tiny tot shorts for my little men

i have been one busy bee this past week. my little nephews visited from SoCal and i enjoyed every minute of chasing 3 boys and a pup.

i learned that i am not as great as i thought i was at baby proofing for the 2 year old hahah... every time i turned around the lil guy had my sewing scissors =/

i needed eyes in the back of my head, or a sewing area that can be closed off haha

(my area is what "used to be" the fancy dining room, wide open to the world... oops lol)

sew what i decided to do (when i wasn't chasing little feet) is make all the munchkins some new shorts. i had planned on it a while ago and bought some skull camo fabric and cutesy alligator fabric... i just traced the pattern from their PJs

guess i forgot to factor in that the oldest in 8 1/2 and needed something more his own. luckily i found some cool airplane fabric that he just loved =D

here is my step by step and some "action" shots:

i traced my pattern onto the wrong side of the material using my tailors chalk and then cut out my pieces.

pin the side seam of the right front and right back pieces, wrong sides together. do the same for the left sides. sew each of these sides.

trim the seam close to the stitching then iron the seam flat

fold the seam over and iron seam flat again. you will now have the right sides together. pin the seam line again and sew each side again. be sure you keep all unfinished ends inside the seam you are creating.

i then took both pieces and layed them wrong sides together. pin and sew the front and backside curved seams separately.

again, iron your seam flat, and the flip to right sides together and iron seams. pin and sew the curved lines once more.

pin the inside crotch seams wrong sides together and then sew a "wide horseshoe" shape following your edges.

iron your seams and then pin the inside crotch seam right sides together. sew. 

flip the right way and you will see all there is left to do is hems and elastic. for my hems i fold and iron about 1/2" and then fold and iron another 1/2". this keeps the unfinished edges hidden. then sew at the top of the seam.

now for the waist... i fold and iron approx 1/2" and then i measured my elastic width and used that as a guide to fold and iron the second time.

when i sew the waistline i sew the elastic in (as opposed to making a tunnel for it to live). Pin your elastic in one spot and then find the exact spot opposite this and stretch your elastic until it reaches that. hold that part of elastic up to that spot of fabric and let the elastic relax. pin in place. i recommend doing this until you have 4 or 8 pins in... depends on the waist size.

as you sew you will stretch the elastic to the capacity of the fabric so that when you are done the waist it rouched

p.s.

my new sewing machine came in while they were here too! yay!!!!

time to bust it open!