stretchy woven 'stuff'. (I don't know a lot about materials yet...)

I had to cut down the amount of fabric at the waist because I didn't have enough. My pleats are just smaller. Though I've played with invisible zippers lots, this was my fisrt 'real' zipper. Easy-peasy. (But I've learned backwards, right?). Any ideas on how to get the pleasts to fall more naturally?

Like the socks? ;) Oh, and the skirt is not hemmed yet, but I was too excited. Mmm, tea.