Ready to wear

The red skirt has a wine colored cotton
knit panty, fuschia colored under
skirt and red sparkle netting on top.

Made three skirts this week.  The animal print skirt is all Lycra.  It's for Chris.  The other two are for the sister of the girl for whom I made the pink skirt.  She asked for a blue one.  I only had enough Lycra to make the pants but I happened to have yards of this blouse fabric.  Had to singe the edges to keep the raveling under control.  The red one is a bonus for her.  Started out making that one for Chris but it turned out a bit smaller than I think Chris would find comfortable, so I'm giving it to pink skirt's sister.  The blue one has a two layers, the under layer is a matching coordinate.  I bought this fabric about 12 years ago. 

Determined to skate

Took a bad fall in the middle of August. It's taken till now to get the welt on my split lip down to the size of a small pea. My nose still hurts a tad. The post-traumatic-stress is still with me but I'm not going to let it get me down much longer. Had cut back on my skating during the healing time and was terribly nervous at first, but that's easing off.

Now I've two new rules for myself. One, don't skate when the crowds are crazy. This isn't just a numbers factor but the foreboding feeling I get when there are just one too many nuts in the crowd. Two, wear full derby gear during deceptively quiet sessions when children are on the floor. All it takes is one kid who doesn't know how to skate, or follow rules to take you down. When you're on skates children are mobile land mines intent on getting into your path. You can't be too cautious; be pro-active for your safety.

Here is a photo, taken from a video, of me skating with a friend named Joe. He's learning to skate and doesn't want to get injured in the process, thus the derby gear. He is simultaneously learning how to referee for derby so he also skates with them too. Recently he's been at the rink during classic dance skate sessions just to get more skate miles. During the couples only time, which is three songs long, solo skaters sit there and watch some of the dance skaters take the floor, any two hand-holding skaters qualify as a couple, so any ole'duo is permitted. Many wobbly one-time skaters occupy the floor during this time when they'd be better off watching. Personally, I love to watch the particularly fabulous couple skaters dancing by but sometimes I get a bit miffed by having to sit out three whole back-to-back numbers (songs). A few weeks back I decided to ask Joe to skate with me during the couples-only numbers and we've been doing this ever since. I don a helmet and sometimes knee pads, just so we'd look more coordinated. I had a blast; I waved to people I knew as Joe pulled me around the corners. What a hoot! Joe is just learning crossovers so we certainly don't do anything resembling dance, but we do keep moving, and we haven't fallen down yet. It's fun to skate about with a partner instead of sitting on a bench.

Sew tiny

This is my third attempt at making a skirt for the daughter of a skating friend. The daughter is fourteen but very tiny, not just slender but child-sized tiny. I didn’t have my tape measure with me and so eyeballed the first skirt, a child’s size 5. That didn’t look right (never showed it to her) so I adjusted the pattern and cut a six. Unfortunately that one didn’t fit either but I had brought my tape measure with me. The girl’s waist was 22-inches.

The boy-leg pants and attached skirt, fuchsia pink, are of

Lycra. The overskirt is from JoAnn Fabric’s Halloween
collection this year.

The pattern I used for this skirt is McCall’s 6159, girls size 8 (waist 23 ½, hips 28). I used the legging pattern, piece E, cutting it off about 3-inches from the crotch. I drew the skirt pattern by hand. I’m so impatient when it comes to cutting out patterns, especially if I’m going to customize them anyway; it’s faster to draw one than to hunt for one in my collection.