The Invitations that never came

 So we are about 20 days after by birthday and I'm still all pruney in the hurt.  So I took some deep breaths and tried to work my mind through the hurt.  I need to find the base otherwise I'll stay stuck in the moment.  

A couple of days ago, a former student and now Facebook friend posted a graphic about getting okay with the invitation that never come and understanding that you were never part of their plans.  It resonated with me immediately.  This whole birthday thing really reminds me that these friends of mine aren't actually my friends but somewhat close acquaintances that I forgot were acquaintances.  I have to remember that not everyone who calls you a friend actually means it.

So this is not a new lesson.  Yesterday, I was almost on the other side of the hurt and then I saw a fucking video.  Oh, so you are back in town.  Then a post, oh so you are making big plans.  To her credit, the other one is keeping her plans secret as they seem to involve a secret so at least I don't have to see it yet.  Anyways, my feels got all hurt again.  So that leads to this morning; why am I still so in this hurt?  Why can't I let go of the rope that is clearly cutting my hands?

The NPR station started going in and out, which I hate, so I turned on my Bluetooth and basically played playlist roulette.  I couldn't remember what I had been listening to the last time I was listening to Spotify so it could be anything.  This is of course when the universe steps in: Cycles by Jonathan McReynolds featuring DOE.  If you don't know the song, it is a Christian song reminding us we have to break the bad cycles in our life.  We continue to repeat them unless we acknowledge them.  

Okay universe, let's turn inward and really dig.  What is bothering me?  Seriously, it's not like this is the first time "friends" have been asshats to me.  What is my issue?  My 44th birthday, really?!  A little deep breathing and boom: being in elementary school and not being invited to birthday parties but hearing all about how much fun they had the previous weekend.  Concerts my college "friends" would go to and tell me about it afterward.  The trips my work "friends" would go on during the summer and I would get to hear about later.  The invitations that never came.  

It is less that I'm not invited but that I'm forgotten or really my feelings disregarded. I understand why I didn't get invited to the parties, my parents treated us like my brothers and I were triples so you weren't just inviting me, you were inviting the whole family.  I get it, I didn't know the band or have the money for the concert and the car was full.  We aren't trip-taking friends just folks that work together.  So I do understand I don't count in those situations; why consider my feelings?  I'm not a consideration at all.  That doesn't mean it didn't hurt my feelings or that it wasn't until that moment that I hadn't realized I didn't have friends.  

So the hurt isn't 44-year-old Martha but 8-year-old Martha and 20-year-old Martha and 30-year-old Martha.  I keep letting myself get hurt and the worst part is I court it!  One of these "friends" once told me that he was going to join me at a drag show but then decided I wasn't the drive or effort so he didn't bother.  I still speak to this person.  Y'all why am I allowing myself to be hurt by someone who so obviously do not care about me?  He has his head so far up his own ass that this isn't a special statement about forgetting me, it is just who he is.  The one "friend" I have known the longest has always dropped me faster than fast whenever she gets a "better" offer.  The newest of these "friends" is just a workout partner.  I have to remember that she will never be more than that so why am I placing any blame at her feet?  The sharing ends at the end of the run, period.  When I had that straight in my mind, everything was cool.

So I am feeling better as I write this.  Finding the root of the hurt and finally putting everyone in their place in my life is what I needed to do back on May 28th.  I wasted a lot of energy on being hurt.  How do I fix this nasty pattern?  That is a much longer project and currently, I have no plan.  The easy flippant answer is to say I'll never speak to those people again and find actual friends but I know that this is a strong life pattern rooted deep inside of me.  I'll just do it all over again and again.  Pattern breaking is so much hard work but I know I'm worth my effort so step one: recognize the pattern.  Step two, I'm not sure yet.

Tear away stripper pants: Part 2 - How-to

So on to the how to actually make tear away stripper pants:  This is just how I did it.  By no means the only way just mine.  I did you McCall's Stitch 'N Save pattern #M5504.  Pictures are forth coming.  Have to find my card reader, sorry.  Here is the link for converting jeans into stripper pants.

"What do you need":
Made from scratch:                             Pulling from the closet:
Fabric                                                  Pants
velcro (hook and loop) sew-on           Velcro
snaps                                                    snaps
elastic
bias seam tape (optional)
pants pattern

1:  Measure.  You need to know your fit.  This is true even you are tearing up a pair of pants to turn into stripper pants.  How much room do you have for the velcro/snaps?

2: Decide on your style.  You starting from scratch or pulling from your closet?

3: Hit the fabric store. 
     My purchases: McCall's M5504, Sew-ology Hook & Loop sew-on in Black (3/4 in. x 36 in.), 3 yards of fabric

4: Lay it out/cut it out.  I made the M5504 in medium to get a tighter fit.  Remember that if you are going to use a fabric with a pattern you might need more to match the direction.  If I had been making the shorts to be the final product I would have matched the lions up but it's prototype to I just laid it out and cut.

5.  Sew the front to back and then the inseam.

6.  Starting thinking.  You would normally sew the outer seam next but you don't want to do that this time since you are tearing away at the outer seam.  This is where the pants become stripper pants.

7.  Bias tape the outer seams.  I did this to add some strength; after all, there will be a lot of pulling on this area.  I had some single sided bias tape here and that is what I used.  I also liked that it help with the hemming since people will see this once the pants are off.

You can see the seam tape I added.

8.  Make the elastic casing on the back.  There will be holes on each side so that you can add the elastic later.  I saved this for after the seam tape so that the waist also had the extra reinforcement.

9. Fold in the front outer seams about an inch.  I did this to add extra reinforcement.  The pants get pulled forward so it's my thinking this area needed all of the reinforcement it could get.  So it will be a double layer of fabric under the velcro/snaps.

10.  Make the casing for the draw string in the front.  Again you'll have the holes on the sides and the middle for the draw string.  Same thing here do it after you use the bias tape and doubling of the fabric.

11. Hem it up.  You could save this for after the next step but I hate it when gatherings get in the way.  If you do them here everything is flat.  Again this is after the bias tape and fabric doubling is done.

12.  Add the elastic and the drawstrings.  I added the draw strings without much thought.  They are adjustable so I didn't really need to measure.  The elastic I put in and sewed on one side only.  I pinned the other end so that I can measure how much elastic we needed.  I hate elastic and I hate ripping out seams so better to wait and get it right the first time.

13.  Time for velcro and/or snaps.  (I used a combo of both. I used snaps at the waist to give a bit more reinforcement and with the elastic I wanted something with a bit more weight. It also means I left the snaps off until after the fitting.) Leave the side with the pin for the elastic undone at the waist so you can measure out your elastic first and then you sew it up.  I used one inch pieces of velcro placed about one inch apart down the legs.  We haven't done a test run yet so this might change.  I sewed the velcro on at the top and bottom.  After a test run I might go back and sew the sides of the velcro if they need more reinforcement.

close up of the snaps and velcro

14.  Try it on and get the elastic measured and sewn. 

15.  Add the waist snaps.

Full length picture.

16. Strip away.

Tear away stripper pants: Part 1 - Why

So I'm doing a 2 part series on tear away stripper pants.  Why two?  Well Part 1 - Why is the background story to the making of, while Part 2 - How-to will be the how-to make stripper pants from a pattern or Part 3 - Converting Jeans into Stripper Pants.  This way if you care why I started making stripper pants you can get the story but if you want to just learn how you can skip the why and go on to making your own.

Why would I ever want to make tear away stripper pants?  It's actually pretty simple, I was fulfilling someone's dream. :)  Actually I won't go that far.  As you have read in the past, there is a man-child I know whom I call Jailbait (who by the way is actually legal but still the name applies in my old teacher brain).  This all begins with him.  I'm no innocent.  I have been to strip bars in my day but never have I ever wanted to make/wear/own tear away pants.  However, JB has been talking about wanting to own such a thing.  How could I knowing that I could make a dream come true deny him?

JB didn't have any idea that I actually sew so it's not like he asked me.  Since I'm staying home with Ravebaby, I've been looking to get back into my old crafty self.  I thought the challenge would be a good brain exercise.  Now my bestest friend, Artsy-Momma, can make anything!  I mean anything.  Just mention it and she will make it.  She doesn't need a pattern or anything.  Not so with me.  If the pattern doesn't exist then I can't make it.  So tear away pants were going to be a real challenge for me.  For some reason neither Simplicity nor McCall's have a stripper pattern line!  I know right.  I bet the market is huge.  But back to topic, I offered to make JB the pants.

Since this would be a first for me, I had to watch "Sexy and I know it" by LMFAO several times to try to get an idea of exactly what he might have in mind.  I kept trying to pause the video on the actual stripping scene but youtube kept stopping on the junk rather than the pants.  So that approach didn't help.  I did some internet research.  Surely someone would have posted step by step directions.  No such luck.  Wiki-how did have a step by step but I didn't really get it.  So I decided the best way to do it was just start from scratch.  I found a pattern, fabric, and velcro (hook and loop) but now I needed measurements.

Strangely for a person who claimed he wanted something so badly, JB worked very hard to avoid getting measured!  It took me 3 days to finally get that boy measured.  I own a self-measure measuring tape but either he couldn't or wouldn't get it on right and give me a number so I finally just put my arms around him and got the numbers.  This then lead to the discussion of how tight should these fit?  (Oh I also decided to make shorts since this is a prototype; no point in wasting fabric on something that doesn't work.)  I decided to go smaller.  I mean a stripper doesn't typically wear loose clothes besides these are a prototype.

Once I got started on the actual construction, I took about 3 hours to make the prototype.  Again, I had a few stops and starts.  There was much discussion on whether to use snaps or velcro.  In the end we went with velcro since JB actually wanted velcro and the shorts were for him so he got what he wanted.  Shocking, I know.  I think the shorts are actually tighter than I thought they would be since he did complain about the tightness.  No one has actually seen the shorts in final form on JB.  In fact, the shorts are still in my purse since I had to finish them at home rather than at the fitting.

JB still wants pants.  Pants were always the actual goal.  I'm still not sure that we've worked all the kinks out of the prototype.  I mean we need to see if they will tear-off without tearing up the shorts!  But I will say that we at least have a working prototype.  There is talk of turning a pair of khakis into tear-away pants.  We'll see.  If it took 3 days to get measurements, I'm sure if I leave JB, he'll take 3 months.  My guess I'll have to kidnap him and take him to the store to pick out some pants or I'll have to use my ill-gotten measurements and pick some out.

To be continued . . .   

You can see the velcro.  JB refuses to pose so this will have to do.