Careful readers may notice that I did not do my traditional yearly round-up post at the end of 2021. The reasons for this are many, but heavily due to the fact that I felt like last year was just a huge pile of crap for me, creativity-wise. Yes, I made a beautiful blanket that I was very proud of, plus some other very lovely things, but most of the time I just felt very lost and aimless. Luckily, Dan swooped in to help save the day, at least a little bit.
In the fall of 2020, Dan and I fixed up a craft room in our house for our various crafting projects, and one of the only things we were unable to achieve was the rehabilitation of my grandmother’s sewing machine from the 1960s. We tried multiple methods to get out that final stripped screw, but nothing has helped yet. So, for Christmas this year, Dan bought me a new sewing machine to cure my heartbreak.
So, of course, I had to jump in right away! I have very little sewing experience, especially with machine sewing, so I picked a project that I figured would be fairly simple, a circle skirt.
I used the very handy Circle Skirt Calculator at Mood Fabrics to get my general measurements, picked out some very pretty stretchy knit fabric at JoAnn’s, and got going. After at least a week of staring at the machine and fabric alternately and being terrified to start, that is.
The thing is, I am fairly afraid of sewing machines. Just in general. They are always trying to grab you and pull you into their pointy stabby bits. It’s like their favorite thing to do.
I mean, it looks so innocent, but it is very pointy and grabby and stabby, I promise.
However, with this new machine, I was determined to play nice and make it my friend. I did lots of practice on scrap fabric, practicing threading the machine, winding and threading the bobbin, and getting the thread tension right. I realized that I could adjust the speed and the thread tension so that I wasn’t freaking terrified of the damn thing.
Too bad there were only two machine-sewn seams in the whole skirt. (Don’t worry! I more than made up for this with my next project.)
As those of you who are much better sewists than me, or just have more common sense than I do, know, for a circle skirt, you basically use your waist measurement to cut out a circle of fabric for the skirt, then add a waistband. There really isn’t much to it, but I made sure to make it as slow and complicated as possible, as is my wont.
I took about an inch out the skirt when it looked like it was stretching way too much (which was a mistake, I really should have left it in and will do in the future, because the waistband is much less stretchy than the circle opening, which is cut on the bias), then after machine-stitching the skirt together and the waistband on, I whip-stitched the waistband facing down by hand.
And the very tiny rolled hem, which took ages to do.
I have to say, though, it might be my very favorite part because it came out perfect.
I really love the fabric, too. It reminds me of when people make sunprints by laying flowers and leaves down on photographic paper.
So pretty!
This is the only picture I have where the wind isn’t trying to blow me and my hair and the skirt all over the place, because last weekend was extremely windy just for spite.
See? Hair everywhere, but skirt lookin’ cute.
Wind again, but still adorable.
And here’s me demonstrating the best part of a circle skirt: twirlability.
You feel like a poodle skirt fairy princess, even when the wind is trying to take you down.
We even got some cute little rainbows on it on the drive home, courtesy of the little crystal bunny that lives on my rearview mirror in my car. Overall, just a charming experience. Yes, it’s a little bit too small, but I learned so much even with making something so simple, plus overcame so much sewing-machine-based fear. I may have bought three more stretch knit fabrics this weekend to indulge myself, so stay tuned for more twirly goodness.
jingersnaps 