Project Run and Play: Playground Skirt Tutorial

Today we are lucky enough to have someone who is not only awesome in blogland but is awesome in person...besides being adorable she is just genuinely nice. Really, she is...every time we've had the pleasure to be in her company she has been nothing but friendly, sweet, and someone I'd like to have for a neighbor. (Isn't good to know there are still people like her around? ) It's Becky from Ucreate sharing a skirt tutorial that I wish I would have thought of....

(PS---After reading all about her great skirt scroll down to the post below to read your invitation to our sewing night next week!)

Hi there, I am Becky from Ucreate and I am so excited to be here sharing my Simple Playground Skirt Tutorial with you.

When Elizabeth & Liz {who I affectionately call the Liz’s} contacted me about Skirting the Issue I was thrilled to participate! In choosing what to make, I wanted to something that was super easy, took hardly any time, and could be mass produced if desired. So I chose to make one of my favorite childhood skirts, but with knit so it would be more breezy and soft.

Supply List:

old jeans

1 yard of knit fabric

plenty of pins

and other sewing essentials

Instructions:

Because we are working with denim and denim frays in the wash, the first thing I did was serge the raw edge.

Take the two knit pieces and sew the short edges together making a circle.

On the top of your skirt body, sew a basting stitch (wide loose stitch)…twice. Mine are about 1/2 inch apart. These don’t have to be perfect because they will be removed later.

Make sure to leave the beginning and ending threads about 2-3 inches long for ruffling.

Pin the side seams of the skirt body to the side seams of the old jeans so they line up nice and pretty.

Take the middle of your skirt front and pin it to the middle of your old jeans…the middle is the zipper so I went over just a bit.

Now find the middle in between the seam pin and the zipper pin of your skirt body and pin it to the old jeans.

Now find the middle of the fabric on each side of the pin you just put in and pin those in place to the old jeans.

This process will help the ruffling of the skirt body look even and lay better. The front look like this when you are done.

Now do the back!

Now find the top threads from where you started your basting stitch and gently pull until the fabric begins to bunch.

Spread the bunched fabric out and gently pull the threads a little more. Keep spreading the bunching around the skirt until you have about the same amount of pleats or bunching between each pin.

For the back, I flipped the skirt over and pulled the ending threads (instead of the beginning ones on the front) and worked the bunching through the pins in the back.

I find it is easier that way. A little manipulation is required through this whole process.

Now take your beautifully ruffled skirt and sew everything in place by sewing a basic stitch all the way around in between the two basting stitches.

Make sure to sew this stitch at your default setting and not the loose basting stitch you did earlier. {I learned the hard way.}

Once you have a secured basic stitch it is time to pull out the basting threads. I love doing this because you don’t have to be careful. Just yank and get that thread out.