I want to sew clothes, maybe a skirt? Where do I start? Point me in the right direction please!

[Suddengeekgirl]

I have a sewing machine. I have made curtains and bunting and a few simple costumes for the dcs. Now I have the sewing bee bug and want to make something for myself.

I'm thinking a skirt would be a good place to start. I'd quite like some sort of jersey fabric, but I'm guessing that would be a bad starting point as it's stretchy.

Come educate me please sewing bees!

Perhaps a cute midi circle skirt? It's an easy first skirt, can be quite forgiving. There are a few good tutorials on Pinterest.

I can see me spending hours 'researching' on pintrest!

Next question - where do you buy fabric?
How do you know what sort of fabric is right?

Just googled midi circle skirt - I have a few like that which I like.
BUT I hate that they try and blow up all the time! No one needs to see my arse on the school run!

I've bought fabric from eBay before, and from a shop in town. Google 'fabric shop [location]' and you should find somewhere. Places like hobbycraft do some.

I've lost many hours on pinterest looking at tutorials!

What is the easiest style to start with - other than the circle skirt/ woosh look at my big pants skirt?

I buy a lot of fabric when I go to the states (sooo much cheaper) however- I have bought on Ebay here and a few local places in town in a pinch. I'd say go with a pencil type skirt, but you will really have to get your measurements correct. Try a heavy cotton or a poly blend with some stretch.

Thanks!

I quite like the idea of an elastic waist skirt, not sure I'm ready for zips yet!

Buy some material you like, pull apart an old skirt at the seams you like the shape of and use it as a pattern and go from there. Experiment a bit and move onto bought patterns you like the look of.

Pin your material, tack it together, and sew away.

Use hook and eyes or poppers to start off with instead of zips or elastic.

A wrap round skirt is very easy to make. And no worries about zips or fastenings.

Thanks all! :)

After much pinteresting I think I'm going to try this pattern here

But I've gone cross eyed looking at fabrics online and have no idea what to buy! All I've worked out so far is that the cotton poplin that dunelm mill had seemed fairly thin and very creasable iykwim.

Any suggestions? :)

I've bought some fabric! :)

It's a cotton print from the market so was only £5 a meter. It's fairly thin/ lightweight so think this will be a summer skirt... might take me that long to make it

I'm right in thinking I need to wash it first - in case of shrinkage?

You could do to be on the very safe side .. although I have never pre washed anything in my life.

Love the fabric!

Very pretty, very feminine - perfect for summer

You could use some light weight interfacing to make the fabric a bit stiffer.

I have found this book good www.amazon.co.uk/Sew-What-Skirts-Francesca-DenHartog/dp/1580176259

I'm also looking at sewing a skirt for the very first time (after I have finished knitting my very first pram blanket for my first grandchild!!). I have only ever made 2 cushion covers before.....fingers crossed.

Anyway, I got some lovely fabric from a website called Fabric Rehab.

Good luck!!

I made an apron from some pricey material and some old cotton lining. When I washed it, the new stuff shrank, old cotton didn't - lesson learnt, now I always prewash and iron fabric.... Nice material you chose.

We'll I had a crack today after I got back from school run.
It is shorter than I wanted as I messed up my measuring/ numbers but will be decent still.

But I'm having trouble with the waist band. The elastic keeps folding on itself.
I don't know if it's because the tube I sewed to put the elastic in is a little narrow, or if I need a line of stitches at the top ofte waist band to help it sit better.
Once I've got the elastic in smoothly I'm going to stitch it down on each side to stop the skirt bunching too much.

Any suggestions for my fold-y over naughty elastic?

I fitted the elastic and stitches it down on each side were them side seams were.

It looks super short in the pictures but is not at all indecent!

Congrats on finishing your first skirt.

It looks lovely :)

Not sure she does a skirt but you could have a look at madebyrae website. The first pattern I ever followed warms the washi dress, very easy to follow and came out lovely.
I get fabric from eBay and also local Asian fabric shops.

Oops sorry see you've moved on! Skirt looks lovely, maybe madebyrae could be your next attempt!

Looks great OP. Re elastic, I always use 'no roll' elastic for waistbands. Does just that. On the odd thing for dd where I didn't have any I would top stich a couple of lines I stitching on the waistband but prefer no roll for my things.