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DIY Spanish Style Skirt

July 19, 2020 · 2 Comments

So last time I showed how to draft a skirt pattern from your own measurements, in preparation to make a Spanish style skirt from the dress Nicole made on The Great British Sewing Bee. The post is here if you missed it.

If you don’t want to make your own pattern, you might have a pattern already that you can use.

To make a Spanish style skirt, we’ll need to make some modifications to the pattern we drafted, and the same modifications will apply to a commercial pattern. If you prefer to use a pattern you have already, just make sure that it’s for a straightish skirt.

We’ll need to adjust the length and the shape of the front hem and there are a couple more pattern pieces we need to make, then we can start sewing.

Modifying the Pattern

One of the things that makes a Spanish style skirt what it is are the ruffles. This skirt has 2 ruffles, each one made from a circle and joined onto the skirt with an extra section.

Because the ruffles are going to add to the length of the skirt, we’ll need to make the skirt shorter.

Each ruffle will be about 10 cm. There are going to be 2 of them and they will overlap by about 3 cm. They’ll be joined by an extra piece of fabric.

So you’ll need to make the skirt 17 cm shorter (unless you really want it to be longer, in which case leave it!).

The easiest way to do this is to cut 17 cm off the bottom edge of both pieces.

The other thing you’ll need to do is change the shape of the hemline at the front.

Find centre front on the pattern piece and measure up 14 cm from the bottom. Using a French curve (or another curved edge like a dinner plate if you don’t have one), draw a curved line from the centre downwards to the edge of the skirt pattern. It will look less weird if the line is straight for a little way, then curves to meet the bottom of the side.

Additional Pattern Pieces

There are 3 additional pattern pieces we need to make for the Spanish style skirt: facings (because I forgot when I was drafting the skirt!), the ruffles and the pieces to join the ruffles to the rest of the skirt.

To make the facings, take one of your pattern pieces. Pin the dart.

Take a new piece of pattern paper and trace from the waist line down to about 5 cm. Do this with your other pattern piece too. Make sure you label them!

To make the ruffles, we’re going to use a circle. As far as I remember, Nicole said that each of her ruffles were 2 circles joined together. I’m not going to do that here! 1 circle for each ruffle should be plenty. The pattern piece will be a quarter of a circle.

Cut a piece of pattern paper 60 cm square. From 1 corner, measure 60 cm across from one side of the paper to the other.

Now measure down 46 cm from the same corner. Measure across the paper in the same way. This will give you a chunk of a quarter circle 14 cm wide.

The third extra piece is the section that will go between the ruffles. Obviously we don’t want to loose the shape of the hem here.

For the back, draw a rectangle the same width as the skirt and 14 cm high.

For the front, trace the shape of the hem. Measure 14 cm down, then draw the hemline again.

Sewing the Skirt

We’re going to assemble the skirt first, then the ruffles, then join the ruffles to the skirt.

When assembling the skirt, my advice is to leave trimming the seams until you’ve checked that it fits! Even if you are using a pattern drafted from your own measurements, it’s best to be on the safe side.

Pin, then sew the darts on the front section and both the back pieces. Press the darts away from the centre.

Sew the centre back seam. You’ll need to put a zip in, and if you have a preferred way to do this then by all means do that! My way involves sewing the seam completely, then dealing with the zip afterwards. Trim the seam and press it open.

Sew in the zip. The way I do this works best with invisible zips, although I have done this with ordinary zips too. Pin the zip face down over the seam on the wrong side. Tack it in place, checking that the teeth of the zip are aligned with the seam. Sew the zip to the skirt. Now unpick the seam to expose the teeth. More detailed instructions can be found here.

Sew the side seams. Try the skirt on and check that the skirt fits. If it’s all ok, trim the seams and the darts and press.

If you haven’t cut out your facings, do that now. The front one can be cut on the fold, and the back ones need to be cut out on folded fabric so that you have 2.

Use some fusible interfacing to prevent them from fraying. Join the facings at the side seams.

With the wrong sides together, sew the facings to the waist of the skirt.

Understitch the facings.

Find where the darts are on the skirt and cut the facings in the same place. You might also like to hand stitch them to the side seams and the dart seams, just into the seam allowance to stop them from popping up and being annoying!

Making the Ruffles

Nicole used 2 circles for each ruffle on her Spanish dress. I decided to use one circle because I wasn’t sure whether I had enough fabric and 4 circles would require a lot of hemming!

Cut 8 quarter circles. I used odds and ends of things that I had in my fabric hoard. If you’re doing this too, you’ll need to piece them together to make the quarter circles.

To do this, take your pattern piece and pin bits of fabric to it until the pattern piece is covered. Make sure that the pieces of fabric overlap.

Turn the pattern piece over and cut away the extra fabric.

Turn it back over and trim down the overlapping areas, leaving enough for a seam.

Sew the quarter circles together so that you have 2 complete circles.

Hem the bottom edge of each circle with bias binding, or you might prefer to use a rolled hem foot if you have one. I used bias binding. If you need instructions for doing this, there’s a tutorial here.

To gather the ruffles, sew 2 rows of stitches along the top edge of each circles. Make sure that the lines of stitches don’t cross each other!

Gather the ruffles by pulling the stitches from one end. Usually when gathering you would knot the threads at one end and pull from the other. As you’ll have quite a lot of fabric to gather, you might like to get halfway along from one end, then gather the other half from the other end.

Keep going until the ruffles are the same size as the bottom of the skirt.

Assembling the Skirt

Take the extra skirt pieces that you drafted from the bottom of the skirt and sew them together at the side seams.

Take one of the ruffles. Pin, then sew it to the bottom edge.

Take the other ruffle and saandwich it between the bottom of the skirt and the top of the extra piece. Pin it, then sew.

Trim off all the stray threads and your Spanish style skirt is ready to wear!

Drafting a Skirt Pattern: Spanish Style Skirt

July 11, 2020 · Leave a Comment

This post about drafting a skirt pattern contains affiliate links.

So the Great British Sewing Bee is over for another year, and while there are things they made on the programme that I probably wouldn’t make, I feel inspired to make a Spanish style skirt like the dress that Nicole made.

It’s not the kind of thing I would normally wear. I like my circle skirts! But this dress was so pretty and I loved the ruffles at the hem.

Wearing a full on Spanish dress to do normal life things might be a bit too much, even for me! And the colours and prints probably aren’t the kind of things I would choose either. But as I began thinking about it, I realised that I could probably make a skirt version out of fabric I had already.

I’m trying to resist the urge to buy more fabric, mostly because I have a pile of bits left over from other projects.

So taking into account that I don’t usually wear bright colours, it’s going to be a Spanish style skirt in vintage florals. I’ve only got as far as drafting the skirt pattern, but I can tell you that in my head it looks amazing!

The skirt section on Nicole’s looked like a fairly simple fitted skirt. I could have used a pattern, but I decided to draft one myself.

Drafting a skirt pattern can be intimidating if you haven’t tried it before, but it’s easier than you’d think! Here are the instructions if you’d like to try it!

How To Draft a Skirt Pattern

You Will Need

Pattern paper. I recently bought a roll of this from Amazon. It has cm squares on it which makes pattern drafting much easier.

Tape measure. Plastic ones are considered to be better than fabric ones because they don’t stretch, but it’s fine as long as you use the same tape measure for measuring yourself and for measuring out your pattern.

A pencil or pen. I drew the pattern with a Sharpie and I would not recommend it! The pen bled through the paper and onto the table, and had to be removed with rubbing alcohol. I’d use a pencil or a water based pen.

Somewhere to jot down your measurements. I find this most definitely necessary as I forget them otherwise!

A long straight edge. A 30 cm ruler is fine, especially if you use the pattern paper with a grid.

A French curve is nice to have, as is a friend or a helpful husband to assist with taking measurements. I have this French curve. Unfortunately Amazon don’t supply helpful husbands!

Taking Your Measurements

For drafting a skirt pattern you only need to take 4 measurements: your waist, your hips at the widest point, the distance from your waist to your hips (where you took the measurement), and from your waist to just below your knee.

My advice here is to write your measurements down (I forget them if I don’t!), and don’t pull the tape measure too tight! Lots of us have gained weight during lockdown, and yes, it’s depressing, but you’ll forget about that when you have a lovely skirt to wear. If it’s too tight, you’ll remember and you’ll be uncomfortable and you won’t want to wear it. So keep the tape measure loose!

When measuring around your hips, make sure that the tape measure is level all the way round. This is where having a friend or a helpful husband comes in handy.

There’s a post here about taking measurements if you’d like more advice.

When you’ve taken your measurements, divide your waist measurement by 4 and add 4 cm.

You’ll also need to divide your hip measurement by 4 and add 2 cm for ease of wearing.

Drafting the Skirt Front

On a piece of pattern paper, draw a line the same length as your waist to hem measurement. This will be the centre front of the skirt.

From the top end of the line, draw another line outwards the same length as your waist measurement divided by 4 plus 4 cm.

On the original line and measuring from the top, measure down the same distance as from your waist to your hips. Draw another line outwards the same length as your hip measurement divided by 4 plus 2 cm.

At the bottom of the original line, draw a third line outwards the same length as the hip measurement.

Now join them up.

The next step in drafting a skirt pattern is to make some little changes to this to allow for the fact that women are not cuboid and bits of us bulge at least a little bit.

Drawing the Curve of the Hips

This is where having a French curve will come in handy. If you don’t have one, you could try a dinner plate or just draw it freehand.

There’s 4 things to do here.

Firstly, find the waist measurement line where it joins with the side of the skirt. Measure up 1.5 cm from here and add it to the line. This photo shows where the dot is. I forgot to take a picture after I’d joined the line to the dot!

Secondly, find the line you drew from your waist line to your hip line. Mark the halfway point. This is the other dot in the picture above.

Thirdly, extend the line you drew for your waist, then extend the hip to hem line upwards so that they meet. You should now have a big rectangle. This is to help you to draw the curve.

Lastly, take your French curve and draw a curved line from where you added the 1.5 cm to the halfway point between your waist and your hip. The vertical line that you added should meet it about here. If not, you might need to make the curve a bit longer.

Sorting Out the Waist

You’ve already marked an extra 1.5 cm on one side. Now on the centre front side, make another mark 0.5 cm above the waist line.

Find the halfway point on the waist line. Join this point to the mark you made on the centre front side of the skirt.

Now grab your French curve again, and join the halfway point to the outside edge with a curved line.

Drawing the Dart

The finished skirt will have 4 darts in total, 2 at the front and 2 in the back. I’ve made skirts before from patterns I’ve drafted myself and, apart from circle skirts, if you don’t bother with darts you’ll end up with something that doesn’t fit very well!

They’re not tricky to do and they’ll make all the difference.

Find the halfway point on the waist line again and mark 2 cm either side.

Now draw an 8 cm line downwards from the original point. Join the end of this to the points on either side to make a triangle.

Adding the Seam Allowance

Add a 2 cm (3/4 inch) seam allowance along the waist, side and the hem. You’ll be cutting this section on the fold, so there’s no need for a seam allowance along the centre front.

Drafting the Skirt Back

The good news is you’ve already done most of the work!

Instead of redrawing the whole thing, you can trace the skirt front onto another sheet of pattern paper.

You will need to make some changes as we’re not the same round the back as we are at the front! Also you’re going to need to be able to get in and out of it.

There are going to be 3 changes to make. The first is to the waist line.

Find the original waist line on the skirt front. Do you remember that you made it 1/2 cm higher at the centre front end? For the skirt back, you need to make this point 1 cm lower than the original line.

Using your French curve, join this to the original line at the middle point.

The next change is to the dart. Extend the original line by 2 cm, then join it up to the points on either side. This means that the darts on the back of the skirt will be 4 cm wide like the ones on the front, but a couple of cm longer.

The last thing to do is to add a seam allowance to the centre back. You’ll be putting a zip in here.

Your self drafted skirt pattern is ready! In the next post, I’ll talk about modifiying it a bit and then using to make a Spanish style skirt.

If you’re interested in finding out more about making clothes from patterns you’ve drafted yourself, I encourage you to have a look at my ebooks and other downloads, as this is something I’ve written about quite a lot!

Embroidered Pincushion Tutorial

June 27, 2020 · Leave a Comment

It could be possible to become addicted to pincushions. Like having an collection of pretty teacups, pincushions can be as different as you want them to be and pretty as you like. There are so many different ways to make them and, because they are little things, you can use scraps that are too big to throw away but too small to use for a larger project.

This embroidered pincushion is part of a kit that I’ve been developing. I wanted to call it the Safe At Home kit, but as the extra time people kept telling me I was going to have never appeared, it’s taking me a while to finish it!

The other projects in the kit are this bunting, and this needle case.

UPDATE: The kits have finally been completed and you can find them here!

Anyway, the last project is now finished and here it is, an embroidered pincushion!

It can be sewn entirely by hand, or you could speed things up a bit and use the sewing machine to sew the pincushion together.

The embroidery design is free to download, but I do ask for an email address. You can find out more about why I do this here. The form is at the bottom of the post.

Making the Embroidered Pincushion

You Will Need

Scraps of felt in pretty colours
Embroidery thread
Polyester filling, sawdust or emery sand to fill your pincushion
2 buttons
Pattern pieces and the embroidery design. You can either download mine (the form’s at the bottom), or you could make your own.

Cutting Out

You will need 2 circles the same size, and one circle a little bit smaller.

Embroidering the Design

I used lazy daisies, fern stitch, woven wheels and French knots. It’s worth remembering that odd numbers of things usually look better, but you can do what you like! Just remember to leave a space in the middle for the button.

Sewing the Pincushion Together

Attach the embroidered section to one of the larger circles. You could hand sew it or use your sewing machine.

Place the other larger circle on top of the embroidery. Sew around the edge, leaving a gap.

Trim the seam if you need to. Turn the pincushion the right way out. Fill it with your chosen material. It will need to be firm to make it easiest for pushing the pins in.

Take a plain button (this one will be at the bottom) and tie the end of length of thread to it. You might want to use a stronger thread for this, or you could use ordinary sewing thread doubled.

Now push the needle through the centre of the pincushion from bottom to top.

Thread a pretty button onto the needle. Pass the thread through, then back into the pincushion and through the button at the bottom.

Do this a few times and pull it tight. Cut the thread and tie it off.

If you wanted to turn this into a wrist pincushion, you could attach it to a piece of elastic, or make a strap for it like this one.

If you like pincushions, I have a whole Pinterest board devoted to them here!

How To Alter a T Shirt

June 18, 2020 · Leave a Comment

One of the things we were going to do in Japan, as well as admire the cherry blossom, look at Mount Fuji from several different angles and visit the snow monkeys at the hot springs, was to go clothes shopping for souvenirs.

I’m not one for shopping very much generally, and the idea of going clothes shopping with a herd of boys in tow brings me out in a cold sweat!

But it was hubby’s idea to bring back souvenirs that were actually useful and that people could wear. My boys already have quite a nice collection of t shirts from places we’ve been and they’re a lovely reminder of all the places we’ve visited and the things we’ve done.

As the trip had to be postponed, hubby decided to raid Uniqlo online instead as the next best thing. He got the boys Pokemon t shirts and he bought me this.

Unfortunately the t shirt was way too big! I have put on weight since we’ve been in lockdown, but I’m not wider than I am tall!

I decided to do something about it, mainly because I like the t shirt, but also because I don’t like to have things taking up space in my small wardrobe that I don’t wear.

The other thing is that I’m only just starting to realise the impact clothes and textiles are having on the environment and it’s shocking, even something as small as a t shirt. There’s more about it here. Also Patrick Grant on the Sewing Bee said that there are currently enough clothes knocking about to last 6 generations! So I’m going to think twice before throwing something away.

Fortunately, it’s easy to alter a t shirt that’s too big, and it doesn’t take more than an hour or two. Here are the instructions in case you want to alter a t shirt yourself!

Instructions For Altering a T Shirt

You Will Need

The t shirt that doesn’t fit
A t shirt that does fit
Tailors’ chalk, a pen or a pencil
Usual sewing supplies

Instructions

Take your t shirt and smooth out any creases. Then fold it in half.

Now take the t shirt that fits properly, smooth out the creases and fold it in half.

Pop the t shirt that fits on top of the one that doesn’t. Line up folded edges, the neck and the shoulders.

Draw round the t shirt that fits, leaving a seam allowance. This will probably involve cutting further up than the existing armpit area. We’ll sort the sleeves out in a minute!

You can decide at this point whether the t shirt is also too long, or whether you want to leave the length as it is. If you want to shorten it, draw the new hemline on the t shirt.

The sleeves are likely to be too wide as well, so draw underneath the sleeves of the smaller t shirt.

Cut the t shirt along the lines you have drawn.

On my t shirt, the shoulders were halfway down my arm! So the next job is to move the armhole. On the t shirt that fits, find where the sleeve meets the shoulder, and make a mark on the t shirt that’s too big.

Redraw the armhole on the big t shirt by joining up the new armpit with the mark you made at the top of the shoulder. The armhole should curve a little bit. If you’re not sure how much it should curve, have a look at the t shirt that fits and draw a line that’s similar.

Cut along the new armhole.

Now take the sleeve sections that are now no longer attached to the t shirt, and cut them away along the seam.

Check that the sleeve pieces are the same size. Find the centre of the seam edge. Match the centre to the shoulder seam and pin the sleeve to the open armhole. Sew the sleeve to the armhole. Do the same with the other sleeve.

Now pin the side seams and the under arm seams. Usually I would start at the armpit and sew the side seam, then go back to the armpit and sew the underarm seam.

You could start at the armpit, but if you are leaving sleeve length and hem length as they are, you might want to start at the hems instead to be sure of them matching.

Try the t shirt on and check the length of the t shirt and the sleeves. If they are still too long, decide how much you need to remove, cut it off and hem it.

And that’s it! Being stretchy, it will look fine even if you haven’t done a perfect job, providing that the obvious things like hems and sleeves match.

Tips

Your sewing machine probably has a stitch for sewing stretch knits. If it does, I’d use it. Otherwise use a zig zag.

Try to resist the urge to pull the fabric through the machine while it’s sewing! If the feed dogs appear to be struggling, you might need to take the bobbin section of your machine apart to clean the fluff out.

If you haven’t changed the needle for a while, it might be an idea to as a blunt needle will snag the fabric.

Jersey knits have a tendency to curl. My t shirt wasn’t as bad as I thought it might be, but it did still curl a bit. I don’t really have any tips for this, just to check before you start sewing, or you’ll end up with bumpy seams.

If you like this post showing how to alter a t shirt, and upcycling and refashioning are your thing, you might like these posts.

This one shows how I refashioned a tea dress from something that was ghastly and didn’t fit at all into something wearable.

This post is about a top that I turned into a dress.

This post shows how to make a pair of toddler trousers from a man’s shirt.

Embroidered Needle Case Tutorial

May 31, 2020 · 3 Comments

Needle cases might be seen as a little bit old fashioned, but I like them.

I’m the worst person in the world for losing needles, so having somewhere pretty to put them might stop me from losing so many!

This DIY embroidered needle case will eventually end up being part of a new craft kit I’m working on. I actually started it early on in lockdown, and I was going to call it the safe at home felt craft kit or something like that.

However, all the extra free time people kept saying I was going to have didn’t materialise, plus there’s been a dangerous virus to worry about, so I’ve only just got round to the second project (the kit will probably have 3-5 projects. The first one will be this mini bunting).

Whatever is going on, it’s always nice to have something to work on and craft kits make good gifts for crafty people. So I’m carrying on with it and I’ll just call it something else! Once the kit is ready (hopefully not too long!) it will be in my Etsy shop, and there’ll be a treat for the people on my email list as well.

UPDATE: The kits have finally be completed and you can find them here!

This needle case is made from felt, bits of ribbon and lace trim and embroidery.

If you have a die cutting machine that can handle felt, you could decorate it with felt flowers. I don’t have one, and anyway I’m a little bit addicted to sewing woven wheels!

I’ve decided to keep it simple and not too fussy, but needle cases are the kind of thing that are easy to personalise. So you could use this as a starting point for your own ideas!

For more inspiration I have a Pinterest board dedicated to needle cases here.

Instructions For Making a DIY Embroidered Needle Case

You Will Need

Small pieces of felt in complimentary colours.

Bits of ribbon, lace or other trim. I used cotton lace, grosgrain ribbon and some pink decorative bias binding.

Embroidery thread. I used pink, 2 shades of green, off white and pale grey.

Cutting Out

The pattern pieces for the embroidered needle case are free to download in exchange for an email address. Information about why I ask for an email can be found here. The form is at the bottom of the post.

I used green, pink and white felt for my embroidered needle case, but you can swap those for whatever colours you like!

Cut a piece of green felt and one of white felt 7.5 cm x 12.5 cm.

You’ll also need a smaller pink piece 7 cm x 12 cm. The larger pieces will be the cover and the other will be the inside of the cover. The smaller one will make the 2 pages in the centre.

Cut a larger circle and a smaller circle both from the pink felt and from the white.

For the inside of of the cover, you’ll need a pink rectangle 4 cm x 4.5 cm, and a white rectangle 2.5 cm x 3.5 cm.

For the safety pin tag, you’ll need a rectangle of white felt 4.5 cm x 3 cm and a 4.5 cm length of pink trim.

Cut a 4.5 cm piece of lace trim cm long, plus a piece of white felt the same size.

Cut a piece of grosgrain ribbon 5 cm long, and two more pieces 13 cm long.

Embroidery Stitches

The stitches used in the embroidered needle case are:
Chain stitch
Running stitch
Back stitch
Lazy daisies
Woven wheels

I’ve included links to some of these if you’re not sure of them.

Embroidering the Cover

The cover will be folded in half, so you might like to mark the half way point with pins first.

Position one of the larger circles onto the cover. Place a smaller circle on top of the larger one. Position the other circles on the cover and pin them in place.

Sew backstitch across the circles to divide them firstly in half, then into quarters, then into eights.

Sew stems in chain stitch.

Embroider lazy daisies for the leaves.

In each corner, sew a woven wheel for a flower. Then sew 2 lazy daisies on either side of the flower for leaves.

Making the Insides of the Needle Case

The white piece will be sewn to the wrong side of the cover to conceal the sewing, and the pink piece will be sewn to the centre, then folded in half and sewn together.

So for the moment, you can treat each rectangle as a whole.

Embroider woven wheels and lazy daisies in each corner on both pieces.

Take the white piece of felt first. On one half, attach the rectangles using running stitch.

On the other half, fold the ends of the shorter length of ribbon under, then attach the ribbon to the felt by embroidering woven wheels and lazy daisies at either end.

Take the pink piece of felt and pin the lace trim with the little bit of white underneath it. Using the holes in the lace, sew the trim and the white felt to the pink felt.

On the other half of the pink felt, pin the pink trim to the rectangle, then to the piece of pink felt. Sew woven wheels near the top edge to attach them.

Making Up the Embroidered Needle Case

With the wrong sides together, pin the white felt inside to the green lining. Using running stitch, sew the 2 pieces together. You could use a sewing machine for this if you prefer, or you might like to sew blanket stitch instead of running stitch.

Now pin the pink centre piece to the white and green pieces. Mark the centre with pins. Sew down the centre of the pink piece.

The sewing won’t be visible on the pink felt, but it will be on the cover, so think about what colour you would like the stitches to be! I did mine in pale grey. You could use the sewing machine for this too if you wanted to.

Fold the pink bit of felt in half and pin. Sew it together using a running stitch.

Attaching the Ties

Take one of the longer lengths of ribbon. Fold the end under, then sew a woven wheel and a couple of lazy daisies to attach it to the front of the cover.

Do the same with the other piece of ribbon and the back of the cover.

Now your embroidered needle case is finished! You have somewhere to keep needles, pins, safety pins and a needle threader.

I actually can’t remember making anything quite this pretty before. There is a bit of a mistake though! Did you spot it? The white section was supposed to be the other way up, so the ribbon was nearer the top, not the bottom. This is what happens if you’re watching the Great British Sewing Bee at the same time!

Modifying the Pattern

Additional Pattern Pieces

Sewing the Skirt

Making the Ruffles

Assembling the Skirt

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How To Draft a Skirt Pattern

You Will Need

Taking Your Measurements

Drafting the Skirt Front

Drawing the Curve of the Hips

Sorting Out the Waist

Drawing the Dart

Adding the Seam Allowance

Drafting the Skirt Back

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Making the Embroidered Pincushion

You Will Need

Cutting Out

Embroidering the Design

Sewing the Pincushion Together

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Instructions For Altering a T Shirt

You Will Need

Instructions

Tips

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Instructions For Making a DIY Embroidered Needle Case

You Will Need

Cutting Out

Embroidery Stitches

Embroidering the Cover

Making the Insides of the Needle Case

Making Up the Embroidered Needle Case

Attaching the Ties

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