A cape

On vacation recently my daughter was on the lookout for good cape material. That is to say material to make a cape in the style of her favorite Disney princess...I have so far declined to make a full costume, but I was on board for a cape. I envisioned something super simple and hopefully durable.  We did bring home a shimmery piece of fabric, and after moving it from spot to spot around my studio the last few weeks I finally took an hour to sew up the cape; mission accomplished!

Here's how I did it:

I had bought a 3/4 yard cut of fabric and used it as-is in a big rectangle.  I had pre-washed the fabric, so first I ironed and then trimmed the sides to be straight. I also trimmed of both selvedge ends. I then basted both long edges of the fabric (I find a basting stitch is a fast and easy guide for hemming). For the two long edges I wanted just a narrow hem so did a 1/4" seam:

Break to check out the awesome lego tractor she just built.

I then folded along the basting stitches; I did a quick finger press first and then used my point turner to run along the edge in front of the iron (the point turner is a fairly recent acquisition and I love it - no more burning the tips of my fingers with steam - yay!) Then fold the edge over again and press. Repeat for other long side and then edgestitch both hems. I did a slightly wider hem for the bottom edge.

Break again somewhere in there as she had now finished the trailer, complete with puppy and apple.

For the top I made a 1/2" casing and then draped the cape around my daughter's neck to estimate the length of elastic. I inserted the elastic, leaving just a 1/2" or so sticking out of each end and then made two 12 1/2" strips of single fold binding with some coordinating blue fabric to use as ties. I decided it would look nicer if the ties were enclosed in the elastic casing, so I tacked one edge of each tie to the end of the elastic with a couple stitches and then after fussing with it for a bit managed to get the tie edge into the casing. I used a zig zag stitch to secure the tie and elastic at the same time. It would have been better to use my walking foot for the zig zag stitches as it was a lot of layers and they didn't want to budge so the stitches were a lot closer together than I intended; oh well. It's definitely secure. :)

 Tie a bow on the happy recipient and let the lego playing recommence. :)