Favourite Skirt Upcycled

M has a really cute little denim skirt that I got from a good friend. Sadly it was getting indecently short. Still plenty of room width way and tonnes of wear left in skirt....time for some upcyclying!

Recently I was shown this gorgeous fabric with dandelions on it. I have fallen in love with it and like to use it all the time. I only needed about 3 inches across the bolt for this little project.

So, here's what I did...

First I unpicked the hem of the denim skirt. This not only gave me about 3 cm more length but a funky detailing too. Then I pressed it flat.

Next I prepared my fabric. I cut 3 inches lenght across the width of the fabric and used the salvage as my seam allowance (won't fray). I then whipped round top and bottom of my fabric circle on the overlocker top prevent the cotton from fraying.

Next up, I folded up and pressed a 1/2 inch hem.

Then I whipped round that on the machine sewing at 1/2 inch.

Next comes the gathering. I learnt a really neat way to gather from an etsy pattern. You need dental floss (weird I know). You sew with a quite wide zig-zag stitch over top of the dental floss around the top of the fabric circle. I sew the gathering stitch about 1/4 inch. When you have sewn the dental floss zig zag all the way around the top, you gently pull the floss and gather your fabric to the required width. Its quick, easy and no more broken gathering cotton!!

Next I pinned the gathered fabric to my denim, right sides together and sewed a 1/2 inch seam with the gathering facing up so I would keep an eye on it and even it out if it bunched up.

I pressed the seam and wa-la!

And would you believe - all of this before 8am on a Kindy day. Thanks to both the children waking early today and breakfast over and lunches packed before 7.30, I decided to make the most of the half hour and make this for M to wear today. She was very happy with her new skirt, teamed it up with orange and pink and later, her red boots.

(note: my photography is not normally this bad! m is in the habit of lurching forward to look at the photo before I have managed to take it!)

So, an old fav now a new fav. Pretty neat eh? A x