Like many other ladies, I love a good maxi skirt or dress. They are flattering, comfortable, and easy to dress up or down. I have a few of each in my closet that I mostly wear during Spring, Summer, and Fall, (Winter here is New England is not always the time for a maxi!) and love adding layers when it is cold, or wearing plain on warmer days.
To keep you in the loop, my posts contain affiliate links! This means that if you buy something through one of those links, I will make a small commission at no additional cost to you. Thanks for your support!
So when I saw this tutorial on One Simple Bliss, I was so excited to try to make this maxi skirt! I recently started my sewing journey and the instructions for this skirt were easy enough for my beginner self to follow and feel confident with. So I headed down to Hobby Lobby and got my supplies to make this fun skirt. I made the skirt the day before I was heading off to a friend's bridal shower, since I felt like this skirt would be flattering, easy to wear while also being with my daughter, and would be comfortable on a hot New England day.
At Hobby Lobby, I took a look through the knit fabrics like One Simple Bliss states and came across this pretty purple floral pattern. I picked this one since I love purple and am afraid of wearing see-through things, so this felt like a safe bet to wear with it being a darker color. Once made, I paired it with a black tank top so that it would be cool on a hot day.
First, I had the fabric folded in half (like it came from the bolt) and cut off the salvage on the side. I also evened the bottom and top of the fabric as best I could so that I was working with even edges. Since I purchased two yards of fabric I did have to cut mine, unlike the instructions from One Simple Bliss. I added two inches to my skirt length for potential mistakes so that I could cut the fabric if need be.
Once I did that, I unfolded the fabric to do the long stitch. Being new to sewing, I just did a regular stitch with my sewing machine set to about 2-3 for the stitches. This is why I added the extra two inches, because I did end up cutting off the portion with my first stitch! Then, I redid the stitch at a 5 so that I would have an actual long stitch to create the ruffle.
After I corrected myself and did the long stitch, I was able to pull the thread to make the ruffle. It was a little difficult to get the ruffle totally even with all the fabric I had, but I did my best to make it as even as possible. Once that step was complete, I stitched the fabric to the elastic. I got this black 1 5/8" wide elastic that was 2 yards from Sew-ology at Hobby Lobby. I stitched my fabric towards the bottom of the elastic like One Simple Bliss suggests. I pinned the fabric ahead of time and when sewing, I did notice that it was bunching a bit so there are some parts of the skirt that are a little more bundled than others.
After I stitched the elastic to the fabric, I finished off the skirt by sewing the side seam, which I actually wear as the back of the skirt. I them did hem the bottom and folded my edge twice to make the seam. I didn't sew it close enough to the top of the seam, so it lays a little funky, but it does the trick (and of course I have no pictures of that, just trust my mistakes!).
All in all, the tutorial was very easy to follow and I did not feel in over my head trying to do each step. I felt like instruction was clear without being too wordy and over the top. This pattern is definitely one that I will be trying again in the future because it was so easy and enjoyable to follow. And I got a super cute skirt out of it! I plan on going back to Hobby Lobby to see what other patterns I might be interested in, or just go for straight up black.
Would you make this skirt too? Would you try to make it even if you were new to sewing, like me? What do you think?