by L. Shell Madden

Created on: May 28, 2008

Shiny Poofy Pants

My birthday wasn't that long ago and as a gift I received a lavender and silver, belly dance, performance costume. I'd had my eye on it in a local shop, but was being careful about laying out that much money. Jae was with me at the time and returned to the shop, unbeknownst to me and bought it.
Needless to say, I was blown away, very nearly speechless.

So here I was, two weeks out from my first public performance and I have been gifted with something spectacular to wear. Thing is, this particular outfit has a pale lavender, very sheer, straight, "Egyptian" style skirt. Danglies, sparklies, and embellishments aside, it was not something I could wear as it came out of the box.
The top at least was well constructed (with a front like mine; that's a very good thing). It had a nice bit of false security in a not so cover-up, tummy cover-up, and lots of danglies, jinglies, sparklies, etc. The closure was wonderfully secure, it was the straps, or more specifically the lack of sleeves that gave me pause.
As the evening wore down and the guests departed, two of the ladies offered to help with the project if I wanted to "modify" the costume.
Two days later, I'm sitting in the living room at Ann's, outfit in a bag, discussing possibilities and harem pants came up, were talked over, described, analysed, and finally approved by all concerned
Into the "sewing cupboard" we went, to see how much of what fabric was available for use. Ann does a large amount of sewing, mostly for her two daughters, both of whom are not yet in their teens. Lets just say the colours and patterns of fabric were somewhat unsuitable for the project.
Next step Shopping! Okay, Ann lives in a town, and not a very big one at that, so our options tended to be a bit limited. We headed out to the one "big box" store in town (and the only one with a fabric department) hoping to find what we needed because the alternative was a forty-five minute drive into the city to expand our search.
We were in luck, just as I was about to throw my hands in the air and reach for my car keys, Ann found a stash of appropriate fabric under the cutting table. And more exciting still was another fabric suitable for sleeves in a complimentary colour. Man I was living right that day
Twenty minutes later we were back at Ann's, I had a cup of tea in my hands and the plans were coming together
That was when Ann's daughters came in, wondering what we were doing. While Ann dug out her measuring tape, and Jan talked

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