Welcome to Day 1 of the sew along. Today we are making a cute recycled ruffle skirt. This is sooooo easy. You are going to love it.
1. Start by laying out your pair of kids jeans. I like to do it back pocket side up because that gives me a good idea of where to cut. Cut below the back pockets all the way across.
2. You will end up with a skirt that looks like this. Now if you were a teenager in today's world you might call this day time wear and head off to school or the mall in it but not here on Small Fry. Notice how the front pockets kinda hang out the bottom. Trim off any that hangs out. First what little kids uses their pockets and second we will stitch over them in the coming steps.
3. Using one of the t-shirts cut off the bottom hem. Discard this.
3. Next cut a strip of fabric to make your ruffle. The skirt I am making is for my 15 month old so I didn't want to have my ruffles too long. If you are making a skirt for an older child you will want to make your ruffle pieces longer or add more all together. I cut my first strip 2" wide.
It should be one continuous piece (forming a circle).
4. Using a basting stitch, stitch all around your piece at 5/8".
5. Start and stop right before and after one of the side seams.
6. Pull on your strings to gather the piece.
7. Turn the ruffle piece so that you will have the right side of the ruffle and the right side of the skirt matching. Match up both of your sides seams on the ruffle (the original shirt seams) to the side seams on the skirt. Pin in place all around and adjust gathers as needed.
Make sure you catch the bottom of the pockets you cut off when pinning.
8. Return your machine to a normal stitch length and stitch all the way around the bottom of the skirt at 5/8". If you are really careful and lucky you will sew right over your basting stitches. Backstitch start and stop.
9. Trim threads and press the ruffle down.
10. Next cut your second ruffle piece from the other t-shirt you bought or the same one as above only this time add an inch to your width (so this strip will be 3 inches). Every ruffle you add you will add an extra inch to the width (though don't get too carried away because it will be a lot for your machine to sew through). Repeat all of the same steps as above to create a ruffle.
11. Pin this ruffle with the right side towards the wrong side of the previous ruffle (see picture). Stitch all the way around like you did before. Trim threads, turn and press ruffles down.
It should look like this. That is it-you did it!!!.
Here is my little pumpkins skirt.
Here is the one I made for Small Fry.
And here are my beautiful models:
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I love these! Can't wait to make some for my girls! Thanks for sharing! :)
ReplyDeleteYou don't hem the ruffles? How do these hold up in the wash?
ReplyDeleteI can't believe how easy this is and how cute it turns out. I have some jeans and shirts that would be perfect for this. My girls will be thrilled!
ReplyDeleteThank you! I just cut up 2 pairs of jeans but then froze because I wasn't sure how to attach the ruffles.
ReplyDelete