How to Take Measurements

May 1, 2017 · 29 Comments

How to Take Measurements When Making Clothes

Making clothes is a lot of fun, but we want the things we have made to fit right.

In order to do that, we need to take measurements that are accurate.

This is true whether you are using a pattern, or if you are making something from scratch without one.

It is worth remembering that even if you find shop bought clothes in a certain size fit fairly well, the sizes on the back of a pattern are often totally different!

I have made the mistake myself in the past of assuming that the sizing on the pattern would be the same as for shop bought clothes, made the thing and then found it was too small!

Checking your measurements is probably the most important thing to do before you start making anything. If you’re using a pattern, compare them with the size guide on the back.

If you’re not using a commercial pattern but you are using a dress form, check that the measurements on your dress form are the same. If there is a significant difference, you might like to read this post about how to adjust a non adjustable dress form.

Once you’ve taken your measurements, jot them down somewhere so that you have them to refer to when you need them again.

How to Take Your Measurements

Before you Start

You will find it easier if you have somebody to help you. If you don’t, consider using a full length mirror so that you can check that the tape is straight when you are measuring.

Don’t try to take measurements while you’re wearing anything baggy or bulky. Something close fitting like leggings and a vest top is best.

Use a good quality plastic tape measure (affiliate link). The fabric ones sometimes stretch a bit, especially over time.

When measuring from your waist or your hips, dangle the tape measure so that the end of the tape measure is at the bottom. That way you can read your measurements easily.

Don’t be tempted to pull the tape measure too tight! You want to be able to breathe and move about, so keep it loose. If your finished garment turns out to be slightly too big, it’s easier to make something smaller than it is to make it bigger.

What to Measure

Top Half
From shoulder to shoulder
Across your collarbone
Around your chest under your armpits
Bust
Underneath boob area
Waist (where the tape measure sits comfortably)
Shoulder to armpit
Armpit to waist
Waist to hips

Bottom Half
Hips (at the widest point)
Waist to knee
Waist to ankle

Arms
Around the top of your arm
Around your wrist
Shoulder to elbow
Shoulder to wrist

For making trousers
Inside leg
Around thigh
Around the top of the knee
Around the ankle

If you are making a dress or a skirt and you want the hem to be at a mid calf kind of level, you will need to take this measurement too.

Whether you make clothes using a commercial pattern or without, keeping your measurements handy in a diary or a notebook means that you can refer back to them without having to measure yourself all over again.

PS If you want to sew clothes without using a pattern, you might like my ebook!

FIND OUT MORE

Linking up here.

How To Sew Piping

April 5, 2017 · 2 Comments

How To Sew Piping

Piping is a fab way to give a professional looking finish to your sewing projects. But it’s also something that can be a little bit intimidating if you haven’t tried it before.

I felt intimidated by the idea of sewing piping until I tried it! But I decided in the end that I wanted the nice look that piping would give more than I was put off trying something new!

Adding piping to a cushion is a good place to start if you haven’t made it before. It’s not to fiddly just to add some to the edges, and you can use the nice thick stuff.

So I’m going to show you how to sew piping!

You don’t need anything special, just some fabric (or some bias binding if you don’t want to make your own strips) and some piping cord. A zip foot is useful, and if you have a rotary cutter, you might find it quicker for cutting the strips (these are affiliate links).

How To Sew Piping

The first thing to do is to make the bias strips. Cutting the strips on the bias will allow the fabric to stretch a little bit, which is exactly what you will want it to do if your project has curves and corners!

If you don’t want to make your own strips, you could use bias binding instead. You’ll need to get the 25 mm kind, or wider if you can get it.

It’s easy enough to make your own strips though! Making bias binding can be fiddly, but cutting the strips isn’t the fiddly part. You can make them wider than bias binding, which makes sewing the piping easier, and they will match your project perfectly.

Making the Bias Strips

The width of the bias strips will depend on the thickness of the piping cord you are using. They need to be wide enough to cover the piping cord when folded in half, plus a bit extra so that it can be sewn into the seam allowance. I used thick cord for my project, so I needed my strips to be wide.

It’s easier to make your strips wider than you need and then cut them down, than to find that they are not wide enough!

1. Take a large square of fabric and fold in half on the diagonal. Pin.

2. Measure 2 cm away from the fold, all the way along. Draw a line with a pencil or a fabric pen.

3. From the line you have just drawn, measure 4 cm away from it all the way along. Draw another line.

If you need more bias strips, draw more lines 4 cm away from the last one.

4. Cut along the lines. This is easiest with a rotary cutter (affiliate link).

5. Join the strips together by pinning them at right angles and sewing across from corner to corner. Cut the corner off.

Now that your bias strips are ready, you can sew in the piping cord!

Making the Piping

Fold the bias strip in half lengthways and press with your finger. You don’t need a proper crease here, it’s just to get the cord in the middle.

Pop the cord inside the bias strip so that the cord is protruding beyond the end of the strip.

Sew along the folded bias strip close to the cord so that the cord is enclosed inside the bias strip. If you have a zip foot, using it will allow you to get closer to the piping cod than an ordinary foot will.

Leave a couple of cm free at the ends. You’ll need to be able to fold one end over the other when attaching the piping to your project.

Now you know how to sew piping, you need a project! Here’s a tutorial for a piped box cushion.

How To Applique: A Beginners’ Guide

April 1, 2017 · Leave a Comment

How To Applique: A Beginners’ Guide

Applique is a a french word that means apply. It’s generally used to describe the technique of sewing pieces of fabric to something to decorate it.

There are lots of uses for applique, and lots of fun, easy projects you can try. It’s great for decorating cushions and tea towels, bags and purses, you can even applique clothes if you want to!

You don’t even need to make something new. Applique can be added to things you have already as a way of personalising them.

If you’ve never tried applique before, it’s easy to do and the possibilities are endless! You don’t need anything special, just some fabric and some fusible interfacing. You can use your sewing machine, or you can applique by hand.

Here’s a beginners’ guide showing how to applique!

There are affiliate links included in this post.

Making Your Shapes

When planning your project, remember that simple shapes are easiest to sew. Avoid anything too fiddly or complicated and you stand more chance of ending up with something that looks lovely that you’re happy with.

If you need more detail on your applique, consider what you could do to achieve it. Embroidery, by hand or machine, or you could sew on buttons, beads or sequins.

If you have difficulty drawing freehand, there are plenty of places where you can find shapes for applique. In addition to free templates and tutorials on the internet, you can try stencils, clipart, precut paper shapes and cookie cutters.

Preparing Your Fabric

Applique works best with fabrics that are similar in weight. Appliqued shapes cut from lighter fabric sewn onto something heavier, like denim or canvas, is also usually fine. Try to avoid appliqueing heavier fabrics to lighter ones.

If the fabric being appliqued to is lighter, the lighter fabric is more likely to pucker, especially if you are using a zigzag stitch.

If this happens (or if you think it might happen), use some fusible interfacing to give the bottom fabric a bit more weight.

If you haven’t used interfacing before, it’s easy to identify which side is sticky. It’s usually the side that is either shiny or has raised bumps. Put the sticky side next to the fabric, then iron with a warm (not hot!) iron. To prevent sticky from ending up all over your iron, either iron on the fabric side (ie not the interfacing side), or use a tea towel over the top.

Fraying can be an issue with applique. This is also solved by adding some fusible interfacing to the wrong side of the fabric. If the fabric frays a lot, then fuse the interfacing to the fabric before cutting out the shapes.

Bondaweb can be used as an alternative to fusible interfacing for the shapes.More about that in a minute!

Appliqueing Your Shapes to Your Fabric

Once your shapes are cut out and you’ve put some fusible interfacing on that back, you can sew it to your fabric!

All you have to do is pin your shapes on, then sew around them.

Using bondaweb is an easy alternative to pins. This stuff is like fusible interfacing, but it’s sticky on both sides.

Just iron it on as you would with fusible interfacing, then peel the backing off. Put it onto your fabric, then iron it again and it will stick. This holds it in place nicely while you sew it on. It’s especially useful if you’re appliqueing tiny pieces where a pin would get in the way.

Which Stitch to Use?

It’s up to you!

Traditionally applique is sewn on using a satin stitch, which is basically a lot of zigzags all close together. This gives a nice, neat finish.

However, it’s perfectly fine to use a standard zigzag or even a straight stitch.

A straight stitch is a good choice, especially if you are planning to do some machine embroidery over the top. You might have a bit of an issue if the fabric frays as the straight stitches won’t cover the raw edges. As I mentioned before, bondaweb or fusible interfacing will help with fraying, but you might decide that the frayed edges actually give it a kind of charm that you like!

Zigzags are half way between a satin stitch and a straight stitch. The raw edges are sewn over, but they’re not completely covered. You could sew around your appliqued pieces once, or more if you want to.

Experiment with the size of stitches before you start. In theory, stitches that are visible should be longer. However, if you are sewing something small, using small stitches will be easier.

Depending on your sewing machine, you will be able to control the width of the zigzag stitches as well as the distance between them. Just have a bit of a practise first!

You can also applique by hand. For these felt birds, I appliqued the hearts using blanket stitch.

Do I Need a Special Foot For My Sewing Machine?

Apparently there are feet for applique. I have never used one.

If you have a fondness for sewing machine feet, here is an affiliate link for an applique foot. If your sewing machine came with one, you might fancy trying it out. But no, you don’t need one. It’s perfectly possible to applique without a special foot. However, if you have an embroidery foot with a transparent bit at the front, you might find this easier if you are appliqueing little bits of fabric.

If you are interested in finding out more about sewing machine feet, you might like to read this post here.

Some Applique Projects You Might Like to Try

Now that you know how to applique, you need a project!

Shopping bag with appliqued bunting

Reindeer cushion

Flower Purse Bunting Cushion

Linking up here.

Setting Yourself Up For Success: 15 Tips for Successful Sewing

March 22, 2017 · 8 Comments

Setting Yourself Up For Success: 15 Tips for Successful Sewing

The idea of setting yourself up for success is one of my favourite things at the moment.

I suspect people might think I have it all together. I really don’t!

Recently I started the Flylady thing again as the mess in my house was out of control. A big part of this is that we’ve been redoing the kitchen, but it’s not all kitchen stuff! I’m finding it very difficult juggling everything at the moment and feeling that I’m failing is not very nice.

So I set myself up for success. The Flylady is about keeping on top of things. Even tiny things like putting all the shoes onto the shoe rack in pairs, or making the boys’ lunches the night before, can make a huge difference to how smoothly things go in the morning.

This idea can be applied to sewing too!

Here are my tips for successful sewing and what you can do to set yourself up for success.

15 Tips For Successful Sewing

Before You Start

Decide When to Make Your Thing

Identifying some time when you can work on your project greatly increases the chance of you actually doing it! Just sticking it on your to do list isn’t enough. You need to decide when.

Finding time can by tricky, especially when you are busy. If you need some ideas of how to find time to make stuff, there are some tips here.

Find a Place Where You Work

It’s much easier if you have somewhere where you can leave things out while you have a project going on. If you can find yourself a space, you can also get things ready beforehand. That way, when you’re ready to start, you can get going straight away.

If you live in a small house and/ or have lots of kids, this can be difficult. Remember, it doesn’t need to be a whole room! Just a corner where you can leave your sewing machine out. I’ve written a post about finding a space to sew which you can read here.

Check That You Have Everything You Need

It is very frustrating to start making something, only to discover that actually you need velcro, or that you don’t have thread in the right colour.

Even if you live opposite a shop that sells this kind of thing, the shop is unlikely to be open at 5 am, in the evening or on a Sunday afternoon. So check that you have everything first!

When you do have everything, it’s a good idea to put it in a box or a basket. Then you can put the box or basket near your sewing machine and you won’t end up wasting time hunting for stuff because you can’t remember where you put it (been there! 😉 )

Check That You Know What To Do

If you’re using a pattern or a tutorial, read through it a couple of times so that you know what you’ve got to do.

You might decide that you want to do things in a slightly different way.

You might want to change the order of the steps, or do something else differently, like add a button instead of a zip, or add an appliqued design.

It might be that you want to make things easier, like sew bias binding to a curved hem or a neckline, instead of hemming or using facings.

If there’s a technique you’re not sure of, take some time to have a think about how you’re going to do it. You can find out how to do pretty much anything online. YouTube especially is very good for this.

Other Things You Can Do Beforehand

Thread your machine with the correct thread.

Make sure that you have anything else you might need to hand. This will probably include pins in a pincushion, scissors, unpicker, tailors’ chalk, tape measure.

If you’re making clothes for yourself, check your measurements against those on the pattern. Jot them down so that you don’t end up having to re measure yourself.

Get any other measuring done before you start and write it down somewhere.

If you’re using a digital pattern, print out pattern pieces and instructions.

Iron your fabric.

Iron pattern pieces if you’re using a paper pattern.

While Sewing

If you need a break, take one. Studies have shown that less breaks actually mean lower productivity. Having a break is not a waste of time!

If you are tired, go to bed. Last summer I made a dress for a family party. I sat up late and I rushed it. The dress ended up being a total car crash and I couldn’t wear it. I had to buy something instead.

Take time to do the things that will make a difference to the finish. Trim your seams in half. Finish the raw edges. Press your seams. If you need to let something hang over night, then let it hang. Don’t rush it!

Try to keep tidy. I want to take my own advice on this one! If you put things back where they live, fold up fabric and move it once you’ve finished cutting out and generally control the mess, you’ll waste less time hunting for things and there’ll be less to clear up at the end.

In the End

Sometimes things go wrong. To borrow some words from Robert Burns, sometimes the best laid plans of mice and men go awry. Not everything is within our control.

Yet by following these tips for successful sewing, taking a little bit of time to do some preparation before you start, and taking time where it counts, lots of little things that could go wrong probably won’t.

If things do go wrong, well, this is why you need to locate your unpicker before you start! And lots of mistakes can be disguised with a ruffly flower 🙂

If you have made something and it’s not gone according to plan, you might like to read this post about what you can do when a sewing project goes wrong.

Linking up here.

How to Make a DIY Body Form

March 14, 2017 · 13 Comments

How to Make a DIY Body Form

A dress form is a very useful item to have if you make your own clothes. Draping, pinning and adjusting are all tricky to do on yourself, especially if you don’t have a kind friend who you can call on to help, or a husband who won’t mess it up!

However, the adjustable sort can be expensive and the non adjustable kind might not be the same size as you.

Thankfully there is an alternative! In this post, Maggie from All Free Sewing shows how to make a diy body form from duct tape.

Hello all you happy sewers!

My name is Maggie Connelly and I am the editor for AllFreeSewing.com. Anna is kindly letting me post here so that I can show you guys how to make a DIY Body Form. Now you don’t have to worry or fuss with trying on your sewing project numerous times. Making a body form that perfectly matches your body and proportions is a fantastic way to cut down some time in finishing up your sewing project.

Don’t bother wasting any more time trying on an altering that dress or skirt or blouse you’ve been working on. The great benefit of creating a body form that perfectly matches your body is that you know what the garment you are trying on is going to look like. You don’t have to follow a pattern just to see that once you make the alterations it doesn’t look like you had hoped. Skip the disappointment and wasted time and get started on creating basically your body double.

Materials
Pillow
Duct Tape
T-shirt (oversized)
Saran wrap
Loose Fiber Fill
Scissors

Instructions for How to Create Your Own Body Form

Note: If you are making this body form for yourself, you are going to need some help in creating it, as you will be the “model” in the instructions.

1. Wrap Saran wrap around the base of your model’s, or your own, neck. (This will prevent you from getting duct tape on the neck).

2. Using short lengths of tape, from the back, pull the t-shirt tight, and tape it into place.

Pro Tip: “You don’t really need to worry about wrinkles in your t-shirt. However, since the t-shirt is going to be large, you will want to tape it to fit the model simply because it can become very uncomfortable as you continue to tape” – Mary Beth Temple

3. Tape up the entire t-shirt. Be careful to not make the shirt too tight. Start with a criss-cross pattern at the top of the neckline to cover the shoulders. You will want to be using a dark or colorful tape to contrast against your white t-shirt as well, so that you can make sure you are fully covering the entire shirt.

4. Make sure while you continue to wrap, that one strand of tape wraps around the next.

5. When you get under the arm, use wider strips and let them overlap to the front as you continue to tape.

6. Be sure to only go 3-5 inches below the hipline, but not any further.

7. Going back to the front on the shirt, after you have your criss-cross completed, go side-to-side with the rest of the front side of the shirt.

8. Place some strips around the collar and each shoulder to know where to cut to keep a clean line.

9. To keep the bottom of the body form smooth, start at the bottom and spin around and around as high as you can go.

10. Turn your model around and prepare to cut all the way up the back. Be sure to only cut the t-shirt and not any other clothing the model may be wearing.

11. Stuff your dress form as tightly as possible using loose fiber fill, starting with the bust area.

12. Use a polyester pillow to take up most of the space for your body form.

13. Tuck your sleeves inside of the form to keep the stuffing from leaking out.

14. Work from the waist out and tape.

15. Make sure you have enough stuffing in the shoulders to keep them from collapsing.

16. Tape across the neckline to keep the stuffing from leaking out. Be sure to not apply too much pressure but simply lay the tape across the top so that you do not create a flat or caved in neck and shoulders area.

17. Tuck your pillow up as far as it will go and tuck the ends of your shirt over the pillow. Then tape it all in place to keep the pillow from falling out.

Now that you have your own personal body form ready to go, why not test it out with some new sewing patterns? Check out this amazing collection of 35 FREE Printable Sewing Patterns just for you!

How to Take Measurements When Making Clothes

How to Take Your Measurements

Before you Start

What to Measure

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How To Sew Piping

How To Sew Piping

Making the Bias Strips

Making the Piping

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How To Applique: A Beginners’ Guide

Making Your Shapes

Preparing Your Fabric

Appliqueing Your Shapes to Your Fabric

Which Stitch to Use?

Do I Need a Special Foot For My Sewing Machine?

Some Applique Projects You Might Like to Try

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Setting Yourself Up For Success: 15 Tips for Successful Sewing

15 Tips For Successful Sewing

Before You Start

Decide When to Make Your Thing

Find a Place Where You Work

Check That You Have Everything You Need

Check That You Know What To Do

Other Things You Can Do Beforehand

While Sewing

In the End

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How to Make a DIY Body Form

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