Craft Day Saturday - Sew a Skirt

Last weekend's CDS was all about transformations - making something you already have in your closet into something a little different. I took two dresses of mine and made them into skirts...which I have already worn.

I was going to share my process of altering the dresses today, but while doing some pinning this week I found this tutorial from Dana Made It which would have made my life so much easier!

DanaMadeIt

Her process, in a nutshell, sew two equally sized rectangles of fabric together, rights sides together. Turn right side out and fold in the top a little wider than the width of the elastic. Sew the fold down leaving a small opening at one of the side seams for the elastic. Feed elastic through the opening and then sew the ends into the side seam.

Seriously, if you want to sew a skirt and don't have a ton of sewing experience, like me, check out her post.

But, in case your are curious, here is what I did with my dress-turned-skirt:

I laid out the dress and found the point of the dress I wanted to make the cut. I chose the area right under the bust and where the zipper ended. Once the dress is cut, find the two quarter points between the side seams. I just folded the skirt in half and put a pin in to mark the folds.

I then took the elastic and pulled it around the point between my natural waist and hips where I wear most of my skirts. I pulled it just taught enough so that it would be comfortable around my waist then I sewed the ends together.

Like with the skirt, I found the mid-points in the elastic by folding it in half and marking the folds with a pin.

Once I had all the quarters marked on the elastic, I pinned the right-side (if there is one) of the elastic to the right-side of the fabric. That means that the elastic is around the front of the skirt. I then matched the elastic marks with the skirt marks 

To sew in the elastic, I pulled the elastic with my left hand so that the fabric would lay flat and not bunch. It was actually much easier than I expected. Once I got all the way around the skirt, I folded the elastic up. If I had really nice elastic in a different color, I would have stopped right there and made the elastic visible.

Unfortunately, I could only find this lame white elastic. To hide the elastic, I did two different things with the skirts. On the blue skirt, I folded the elastic in, pinned it down, and sewed the elastic down into the skirt creating a waistband. On the pink skirt, I didn't sew the elastic down (I got lazy), so there is no apparent waistband.

I am pretty happy with how they (sorry, no good pictures of me wearing the blue skirt) turned out and I encourage all of you to either go sew your own skirt or find a dress in your closet you never wear anymore and turn it into a skirt.

Have a great weekend!