Axel Skirt

Greetings, my lovelies! Did everyone have a wonderful September?? Fall has officially descended upon my corner of the Pacific Northwest, and we are already starting to see color in the trees. We've also been having spooky, surreal early-morning fogs that hover in the air and make everyone's morning commutes equal parts dangerous and beautiful. I've been meaning to snap off some pictures to share...

My latest make is Megan Nielsen's Axel skirt. Although I probably didn't do the pattern full justice, I really enjoyed the straight-forward instructions and minimalist design. I typically make big-4 patterns, so Nielsen's streamlined instructions for this skirt were a breath of fresh air.

In other news, my generous boyfriend gifted me a Singer Professional (serger and cover-stitch) for my birthday this past Summer. After over-coming my initial anxiety over setting it up, I spent several weeks learning how to thread and use it. It's a really great machine so far, and I'm super excited to have cleaner looking seams. After watching what felt like hours of youtube tutorials (I recommend Vince J. Acuri's videos for Singer professional; he actually walks you through threading), and reading each section of the manual out of order, I was able to sew up my Axel. I serged everything except the hem, which I cover-stitched. Eeeeeeee!!!!

My biggest challenge was matching the stripes. For each seam, I pinned every strip, then basted on my Brother and serged on my Singer. I think the tension is slightly off, or needed to be adjusted on both machines because each time I sewed, the stripes became slightly less aligned. I actually ended up cutting out the center front seam because it was so comically maligned, which meant that I lost about 2 inches of fabric in the front (I cut more than necessary to better pattern-match), which made the entire skirt tighter, as well as the slit a bit more conservative. Other than that snafu, I enjoyed this make, and will hopefully make this again in the future, probably in a solid!

I've also been super inspired by prints on prints lately. I read a funny style tip not too long ago that was the inspiration for the styling of this shoot. "Believe in your outer alien and inner grandma for extra living." -Borns


xoxo,

Amy