Don't get me wrong, I love our roller shorts pattern, but some days I am just not in the mood for sewing binding.
Today being one of those days, I altered the pattern just a tiny bit to make these fab shorts, that depending on what you made them out of could be anything from pj shorts to some gorgeous casual shorts to take you right through the weekend.
If you too can't get enough of super comfy and cute shorts with huge pockets, here is how to change up your roller shorts pattern.
First thing to do is to get out your roller shorts pattern pieces and make a few small changes. You could trace them off and make these changes on the new copy, but I was lazy and just made the adjustments straight onto the fabric.
Basically what you want to do is square off the bottom of the shorts and then add some length for a hem. I wanted my shorts a little longer so I added 1 inch for a hem and another inch for extra length. Do the same thing to both the front and back pattern pieces.
If you are having pockets you will need to square those off too, but if you are not adding length to your shorts you will not need to add length to those, if you are adding extra length you will need to add that but not the extra inch for the hem.
So here are my pieces: 1 inch added to the pocket pieces and 2 inches to the front and back pieces.
Then we are going to get to sewing the pockets. The procedure here is different to the pattern as we are avoiding the binding, but it is super easy.
1. Place your front pocket piece right sides together with your front shorts piece and serge the pocket opening.
2. Flip your pocket piece to the inside and press the seam.
3. Place your back pocket piece right side facing the front pocket piece and serge the 2 pocket pieces together along the straight edge.
4. Baste both pocket pieces to the edge of the shorts inside the seam allowance (I was super lazy and did this with my serger since it is going to be inside the seam anyway).
5. Place one front and one back piece together with right sides facing and sew the side and inside leg seams. Repeat with the other leg.
I serged around the bottom hems here as well just to neaten them up for later.
6. Turn one leg in the right way and put it inside the other leg. Line up and serge the crotch seam. (this is the same technique as in the pattern).
7. Insert the waistband elastic as per the pattern instructions. I added a few more lines of topstitching around the elastic just for something different.
8. Press up 1 inch around each of the bottom hems. The hem will fold over the bottom of the pocket.
9. Topstitch your hems in place and add a faux tie (if you want to) and you have some cute shorts.
These are going to get a lot of wear come summer time, and I might make some PJ shorts too.
If you have a go at changing up your Roller Shorts, I would love to see, so be sure to grab some pics and hashtag them #threadfaction
