Winter is coming! Better dress for it. (is flatlining still a sewing thing?)

I don't know if it's just me, but I find fabric shopping one of the most frustrating things in my life.  

That and washing the dishes.

I know enough about sewing to put together clothes.  I know enough about fabric to weave it.  But I don't know enough about either to put the two things together.  If I did, I would probably buy my fabric online so there could be more money left over for more fabric buying.  The thing is, I don't even know where to start, so there's a lot of trial and error going on.  

This week I went to the Big-Box-Fabric store (not the real name) and under the glaring lights, I try to find something that isn't made for quilting or made from a petrochemical.  I like natural fibres.  It's probably not the best place to look for this, but it's nearest to where I was going that day.  

Perhaps some cotton twill fabric, like jeans, would make a nice winter skirt.  But wow, that's expensive.  So I settled on some wool-cotton blend that was almost half the price for some reason.  The occasional kemp hair in the fabric might have something to do with it - it's that kind of thing that gives wool a bad name, so scratchy!  

 Isn't it pretty?

The red cloth is a lightweight cotton sheet I got at the Salvation Army.  Organic cotton next to the skin - very happy!

flat felling seams by hand - not an arthritus friendly activity

I'm not happy about the washing instructions on the wool blend (dry clean only isn't in my vocabulary), so I ignored them and ran the yardage through the washing machine on a gentle cycle last night.  It came out okay.  No obvious shrinking or puckering.  Mostly cotton and already well fulled, that's what I expected.  Although next time I should do a sample first.

Time to try a new technique I saw on Bernadette Banner's videos (she's the skinny one with the happy voice that does a lot of Victorian and Edwardian sewing - and my hero).

Bernadette calls it 'flatlining' which seems to be to sew the lining and the outer layer together as if they are one cloth.  That doesn't seem to hard, although I wish I could find more tutorials on why and when and how to do this.  Perhaps it has a new name?

Or perhaps people don't do this anymore?

Since I'm not matching patterns, I should be able to get two skirts out of this.  I don't know if I'll have enough left over for this project.  It's probably better if I don't.  

Hoping to get at least two warm skirts for this fall.  Not sure how well this will work for farming, so I need to keep looking out for another easy to wash cotton twill or the like.  Does anyone know an affordable (preferably Canadian so I don't have to pay customs) source for this kind of cloth?

ps.  Sorry about the poor lighting in the photo.  It's winter and the sun probably won't be showing herself much until spring.  I need to get my winter lights up into the workroom.

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