Bottoms Up - Part 6 - Skirt Leggings

Here's the story behind the series, the second part of the series is here, third part of the series is here,  part 4 is here  and go here for part 5. 


So the munchkin is now old enough to go to a daycare ( really? when did that happen?). I still remember that when I brought her home from the hospital, even 1 month seemed like far away in the future. Oh the days, that turned into months and years....Ok zap back to reality!
When I was sorting her clothes to wear at the daycare, I realized that she had enough tops (thanks to my recent bout of Octoberizing her Tees) but all her pants were either - Too short (already) or too..errr...well loved ( turmeric stains anyone) to be worn outside home. Yeah! didn't I just made her like a dozen pants? Anyhow, the fact remains that she has too few pants and most of them don't match well with the tops she has.
So I decided to make her some leggings this time, specially because leggings are easier to layer if we need to.
After 2-3 pairs, I decided I wanted to jazz up some of those. So I came up with these skirt leggings and I love how they turned out.

Supplies:

Two co-ordinating knit fabric - 1 for the leggings and one for the skirt above it.
1 jelly roll strip of coordinating woven fabric (2.5 inchesX 40 inches) for ruffle - Actually you could also use knit for this but since I used woven I'm writing woven in the list.
1 inch wide elastic - for waistband
Ric-rac  to finish the hemline (optional)

Construction:

Construction of leggings:
1.

Use any pair of leggings that fit well and trace their boundaries leaving 3/8 inch of sewing allowance all around except for the hem. Leave a 1 inch allowance at the hem. You don't need to leave a bigger allowance for the waistband.

2.

Using this template cut two pieces on fold

3.

Keeping each piece folded right side together, sew the inseam of each leg.

4.

Turn one the pieces inside out and insert into the other leg.

5.

Sew along the crotch area carefully aligning the inseam of both legs.

6. Cutting the skirt
I made an A-line skirt to attach to these leggings.To make an A-Line skirt the width at the  top of the skirt should be equal to the width at the top of the leggings.

The way I determined the dimensions for the skirt is following.

Width at the top WT = total circumference at the top of the leggings divided by 2 + sewing margins X 2

Length of the skirt = length from top of the leggings to the crotch.
I kept the length of the skirt exactly equal to the crotch because I intended to add a ruffle which would make it slightly longer than the below the crotch area. That was the length I was going for. If you want any other length feel free to alter the length but keep in mind that the ruffle will increase the length by roughly 2 inches.


Width of the skirt at the bottom - WT +3 inches
 ( This was sort of guesswork and I got a decent flair with this measurement but if you feel that your baby is chunky at the butt you may need to add more than 3 inches)


Construction of skirt:

7.

Cut the front and back of the skirt as shown in the diagram above. Place both the pieces right sides together and sew along the sides. Please bear with me...my drawing skills are...err..basic, I just wanted to give you an 
idea of how to cut. This image is not made to scale or symmetrical.


8. Hem the jelly roll strip at one edge. I usually do it by serging the edge once and then folding it on the wrong side and sewing on it as close to the edge as possible. I find it faster than folding it twice. If you don't have a serger, you could always fold it twice. Just keep it as narrow and even as possible.

9. Ruffle the jelly roll strip by setting machine tension on the highest, stitch length on longest and machine speed on fastest. Adjust the ruffled fabric by hand to match the width of the skirt.


10.

Line up the bottom of the skirt with the ruffled edge of the strip ( Right sides together) and sew a seam along the bottom edge of skirt.

11.

Fold the ruffle out and with the seam allowance turned towards the main body of the skirt top-stitch as close to the edge as possible.


12. Attaching the skirt to the leggings:

Turn the skirt inside out. Keep the leggings right side out. Line up their tops such that the seams of the skirt fall on the side of the leggings.

Sew a seam together along the top edge of skirt and leggings. With right side of skirt together with wrong side of leggings.

13.

Turn the skirt right side out

14.

Top-stitch as close to the edge as possible. I have used zig-zag stitch here but you can use the regular stitch as well.


15.

Now sew another seam about 1.5 inches below the top-stitching. Leave a 1 inch gap where the seam ends. This will be the opening to insert elastic in the leggings.

16. Inserting the elastic:

 Pull apart the skirt and the leggings at the place where you left the gap.


18.

 In this opening insert an elastic with the help of a safety pin.

19.

Sew both ends of the elastic together

20.

Go over the elastics multiple times to reinforce the stitching. I use stitch 1-14 on my machine that looks like broken zig-zag. If you don't have it in your machine, you could use the regular zigzag.

21.

Sew the opening shut.

Bye bye plain leggings! Hello skirt leggings !

There's an Elf on my shelf

Photo credit: earl53 from morguefile.com
I know its way past the holidays and here I'm talking about elves. Well I kinda sorta got an elf around the Christmas and I thought today is a good time to talk about that...why? Read on..
Its been about 8 months since I started this blog. I have loved every minute of it even though it was difficult to juggle home, office, shop and blog all at the same time. I feel like I have been making some difference, doing something worthwhile and of course, I got to sew! what could be better. But slowly I have come to the realization that even though I try to be efficient in everything I do and work really hard, I still can't do everything by myself. Now, I have always been a DIY kind of person...whether something is too simple or too difficult, I like to tackle it myself. For the most part its good, you get to learn new things all the time, you figure out how to get better at many new skills...sometimes though, it becomes difficult to get by doing everything by myself. At those times, I believe, its good to ask for help...and I did.

I was finding it really hard to focus on creating good stuff and writing good content for this blog along with all the publicity work I had to do to promote each of my post. So I asked Ruchi to help me out. And oh boy! Did she help!

Ruchi is a cousin of mine. Though we never got a chance to kind of "Grow up together" as we were living too far apart, but as I grew older and started traveling by myself, I got many opportunities to visit my Aunt and meet Ruchi and her other siblings. Slowly, I began to appreciate the potential and dedication this girl had. She is a mathematics wizard and teaches quantitative maths to students her own age. And from what I am told her students absolutely adore her. She even has a quantitative analysis blog over here. On top of all that, she agreed to help me with the promotion of my blog and I already see her making a huge positive impact on my blog.

Its a big burden off my shoulders and I feel like I'm finally free to create and to share. Two things that I loved about having a sewing blog to begin with. Thanks Ruchi!

So why I chose today to write about her. Well, today happens to be Ruchi's birthday. Happy birthday dear sis! Wish you a long life full of joy and success. Its been a privilege to get to know you.

Hop on over to her blog to wish her!

The Knitereview

Made by Rae is running this amazing series about sewing with knits. It is very informative and if you have been wanting to try sewing with knits ( which you should) you gotta read this series. Knits are the most forgiving of the fabrics and yet can be really frustrating to deal with. Getting the tips on how to make them work for you will save you a lot of grief ( and holey garments).
I thought I will add my two cents as well, because I started sewing with knits on my super basic brother machine and I do have a lot of stories to tell about my experience with knits. Now, however, I love working with knits. I have a gazillion knits of all varieties in my sewing room waiting to be made into something.
I took the liberty of peppering this post with some of my creations in knits. Why? Because it was fun.



Did you ever FEAR knits?
Did I ever FEAR knits...ohh boy! It wasn't FEAR..it was a deep, unsettling, phobia of knits. I had a basic brother machine and I used to think that sewing with knits was something reserved for only the best, most advanced machines. Was I ever wrong!

If so, do you remember a specific turning point?
I had an ever growing pile of cast-off Tshirts from my husband, begging to be made into something. I also kept stumbling upon great knit sewing tutorials like this 90 mins. shirt from Dana of MADE. I couldn't help but try making them. My biggest turning point came much later though, when I found a walking foot in my new ( and much fancier) machine's accessories. I spent a few hours installing the walking foot on my machine and I never took it off. It was a sheer joy to sew with knits afterwards.

Do you prefer sewing with knits or sewing with wovens?
I'm yet to choose among the two. I love them both for different reasons. Knits are very forgiving - Once I sewed the cuff part of a sleeve to the armhole ( in my defense there was a flare in the cuff of the sleeve) and it was still perfectly wearable and barely noticeable...bet you can't get away with this in a woven top.
Woven's on the other hand have much more options when it comes to beautiful prints, all the sought after designers design most of their patterns in wovens, so if I want to make something really vibrant I tend to lean towards wovens.

Do you have a favorite type of knit?
Interlock wins hands down here, for sheer ease of cutting and sewing. All the benefits of knit without any of the pain.

Where do you usually buy your knits?
Printed knits are usually difficult to find in local stores. My favorite place to buy knits is actually Old Navy (gasp). I usually scour their clearance section during their whole store 30,40,50% off sale and usually score some nice deals. Last November I bought eight (!) XL tank tops for a whopping 47 cents each.Those tops had the softest 100% cotton ribbing. I almost always buy Old Navy groupons whenever they are available and that helps too. Its a must visit place if you wish to score quality knits at rock-bottom prices. Both the shirts for the above dress came from Old Navy. I have been known to score great deals at Walmart too.

Any hints for buying knits online.
I haven't found my dream online store yet, but I had gotten some really nice knits at great prices at the Seamstress Boutique of Sewingmamas. I have sometimes even bought surprise scrap-bags for pennies on the dollars and have been really surprised with the selection I got. Since I mostly sew for children, I have been able to use most of these scraps. Both the fabrics for the dress above came from sewingmamas and I had plenty leftover for pants.

What brand/model machine do you primarily use to sew with knits?
Now I use my babylock Ellageo ESG3 machine to sew with knits or wovens, but I have used my Brother machine earlier with mixed results. The main problem I have faced with both the machines is that they sometimes eat up my knits and get stuck and then its a pain to get them functional again. This was before I started using Walking foot. For me thats been the silver bullet.

Do you use a serger?
I do, but mostly to finish the garment seams from inside, not to sew the garment. Basically it serves the same purpose whether I sew with knits or wovens.

Whats your default setting on machine?
I have tried various settings ( lowering the tension, lightening stitch lowering feed dogs) and finally realized that my machine is intelligent enough to adjust to the fabric by itself. I got the best results by using the default settings, so I don's mess with them now. My stitch length depends on the fabric and the type of seam I am sewing. If the fabric is heavy I use longer stitch length. If the seam is not supposed to get much stress ( like the hem of a dress) I use longer stitch, otherwise I stick to the default length.

Walking foot: Yay or Nay?
Yes, yes yes!
I can't imagine my life without it now.

Double needle; your thoughts?
Good to use for professional hemlines and outer seams on the pants. No big deal though. Sometimes I use them, sometimes I get lazy and skip them. Like I said, no big deal.

Do you have any other tips or tricks for sewing with knits?
I have sometimes used a tissue paper/newspaper beneath the knit fabric to provide some stability while sewing.
Avoiding the edge also helps the fabric not getting stuck in the machine.
When you are trying a knit for the first time, go with the slowest speed, this way
you will be able to pull out your fabric before its too late.
Whatever you do, there will be times when your knit will get stuck in your machine...remember forewarned in forearmed. Just be calm and know how to open your machine's panel below the foot, its actually pretty easy and clean up any stuck fabric there. Don't panic...this is just a rite of passage while sewing with knits :)

Anything else you want to say about the knits?


They are not the same as wovens, they have their own strength and weaknesses, embrace those differences and you will do just fine...
Haha!


Thanks Rae! For a few minutes I felt like I was the Nobel Laureate for Sewing and everybody was waiting with baited breathe for what I had to say...the dream was awesome while it lasted :)

Dec Roses Scarf Tutorial

Winter means a lot of accessories, and among all those...scarves is my favorite. They can perk up any plain outfit, come in bazzillion styles and colors and are so easy to make. And if something is easy to make, I have to make it. So I did. This super soft bunch of ruffles. I love it and I thought you would like it too so I'm sharing with you how to make one.


Supplies:

Knit Jersey Fabric : 15 inches ( length) x 60 inches ( width)
Elastic thread
Matching thread


Construction:

1. Cut two strips from the fabric of 7.5 inches X 60 inches. If your fabric is not 60 inches wide than just cut multiple strips to make that length. Don't worry about cutting the strips evenly, since it will all get ruffled eventually a little variation in width won't be noticeable and most probably look good.

2.

Now take one strip and shir it in the center. To do this you need to fill your bobbin with elastic thread and use the regular matching thread on top. I did two rows but since all the fabrics shir differently you will need to vary the number of rows based on when you get a decent ruffle in the fabric. If you don't have any experience with shirring here's an excellent shirring tutorial to jumpstart you.

If you cut two smaller strips instead of a 60 inch wide single you need to join them before you shir. The good news is that you don't need to do anything special for that. Just overlap the two strips 1 inch and continue shirring like it was a continuous piece. Because the final piece would be very ruffled, the join would be invisible. Since the knits don't fray, it would be okay in the wash too.

3.

Repeat the above step for both the strips.

4.

Now place one strip over the other ( Wrong sides together). The wrong side is where the white elastic thread is showing. Our goal is to hide this thread, so it doesn't show up whatever way you wear your scarf.

5.

Sew a seam of half inch at the starting point ( shown by the arrow), go back and forth 2-3 times. Trim the extra thread.

6.

Sew a half inch seam every 5 inches. Go back and forth like you did in step 5. Trim any excess thread. What these small 'tacks' do is hold the two layers together so the elastic thread won't show. But sewing these only at the intervals would maintain the stretch in the scarf that was given to it by shirring.
7.

Sometimes, due to unpredictable nature of shirring, your strips may turn out to be different lengths. If that happens, just turn the extra part from the longer strip over the smaller ( As I did in the image above - look right above the arrow) and sew a tack at this point.

8.

The scarf is ready! wear it, gift it, show it off!

Variations:

You could do a number of things with this basic idea. Here're a couple that I could think of.

1. Use strips of different widths

2. Cut fringes after shirring

3. Use different colors for both the strips

4. Use 4 strips instead of 2 and shir 2 layers together.

5. Join different colored small strips instead of making a single long one


I may try some of these ideas myself at some point...but for now, ball is in your court. Go wild!

Snow bib

So we needed some snow gear for our recent trip to Lake Tahoe. I tried finding snow-pants/snow-bibs at our local stores but since this region doesn't get any snow, I was out of luck.  It was too late to order online. So I did what any sewing mama would do. Made my own.

I bought a pair of men's nylon pants and just cut it apart to make a snow bib for the little one. I wasn't still sure that this is exactly what we needed so I sought advice from the members of a sewing forum.

After many mamas in the snowy areas approved them, I felt much more confident about them.

The little one wore them to our outing at the ski resort and they worked perfectly. She didn't get wet and neither did she feel cold. I'm so pleased with myself :)

I'm working on a tutorial, but if you're impatient, the construction is pretty similar to these Rumble-Tumble Coveralls.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year! Hope this year brings you lots of joy, love and success. We celebrated the new year eve with friends and family. There was lots of good food, chit-chat, games and fun.

There was also a beautiful lake, snow-clad mountains and dense forests.

We made memories. The good ones :)

Here's to new beginnings...