Sew What?

Yesterday was a lovely break from reality - a day spent in the pool, or beside it, chatting with friends and eating good food while the kids (and a few grown-ups) splashed and played to their hearts' content.

Today, however, it's time to get busy again.

I'm doing some sewing for a friend - she sells costuming at sci-fi and fantasy conventions and other shows, and there's a big one coming up next weekend. Dragon Con. It's in downtown Atlanta, it's huge, and I've always had fun there (I'll be helping out in the booth this year as well). I am especially fond of the Storm Troopers (they invest a LOT in their garb). They're awfully cute, and I'm often offering to fetch a can opener or nut cracker to help them out of their costumes.

The Klingons are fun, too...but don't piss off the Keeper of the Sausage!

Anyway, I'm currently learning to sew cloaks. There's no pattern in any traditional sense...she tells me what to do, I sketch it in my little notebook and write out the steps, and then when I get home I panic because I think I've forgotten something so I call her and ask questions until I feel better about (ulp) cutting and sewing.

The material I'm working with is pane (pronounced puhnay). It is beautiful, drapes gloriously, comes in a variety of colors...and I hate it. it's slippery, stretchy, has a mind of its own (which doesn't often involve cooperating with the seamstress). I don't know how my friend works with it as much as she does - she makes the most amazing, slinky little dresses, skirts, and tops with it. She's trying to teach me the easier things so she can focus on the more complicated work.

The cloaks are simple enough to make...mostly straight lines using a straight or a zig-zag stitch. Until recently, my machine has never done anything but a straight stitch, because that's what I know how to use. The Singer and I are expanding our horizons.

I don't want to get these wrong - the fabric isn't cheap, and it isn't very forgiving of mistakes, and this show? This show is what has to get my friend through the Winter until the season starts again in the Spring...I don't want to be the reason she can't pay her mortgage. No pressure though...

It's been a family effort - Someone and the Evil Genius have both helped me measure, mark, pin, and cut where needed, and if all goes even moderately well today I should be able to finish all two-million (or maybe just a dozen or so) cloaks by the end of the day.

Wish me luck...

By the way - the contest is still on for publication and twenty grand. Do a gal a favor and go vote for her, huh? Puhleeeeeze???

This link should take you right to my thingy...I hope...:Read my Medium Raw challenge essay: It's not always about the ingredients, is it?