Well, well, well lookit me being all bleeding edge hipster because I wanted to share the concept of Hygge with my family in the form of handmade pajama pants as Christmas gifts last year.
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For. 19. People.
In.Time. For. Christmas.
What was I thinking?!
I’ll tell you what I was thinking. That with an off season mega huge flannel fabric sale earlier in the year I could pretty much fill my Christmas gift giving list if I got my butt in gear and made pajama pants here and there as time permitted. I bought t shirts to pair with the pants for pajama tops.
Also, it might have been an excuse to girls gone wild and buy all of the cute fabric I liked because I needed a BUNCH.
10 Tips for How to Sew a Ton of Pajama Pants Without Going Crazy
I made the pair of pajamas in this post with flannel fabric left over from the Christmas project for myself and took advantage of the lack of deadline to practice machine embroidery on the t shirt top.
Not too bad but the jaggy edges bug me. Who knew jersey is such a fussy fabric to embroider?
Here are a few tips for making big sewing projects.
1. Planning! Planning! Planning! I made a master list with each person’s name, size, yardage needed (since I knew I’d had to buy multiple prints to meet the quantity of fabric I needed for 19 people,) and the print I planned to use.
2. Depending upon the type and thickness of fabric there is approximately 6 yards of fabric on a new bolt at Joann Fabrics.
3. Brush up on how to read a sewing pattern, fabric selection, and construction Crafty’s on line class Learn to Sew: Pajama Pants. Very helpful!
4. Buy a multi size pattern if you are sewing pajama pants as gifts. My favorite pajama sewing patterns are:
- Simplicity 3935 – sized to fit boys and gift from little kid to adult
- Simplicity 3696 – Sized for women and also allows you to make nightgowns.
5. Cut pattern pieces in batches, label each pattern piece with the size, person’s name, and name of the pattern piece. Once I cut all four pieces for each pair of pants I temporally pinned them together to keep them together. That way, I won’t sew two fronts together of two different sizes by mistake.
Also, dogs make excellent pattern weights!
Lending Lisa a paw. This pattern isn't going anywhere!
6. Sew pattern pieces with the same thread color in batches. After pinning all of the fronts and backs together, I sewed all of the pairs with white coordinating thread. I changed thread in my sewing machine to sew all of the pairs that used black coordinating thread. Rinse repeat until I finished sewing each batch of flannel pajamas.
7. Use a sewing gage to pin the waist band and hem of each pair of pajama pants in batches.
8. Making pajama pants with an elastic waistband instead of a drawstring waistband is going to be easier if you are making a large number of pajamas. Elastics waistbands are usually better for small children. Drawstring waistbands work well if you aren’t sure of the person’s waist size like with growing teens.
I use a safety pin instead a bodkin to run drawstrings and elastic in casings.
9. Sew the waistband closed with different color thread so the wearer can tell which side is the front and which side is the back. There is nothing less comfortable than putting your pants on backyards!
Not that I know anything about that by the way.
10. Wrap the pajamas in DIY Giant Peppermint Candy Gift boxes if you run out of gift boxes. For extra fun have everyone open their pajama gift at the same time!
Lacey supervised every part of this long and involved project!
Fortunately, the big flannel pajama gift reveal was a success. Everyone liked the fabrics I selected for them which made all of the work worthwhile. In all honesty it would have been cheaper and easier to buy everyone flannel pajamas instead of make them. It was a TON of work!
Next Christmas I told Husband we’re taking the easy way out and giving everyone gift cards .
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