It’s nearly Christmas, time to wrap one of these bad boys around your waist and break out the butter. For baking of course. Last year I found this sinful Santa fabric, aptly named Hurry Down the Chimney by Alexander Henry, and couldn’t not purchase enough yardage to make ten, that’s right ten, aprons for some of my favorite ladies. I was a veritable one woman sexy Santa sweatshop last November, and it was worth every minute.
Hubba hubba.
I started by cutting two roughly 22″W x 19″H U-shaped pieces of fabric, one of my Santa fabric, one of lining fabric. These aprons are reversible, so you can keep them close to your, ahem, heart all year long. I then made about a bazillion inches of red knife pleats.
Knife pleats, knife pleats, more knife pleats. I used a scrap of cardboard as my pleat measure/fold guide, and this went a whole hell of a lot faster that making gathered trim. Which I also tried for a few of the aprons. Did I mention there were ten of them?!
Baste the pleated trip around the perimeter of your apron front, unfinished edges together.
Next, sandwich your lining fabric on top, right sides together, and stitch around the sides and bottom.
Clip corners, turn and press.
Top stitch along your pleated edges. Why hellooooo there.
Now add a couple cute little pleats along the waist edge.
Like so. Who’s your furry friend, Santa?
For the wrap-around tie, I sewed a rectangle of fabric roughly 5″ x 80″, fold it in half right sides together, and stitch around the ends. Leave center 20″ or so open, so fit the apron. Turn, press, and position over the unfinished waist edge of the apron. Top stitch around the edges of the tie, and through the apron along the waist. I added a second row of stitches to reinforce the waist edge.
I sewed a simple lined pocket, using these great pocket instructions over at Sew Country Chick, and top stitched it onto the apron. Try not to cover up any of the good bits.
Have you been naughty or nice this year?
