When Crinolines Attack

Yes…. I am saddened to say my crinoline has officially attacked me.

It all started off with wonderful expectations and a bit of free time.  I found myself between projects and with some free time to fill, so I decided to make a crinoline, at long last.  I’ve had the supplies sitting in my fabric-closet for some time and since I’ll be needing to wear one with my valentine’s day outfit I thought it’s now or never.

Guided by Sugardale’s tutorial I went to work measuring out my fabric strips, applying fray-check, cutting, sewing 2 lines of gathering stitches, etc.

The project I was in between was my valentine’s day dress (where the unpiped bodice is hanging on the back of my chair).

This took forrrrever.  Ugh.  I was so bored sewing this up…

Anyhow, after I pinned the 8-yard bottom tier to the 4-yard middle tier was when I decided to deviate from Sugardale’s instructions, to make the work go quicker.  I didn’t want to sew on ribbon between each of the tiers of the crinoline to encase the raw edges… that’s what my serger is for!  (Nor did I have said ribbon in my stash and I didn’t feel like going to the fabric store for just one thing.)

Being determined to cut down on sewing 4 yards worth of fabric, I thought I’ll just serge it all together; sew and serge in one step, what could go wrong?!.  This is where things took a turn for the worse.

Within the first 12″ of sewing on the serger, apparently I had not removed a pin soon enough when something, somewhere flew out and hit me in the face.  I was stunned to say the least.  But then I was like “mehh” it was only the ball of the pin.  I went back to serging only to find that my fabric wasn’t being cut by the serger and was making a funny noise.  That’s when I realized what flew out and hit me: the upper knife off my serger!  *Gasp*

Yeah… one little pin did that!

Luckily!!! I didn’t get hurt (not even a scratch on my face).  But it was enough to shake me up and I began to get annoyed at my crinoline.

I went online and this little blade is costing me $21.99 to replace.  On top of that, I had to suck it up and buy ribbon to enclose the raw edge instead of using my serger.  That was another 6 bucks.

Now I’m thoroughly perturbed at this whole crinoline business and have come to realize that I’ve put more money towards this crinoline than it would have cost to just buy one online, not to mention hours of my time spent with boring sewing.

At this point, I’ve put too much time and money into this thing that it’s not worth it anymore for me to buy one.  My crinoline has attacked me (aka my serger attacked me for making it sew a crinoline) and now I’m wishing I could attack my crinoline.  But I need it for my dress…. Grrr!

Ever have one of these projects (or days) where things just go wrong???

In: Sewing

Blogger for 6 years and counting, I am a passionate creator who loves to tinker.

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