Make Girl's Bubble Shorts

Today I am going to show you how I used our shorts pattern to make girl’s bubble shorts with curved, gathered pockets for our little grand daughter, Jess.

What you need:

A shorts pattern (see how to make one here)

A Pocket Pattern (get one here)

Main fabric (I used a lovely soft denim)

Trim fabric

Sewing, cutting tools

Let’s Sew

1. Take the pattern and measure down the inside leg 2″ and then fold the pattern along from that point.

2. Place the pattern on the fold and cut 2.

3. Place the Pocket Pattern on the fold and cut 2.

4. With right sides together, sew down the short edge and along the pocket bottom. Trim corners and clip the curve.

5. Turn to right side.

6. Change the stitch length to gathering stitch and sew two rows of gathering stitch along the top of the pocket.

7. Take the trim fabric and fold up from a corner like so:

8. Cut along the line formed by the fold. This will give us a bias cut. Cut 2 strips about 7.5″ long x 1.5″ wide.

9. Fold in half and press.

10. Open out again and fold one edge over 1/4″

11. Pin to top of pocket, gathering pocket to fit:

12. Stitch along the fold line

13. Fold the other edge over 1/4″ and press – I finger pressed this.

14. Fold folded edge to folded edge, right sides together.

and pin

15. Stitch and trim seam

16. Fold to the inside of the pocket and pin

You want the pin to appear as shown, at the bottom of the trim on the right side

17. On the outside of the pocket, stitch in the ditch under the trim – you will see it catches the trim on the inside

but won’t be seen on the outside of the pocket!

18. Position the pocket so that it fits down the side fold of the shorts, at a height that suits you remembering that we have to fold over the casing on the top for elastic.

19. Sew a double row of stitching around the pockets’

20. Continue to make the shorts as we did when we made the boxer shorts.

21. Run two rows of gathering stitch around the leg bottom (as we did with the pocket trim)

22. Measure around the leg about midway between the knee and crotch and cut 2 strips of trim fabric to that length plus 1.5″

23. Join the ends to make a circle and press in half (as we did with the pocket trim), press over 1/4″ along one edge.

24. Lining up the seam of the trim with the leg seam, pin around, gathering the shorts leg to fit.

25. Stitch, trim , fold and finish as we did with the pocket trim.

26. Take a length of the trim fabric, fold in half and stitch around edge leaving space to turn through to right side.

27. Sew gap closed and attach the midpoint of the length to the centre back.

28. Bring ties to front and tie a bow.

I loved the little flowers on the trim fabric so decided to press some heat and bond to a piece, cut out some flowers and attached them to a little top, finishing them off with buttons!

Such a cute little outfit!! I can’t believe that even though Jess loved wearing this outfit, we could not find a single photo to show you! It is such a shame because they really looked much cuter on than I can possibly show in this photo. (one of the disadvantages of living apart from the models!)