Sew-along! || Making some cozy winter skirts

hello i'm elena and i like to make things what i'm going to be making today is a couple of skirts and because it is november and i live in canada i'm going to be making some winter skirts so i have some wools here that i'm going to be using so firstly is this like check like almost looks like a picnic blanket actually it's tan and black and then second i have this like diagonally striped brown fabric um and they're both pretty thick so i think i'm going to be making so i think i'm going to be making some circle skirts so that i don't have too much extra bulk at the waist and this is mittens everyone uh so yeah let's make some skirts excuse me sir i would like to cut those fabrics out now if you could oh he folded his legs under so you know you can't move him now it's it'll never happen for the pattern i like to use a circle skirt calculator i'll link this one down below you pick the fullness and length of skirt you want then enter in your waist measurement and it gives you the measurements and instructions you'll need to create your skirt unfortunately you can't enter in a custom skirt length but it's a good starting point and you can easily make the skirt longer or shorter if you like with my skirt pattern calculated i'm going to draw it out on some wrapping paper the paper i had was pretty small so this is more of a mini skirt pattern but like i said it's easy to make it longer once you move it to the fabric starting from a single point on the paper i'm measuring out the proper distance for my waist measurement in a half circle and drawing a dot and then i can connect those dots together the same is done with the hem of the skirt but this is less important right now because we'll be changing the hem length [Music] the pattern piece is then cut out and laid on top of the doubled over fabric i determined how long i wanted the skirt to be and measured from the waist to that point and placed a pin then i measured how long it was from that pin up to the folded corner of the fabric so i could have an anchor point to continue placing pins so the skirt would be in even length all around these pieces were then cut out if these skirts aren't warm i'll just have to think back to when i was making them because i worked out quite a sweat here [Music] okay so skirt number one the base is cut out um so i decided to go with a half circle skirt here i'm really glad i did i feel like a full circle skirt would have been too full um but this still is like a lot of movement and swoosh so that's exciting um so yeah it's just cut out obviously i have to sew some stuff um keep my other brown skirt beneath this brown skirt but i want to add pockets so i'm actually going to lay the pieces back down over like fold it in half and cut up the alternate side so that i can have two side seams so that i will have pockets in addition to cutting the skirt in half i also cut a slit up the back for the opening however i later cut up the entirety of the back piece and ended up with a front panel and two back panels [Music] oh really you're gonna lay there right now oh my gosh once you've removed all cats from your workspace you can make a pocket pattern i made mine by basically eyeballing it so that there would be enough space for my hand and so the pockets were deep enough to not worry about stuff falling out of them however i ended up not liking this pattern which you'll see soon okay so i'm going to cut out this pocket pattern now i'm going to extend this part up um like a few inches because i like to actually attach them right into the waistband that way the pocket doesn't hang on the seam and like weigh it down so there's a little bit of wasted space up here but um i'm just using some old value village bed sheets that i have um because they're just pretty sturdy and like i have them laying around so i'm gonna use them these ones are embroidered sweet dreams ally so that's cute but also sad that i'm you know cutting it apart but it's for the greater good pockets the pocket pieces were then cut out with about one centimeter of seam allowance and then pinned right sides together to the skirt panels i constructed the pockets a bit differently for the second skirt which i actually preferred so i'll go over that when the time comes the pocket pieces were then sewn onto the skirt panels with a smaller seam allowance that i'd be using to finish the rest of the side seams this allows the pocket opening to hide a bit better in the seam and remains less visible okay don't mind all the cat stuff around but basically i have laid the front and back skirt pieces on top of each other and they are right sides together with the pockets facing out so what i'm going to do is just pin and sew up the sides i'm going to stop when i got to the pocket and leave a gap and then sew up to the top and then sew the actual pockets together and then when you flip the skirt right side out um leave the pockets facing inside and yeah then you have pockets yay all right i hit a snag in my progress because as you can see this fabric likes to fray and as of yet i haven't really done anything to prevent that um so i had the skirt stitched together um but then i noticed that this was fraying a lot and the pockets were actually a little low so i took everything apart so what i'm going to do is kind of trim up any of the really long straggly bits here and then i think i'm going to just run a zigzag stitch along the edges um and then i can adjust the pocket height and sew everything back together so round two let's go once the pieces were zigzagged it was time to return to the pockets i decided to use a different fabric because the white was showing up more than i'd like so i switched to a black satin i'm using the less shiny side as my right side rather than the slippery satin side i also changed the pattern a bit and apparently didn't film that part but i did film it for the second skirt so that shall come shortly i initially wanted to close the skirt with a hook and eye and install a placket to hide the skirt opening so i cut out a rectangle of fabric a bit longer than the opening and twice as wide as i'd need plus some seam allowance this was sewn together along the long edge and one of the short edges and then turned right side out the remaining raw edge would eventually be covered by the waistband the seamed edge of the placket could then be pinned and sewn to one side of the skirt opening with right sides together and the back of the skirt was then seamed together as well we're almost done now it's time for the waistband for this you'll need a rectangle of fabric a couple inches longer than your waist measurement and double the thickness plus a little extra for seam allowance i wanted a fairly narrow waistband for this skirt once it's cut out you can pin and sew it to the top of your skirt with right sides together and raw edges for both the skirt and the waistband facing up in order to hide the raw edges at the ends of the waistband i fold the waistband with right sides together and sew right next to the outside edge of the skirt once the excess is trimmed and it's flipped right side out again you have a nice seam that finishes the waistband if that makes any sense at all this is done on both ends the rest of the waistband is then folded over the top of the skirt and the raw ends are tucked under and finished with a whip stitch you can of course topstitch the waistband by machine but my top stitched waistbands never come out right for some reason so i prefer to finish them by hand i whip stitch by wrapping the fabric around a finger on my non-dominant hand and stitching through a couple threads on the skirt side and then a couple threads on the waistband side repeat for eternity after the waistband was attached i attached a hook and bar to the top of the skirt and the skirt was now wearable i also put a snap button in the middle of the skirt opening slash placket situation which turned out to be a bad idea do not recommend after that i hung the skirt on my dress form to allow the fabric to stretch before finishing the hem this is important with bias cut fabrics while the skirt was hanging it also decided to snow so we'd better get these skirts done once the skirt had hung for about a day i trimmed off any uneven bits the seam allowances were then pressed open which i probably should have done before attaching the waistband but i didn't and then the hem was also folded up and pressed with wool and wool blends hemming a circle skirt is pretty easy because while the bottom part is actually wider and folding it up could introduce lumps and wrinkles the heat of the iron can help the fibers squish together and make a nice flat fold i first ironed and clipped the edges once then went around and folded up the edges a second time to encase the raw edges you could probably just double fold it in one go but i felt like i had more control this way once again the hem was finished with a whip stitch and everything was ironed again the stitches are pretty much invisible from both the inside and outside of the skirt which i love as a finishing touch i decided to tack down the seam allowances on the inside of the skirt using what i believe is called a herringbone stitch this is my first time using this stitch and it's hard to see with the brown thread and brown fabric but let me know if you're interested in knowing more in a future video and definitely google it for your own sewing adventures in the meantime and with that skirt number one was now finished i wore it to work one day and i really loved it there's something just magical about trudging through the snow in a long skirt i think i made the pockets a little too big so i might go back and make them a bit smaller but that should be a pretty easy fix the placket and snap button did not work at all so i've since gone in and installed an invisible zipper instead overall i'm really happy with this first skirt and now for the second [Music] skirt number one is done it is here i am going to basically just use this finished skirt as my pattern for the second skirt the fabric is laid out here so the only thing that i might change is i am probably going to make this one a little bit shorter and i'm going to like move this down a little so that i have a little bit of extra room on the sides for seam allowance because this didn't work well with the butt so i'm going to change up the way the closure on the second skirt and i'll probably go back and change this closure as well the button needs to go regardless of what i do but if just the button goes then this will like gape open a little kind of looks funny so i don't know i might have to add a zipper or a series of hooks and eyes um like at the top but anyway i'm gonna do a different closure for the second skirt anyway so um i'll fix this one later in the meantime it is definitely wearable um and but anyway let's cut out the fabric for this one okay the pieces are cut out this is just literally me holding it up to my waist and i think it looks cute so um i'm not sure if this stuff is gonna fray as much as the other stuff it seems better so uh i don't know if i'm gonna zigzag around all the edges again because that was a huge pain um but i am going to cut one of the panels in half again um for the back seam yeah so let's do that now on to the pockets i first laid the fabric over top the skirt fabric and followed the angles of the side seams and waist hole and marked where i wanted the pocket opening to fall i then traced a general pocket shape and cut that out with enough room for some seam allowance then i used this piece as a template to cut out the remaining pocket pieces these were then zigzag stitched again to prevent fraying this time i sewed the pockets closed around the outside before seaming them to the skirt leaving the long straight edge open for now it doesn't matter how big the scrap of fabric is on the floor if you put it there a cat will come and lay on it the pocket pieces were then pinned and stitched onto the skirt pieces right sides together with a smaller than normal seam allowance this helps to hide the pocket openings better once the sides are seamed together once the pockets are attached the side seams can be closed using a regular seam allowance making sure to leave a gap for the pocket opening [Music] all right the pockets are now sewn in these ones turned out a lot better than the first one so i'm really happy with them uh so now what is left to do is firstly i like to sew the top of the pocket to the to the like top of the skirt and then i'm going to add a zipper and a waistband in the back so i shall do all of that right meow i'm using an invisible zipper here and the first thing i like to do is iron the teeth flat using low heat invisible zippers are all upside down and backwards so ironing the teeth flat helps get the stitches closer to the teeth so that it can indeed be an invisible zipper i'm also using an invisible zipper foot which has tracks that help guide the zipper long but a regular zipper foot can work too once the zipper is installed the rest of the back seam can be closed up and the zipper should just look like a continuation of that seam this is probably a good time to note that i didn't care about pattern matching for this skirt so it looks a little wonky but i just don't care now the waistband can be attached this was done in the same way as the first skirt but i made the waistband for this one a little wider it was first sewn to the top of the skirts with right sides together and raw edges facing up the ends were folded right sides together and sewn then the excess was trimmed and the waistband was flipped right side out again there are a lot of ways to finish a waistband but this is my preferred method then the remaining raw edges were tucked under and pinned so the waistband could be finished with a whip stitch [Music] all right waistband is sewn on i just have to decide what kind of closure i want for the top of the waistband i'm thinking i'm just gonna use another hook and eye so pockets are done waistband is sewn and i also have to decide how long i want the skirt to be i am super torn so i'm just going to i think leave it to hang overnight again so it can stretch if it has any stretching to do on the bias and then tomorrow i probably will hem the skirt um but for right now i shall just finish the hook and eye okay change of plans i just asked my boyfriend what length of skirt would be good and he said he likes this one and also said that if i change my mind in the future i can make it shorter which is an excellent point so i think i'm actually going to just hem this tonight i really want to wear this skirt tomorrow that's why i'm kind of antsy to get it finished so i'm going to finish uh hemming the skirt tonight and sew on the thing for the closure whatever i decide um and then she shall be finished the hem was finished in the same way as the other skirt by turning under twice and whip stitching in place this fabric was lighter than the other and thus easier to fold so i didn't have to iron it down as i went but i made sure to iron it after stitching and with that both skirts were finished the second one came out a bit better in my opinion because i was older and therefore wiser so that's all i hope you enjoyed and have fun on your own skirt making adventures [Music] you

Channel: lanabaloo

Views: 8,193

Keywords: Sewing, Homemade, DIY, Seamstress

Id: UMdbtLgLSUc

Length: 18min 11sec (1091 seconds)

Published: Mon Dec 28 2020