Pleats

Personally, pleats aren't the easiest things in the world to do. I attempted to sew a very light 3/8" 'line' where the inside of the next pleat would be, but then I considered what my next step had to be and realized if I had to do that for all of them, it would take a lot longer than it likely needed to. Called Wynn and though she doesn't do much pleating, she had a suggestion that she said someone else had done. Whether what she told me and what I'm doing tho, are two different things. :D I wasn't quite sure what she intended, but what I am doing now is taking the point of the next pleat and using a -_- type of stitch (yes, that's not very helpful, but think of it as sewing up at the 1/4" line or where I want the first pleat to end and sewing down 1/4" higher on the fabric or into the point of the second pleat, then going about 1/4" and coming up into the point of the second pleat again and finding the corresponding spot on the first pleat). Hmm, a picture will be necessary to make this make sense.

Hopefully that makes sense to someone else, but it appears to be working quite nicely. At any rate, once you've sewn a few of those back and forth stitches, then you pull on the thread and wah-la, you have a pleat without a stitch on the top. Iron it flat and it should be good, though I am only on the first pleat, so we'll have to see if this technique will work on the other pleats and whether or not it'll be hardy enough to work. I may still need to do the top stitch as all the various manuals say it should be done, but I'm hoping not. I'm lazy, what can I say. ;)
This is what the pleat is looking like thus far (rather close up, sorry). It's looking a bit rough right now, but I figure after ironing I'll make a final determination on whether or not the top stitch will need to be done to make it "straighter". Looks better from a small distance!