For our first assignment we had to sew our own workshop apron. After watching videos on how a sewing machine works and learning the techniques necessary to produce our apron, I started the process of creating one.

Before sewing, we first need to cut out the fabric that will become our apron. I first measured out my waistband (18″) and added an additional inch for seam allowance, the part of the fabric that will be folded in to make a clean edge. Since my pattern was folded in half, I divided the length of my waistband by 2 and used the result (9.5″) as the length of my folded waistband. Following the  measurement guidelines, I made the top edge 3 inches less than my final waistband (6″) and made the height of my apron 32″, 33″ including seam allowance. To make the angle cut I measured 6″ from the top edge and connected that point to the left point of the top edge.

After making the pattern the next step is to cut out the fabric following the pattern. Since I made the pattern with the fabric being folded in half, I had to line up the folded edge of the fabric to the straight edge of the pattern. From here I cut the outline of the pattern and unfolded the fabric to get the whole apron.

After cutting out the fabric I began sewing the edges to clean them up. Since I had accounted for an inch of seam allowance, I folded about 1/2″ of fabric on each edge and sewed it inwards. Although I had almost no trouble with this part, there were a few mishaps that occurred.

While sewing one of the edges I did not realize the bobbin had ran out of thread in the middle of sewing. After adding more thread to the bobbin, I tried to start from where I ended my last stitch but was unsuccessful and left a small gap between the stitches.  On other stitches I had forgotten to reverse stitch at the end which caused some loosing to occur when cutting the excess thread.

After sewing the edges I attached straps to my apron. Since I was following the beginner level assignment all I had to do was attach my straps to my apron using a box stitch. I decided to use one of the ribbons available for us to use and measured the amount of ribbon needed by warping it around my neck and seeing how low I wanted my apron to hang.

The final product was a workshop apron that can be used for future projects to protect my clothes from dust and other contaminants.  Although it was my first time sewing, I really look forward to projects that will allow me to utilize this skill again.