Time for another tutorial review!

Okay, so this one is a little different because I used half a pants pattern from Simplicity and half the Paper Bag Skirt with Ruffled Pockets tutorial from A Lemon Squeezy Home. In short, I'm not reviewing the skirt portion of the Paper Bag Skirt with Ruffled Pockets...just the finishings (or the belt loops, belt, and ruffled pockets).

Here's what I came up with:





I'm really proud of how they turned out, even though I got one of the pockets on there a little crooked. It was my first time sewing with a pattern instead of a tutorial online and, despite my sewing machine breaking haflway through and having to be fixed, I have to say I think I did a pretty good job.

I wish I could have a child model them for you, but they're for my niece who lives up in St. Louis and I'm all the way down here in Florida! I'll have to have my sister take pictures for you all once she gets them in the mail.

Here are some close-ups of the finishings taken from the Paper Bag Skirt tutorial:






The tutorial review:

I found the instructions for the belt loops and the belt very simple to follow. They really jazzed up the plain elastic pants pattern that I used from Simplicity and might as well have been pajamas they were so plain.

However, the ruffled pocket portion of the tutorial was a little more difficult. If I hadn't already known how to make ruffles, I'm not sure I would have been able to figure it out. In addition, it was a little bit difficult to sew the pockets on. I don't know if it was because they were so small, the fact that they were rounded, or just that I'm not a very experienced sewer, but one of mine ended up pretty crooked.

Another important thing to mention about the tutorial was the print out pattern for the pockets. The long rectangle that prints out for the ruffle is definitely not the same size as the rectangle used in the post. It was so narrow I had a hard time working with it. However, it made a cute, more modest ruffle, so if you're not afraid to work with it and you want something a little less bold, I say go for it. But if you like the look in the post and/or you want something easier to work with, definitely make your own rectangle that's much thicker.

All-in-all, the tutorial was cute and fairly simple to follow. I wouldn't really recommend it for a beginning project, but if you're an intermediate or experienced sewer it's a piece of cake. Overall, I give it an 8/10.

Happy sewing and see you next time!