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swirly skirts and worky work
Dec. 2nd, 2013 02:10 pmOn Saturday one of our friends (our folk dance teacher) had a 60th birthday party. Since she was born in the 1950's she decided on a 50's theme for the party, and nearly everyone went dressed in period-appropriate clothing, and a number of people went to the effort of doing their hair in 50's style too. I made a new skirt for the occasion. I have wanted a circle skirt for years, so I couldn't resist the excuse to actually do it. Monday evening I dug into our fabric stash and found a nice blue cotton fabric that looked useful. ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lord_kjar also had some blue and white fabric trim in two widths that looked nice with it, so I opted to use that, too. Monday evening I cut the fabric (four large wedges with one straight edge the selvage, the other straight edge 90 degree from there, with a curve cut for the waist, and another curve for the hem), sewed the wedges together, gathered them onto the waist band, and finished the waist band with two bits of the wider trim (one at the top of the waist, the other covering the seam between the waist and the skirt). That took about 2 hours and 40 minutes, and I wisely decided to put it down for the night, since it was already 23:00.
I didn't get another chance to touch it during the week. Tuesday evening was Choir, Wednesday evening we went to iaido and jodo practice. This is a martial art that he used to do very actively, but had gotten out of the habit of attending some time before I moved here, and he has been interested in getting back into it. I was the only new student, so while the others used most of the gym to practice the more advances stuff one of our friends pulled me aside to teach me the basics. He taught only in Swedish, but he is always careful to speak slowly and clearly, and I did just fine following him, and enjoyed the session enough that I want to return again this week (in fact, afterwards I even looked up the name of the 12 basic movements and the 12 katas used in jodo and set up a form in the logging app I use on my phone, so that when I go I need only tic the ones I did on a given week, rather than having to type in a list and thus remember the spelling). Thursday and Friday I did uni work well into the evening, so I didn't get another chance to sew till Saturday morning.
Therefore I got up fairly early on Saturday and cut out some nice large pockets (big enough to hold a paperback novel) and inset them into the side seams of the skirt. That took around two hours, by which timelord_kjar and I could get him to mark the hem for me. Then I pinned the trim to that line and turned the sewing over to him to sew it to the fabric, while I baked some gluten free cookies to bring to the party. He also cut off the excess fabric and did the sewing of the bottom side of the trim to the bottom of the skirt, but I helped by sitting by him as he sewed and folding the cut edge of the fabric to the inside under the edge of the trim. That all took about 3 hours and 20 minutes, so total time elapsed for the skirt was six hours.
During the party there was, of course, dancing--first to 50's music on the stereo, and later in the evening to Swedish Folk music, since the birthday girl's husband and many of their friends are musicians who bring their violins and guitars to parties. I was very happy with my skirt for dancing--it is full enough that when I spin It gets out to completely horizontal (perhaps even a bit higher, it is tough to tell while being the one wearing it). I did, of course, wear a smaller skirt as a "petticoat", so I don't think my legs showed completely during the spins, but it was really fun to get that much movement from the skirt.
Sundaylord_kjar drove down to the Skellefteå area so that he could help out his brother fix some stuff with the wiring in his new house. I brought along my work computer and got in several more hours of work while the boys did wiring and his wife kept their small son entertained. It was nice to see them, and to see how well they have managed to settle in since moving. They have a much nicer house than we to--I envy them the spacious kitchen. Granted, my current kitchen is so much bigger and nicer than the one I had when we were in the apartment that I shouldn't complain.
This will be another very busy week--things to do most evening, and way too much to do for work, and I need to prepare a presentation the following week for the group trip down to Boliden to present to the folk at the mine headquarters what I have accomplished during my research. The others at LTU who have also done collaboration with Boliden will also be presenting their work. It will be fun, but that is one day lost in writing a paper. (but the presentation will nicely form the basis of the one I need to do for a conference in January, so that will be nice).
lord_kjar also had some blue and white fabric trim in two widths that looked nice with it, so I opted to use that, too. Monday evening I cut the fabric (four large wedges with one straight edge the selvage, the other straight edge 90 degree from there, with a curve cut for the waist, and another curve for the hem), sewed the wedges together, gathered them onto the waist band, and finished the waist band with two bits of the wider trim (one at the top of the waist, the other covering the seam between the waist and the skirt). That took about 2 hours and 40 minutes, and I wisely decided to put it down for the night, since it was already 23:00.I didn't get another chance to touch it during the week. Tuesday evening was Choir, Wednesday evening we went to iaido and jodo practice. This is a martial art that he used to do very actively, but had gotten out of the habit of attending some time before I moved here, and he has been interested in getting back into it. I was the only new student, so while the others used most of the gym to practice the more advances stuff one of our friends pulled me aside to teach me the basics. He taught only in Swedish, but he is always careful to speak slowly and clearly, and I did just fine following him, and enjoyed the session enough that I want to return again this week (in fact, afterwards I even looked up the name of the 12 basic movements and the 12 katas used in jodo and set up a form in the logging app I use on my phone, so that when I go I need only tic the ones I did on a given week, rather than having to type in a list and thus remember the spelling). Thursday and Friday I did uni work well into the evening, so I didn't get another chance to sew till Saturday morning.
Therefore I got up fairly early on Saturday and cut out some nice large pockets (big enough to hold a paperback novel) and inset them into the side seams of the skirt. That took around two hours, by which time
lord_kjar and I could get him to mark the hem for me. Then I pinned the trim to that line and turned the sewing over to him to sew it to the fabric, while I baked some gluten free cookies to bring to the party. He also cut off the excess fabric and did the sewing of the bottom side of the trim to the bottom of the skirt, but I helped by sitting by him as he sewed and folding the cut edge of the fabric to the inside under the edge of the trim. That all took about 3 hours and 20 minutes, so total time elapsed for the skirt was six hours.During the party there was, of course, dancing--first to 50's music on the stereo, and later in the evening to Swedish Folk music, since the birthday girl's husband and many of their friends are musicians who bring their violins and guitars to parties. I was very happy with my skirt for dancing--it is full enough that when I spin It gets out to completely horizontal (perhaps even a bit higher, it is tough to tell while being the one wearing it). I did, of course, wear a smaller skirt as a "petticoat", so I don't think my legs showed completely during the spins, but it was really fun to get that much movement from the skirt.
Sunday
lord_kjar drove down to the Skellefteå area so that he could help out his brother fix some stuff with the wiring in his new house. I brought along my work computer and got in several more hours of work while the boys did wiring and his wife kept their small son entertained. It was nice to see them, and to see how well they have managed to settle in since moving. They have a much nicer house than we to--I envy them the spacious kitchen. Granted, my current kitchen is so much bigger and nicer than the one I had when we were in the apartment that I shouldn't complain.This will be another very busy week--things to do most evening, and way too much to do for work, and I need to prepare a presentation the following week for the group trip down to Boliden to present to the folk at the mine headquarters what I have accomplished during my research. The others at LTU who have also done collaboration with Boliden will also be presenting their work. It will be fun, but that is one day lost in writing a paper. (but the presentation will nicely form the basis of the one I need to do for a conference in January, so that will be nice).
