Tuesday, October 2, 2012

A New Skirt

Today I had an itch to sew Julia a skirt.  Her closet is woefully empty.  I should take a picture!  I'm the worst mom in the world because my daughter has so few clothes.


Well, I got online and looked up skirts from fat quarters.  I have a million fat eighths, which work nicely for little girls.  So I looked all about and found some great ideas.  Then I went and made something up out of my head.  And I think I'm tired of gathers.  Maybe a few gathers, but it really makes things too bunchy.  So I'm going to experiment with that some more.  I didn't actually gather this skirt, I let the elastic do the gathering, but either way: too much!

For today:
I sewed 8 fat eighths together, then backed them up to a piece of muslin.  When I do this again, the muslin will be a teeny bit shorter than the skirt fabric, so that it rolls under nicely to avoid showing the muslin.  Right now, I'm just counting on a decent ironing job to keep things in check.

I left the sides open, and sewed the muslin to the front fabric at the top and bottom.  Turned it right side out, ironed it, then sewed a casing for the elastic.  Popped the elastic in, measured it on Julia, then sewed up the back seam!  Oh yeah, before I put in the elastic, I ran some eyelet ribbon across the lower half of the skirt for cuteness.  Looks better than blanket binding!

Note on the previous blanket skirt: Julia was visiting with a lady who expressed surprise that the skirt was not a blanket but was indeed made that way "on purpose"!  


Here, I had sewn the fat eighths together and then a piece of muslin for the lining.
Forgive the bruise, not sure how it got there.

 I turned the fabric right side out, ironed it flat, NO HEM!!!!  
Stitched some ribbon on for good measure.

 Up close of a me and Julia's favorite fabrics.
She likes the dark one with curlies, I like the one on the left.

 Julia models this for me.
Notice how all seams: side, hem and waistband are HIDDEN!
Except the one seam in the back where I sewed the skirt together.

 Only complaint is bunchiness.  Gotta slim it down up top, but then it's harder to line.
I felt that lining was necessary for two reasons:
fabric is kinda see-thru; she'll want to wear it this winter

Bit of a twirly girl!

Not super twirly, but enough for fun.  And generous enough for running about.

I think I might try an A-line skirt, found a fat quarter wrap skirt that looks SOO GOOD!  I'll see how easy I can make it on myself....  

2 comments:

  1. LOVE it! It's the perfect pink skirt for twirling! (PS> 3 guesses about which of Marina's skirts is back in heavy rotation. Good thing it still fits!)

    ReplyDelete
  2. I love it! I'm inspired by your lining too! The things that come out of my head are always very rough and redone and still come out unfinished looking. Love the lace at the bottom! Love the colors! Love the twirliness! I'm with you on the gathering though. I need more experience with A-lines and such, for me and Cora. I'm rather looking forward to cold weather for once to hole up in my sewing room and make a few things happen!

    ReplyDelete