tutorial: ruched side skirt

Posting over on Project Run & Play today for Skirting the Issue, a very good cause! Hoping to find a local agency to donate these 4 skirts to so they can go to local foster children. 

Designing for teenage girls I wanted this to be a more form fitting skirt but still wanted the ability to pull on easily. With this idea in mind I measured my model at the widest part of her hips, which I believe is technically called her 'low hip measurement'. I then added an inch for wiggle room and five inches for seam allowances. Then divide by two for the width of each rectangle.

An equation may be easier:
(low hip measurement + 6 inches) ÷ 2 = width of rectangle


For the height of the rectangle I used the knee length measurement from these size charts.

Cut two of these rectangles, front and back. 



MAKE THE SKIRT:
Hem both rectangular pieces. Fold 1/4 inch and iron. Fold another 1/4 inch and iron then sew hem. (If you want you could serge and then iron and hem.) I chose to sew two parallel lines to mimic a double needle hem.

Place right sides together and pin. Make sure when you pin that you line up the hem lines on both sides. Notice my pins are set pretty far back in my fabric since the next seam is 1 1/4 inches wide.

Sew both sides with 1 1/4 inch seam allowance. Make sure to slowly back stitch on top of the hem to secure.

Iron side seam open.

Fold each side of seam under 1/2 inch and iron. 

Edge stitch each side. Make sure to slowly back stitch again on top of hem. These will be the tunnels for your ribbon to create the ruching.

Repeat previous 3 steps with other side seam.


Insert ribbon into tunnels.  Use a safety pin on the end of the ribbon to help feed through tunnels. Start at the hem and up to the waist band and then back down to the hem again. Trim ribbon to leave 4 inches or so and use fray check on each end.

MAKE THE WAISTBAND:
Measure your finished skirt for the waistband. I always measure after I sew the skirt together for the waistband because it seems like regardless of how careful I am, I always loose or add 1/4 inch somewhere.

Cut out waistband fabric. Use length above plus one inch and cut height of 4 inches.

Place right sides together and sew 1/2 inch seam. Make sure to sew 4 inches sides together! Iron seam open.

Sew to skirt with right sides together. Pin all the way around with the seam centered in the back. Sew to skirt with 1/2 inch seam allowance. Go slowly and ensure raw edges stay aligned. (If you don't have the fabric for one long waistband you can cut two equal waistbands just add an extra inch for seam allowances.)

Press seam allowance towards the waist band.

Fold top of waistband down 1/2 inch and press. 

Fold waist band down 1 inch to create a casing that is 1 1/2 inches wide. Press and pin all the way around.

Edge stitch on right side of skirt along waistband. Start on left side seam and stitch across the back of the skirt to stop at the right side seam. This seam should catch the waistband on the inside of the skirt and create a casing for the elastic.

Insert elastic into casing and secure to skirt. Once you have fed the elastic into the casing pull elastic to gather the back of the skirt a bit.  Then sew elastic in place above each side seam using matching thread color to help hide the stitches. (Can try on model prior to securing elastic to ensure fit is correct.  You want the finished waist of the skirt to be the same size as the waist of your model. )

Finish the edge stitch on front of waistband. Start at right side seam, where you stopped previously, and continue to left side. Back stitch to secure stitch.

Pull on the ribbon to create ruching and tie a bow.

circle skirt

A circle skirt for a baby girl due in November.

Thought it would fit at 3-6 months but its much bigger, at least 12-18 months. My good friend reassured me I should still gift it because its nice to have things they will fit in later....but a year plus later?!

I'm tempted to make a teeny one for the new baby and pass this one along to a friend with an older girl. We will see.

shorts

Over at Imagine Gnats they are having a shorts sew along. This turned out to be the motivation I needed to make something else for myself. I used the free pattern pieces from Becky at Owly Baby found here. However I made quite a few changes.

Since I have never made shorts before I just wanted something fast and simple to figure out the size and shape so made a basic short. Maybe like a pajama pant? No pockets, no zipper, no cuff, just a flat waist band with some elastic in the back to hold them on. Also had to some length and size the pattern down a bit.

They came together pretty quickly and I did master matching the pattern on the fabric across pattern pieces. Pretty stoked! They are definitely wearable and super comfy but not sure if they are something I can rock on a daily basis.....maybe to the pool as board shorts?

What do you think? Rock them or keep them as jammies?

boy play: bugs in mud

A baby swimming pool.

And bugs.

Add dirt.

Then water.

Oh the fun to be had!

tutorial: teeny color block tee

Here is how I did it.

I used the Flashback Skinny Tee pattern from Made by Rae in 12-18 months for my chunky 9 month old. (LOVE this pattern!) You will need 3 different color knits but make sure that they are all the same type/weight of knit.

Measure the height of your front/back pattern piece from the top shoulder to the hem line(measurement A in red). You will also need the width of the front/back pattern piece at its widest point multiplied by 2 since most patterns are cut on the fold(measurement B in blue). Take measurement A and divide it by 3 to give you the finished height of each color block(measurement C in yellow).

Use the diagrams below to ensure that you cut your fabric with seam allowances using a 3/8 inch seam.

Once you decide on the orientation of your colors use the diagrams above to cut out your pieces, 3 for front and 3 for back. Your pieces should look similar to the 3 above. Take piece 1 and piece 2 and place right sides together and sew with a 3/8 inch seam. I used my serger but since it's knit you could as easily use a regular sewing machine and it won't fray. Just be sure to use a stitch with some stretch as the shirt will need to stretch over the belly. 

Now place right sides of piece 2 and piece 3 together and seam. Press seams down towards the bottom of the shirt. Repeat with other three color block pieces.

Fold each color block piece in half making sure the seams of each color line up. Place your pattern on the fold and cut. You should piece should be similar to this:

(Notice the orange is a bit longer because it should be hemmed, although I chose to leave the edge raw.)

Cut out your sleeve pieces and put the shirt together per pattern instructions.
ta-da! Your very own teeny color block tee.

Check out the first version here!

soon

Over at Project Run & Play this month they are making skirts. Their goal? To donate at least 100 skirts to girls in the foster care system. So awhile back when they reached out and asked if I could guest post a tutorial I definitely jumped on board! I will be posting over there later this month but in the meantime wanted to put in a plug for the cause. Head over to Project Run & Play to learn more and make some skirts to donate!

Also coming up early next month is this series Sew in Tune hosted by Melly Sews and Boy, Oh Boy, Oh Boy. I will be posting a back to school tutorial for this series. Eeeek! So many new and exciting things.

boy play: toddler roads

Like most boys his age Mae is obsessed with any and all trucks. His favorite? The garbage truck and fire truck. At his school they have these 2x4's that the kids can build with and everytime I pick Mae up he is building roads with them for the trucks to drive on.

Well earlier this week in the great Pacific Northwest it was still pouring rain, regardless of it being July. Since we were stuck inside we decided to make a road. Unfortunately we don't have cool 2x4's but we do have tons of books.

So we built a city. 

 Roads.

 Recycle cans. 

 Buildings on fire. 

 And even a monster, or so he was dubbed as he destroyed city roads.

 One more idea to add to your repertoire of rainy day activities.