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Hello!
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Welcome back to another Make Thrift Buy, the
show where YOU send in items you’ve seen
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on the internet, that are either mass-produced
suuuuper expensive – or just plain weird
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– and then I do my best to recreate them.
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A lot of you really liked me taking on the…
problematic…
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WISH app last episode, so today I’m back
to tackle another wish item.
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POW POW POW!
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SO I had a bunch of that silky material left
over from making the top from the previous
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episode, and if you recall I wanted to make
shorts out of that leftover material – and
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the shorts I wanted to make are also an item
from WISH , which is listed on the app as
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a 2-piece set – sorry, not 2-piece set,
“Sexy Women Pajamas Mini Tank Crop Tops
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Shorts Set Sleepwear Nightmare”.
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Nightmare?
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Nightwear.
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It is a nightmare.
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Yeah that.
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ANYWAY – it sells for just $6.
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Worryingly cheap.
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Especially because…
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I’ve made shorts before.
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They’re not the easiest things to make.
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And this two piece set being sold for only
$6 worries me a lot because it means that the person
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or people making them are getting paid next-to-nothing,
when you also factor in materials cost, the
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cost of transporting those materials, and
that the company, obviously, will be making
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a profit as well.
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[sigh]
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SO let’s try make this one for ourselves.
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Let’s begin!
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Alright, so quickly recapping LAST episode,
I got this Black Slip from a thrift store
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and turned it into a top.
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Last episode I said that it cost $2 – buuuut
I accidentally got that wrong – it was only
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50 cents, which I only remembered when I re-watched
the video, where I bought it.
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And I didn’t wanna get any angry tweets
if anyone DID happen to notice, so I’m mentioning
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that here…
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OKAY!
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So I wanted to make use of this bottom part
of the slip by turning into SHORTS!
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To turn this into shorts, the basic pattern
that I’m going to be using is one that I’ve
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already made, when I made shorts for another
video.
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And to see how I made that pattern, let’s
go back to the past, shall we?
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[harp noise, indicating the passage of time]
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“To make this pattern, I copied a pair of
high-waisted shorts that I already owned,
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and that fit me really well.
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To copy these shorts, I folded the shorts
in half at the front, traced around them onto
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paper with about an inch seam allowance all
around, folded them in half the other way,
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and then traced around the back in the same
way, then cut these pieces out.
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This gave me a front and a back piece.
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You’ll notice that the back piece has a
longer bit HERE which gives you more room
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for your BUTT.”
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[harp noise, indicating the passage of time]
Annika: [mimics the harp]
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(Yes I’m a dork.)
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BACK TO THE PRESENT.
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So I pulled those pattern pieces out again,
and I’m not going to add any pockets because
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I definitely don’t have enough fabric, so
the pocket pieces are going away.
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So I laid out the front and back pattern pieces,
just to get an idea of how much fabric the
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shorts will require.
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Hmmm – and I wasn't super sure if I was
going to have enough fabric at this point.
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Because this fabric used to be the bottom
of a dress, it’s in a loop, so I cut it
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open down one of the seams, so I could open
it into ONE layer, to get a better idea of
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how much fabric I had.
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I then traced my OLD pattern out again onto
another piece of paper, but I modified it
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a little – I did this because my last shorts
were FITTED and required a zipper, whereas
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I don’t want a zipper for this pair, I’ll
be doing an elastic waistband instead – and
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because of that, I’m going to have to make
the waist at least big enough for the shorts
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to go up over my hips, because if I don’t
I won’t be able to get the shorts on! (and
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I’ve done this before).
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So, I did increase the waist about an inch
(which is 2.5 cm) on both the front and back,
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and I also “squared” up the edges of the
pattern HERE, turning the outside corner into
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a 90-degree-angle, so that I would use my
fabric more efficiently… ‘coz as you saw
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before – there’s not a lot of it!
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And then…
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I played some tetris with my pattern pieces
and the fabric.
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It was then that I realised, if I used THIS
pattern as it is, I was only going to get
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about three-quarters of a pair of shorts from
out of the fabric.
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Butttttt… then I remembered that the old
pattern had included an extra 1 inch allowance
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for darts – so I could get rid of that,
because the new shorts aren’t going to be
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fitted, AND I also realised that my satiny-fabric
is… quite stretchy.
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Which also means I can reduce the width.
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Because of that, I was able to to reduce the
sides of both the front and back patterns
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by about 1 and a half inches each, which I
did by folding them inwards, 1 and a half
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inch, like this.
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And now...THE PATTERN PIECES FIT!
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HALLELUJAH!
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Because I've done this the shorts aren’t
going to be as “flowy” as I would have
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liked, but fingers crossed this will still
work – the waist is still about 5 inches
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bigger than my natural waistline measurement
(which is fine because I'm going to be elasticating
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the waist - I want it to be bigger).
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But because it’s stretchy I should be able
to pull them over my hips.
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Wish me luck.
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So using these pattern pieces, first I cut
out my back pieces, by placing the pattern
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on the fabric’s fold, which I did to minimise
fabric waste…and I cut around it.
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Here's my back pieces.
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I then cut this in half straight down the
middle to give me two back pieces.
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I then also tried to do the same thing with
the front pieces BUT…
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I ran out of fabric.
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I just didn’t quite have enough to cover
the crotch piece.
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But – do you see all this extra fabric up
here?
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It’s not going to be as pretty, but I’m
going to use that, and attach it on to the
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fabric where I need it.
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So I cut off that extra fabric… and sewed
it on down here.
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In order to get a nice, clean seam, I pinned
it on to the main fabric right-sides-together,
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and I sewed it on like THIS.
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Now - this fabric, being satin, was also a bit
of a nightmare to work with.
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Satins and silky fabrics are difficult, and
when I sewed it using no stabaliser of any
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kind, the stitching looked preeeetty janky.
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So to fix this – and I ended up doing this
for ALL seams in this project, every single
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edge that I was going to sew on – I placed
a piece of one-sided fusible interfacing down
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the edge that I'm going to be sewing on, and
then I put a heat-proof cloth over the top,
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(mine is silk organza, but you could use an
old t-shirt) and then I ironed it down, sticking
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the interfacing to the edge of the fabric.
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And when I sewed this together it gave me
MUCH nicer looking stitches and seams.
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ALRIGHT – I was then able to use this to
cut out 2 of my front pieces, again I cut
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it out with the edge placed on the fold, in
order to save fabric.
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And I also cut my front and back pieces straight
down the middle to give myself 2 symmetrical
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front pieces.
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To construct the shorts, first I needed to
sew each front piece right-sides together,
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and each back piece right-sides together,
both all the way down this curvy edge.
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Once I’d done that, I cut away the extra
seam allowance so that the interfacing wouldn’t
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make the seams all stiff-feeling.
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And then I also pressed these seams with my
iron.
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….. [sigh] and at this point I remembered
that I had interfacing that I should've been
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using instead of the white one, because it
not only matched the colour of my fabric but
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it was a bit stretchy too.
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So I should have been using right from the
start – the white interfacing, although
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you're not going to be able to see it on the
outside of the finished shorts, it won't look
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so great from the inside…
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Here’s a tip from me.
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If you’re following this tutorial yourself
please use interfacing that matches the colour
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AND stretchiness of your fabric.
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Do as I say, not as I do.
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ANYWAY, I’ll be using this black by interfacing
on all the edges and seams, from here on out.
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So the next step is to place the front and
back pieces right-sides together, on top of
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each other.
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And there’s not really any better way to
say this…
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I “spread the crotch” of the front piece
out like this.
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And I placed the back piece on top of it,
right-sides together...spread out the crotch
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as well. [giggles]
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Basically I matched up the front and back
"crotches".
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I held the two pieces of fabric together with
these sewing clips, and then I sewed the crotch
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together like this.
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The next step is to sew the front and back
pieces together at the sides.
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So, I matched up the sides, of the front and
back piece – I’m adding interfacing first,
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just like I have for all the seams before
sewing – and then I sewed them together
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like this.
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By the way, I am using these clips rather
than pins, because I'm working with a delicate
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fabric and didn't want to poke a lot of holes
through it.
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Now that they’re basically shorts, it’s
time for the moment of truth, do they fit
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over my hips?
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YES!
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Thank goodness I was able to easily get them
on.
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Thank you, fabric, for having some stretch.
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So the next step is going to be adding elastic
around the waist, to hold them up.
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First I needed to make a casing for the elastic.
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So, after applying some more interfacing to
the top of the shorts, and with the shorts
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inside-out, I folded the top of the shorts
down just a bit more than the width of the
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elastic that I’m going to be using.
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And then I sewed almost all the way around
the casing at the top of the shorts, leaving
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a small gap to insert the elastic through.
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So...while I was sewing this my sewing machine
was being very naughty because my fabric was
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both slippery and stretchy and it didn’t
enjoy this at all, even with the interfacing
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on the fabric, but it started behaving when
I switched to using a walking foot attachment,
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and by going around the casing FIRST with
a straight stitch, and following it up with
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a zig zag stitch.
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Then I measured this piece of elastic around
my waist, around where the shorts are going
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to sit, and I pulled the elastic a little
bit tight so the shorts will stay up, but
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not too tight that it’s uncomfortable, and
then chopped it to this length – adding
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half an inch to the length before cutting,
so that I can sew the elastic into a loop
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after it’s inserted into the shorts.
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Putting a safety pin into one end of the elastic,
I pushed it through the gap in the casing,
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around the waist, and I threaded the elastic
all the way around the casing til it came
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out the other end, and I removed the safety
pin, and sewed the ends of the elastic closed.
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And finally, I sewed over that little gap
in the casing.
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And with that, I am done!
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SO – how did I go?
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[cute old-timey music]
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I have to be honest, I didn’t expect these
to look as nice as they do, after I had to
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make those pattern pieces… a lot smaller
to fit on the fabric.
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So, I’m really happy with how they turned
out!
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They’re absolutely perfect to wear as…
actually quite luxurious-looking summer pyjamas.
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My conclusion is:
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[scissor sound, zipping sound]
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Now, this is definitely a harder project than
the previous episode, the top, you'll need
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some sewing experience to try this, buuuut,
shorts are really not that difficult to make.
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And if you’re a beginning sewer, or struggling
with shorts, I would recommend using the FREE
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downloadable Madeleine bloomers by Colette
– it’ll help you wrap your head around
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shorts-and-pants-making and help you feel
more confident about trying out your own patterns!
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So in the end, I was able to make both this
silky top and shorts out of just one thrifted
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slip, and this was the total fabric waste
at the end:
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Pretty good, right?
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And these scraps will be going right into
my scrap box to be used in other projects.
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This video is supported by Squarespace!
AND, beginning sewers, wait around for a bit,
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I’ve been using Squarespace myself for over
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– and yes, I know how that sounds… but
you gotta brand yourself if you do anything
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creative on the internet!
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Anyway, it’s been SO USEFUL having this
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all the projects I’m involved in, where
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me, AND it’s also the place where my Beginner’s
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If you’re a beginning sewer – check that
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It’ll help a LOT. annikavictoria.com
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Setting up the main page of my website with
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Squarespace has a whole bunch of gorgeous,
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And one of the best parts is, is that I can
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