Category Archives: sewing

DIY Elastic Waistband Pajama Pants

November 23, 2014sewing, tutorialzontziry

One of my new favorite quick projects is making G new pajama pants. From about two yards of fabric, I can get two pairs of pajama pants done. The pattern comes from a pair of elastic waistband pants he already has, making this adjustable for any size, from baby to adult. Here’s the tutorial! (Note: this tutorial is pretty image-heavy!)

Measurements you’ll need

Waist circumference

Supplies you’ll need

A pair of elastic waistband pants that currently fits
1 yard of flannel fabric (though cotton, fleece, and knits would all work, too)
Pins
Thread to match
Sewing machine
Fabric scissors
Pajama/underwear elastic (1-inch elastic)

ready to sew — Supplies – except for the pins.

Basic Steps

1. First, cut your elastic to the waist size needed. Set that aside. Get the pattern pants, and turn them inside-out. Fold them in half and pull out the seat seam so that it is sticking out.

2. Fold your fabric in half length-wise. Now fold it again length-wise. I usually pull the selvage/raw edge back far enough to allow for a nice extra seam all the way around the pants.

3. Line up the pants along the fold, NOT the selvage edge (the raw edge of the fabric). Leave about two inches along the top and bottom for hemming and attaching the elastic.

4. If you want, you can draw an outline around the pants, giving yourself an extra 1/2 inch away from the pattern pants. Otherwise, start cutting about 1/2 inch away from the seams of the pants (though leave that couple of inches at top and bottom). Whatever you do, do NOT keep in line with the slant at the top of the pants. That slant happens because the elastic draws that fabric in. Instead, after the curve in the seat of the pants, cut straight up to allow enough room for the pants to go over hips. (Trust me, I followed the entire line of the pants once and had to put all of that fabric in my scrap bin.)

lined up with the fold — Line up with the fold.

Note the waist is wider than the waistband of the pattern pants.

5. You should now have two halves of pants ready to go. Pull them apart, flip them around so that the printed part of the fabric is facing each other, and line them up, right-side-in.

6. Sew from the waist down to the seat on both sides. Do NOT sew the legs. (Again, I say this from experience. If you sew all the way down on both sides, you end up with a really weird looking skirt.)

nosewlongseamfirst — Careful where you sew!

waist to seat — Sew from the waist down to the seat.

7. Pull the two halves apart and line up the seams you just made. These seams will be the center front and center back of the waist. This should automatically make the legs fold in half.

line up waist seams — Line up the seams.

8. Keep the legs unfolded for now so that you can easily hem them. To hem, fold the bottom of each pant leg up about 1/4-1/2 inch, then fold again. You should have a double-fold now for the hem. If you’re a diligent sewer, you should iron this seam. I’m not a diligent sewer.

9. Sew the hem for each leg of the pants. Here, you can use a trick from quilting. Once you’re done with the hem on one leg, just feed the next leg through. In quilting, this is strip-piecing. You’ll be capturing the seam with a cross-seam when you sew the legs of the pants, so you don’t really need to worry about anchor-stitching the hems that much.

9. If you strip-pieced the hems, snip the thread keeping the two pieces together. Fold the pant legs in half, lining up the edges. Start at one ankle and sew all the way up one leg, across the seat, and down the other leg.

lining up the seams — Line up the seams.

10. Admire the fact you are looking at a pair of pants…almost. Set the pants aside and sew your elastic into a ring by overlapping the ends and sewing it together.

making an elastic ring — Overlap the elastic and sew together.

11. Fold the top of the waist down 1/4 inch twice (double-fold) and sew.

11. Slip the elastic ring inside the waistband of the pants. Line up the part of the elastic you sewed together with the center back seam and pin. Fold the elastic in half to find the center of the ring, then pin that to the front seam. You’ll notice the elastic is smaller than the waist of the pants.

pinned elastic — Pin the elastic to the pants.

12. Starting at the back seam, pull the elastic tight and start sewing a 1/4 inch seam all the way around, taking the pin out when you reach the front of the pants.

elastic_pulled_tight — Pull that elastic tight!

elastic waist sewn — Sew all the way around.

13. Pull the pants right-side-out, flip the elastic up, and admire the fact you now have a pair of elastic waist pajama pants!

14. Put the pants on the kiddo, and relish in the smiles.

Some Christmas Crafts from 2013

December 28, 2013crafts, quilting, sewingzontziry

This year’s Christmas crafts:

Star Trek lap quilt for my dad, who helped introduce me to science fiction. I used 10.5-inch blocks, and I quilted using stars, Star Trek insignias, and outlines of the Enterprise (following the icons on the front of the quilt).

A table runner for my mother. I used leftover fat eighths I had from the lap quilt I made for myself this last spring. I sewed a couple of big nine-patches, then cut them in fourths for a disappearing nine-patch runner with a fat eighth in between. I really enjoyed playing with the disappearing nine-patch here.

A Hello Kitty pincushion for my very good friend and a couple of owl pillows for her and her guy. I made the owls using super soft fleece for one; the other has a head made from quilting cotton and a body made of super soft fleece. I finally used up my three bags of stuffing on these projects!

A few hot pads for my mother-in-law. I made a lot of these until finally finding the thickness that seemed to work best (2 pieces batting and one piece InsulBright thermal batting).

It’s been a busy Christmas week, but I have loved the chance to sew up this storm!! I haven’t done much sewing since going back to work full time. That’s been good for my fabric hoarding, but I miss the therapy of creating something. Too bad I can’t take my sewing machine on the bus!

A Weekend of Skirts

September 16, 2013blessings, sewingknit, sewing for home, skirtszontziry

I seem to have reached a crossing point in my sewing. I have crossed from going to a store to find myself a skirt first to going to the fabric store to see if there is any fabric on sale that I can make a skirt from first.

That’s a big step.

That’s the step into the land of crazy.

But that’s also the step I found myself taking a couple of weekends ago when I needed to give my wardrobe a little bit of a business-style refresh. See, I have been making comfy, cute skirts and sundresses for myself over the past two years, but when it comes to something I feel comfortable wearing into an office…let’s just say my retro mushroom skirt with leggings probably isn’t going to do the trick.

So, needing at least one office-worthy skirt that would also be comfy, wouldn’t make me feel horrible when I looked at the size, and would be flattering, I decided to head to my local Joann’s Fabric to check out what they had in jersey knits that was on super clearance (i.e., they had a 50% off clearance fabric sale happening right when I needed to make a skirt for office-wear).

Thankfully, I found two knits that I loved! The first was a simple black jersey; the second was a charcoal and green striped jersey. Both were supple and soft. I decided to go for a maxi-style for the stripe and a mid-length for the black. I also had tons of yardage of a mauve-toned jersey that someone from church gave away as she was moving away. I decided to try out a fold-down yoga skirt tutorial I had pinned long time ago.

The first skirt was done using the mauve print; the photos were taken with my phone, so I apologize for the fuzziness. The first skirt took the longest, as well. I failed to read and realize that, when gathering fabric, you need to hold BOTH the top AND the bobbin threads. I kept gathering fabric, only holding the top thread, only to find I was just pulling the top thread out! It took me awhile to get the hang of gathering fabric — I kept waiting for the threads to break! Thankfully, they didn’t break, and I was able to get my gathers done and serged into place with the waistband.

With that experience under my belt, I tackled the black and striped knits. For the black knit, I decided to cut the body of the skirt to have an a-line that would minimize the gathering. I did this mainly because after trying on the mauve skirt, I wasn’t too keen on how the gathered look…looked. The odd thing with the black skirt is that after sewing and serging, it ended up with the angled look. That was entirely accidental, but I rather like it now! The maxi skirt was done as a simple a-line, but I used the tutorial for the yoga skirt to help me with the waistband. I just made sure the top of the skirt was as wide was my waistband when cutting.

What I love most about these three skirts is they took me a weekend, they are flattering, comfy, simple, and cost a total of $19 in fabric. Hurray for sewing!!!

A little trip to the stars

August 24, 2013quilting, sewingpiecing, quilting, star trekzontziry

I have a new project. It’s taken awhile for me to get going on it, but the pieces are cut and they are coming together.

Here is the project:

My current project, only I think mine is going to end up rather bright…

Here are a few photos of some of the blocks I’m working on for this. They were taken on my phone, so they’re a bit small, but I hope they give you an idea of what’s getting sewn. I’m a little worried about this all being a little too colorful, but we’ll see what happens.

Butterflies

July 9, 2013quilting, sewingzontziry

While it’s still on the machine, I thought I’d post a few photos of the quilting for my chain quilt. I went with a meandering butterfly, kind of like the one seen in Winnie the Pooh. I love how it keeps the flowery feel without needing to repeat the flowers themselves. On to binding!

Modified Wiggly Whimsy = Linked Chain

July 5, 2013quilting, sewingpiecing, quilt patternzontziry

A few weeks ago, I was looking at my latest precuts purchase, a jelly roll (set of 2 1/2 inch strips) and a charm pack (set of 5 inch blocks), wondering what to do with them. I came across the Wiggly Whimsy pattern and figured I would invert the pattern. Where it called for white, I would use the prints I had, and where it called for prints, I would use white.

From Moda Bake Shop.

In my mind, the result would be a quit that looked like it had a scattering of white blocks instead of a scattering of colors. As I was finishing the quilt top, I decided to keep the white sashing between columns. The result was a linked chain effect. (Sidenote: I didn’t see the linked chain pattern until showing this quilt top to family. I had the original pattern of scattered small blocks still stuck in my mind.)

Finished quilt top.

Closer view of the finished quilt top.

In person, the green fabric doesn’t seem to be as strong as it does in the photos. It seemed a little stronger than the other fabrics when I was piecing the quilt, but the photos make it stand out a lot more.

I’m excited to quilt this! I have no idea what design I’ll use, but I’m thinking I might do flowers in the sashing to echo the floral prints. I hope to have this quilted in a few days!

Wiggly Whimsy

June 12, 2013quilting, sewingcharm pack, jelly roll, quilt pattern, quilt projectzontziry

I bought a jelly roll and a charm pack, and had no idea what to do with them. A search for quilt patterns using those two items brought this: the Wiggly Whimsy Quilt. I love the pattern, but I’m doing it in reverse…so where you see white, there will be colors. I’m REALLY excited for a quilt that looks like there are white blocks tossed about.

Below is the progress so far – lots of cutting and, today, 98 block pairs. I’m excited!

A Bag-load of Bags!

June 10, 2013sewingbags, outdoor fabric, reusable bags, toteszontziry

Awhile back, I made a set of reusable grocery bags from outdoor fabric and outdoor canvas. We use those bags for everything – library books, groceries, packing snacks and small items for road trips…you get the idea. The only problem is there are only five. We have other reusable bags, but they haven’t held up as well.

During my spring cleaning, I found more fabric, so I set about making more bags! There are six in the photo, but I made two or three earlier that are already in use.

So…what do you call a stack of 13 reusable bags?