Skirts for Skirting the Issue

I have made these two cotton skirts, both size 3-4T to donate to girls in foster care. I hope they are going to make two little girls, who have not had the easy carefree life any child deserves, a little bit more happy!

This is part of Skirting the Issue - a great great initiative from the women behind the blogs Project Run & Play and Simple Simon & Co.

Click on the button below and read more:

Mini jersey dress

Making a 'well known' (at least to me) model into a mini baby version is always fun. I made this dress to my two year old a couple of months ago (you can see it HERE in my very first post on this blog) and when my sister saw that she promptly ordered - no wait she said she REALLY wished for one for her at that time new born daughter. And there is nothing a proud aunt would rather do than to make something for her first niece (I also have a nephew but I don't think he would look good in this dress). That dress was sent to Denmark before I was even thinking I should have taken a photo of it. Soooo when a friend here in the neighborhood recently had a girl I got another chance and here you see it. I hope she is too busy with the baby to check my blog because she has actually not received it yet.

I realize now that I see this photo that this was one of those thing that should have had a box of matches, a pencil or some other well known sized thing to compare the size of this dress to because it is actually smaller than it appears in the photo. I would say it is a size 3-6 months.

Let's hope the Mommy likes it....I am pretty sure the baby could not care less.

Oh, I have an update...The Mom has now gotten the dress and loves it AND so does the baby.....which I should have known since she comes from a truly wonderful family.

Remember if you like what you see and read on this blog you have several ways not to miss another post. See the right side column for Facebook, Bloglovin' and Google Friend Connect options. I would love to have you onboard! 

Skirting the Issue.

Okay I just have to tell you about this great project that I want as many people as possible to know about. The blog Simple Simon & Co is behind this project that almost makes me cry thinking about it....getting people to sew and donate skirts for girls in foster care. I mean if there is any children who deserves any kind of pampering that would be the ones, right!Jump right over to their blog and read all about it, please!

And if you are new to sewing but would like to help I just want to remind you of this very easy skirt incl. full tutorial that I posted a little while back. Click on the photo and you will be taken straight to the post (told you I was going to learn some things along the way, yay!)

Thank you!

Shirt dress with shirring.

Finally some news here on the blog. 

This dress has been underway for a long time. I ran out of fabric (Little Lizzette Collection) and my local JoAnn Store had in the mean time sold out. When I found it at their online store on sale for 50% off almost felt lucky I ran out.....until I realized their shipping was endless. Maybe I was just unlucky (I have never bought anything with them online before) but when they shipped the fabric it took two full weeks before I received it...what? I got it the day before we left for California for two weeks and it has taken me another week here at home to finish it. Hmmm yeah it was just like the sun and the pool were more interesting.

I am sure you recognize the top part from THIS shirt. It is very typical me to draft a pattern for a top, sew it and when I look at the result decide that I have to develop the top pattern into a dress pattern....or the other way around.                                                                                              

I did have a fitting on Wilma to determine the length of the skirt part but when it was done it was still too long....well, at least if I wanted to follow my initial vision of having the belt cover the waist seam. But there was no way I was going to change that when the dress was done and when I look at these photos I actually like the low 'waist' seam and the belt higher up - one of those lucky things I guess! 

Vacation

W's sweatshirt dress is from Soft Gallery and my talented good friend Rikke has made E's owl dress (now top).

We are going on a kind of a vacation. We live on the East coast, Husband/Daddy works at a project on the West coast at the moment and we are going to pay him a visit for two weeks so he does not have to fly back and forward.

We are very excited! And the blog will be very quiet for a couple of weeks.

By the way here is another version of the color block leggings. And again I was tricked by knit fabric. This time in the not-so-strectchy-knit-fabric way and these are very tight and almost too low waist for them - argh! I told you knit fabrics can be tricky to sew with.

Whatever....California here we come!

A-line skirt with snaps and pockets.

I have mentioned a couple of times now in earlier posts that I used to have a fashion business in Denmark years back.  I drafted all the patterns myself - in the very beginning did I even sew the production myself later just all the salesmen samples....urgh THAT was hard work!
I have of course saved all those patterns and this skirt has long been on my list to sew for myself. It was from one of the collections where I got my act together and had a factory to sew my production. But that also meant that if a style did not sell enough then it became to expensive to produce and therefor got cancelled and that happened to this one. I think it got overruled by a very popular skirt dress with the same features that was also in that collection. See photo further down. I am still wearing that shirt dress by the way even though it is now like 6 years old.
I used a lot of cotton sateen with a bit of stretch in my collections back then. I still love that type of fabric. I love that it is cotton but the slightly shiny surface of the fabric adds an interesting dimension. Like with so many others things it took me a while to realize what the English word for that type of fabric was - I am not even sure I know what the Danish word is but that was not a problem since I bought my fabric after seeing it and touching it at a store, fabric fair etc. But here in the US I have only shopped as a private person and mostly online so I have not sewed with cotton sateen for a while....until like I said I finally realized the name: COTTON SATEEN yay!
I even found almost the same beautiful navy blue one that I used in my collection back then. Of course when I bought it I just bought my usual 1 yard (back then not yet decided what to do) and it turned out that that model in my size used a little bit more. Soooooo I ended up doing what I do in so many of my sewing projects.....mixing fabrics. And I must say I love the result. I know that the original one is much more versatile and goes with everything but this one definitely has a bit more character, right!
The lime fabric is corduroy and the check fabric is a thin wool cut on the bias - simply because I liked that look better. (all three fabrics bought on http://www.fabric.com/ by the way.)

Pockets!

The awake reader (anyone?) may wonder why there are no photos of me from the behind wearing the skirt. Well ahem let's just say that my sweet neighbor (who I forced to take these photos) and I were more busy talking than checking details like big grandma underpants showing through. 

But as you can see on this photo it is very simple on the back.

A detail shot of the top of the skirt. Because the check fabric is wool I put the corduroy fabric inside the waistband to avoid any itching. Plus I am planning on wearing this in the summer too (I skipped the lining I had in the original one for that reason too) and you don't need a wool waistband directly on your skin in North Carolina's heat....like at all!

A detail shot of the hem made with homemade bias tape of the lime corduroy fabric. 

Photo: Kasper Thye. Model: Kristina

Here you see the original skirt from my AW2006 collection.

Photo: Kasper Thye. Model: Kristina

And here is the dress in the same fabric with the same pockets, snaps and lines that won the buyers' hearts compared to the skirt. Can't blame them.

Cotton summer skirts.

Over at the blog Crafterhours Skirt Week 2012 (which really is a month but who is counting) is in full swing and that made me think about what skirts I have made lately. And my next thought was that they would be kind of perfect to show here on the blog so here we go.....

It is basically the same skirt in two different fabrics and with the only difference that the orange is fuller than the leopard and the leopard has deeper pockets (which you can't see from the outside but they fit my long monkey arms better).

I made the orange one first for a vacation in Florida earlier in the year and even though I was happy with the result (except for the not deep enough pockets) my original idea was a skirt less full.....and that is where the leopard one comes in the picture because that was the next attempt. 

The orange fabric is 100% quilting cotton from Kaffe Fassett Collective 2010 Dapple Orange. The leopard fabric is a crispy cotton poplin (both bought a www.fabric.com). 

The model itself is very simple - if we can just forget the pockets at first (and still with pockets is it a project a new beginner could do). Basically two rectangles sewn together, gathered and sewn on to a bit smaller waistband. Divide the waistband into 4 casings/canals, put elastic in at a length that fit the place you want to skirt to sit (waist, below waist etc) in the 3 bottom casings, hem the skirt and wupti you are done. 

And no this was not a full tutorial. It should be enough though for a more experienced sewer to understand what to do when they get the measurements later in this post. If you are a not such an experienced sewer (and you are very welcome here too) I would recommend you to go to this very talented lady's website: Marapytta. It is in Danish (because Line is Danish and live in Denmark so I guess that is kind of fair enough.) BUT the DIY I am going to tell you about has brilliant photos and you should be able to figure it out from them. 
It is this DIY that taught me to make the waistband a bit smaller than the skirt piece in skirts with elastic waists because then you are dividing the gathering better by using both gathering thread which will be fixated when you sew the waistband on the skirt and elastic that gives the waistband flexibility. Clever! 

A closer look at the elastic waistband and front pockets. A piping along the pocket opening would be a nice detail by the way.

The orange skirt has a finished bottom circumference of 210 cm (82.6 inches). The leopard is 150 cm (59 inches) all the way around. This still gives plenty of gathering at the waist and room to take steps without need of a slit but it does have a less full look. I like and wear them both for everyday life but my favorite at the moment is the leopard one. Which one is yours?

Yeah I know what you are thinking....she should have ironed her skirt before she took photos (I know I would!) .....and I DID iron it! But like I mentioned before the fabric is kind of crispy (like nice bedsheets) and lazy me are throwing garments like that in the tumble dryer and that has given it some crinkles that does not go away...at least not with my household iron. Oh well it is an everyday cotton skirt and my everyday can take some crinkles.

Last shot from the back of the skirt.....and of the fence that needs painting. But we are still expatriates and are renting this house so not our problem - phew!

Because the skirt itself is so simple I would definitely recommend to make a big hem like I have done on these two skirts (9+1 cm (4 inches)). It is one of those tricks that makes your garments look more exclusive and nice simply because of that extra fabric that has been used. An extra bonus is that that is very easy to do in a skirt that has a square pattern/starting point like this one. 
If you were making a skirt from a circle pattern you would have to make a separate facing to make a high hem like this because well that is simple mathematics (even though it is going to sound complicated in writing, sorry!)....the circle's circumference is much higher on the outside than further up on the circle where you have to stitch the hem to the skirt. Got it? I hope! Otherwise forget about it because this skirt's hem is straight and therefor you simply add whatever length of hem you want to the pattern. 

And the tutorial for this hem is fold, iron, sew, iron, done!

Okay so since I just posted a detailed full sewing tutorial for this skirt I thought that I would focus more on the pattern in this post.

Here you see the back skirt pattern piece. This pattern piece is made 'to fold' which means the CB (center back) will be where the fold is and the piece of fabric you cut after this pattern will be double size in the width. To do it this way is simply just a way to save paper  and you can of course only do it to patterns pieces that are symmetrical. 

Here you see the front skirt pattern piece. This also has to be cut 'to fold'. You can make your side pockets round or straight or square (Yippie, more options!)

When you decide on your type of pocket you draw the line and then add the sewing allowance you sew with. I use 1 cm.

 

Before you cut out your pocket opening on the front skirt piece you have to make a what I call a back pocket bag. This pattern piece is going to fill out the front skirt piece so that it becomes a full rectangle again - you are going to cut of the corners for pocket openings remember. 

By the way you can see here that I have extended the pattern for the leopard version so the pocket became deeper.

Here you see the front pocket bag pattern. This is made by tracing your pocket opening and then trace the back pocket so the front and back pocket is the exact same size.

Last pattern piece is for the waistband. Again I have made this 'to fold' so what you see here is half of the fabric piece you are going to end up with after cutting. By the way you need two pieces - a front and a back.

Some measurements would probably help the project along too.
Since this skirts is made of big rectangles that you gather together with elastic the only measurement that has to fit you precisely is the length of the elastic you put in the waistband. And the length of the skirt.
I am a size 38-40 (US: 6-8) and I should mean this skirt could be used for size 34-42 (US: 2-10) - with different length elastic in the waistband. 
I am 178 cm tall (5"10) and I have made the finished skirt 61 cm (24 inches).

I will give you the measurements of the pattern pieces as you see them on the photos above. 
Remember the patterns are made 'to fold' and you have to multiply with two to get the full front (or back) width and four to get the full skirt's or waistband's circumference. 

Front + back skirt (orange - fuller skirt): 
Width: 52.5+1 cm = 53.5 cm (width, skirt+seam allowance)
Length: 1+56+10 cm = 67 cm (seam allowance, top+length skirt+seam allowance, hem)
Front + back skirt (leopard - less full skirt):

Width: 37.5+1 cm = 38.5 cm (width, skirt+seam allowance)

Length: 1+56+10 cm = 67 cm (seam allowance, top+length skirt+seam allowance, hem)

Front + back waistband (orange & leopard): 

Width: 29+1 cm = 30 cm (width, waistband+seam allowance)

Height: 1+5+5+1 cm = 12 cm (seam allowance+waistband, outside+ waistband, inside+seam allowance)

The pockets are obviously hard to give measurements to because of the round lines but I will give you the width and height of the pocket bag and then I am sure you figure out the rest. Besides even the height and width will depend on what type/style of side pocket you decide to make.

Front and back pocket bag (orange & leopard): 

Width: 1+16+1 cm = 18 cm (seam allowance+pocket+ seam allowance)

Height: 1+32.5+1 cm = 34.5 cm (seam allowance+pocket+ seam allowance)

If you are wondering why the measurements are only in cm it is because I still do not know what you Americans are using as seam allowance but I can recommend www.metric-conversions.org. Please let me know if I can help in any way!

Okay, I think we are through here.

This skirt is only for private use.

Happy sewing!