Back to the drawing board

After my pattern alterations of the 1940s skirt went awry, I decided to start again from scratch. Since I had traced the pattern pieces onto Swedish tracing paper, the original pieces are intact. Good thing because I had to retrace the front yoke and add a half-inch of width to each yoke and skirt piece. I pulled apart the previous alterations on the waistband, put them back together and added more alterations. All together I added two inches to the waistband, in four half-inch increments so the notches would still match up with the ones on the yoke. There was lots of cutting and taping. The plan for tomorrow is to cut it all out again in muslin, sew it together and see how it fits.

I didn’t have the patience for all this starting-over-from-scratch business when I was younger, but I want to ensure I’ll have a skirt and blouse I’ll wear.

I saw a new-to-me phrase recently on my Internet travels: the “slow-clothes movement.” At this point, slow is an aspiration. My progress is more along the lines of glacial.