Lavender undies

A couple of years ago I decided that I wouldn’t buy any more undies, I planned to only make new ones. I’ve broken my resolution several times since then as I just haven’t made many yet. Part of the problem is that I haven’t found/drafted the right pattern yet. I know one of the simplest ways to draft a good pattern is to cut up/use a good fitting pair that you already have, but none of my store bought ones fit as I would like them to.

These ones were cut out about a year ago and have sat waiting patiently in my sewing room since. They were altered from a bikini bottom from a McCalls swimsuit pattern, and the fit is comfy but not quite right. I am really after more of a boyleg pattern, I have a free hipster pattern from makebra to try next.

The waistband elastic I’m fairly sure I bought on sale at the Fabric Warehouse (I seem to buy all my elastic on sale from them!). At the time I thought *ohh, how pretty*, while sewing it I thought *@$$%! so thats why it was on sale*. It wasn’t really, really awful, but it was fiddly and slow to sew. I even got fancy on one of them and sewed just the bottom of the elastic on. It probably looks nicer, but I cut the elastic in one place while trimming the fabric back, so didn’t bother with it again.

Speaking of cutting the fabric back: it is the easiest way to get a neat and clean finish on a fabric that won’t fray. I sewed the elastic on the legs with about a 1cm allowance (eyeballed only), then trimmed off the edge once done.

The first couple of pairs of undies I made had completely enclosed elastic (because I was going off a swimsuit pattern) and it was far to bulky.

Lavender is not really my first colour choice – this lycra was left over from when I was doing roller derby, one of the colours of my team at the time.

Easter has been great at catching up on less exciting sewing. I also got most of my mending pile cleared out.