Wherein She "Skirts" the Issue...

A clever person solves a problem.  

A wise person avoids it.

~ Albert Einstein

"So," you ask, "how are you doing on that vow to learn how to say 'no'?"  

Well...  Oh!  Look over there!  It's sewing!  

Yup!  I got to do some sewing this weekend!  I'm making eight little skirts (all size 4T) for the daughters of my friends at work.  

The simple pattern is from the One Yard Wonders book - you add some pleats to rectangle-shaped panels and then an elastic waistband.  

Here is a finished one:  

I LOVE the fabric - it is old fashioned and just perfect for a little girl...  In fact, I'm making four of these skirts.  

I did take the opportunity to try a technique that I've never done before. After stitching the lace trim to the skirt, I cut the fabric behind the lace down the middle and then folded it over (away from the lace) and stitched it down.  Here is the back view:  

Turns out it didn't make a big difference on the white skirts, because the fabric didn't really show through the lace.  

But it made a nice difference on these red skirts with yellow ribbons:  

The red fabric bled through the yellow ribbon and darkened its color a bit.  The ribbon looks much brighter when the fabric is pulled away from it:  

I was a little disappointed with this "ribbon" - it's actually some kind of plastic and it doesn't drape nicely with the cotton.  I couldn't feel it when I bought it, so I didn't realize that - guess I need to actually READ the packages in the future...  

I'm making two of the red skirts and two skirts with this fabric - the same design, but a blue color scheme:  

For this one, I'm using green, semi-glittery ric-rac.  I might apply three stripes - if I'm not too sick of sewing straight lines by then!  ;)

"Okay," you say, "very cute skirts, but I still want to hear about your progress on your vow..."  

"Of course!", I say.  

"No problem!", I say.  

Only, darn it all, I'm out of time for today...  

I'm afraid it'll have to be next time...