The post where I show my undies to the world

When I was a little, little girl, one evening, I was excited because I got to dress myself up in a pretty dress for a special occasion  We were meeting family at a fancy restaurant in town. We pulled up to the restaurant and were walking in past a large picture window when I stopped, lifted up my skirt, and announced gleefully, "Look mom, no underwear!" Needless to say, my family was shocked, as I'm sure were the restaurant patrons on the other side of the window. My mom handled the situation gracefully--she simply grabbed my hand, marched me back to the car, and drove me home to get undies.

Now we've come full circle---instead of showing off my lack of underwear, I'm showing my newly made undies for all of the internet to see... Happy New Year, world!

Check out the backs!

Sewing Notes- I used So Zo's free undies pattern and her great instructions as a starting point. And then I made 4 test pairs. I highly recommend doing this, as I slightly changed the pattern and my techniques with each one. (In the end, I added about 1/4" to the crotch width and about 3/4" to the height, if you're curious.) The great thing about sewing your own undies is that it doesn't take up much fabric, and it is quick and easy, so take the time to test things out. Since it's a small project, this is a great opportunity to use up bits of lace or mix/piece fabrics for a fun look.

These are my test-undies.

I didn't have fold-over-elastic, so I used this tutorial to attach my elastic with one significant change---I sewed the elastic the first time on the wrong side and flipped it to the right side to sew the second time. As a result, the elastic is on the outside of the undies, not the inside. This way, the soft fabric is next to my skin instead of elastic. It's a small change, but it makes a difference comfort-wise. And I wouldn't have figured out to do this, if I hadn't made my test undies first.

See how I applied the elastic to the outside?

Also, as a side note, I constructed these entirely on my sewing machine (no serger). I used a triple-zig-zag stitch to attach the elastic, and it worked great. I've now been wearing these around for the past week or so. The verdict? I love them! You can bet that more handmade undies are in my future! So if you've ever considered making your own undies, give it a try...it's really not scary and actually quite fun!

One final side note: All of these fabrics are left-overs from other sewing projects. You can see the original makes for the fabrics here, here, and here. And now I have undies to match some of my handmade shirts! How many people can say that?!?