Simple Simon and Company

General· Uncategorized

Some People Go To ALT to Network…Some People Go To ALT to Sew Men’s Stretchy Pants…We Are of the Pants Persuasion

Let me explain.... No wait. It's too weird...and it doesn't make any sense. Let's just do this:  I am going to tell you a story.  A true story.  A strange story that involves swants, gold spandex, faux fox fur, Instagram, a guy named Stone, and of course Elizabeth and I.  And hopefully you know us well enough by now that when I say Elizabeth and I and a story you understand that of course its going to be strange and you won't find any amount of gold spandex and faux fur unnatural. Now, with ... View the Post

Learn to Sew· Tutorials

How to Sew a Dart

Sewing darts is another one of those things in sewing that seemed so complicated and hard when I first started sewing.   But as time went on and I got braver....I finally tackled darts.  And again, I wondered why I was so nervous.  But I guess seeing all of those markings on patterns, I was more than a little intimidated. There are lots of kinds of darts.  The picture below shows a pattern with one dart, but there can also be bust darts, curved darts, or even double darts (that look like a ... View the Post

Techniques· Tutorials

How to Sew a Buttonhole (and let your machine do all the work!)

Today we are talking buttonholes...and I know, I really do know.  Some of you are still afraid of them.  I was.  I would *conveniently* ask my Home Ec. teacher to "show" me how to do a buttonhole over and over and she would end up "showing" me but doing the whole thing for me.  It was my trick for years.  And then later it was my mom...until one day, I said that it was time to learn the buttonhole.  That was years ago and now I laugh at how scared I was of something....but it seemed so ... View the Post

General· Skirts

And we interrupt our regularly scheduled series….

Sorry, we are interrupting our series for a day....but I promise it's for a good cause (and good tutorial)!  Today we are over at Sew, Mama, Sew sharing in their quilting series and giving you a project for all those orphan quilt blocks that didn't make it into quilts.  They make great pockets!!!! See you there!  And just to let you know.....coming up this week we will be talking buttonholes, zippers, sewing darts, inserting sleeves and much more!  (It's going to be a good week....) And we ... View the Post

Techniques· Tutorials

One Girls Guide to Gorgeous Gathering (How to Gather)

How to Gather: Today we are going to continue our "What I Wish I'd Known When I Started Sewing" series with a day dedicated to gathering. Because we like big skirts and full dresses we kind of have gathering down to a science so we are excited to share with you a technique that we use ALL THE TIME. Now before we show you how to gather we want to talk a little bit about what gathering is. Gathering is a technique that helps control fabric fullness.  It is a process that draws a given ... View the Post