The Pant Cuff Surprise

Last week I got a part time job to work for a London based staffing company. The company is contracted by larger caterers, or venues for large parties at some of the coolest venues in London. This week, for example, I have a job at the Royal Albert Hall. What will I do? Im not sure, but I will write about it later on.

I got the call on Monday requesting that I be in training by Tuesday (the next day) for several hours, and was told I needed to be in uniform: black pants, and a black T-shirt. Only problem was, I didn’t have either of the two.

After getting home from school I raced to a nearby TK Max, and got the stuff I needed just as the store was closing. The pants were way too long, but I was all ready showing advanced symptoms of Man in Shopping Mall syndrome (unexplained fatigue, nausea, regressive behavior, and short term memory loss) and needed to finish shopping quick before I lost consciousness. To remedy the long pants problem, I planned on doing an improvised sewing job to shorten the pants when I got home. I mean, how hard could it be?

I got home, found the mini sewing kit that I had kept since my mission in South Korea, and got all the necessary “bits and bobs” ready to go. I then asked Kaela to mark the appropriate pant length as I stood with my dress shoes on. This was more challenging than anticipated as she kept laughing at the prospect of me doing the sewing all by myself, and consequently kept shifting the marking needle.

Pants marked, and sewing stuff ready, I threaded the needle and began the work. Being raised by a mother who majored in “textile studies” and after watching her construct quilts that should be exhibited and not used, I thought, how hard can sewing a flippin pant leg honestly be? As I finished the first leg, Mikaela saw my efforts and couldn’t control herself. My stitching was uneven, and according to her it looked pretty bad from the outside. She offered to do the other leg “properly” and I sheepishly handed her the pants as she sat down and started the other leg. A few minutes later, after she had meticulously worked her straight edged stitches, she smiled at her work, and had me put on the pants. Here were the results:





But lets take another look:





Lets just say I re-did her side.

And kept my ego too.