Sew Easy #22, How to Join Waist and Skirt

all of us in whatever line of work we find  ourselves are interested in learning easier ways of doing things or short cuts that's  also true of sewing and I hope many of you have found easier ways to sew from following  these demonstrations perhaps you've noticed that good organization is one of the best short cuts  and by following logical organization we have made a skirt and the blouse separately  and now we're ready to join them together before we do this let me do something that'll  make it possible for you to see just where we are at all times here at the center front  i'll put a big f whenever you see that f you'll notice that is center front and  here's the side right side we'll put an s a b at the back and here on the left side i'll put a z to show where the zipper will come  i'll put a z on each side of that open placket the pattern normally allows for ease at the  waistline this ease is to take care of the curves of the body when we altered our pattern  we did it in such a way so we retained that ease we did it by basing our alteration on the  measurement printed on the back side of the envelope rather than by measuring the pattern  itself and now we need to take up that ease so that the skirt will fit the waistline an easy  way to distribute that ease and hold it in place is to use a straight woven tape not bias  about one half inch wide or if you wish you can cut a half inch strip from  along the selvage of your fabric by roughly measuring from your zipper  placket edge to the center back to be sure you have enough tape for that area  then pin it in place right at the center back next find your waist measurement on  the tape measure then fold that in half hold the end of the measurement  on the center back mark and mark that distance off on your  woven tape and mark it with a pen then bring that point around to the center front put right on the center front mark and pin it and here you see the fullness in the  skirt this needs to be eased up in order for the skirt to fit the tape which  is exactly half of your body measurement when you have the waistline  pulled up so that it fits the tape pin it in place so the edge of the tape will just  be caught in the seam line when it's stitched now that represents half of your waist  measurement from center front to center back and here's an easy way to be  sure that both sides of the front will be the same simply fold your  tape back from the center front pin and mark where the side seam comes then bring that pin over to the zipper placket seam and that's to  the seam line and not to the edge ease this section of the skirt up to fit the tape repeat that on the back fold the tape back on  itself from the pin at the center back and mark where the side seam comes and bring that pin  to the placket the zipper placket seam line then ease up this waistline until it fits the tape as soon as i have all of this tape pinned in place I'll baste stitch it to hold  it while I attach the blouse let's review the advantages of  putting this tape at the waistline first we know that this waistline will fit  you because the tape from the center back around the closed side seam to center front is  exactly half your body measurement at the waist second since we measured the tape from  this side against the tape on this section we know that both halves of the front  are the same and similarly we know that this half of the back is the same as this half of  the back now leave your skirt wrong side out and leave the blouse right side out then collar down slip the blouse into the skirt now match center front of the skirt  to the center front of the blouse the side seam of the skirt to the side seam of the blouse center back to center back and then the edges of the zipper placket both back and front then ease the blouse in to fit the skirt this particular pattern calls for gathers across  the back and you'll remember that while the back piece was still out flat we  put in those gathering stitches but we did not pull them up remember is the bobbin threads that we hold  onto and slip the fabric over the threads gather it up until the blast seam  line matches the skirt seam line then pull the lower threads through  to the top and tie them together to keep them from slipping while we distribute  the fullness evenly and stitch the seam repeat that on the other half of the back then pin the seams together and stitch them to avoid a pucker here at the  waistline when you put in a zipper slide your stitching up instead  of going straight across and here's our dress ready for the zipper