Swim Suit Season

I recently bought the little one a swim suit that she has almost out grown completely, I had it only two months! The endless cost of growing children got me thinking, make your own stuff, well at least some of it...I am no seamstress my any measure, what little skill in that department has come from trial and error and a few wise words from grandma.

It seemed a little crazy though to make a swim suit when I lack proper material and know how, but I decided the heck with it and I must say I am pleased with the outcome. I'll go ahead and include a couple of pictures of the process, I dont exactly feel ready to go full fledge tutorial on you...yet.  So here it is two swim suits for my girl!

I began with a pair of ugly old pants from good old Salvation Army, they consist of 90% nylon and 10% spandex.  I cut them open down the inner leg seams to get a larger piece of material.

I then grabbed a pair of undies that I didn't mind cutting to make my pattern, I traced around them leaving about a half inch allowance for the hem.

I then pinned up my half inch allowance on all sides, this is when the project got a bit awkward, my sides weren't matching and I could tell the suit would sag in the front. I preceded anyway figuring I could guess my way through it.

Then I hemmed...

After hemming I knew I had to do something to tighten up my suit, I didn't have any cute edging so I cut up a pillow case that was missing his mate. I used the trim of the pillow to then trim along my hem, I ran into more problems when I realized sewing around the entire bottoms with my non stretchy lace edging made the suit too tiny. I wasn't planning on side ties for my almost three year old but I didn't have another option...so I snipped and added side ties.

For the top I just sewed a tube, hemmed and added the lace edging around the front, my camera battery at this point was dying so what you dont see is the straps I then added to keep the suit from shimming down! To my surprise the suit worked and the little one LOVES it!

I decided I hadn't tortured myself enough so I made another, this one is a bit more modest which I prefer and even cuter if I do say so myself. ;-)

I made the legs too tight so added the detail to stretch out the thigh, it photographed funny but looks good when taut against the skin.

I think my model likes this one even more then the two piece, yay!

Sadly I did not get pic's of the process but I went about it in a very similar way...trial and error.  So what do you think?

Dylan liked what I did so much she decided to get in on the fun, we came across a brand new Victoria Secret bikini at a garage sale for five dollars! Yep you read that right, it was just one of many scores of the day.  She loved the simplicity of the white suit but longed for more, this is what she came up with, I love it and so does she.

Dylan's before, sweet and simple...

Another pillowcase bights the dust!

Trimmings

Here is the after of the front and bottoms, she hand pinned each section so she wouldn't lose the elasticity in the suit. It is still simple and sweet but now has a touch of personality.

She also went ahead and pinned in the sides since the suit was a bit big in the bottom, great job Dylan!


Hope you enjoyed the post, thanks for stopping by...

-Gypsy Lov'n