Thursday, February 8, 2007

Just let me go home

(That title is to be sung to the tune of Sloop John B by The Beach Boys...Lyrics here if you want to sing along.

I spend all day in Santa Fe for school on Thursdays. No, the classes I take aren't offered in ABQ. The more time I spend up here, the more I can't stand this town. Everything is old and run down. All the buildings look the same (brown adobe--even Micky-Ds) and the streets wind to and fro and take you in directions you didn't mean to go. Traffic was awful all the way to SF, in SF and home from SF.

I decided to kill some time and see a movie, but the close theater has crappy movies. The good ones are across town. So I got directions and naturally ended up LEAVING town accidentally. Twice. Uh-oh. Mrs. Cranky Pants is back.

Then there's the weird people. Like the lady at JoAnn Fabrics who was in her 50s and wearing a glittery pink eye mask like it's Mardi Gras or something. Only it's not. It's JoAnn Fabrics and she's walking around like it's totally normal. I won't even discuss her hat.

School was rough. The beginnings of these classes are tough and technical. Everything has to be so precise, and since you build off of it, you can't half-ass it and move on.

My first class is Flat Pattern II. This is a method of constructing garments from paper. It's all about measurements -- and precise ones at that. Think 1/16 of an inch is negligible? Well, it's not. It's a big deal if you're off by that. Say you're off by 1/8" somewhere. Well, since you're working off half a pattern, multiply that by 4 and you can be off by 1/2" all the way around, and that will mess everything up.

This is from flat pattern so far. My "sloper" (I know some patternmakers hate that term) came out way too big. I'm making adjustments. All the rough edges must be trued eventually:
Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting


This is my draping class, so far. It differs from flat pattern in that we start with this block of muslin:
Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

And pin and mark and end up with this:
Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

I know it's hard to see. Anyway, I'm just worn out and need to go relax. Santa Fe, I apologize. Better luck next week.

No comments: