Drawstring elastic application - method 2 of 3

Note: To see a bigger photo, click on the one in the entry.

As in method #1, once you get your garment assembled, finish the top edge. For this pair I used a rolled hem - I was playing with my new serger. You can do this, fold over a small amount and straight stitch it, use an overlock stitch, or use a zigzag stitch; whatever you are most comfortable with is fine.

Take your drawstring elastic and cut it your waist measurement minus enough for the elastic part to be comfy, generally 6-8 inches. This, however, varies with your size. Pull out 3-4 inches at each end and knot off to prevent them slipping back inside the elastic. Once you have done this, measure the width of the elastic and then go over to the garment. Using a ruler, measure 2 times the width of the elastic plus 1/4 inch and mark a spot on the fabric with a disappearing marker in a color dark enough for you to see.

Using the ruler and marker, continue to mark this same measurement all the way around the waist of the garment about every 3 inches. Again, use a washable or disappearing marker and make the lines dark enough for you to see.

Lay the garment flat on your work surface. Using the ruler and marker, connect all the lines you have drawn so far to mark the sewing line for the casing. Make the marking dark enough to see because you will be using this line in a while.

Here is a picture of the line drawn all the way across the fabric of my lounge pants. It's not very dark in the pic but it was clear enough for me.
NOTE: As an alternative, if you don't have a water soluble marker, you can use straight pins to mark your seam line. Don't necessarily run out and buy one if you're only going to use it this one time. I've used pins myself several times and they worked just fine.

Measure the how far up from the bottom of the elastic the drawstring is located. At the center front seam of the garment, go to the bottom line and measure that far up from it. With a dark marker, make a little hash mark on the outside of the fabric to indicate where the buttonholes should be located for the drawstring.

Cut two pieces of fusible interfacing about 2 inches by 2 inches and iron them to the back side of the garment close to the center seam and slightly below the mark for the buttonhole. This will strengthen the fabric in the area where you will be using the drawstring to adjust the waist of the garment.
Make the buttonhole, sewing on the front side of the fabric and using a 1/2 inch button to guide the size of the hole as indicated in the previous method. Use the pins across the ends to provide a guide to safely and gently cut the buttonhole open.
Once the buttonholes are sewn and cut open, fold the top of the garment down and pin it so that the edge lies along the line you drew all the way around the waistline earlier. Leaving an opening in the front of the garment to feed the elastic through, sew a straight line between about 1/4 inch from the finished edge of the fabric. If you'd rather, you can do an elastic stitch or regular zigzag stitch and just guide it to secure the edge of the fabric to the garment. The opening for the elastic should be about 1 to 1/5 inches on each side of the center front seam depending on the width of the drawstring elastic you will be using.

Once the casing seam is sewn, take the drawstring and turn it bumpy side down so the side facing you is smooth and the sewing that encases the drawstring isn't visible. Keeping the bumpy side dwon, take a safety pin or other elastic guide and feed the elastic through the casing, taking care to secure the end that is not being guided though so that it doesn't slip into the casing. You need about 3 inches of each end of the elastic outside the casing in order to finish sewing it.

After the elastic is threaded through, you need to put a piece of fabric the width of the drawstring elastic and about 4 inches long behind the elastic so that you can sew the elastic part together. I use a piece of interfacing or scrap fabric. This stabilizes the seam and also gives you a little more protection while you are sewing since the elastic stretches and will get all out of shape. Using a zigzag stitch, start at one end of the supporting fabric and go all the way to the other end. Turn and repeat twice, stretching gently so that the portion of the elastic being sewn doesn't have the feel of being all stretched out and having lost elasticity. Do this stitching on the bottom and top of the elastic, making sure not to catch the drawstring into the stitching line while you're doing it.

After the elastic is secured, feed the drawstring through the buttonholes and adjust the drawstring elastic inside the immediate area of the casing so that the joining area of the elastic is between the buttonholes and the drawstrings are directly behind the buttonholes. To secure them for the moment, use a straight pin or safety pin and fasten the area with the pins so that it doesn't slide around.

Once the drawstring is through the holes and secured, tie it in a loose knot. This is yet another way to make sure things stay the way they should be. After you tie the knot in the drawstring, take the pins loose so that you can fit the elastic into the casing. You can secure the area between the buttonholes if you wish to by pinning the elastic into place - again, this keeps it from sliding around while the garment is finished.

Take hold of the garment and stretch the casing, working it until the elastic disappears into it. It should not show outside the area that is open. It might take some work depending on how well you made the casing. If it is just a bit tight, it will require extra maneuvering to work the elastic/drawstring combination into the casing. If it is a bit too wide, you may have to deal with the elastic flipping over upside down, at which point you will have to work it back around so it's facing the same direction all the way through the casing.

Now that the elastic is all located inside the casing where it belongs, you can pin the opening in the casing closed and stitch across it with a simple straight stitch, either lock-sewing or backstitching at either end to make sure the thread doesn't unravel. When that is done, turn the garment around and untie the drawstrings. If you wish, you can sew a line up and down where the drawstring and elastic meet to keep them where they belong. However, if you don't want to, it's not a big deal.

All done!

Applying drawstring elastic, method 1 of 3

Once you have assembled the bottom of your pajama pants, boxers, lounge pants, or skirt, the next thing you do is to prepare your drawstring. Measure your waist and subtract 8-10 inches depending on how snug you want the waist to be. Of course, as your size goes down the amount you subtract decreases - otherwise for babies there wouldn't be enough elastic to put in the clothes. Pull out the drawstring 3-4 inches from each end and tie a knot. Set the elastic aside for a minute or two.

Using a serger, a zigzag stitch, or folding over a small amount and then stitching a straight seam, finish the raw edge of the waistband. Take your elastic and fold it in half end to end. Lay it across the back of the fabric at the seam line below the finished edge. Fold the fabric down past the upper edge of the elastic by 1/4 inch to match the far side of the finished part of the fabric. Repeat in the center front of the garment.

Repeat the folding process. Pin through the outermost layer in the back at the bottom of the folded area so you know how far down you are going to be sewing. Now, before it is too late, slip the garment on and make sure the room you allotted for the waistband leaves you enough room to pull the garment on and be comfortable sitting down. If not, you are going to have to use a more narrow elastic or choose another drawstring option that will be discussed later.

In the front, first mark the bottom of the elastic like you did with the back. Now unroll the elastic and fabric and lay the elastic bumpy side up on your cutting surface. Cover it with the fabric, aligning it with the pins marking the bottom location of the elastic.

Now, move those pins or use other ones to mark where the drawstring is located on the elastic piece in relation to the fabric, getting within 1/2 inch of the center seam. Keep the pins as even as possible. This will be the location of your buttonholes for the drawstring. After this is done, you can remove the pins marking where the bottom of the elastic goes in the front since the buttonholes will help you keep it in place later on.

Choose a button about 1/2 inch across for the buttonholes in the garment to give the drawstring somewhere to come out and be adjusted. If you have an automatic buttonholer or even a regular buttonholer in your machine, this part will be nice. However, it can also be a labor of love by hand; I once made a dress for my daughter with 15 buttons going down the front and I hand-stitched every single buttonhole because my machine at the time didn't have a buttonholer.

Cut two pieces of medium weight fusible interfacing to stabilize your fabric. Each piece should be about 2 by 2 inches. This helps the buttonholes not get torn from the use of the drawstring to adjust the garment.

Apply the interfacing per package directions to the areas marked by the straight pins close to the center front of the fabric. Most packages direct you to dry iron the interfacing first, and then steam or damp iron it to the fabric to help it become permanently attached to the fabric and keeps it stable while you sew on it. Once the interfacing is applied, make a buttonhole on both sides of the fabric where previously marked. Try to keep as close to the seam as possible.

Once the buttonholes are sewn, remove the pins that were marking the buttonhole location. Now, very close to the edge of the unsewn center space on the top and bottom, put a straight pin to act as a stopper for the seam ripper. Do this on both sides of the center seam, marking both buttonholes that have been done.

Gently and carefully insert the tip of the seam ripper into the unsewn center space of the buttonhole as sewn, with the blade pointing up and down. Slowly cut the fabric along the length of the buttonhole, stopping when the guide comes into contact with the straight pin you put in as a guide. Once you get one end cut, turn the garment around and repeating this for the other end of the first buttonhole and the entire second buttonhole. When finished, remove the straight pins and put the seam ripper away.

Now that the buttonholes are cut, it is time to work on the drawstring elastic. The first thing you do is to fold the elastic again from cut end to cut end and mark the center with a straight pin or marking pin. After that is done, fold the end of the elastic into the center on both ends and mark the center of that with a pin or marker. This is called "quartering" the elastic and is useful for making sure the elastic is at least close to being applied in the proper proportions while being sewn. When you are done you should have 3 straight pins and two open ends on the elastic, ready to be applied to the fabric.

Choose a zigzag stitch for applying the elastic or, if you have it available, a zigzag lightning stitch. This stitch is interrupted several times, increasing the elasticity of the waistband while not losing integrity. If not, a medium-length and medium-width zigzag stitch is fine. On my machine, that setting is 2.5 for width and 3.5 for length.

Line the elastic edges up to the near part of the finished edge of the waistband, with the bumpy part of the elastic against the fabric. Starting in the middle back, pin the elastic to the fabric at the seams with the straight pins that were used to mark the fabric earlier, matching the pins that quarter the elastic to the pins in the fabric. You will notice the elastic is more tight than the fabric and that is okay because you're going to be stretching the elastic to fit the fabric. Use the same method to align and pin the elastic to the fabric at the remaining seams. In the middle, where the buttonholes are, you will meet the elastic edges to themselves but do not pin one over the other or in any other way hinder the movement of the drawstring.

Ok. Now we get to a bit of a tricky spot. Taking the elastic and fabric in hand, beginning at the part where the elastic is cut, sew several stitches through the elastic and fabric on the side opposite the finished edge of the waist without stretching to secure the elastic and thread to the fabric. Make sure for this entire section that every time you stop sewing the needle is DOWN in the fabric so it can't move around, or you are going to have a big mess. Next, take a deep breath and stretch the elastic between the part you just sewed and the first straight pin beyond it. If you need to, grab it in the middle to steady it a bit, and sew along the line furthest from the finished edge slowly and carefully until you get all the way to the pinned spot. Put the needle down. Stop and take a break. After a minute or so, use the same technique to do the next spot, and so on until you have that entire side of the piece of elastic sewn to the fabric. Make sure when you are done to oversew and then either 1)backstitch or 2)do a lock-stitch at the end so the thread doesn't come unsewn.

This picture shows the elastic being sewn edge to edge along the stitching line. You may want to sew over this a couple times, at all times being careful not to catch the drawstring up into the sewing. Don't be too worried about how it looks because this will be on the inside of the garment and not too many people will see it. Your technique will improve with time and practice.

Before sewing the last bit, you need to pull the two ends of the drawstring through the buttonholes, tie them, and pin them out of the way so they stay free while you sew. Make sure that you line up the elastic so that it is pinned end to end without overlapping or in any other way impeding the drawstring from functioning freely. If you are sewing with a knit, you will want to pin the fabric in several places after you fold it so that it doesn't get all stretched out of proportion while you're doing this last seaming. With woven fabrics it isn't quite as necessary but can still be done.

Here is a picture of the first row of stitching done with the lightning zigzag stitch. The fabric hugs right up to the elastic and one the nicest effects is that it will not roll or slide around inside the casing like free-floating elastic will.

Before you sew the last seam around the bottom of the elastic waistband, make sure the drawstring is still tied and pinned out of the way so it doesn't get caught up in the sewing. There's nothing worse than having to use the seam ripper to pick sewing thread out of a piece of drawstring.

Going slowly to keep the seam and stitching line as even as possible, stitch through the fabric and elastic right above the finished edge of the waist of the garment. Try to keep the lower edge of the seam even with the upper edge as much as you can, but don't demand perfection the first time you do this. Reinforce the area where the elastic is joined end to end to keep it from sliding around.

Now that the seams are done, and everything is in place, make sure all the pins are removed and all your supplies are put away. Now, take the garment and untie the loose knot you put in the drawstring and replace it with a bow. If the garment is for you, try it on and make sure it fits correctly. Don't wait till it comes out of the washer and dryer before you check to see if you need to remake it.

These last two pics are what I call success pics. They show the pajama or lounge pants I made, all done, ready to go in the washer for one last trip through before they go into the lineup in my dresser. I know they won't be the only pair there, but they were the first I made in this manner; I am pretty sure they won't be the last.
Please feel free to email me if you need any help with yours or to give me feedback about this tutorial or any other one in my blog, especially since many of them were written in the middle of the night.

Christmas night

We do our Christmas on Christmas Eve. We had turkey, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, corn on the cob, crescent rolls, stuffing, cherry and pumpkin pie. We forgot the green veggie. The turkey took 3 hours more than I thought it would to cook. I won't follow the directions on the package ever again. Instead, I'll put it in the oven and let it cook all day like I used to.

Abby and Donovan are getting a divorce. It's not been a fun few weeks. The economy is tough and Abby, who has been a stay at home mom, is trying to find employment so she can pay rent and the like. Being the holidays complicates it because so many places are only open a couple days a week for two weeks, and nobody is calling back right now. Someone she used to work with gave her a lead and we're praying it pans out. Between us, the family members on this side, we'll take care of the boys when she has them and it won't cost her anything. At issue is custody - who has them when, who drives how far and such - as well as dividing up the possessions. It's horrid to have this happen after 6 years of marriage, especially since it involves the same two "friends" that were involved on Donovan's side last time. Now Abby's feeling like she made a mistake to let him come back 4 years ago. However, hindsight is far more clear than seeing through the trees of the present, and I've spent a lot of time reminding her that none of us can see the future. I am praying this doesn't crush her spirit. She has such a sweet spirit...She's going back to school to be a teacher. She was going to do healthcare because it's supposedly faster but I reminded her that her whole life, all I've heard is that she wanted to be a teacher and that I thought that her love of kids would be better served that way and she decided to stick with her original choice. She's going to go to community college for the basics and then transfer to a larger school. It will save money and she can take lots of the classes online.

JR threw a rod in his truck. He kept telling them something wasn't right. I guess he knew what he was talking about. He is officially laid off till after the first of the year, at least. He can't get hold of unemployment, again because of the holidays, when he calls like they told him to do - but the website says if you don't file in a timely manner you can lose benefits. He needs money too...bills have to be paid.

I made way too many things I didn't take pictures of. I made pajamas, t-shirts, a maternity top, sweat pants, underwear, a couple girl's purses, and a nightgown. I am selling one of the girls' purses in my Etsy store. I cut out too many pieces so I decided I might as well just make and sell the extra if anyone will buy it. I guess it's time to take the stockings out of the store for now as well. I keep trying to sell things but nobody seems to want to buy them. It's frustrating.

The dryer quit. It's going to cost at least $300 to replace. I got a crack in the windshield of my car when a little pebble from the sand/chemical truck ricocheted and hit the windshield. That will be another $300 to replace. Then there is the issue of the tires on my car. They are going to need to replaced within the next couple of months.

Still, all in all, God has been good to us. We're all still alive. The kids are healthy. We have roofs over our heads. We have food in our tummies. We have each other. It will work out for the best just like He promises us in His Word.
"And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose."(Romans 8:28)

He is faithful and good. We are blessed.

Newest quilts and a couple other treats

These are called Chicken Saddles. They are used to prevent overly amorous roosters from leaving their favorite hens with no feathers on their backs. I made them today. A lady asked me to make them for her friend and now she wants some for some hens she's getting this week, too. They alread have bad backs. The saddles are pretty popular with chickeneers.

This is a newborn size fleece diaper soaker. It is used in place of rubber or plastic pants. This is made of an outer layer of fleece with an inner centered "wet spot" protector consisting of ripstop nylon and another layer of fleece. The stretch on the legs and waist goes from side to side. It is very absorbent and helps keep the moisture in the diaper from leaking to the outside.

This is a flannel diaper. It will fit a baby from newborn size to toddler simply by folding in the tabs on the front and folding down the upper part of the back and front. You go from overlapping the folded-down back over and around the folded-in and folded-down front and pinning it with one pin to using it like a regular old-fashioned prefolded diaper. It is made with a layer of flannel on the top to start. This is followed by 8 precut layers of what is called an "insert" that is sewn together with a zigzag stitch and then straight stitch to prevent excess fluid loss through the diaper. This is placed on a bottom layer of flannel that has a layer of the same size of french terry on top of it. The diaper is pinned together all the way around and then fold-over elastic is applied with a lightning zig-zag stitch, stretching the elastic where needed like around the legs, in the front and back, and using it more like bias tape the rest of the time. It is very absorbent and soft. This, and the soaker above, was made as a requested sample from a prospective customer and mailed to her. They are in the process of deciding whether or not to invest this amount of money in something that they will then use as a constant thing. The difference between cloth diapers and disposables is significant but some people just can't commit to using cloth for their baby, and that is okay. We all have our own preferences and limits. She's sending me the samples back so I can use them to show to other people who might be interested in the diapers.

This is a freshly-made green bug-and-frog Oma Blankie. It is listed on my Etsy site in hopes of earning some extra finances. Hubby's pay grade got bumped back down when he did so it's going to be really tight this year. I can't work outside the home, but I can sew, and that is what I'm doing. I have two more quilts planned and partially assembled already.

This is the blue bug-and-frog Oma Blankie. It is also listed on my Etsy site. I am hoping this one sells as well. I've really had fun sewing this last week even in spite of people who don't show or who ask for samples and then disappear. I guess that's just gonna happen no matter what you do, isn't it? It's better to just let it slide than to get all whacked out about it.

Go here to find my Etsy store.

Waistband elastic application for sensitive skin (Part 1)

Fold down the top half of the casing allowance on the pattern for the boxers and cut the pattern out that way. Proceed as usual with making them.

Cut the elastic the circumference of the waist minus approximately 4 inches (10cm). Sew together into a circle, using a zigzag stitch.

Quarter the elastic, using straight pins to mark the back seam, the opposite side, and then match them up and pin the other two quarters of the elastic.

Use the same technique to mark the quarters on the boxer waist part.

With the boxers turned inside out, apply the elastic to the outside of the waist area, with the right side of the elastic facing out.

Pin at the previously marked quarter sections on both the boxer fabric and the elastic.

This is what it should look like with the elastic pinned, right side out, to the boxers, right side in.
Make sure to check that your elastic is far enough down from the top of the boxer fabric that you can sew it to the fabric without catching in the edge of the elastic. This will make turning the elastic to the outside easier and look more professional.

On my machine, stitch number 6 is the lighning zigzag stitch. This is much similar to the zigzag stitch, except the stitches are broken into sections to allow for greater stretching. It is purported to be more sturdy when sewing elastic for waistbands and other applications requiring the elastic to have more give.

This is how my machine looks on the lightning zigzag stitch setting. Since it's an automatic and computerized machine (to an extent), it chooses and adjusts the settings again.

(Continued on next entry due to photo limitations)