Twirly skirt

I had planned - and actually bought a pattern - to make a twirly dress already a while ago. I think it was beginning of the year ... (Scary!) So now I finally wanted to do it. In the end I decided that I make a skirt for now (save the dress for next year) cause it's probably easier and takes less time. My daughter had already told me that she wanted something from the fabric above (Also bought second hand.) and I thought that it must be great for a twirly skirt cause the pattern is already arranged in panels. Well, after actually spending almost a WHOLE DAY trying to make straight panels out of the fabric without cutting into the pictures ... I was totally frustrated and gave up! Can it be THAT hard to draw a straight line?!
Because of my yelling and swearing my husband came to check what was wrong ... after standing there and looking at the fabric for about 5 seconds he told me in a calm voice: "The pattern is not printed straight onto the fabric." I am like "WHAT"!!!!

Just a lot louder and much more annoyed than you can probably imagine. How can they do that?!
Well, in the end I managed to get the panels kinda straight ... but it was really no fun!

For the skirt I used the tutorial from Ikat bag and the one from Blueprints. I also tried a new method for gathering fabric. I used to gather with two rows of basting stitches ... but it took forever and I was never really satisfied with the outcome. For some reason the gathering was never even. So I googled and found these two tutorials - one on the blog Sew little time and one on the website The Family Homestead - on another method of gathering and tried it. I like this method better and will do it that way in the future. However, when pressing the skirt in order to do the topstitching I realized the gathering is still pretty much not even ... but oh well ... I hope it'll get better with practice.
I also consulted a book I own: sew what! SKIRTS. (Yes, a regular book. Out of paper and everything. Remember?) ;-) I bought this book a while ago and I really enjoyed looking through it. It explains how to draft (yes, make your own patterns!) and sew skirts for yourself. I am already very excited that once the big baby belly is - hopefully - gone I can try it and make a skirt for myself!

Here is the finished skirt. Once it is washed and the wearer is compliant I will add some pictures of it being worn.