The back view of the green skirt.

This is my first time to make a skirt with a curved hemline. It’s more difficult to sew because I had to stop at certain points to make sure the stitches curve. There was also a whole of cloth involved in the process because I followed the guide I saw on the EGL community on how to make a flared skirt.

New things I learned:

• Iron settings. My cloth had to be ironed with a setting of at least ‘4′ on it. I think that’s quite hot, literally. If it’s not hot enough, the fold won’t stay at all. I tried it with the hem and failed. I think it was because I used the wrong setting. It was too cool so it kept unfolding. When I sewed the waistaband it wasn’t too bad anymore.
• How to put the zipper foot. I think what we got on our Brother XL 2230 is a general zipper foot. I will take pictures of it next time. The zipper foot we have at home didn’t look like any of those on the videos I found online. So I had to read the manual. I had to put the zipper foot on while reading the manual because I couldn’t understand it. My imagination wasn’t enough. Anyhow, it works!
• How to use the zipper foot. Because it looked different from the online tutorials I saw, I had to figure it out with the help of the manual. Again, I must take pictures so people will understand what I want to say about the zipper foot.
• Cutting makes an entire difference. There was one piece which I cut smaller than the rest. So it affected how I was going to make them all fit at the waist. Also I should’ve cut the waistband piece first because it was a rectangular piece compared to the rest.
• I learned that I have yet to learn how to determine which is the wrong side and the right side of the cloth. And that I should mark them accordingly. Plain cloth such as this and tetoron make me confused as to which side is right and which side is wrong.

Because of this list of things I learned, I now have a better idea of what kinds of projects I want to make so I could improve. I know I still have my apron, blouse, petticoat and bloomers to make but I’d spend Friday and Saturday for most of them. I might outsource the blouse though. It’s just too difficult for me.

I want to make another skirt. Maybe out of a certain pair of old jeans or something. Also, a skort is tempting. Really. I used to have skirt/skort. Its zipper in front made it into a skirt. That skirt/skort was something I had when I was 10 or 11 years old. Should be interesting to make one this time around.

Since last year, I’ve been chatting a lot with Oui and Jonette about Lolita fashion. I love talking about it with them because our ages aren’t too far apart. We’re also not exactly the small and petite kind of women so we have similar dilemmas when it comes to wearing Lolita fashion. Throughout those times, I’ve gotten really interested in sewing my own clothes. However, I just started learning how to sew with a sewing machine a couple of weeks ago so that’s not possible at the moment. Jonette has been sewing and has been influential in this hobby of mine. She has sewn some really cute skirts already and she even made a tricorn hat for a party she went to.

I was glad that Jonette agreed to make me super scarves (a funky one and a cute one), skirts (one inspired by the Regimental Stripes skirt of Victorian Maiden) and a petticoat. I really believe in her crafting skills because she’s got a creative mind and hands that never seem to stop practicing. When we chat, she shares her ideas a lot. And she even taught me a way to sew a gathered skirt. (I thought I might mess it up so I did something simpler for my first skirt.) She’s also nice and is very generous in giving hints, as well sharing links via Plurk. I love the way she thinks: she doesn’t believe in being selfish about her knowledge and skills. And for me, that’s awesome.

Jonette has her own dreams and I want to support her as a friend, even if we mainly just talk online. She is a crafting buddy and a confidante and a source of inspiration.

Materials:
straw hat
crimson wide ribbon – shiny, gauzy
crimson not-so-wide ribbon – opaque, satin
white lace
synthetic flower
thread
needle

I basically just decorated a straw hat. I had to cut up the gauzy ribbon so that it will go around the hat. Then I sewed it up so that it will be a band. I added white lace to the band. After that I made a bow with the gauzy ribbon and pinned it to the band using the flower. I cut two ribbons so that I could sew them to the inner part of the hat. The ribbons will be used to tie it under the wearer’s chin or the nape.

It’s so fun decorating hats! I sewed up the stuff by hand