Fashion DIY: My first ever project, A jersey maxi skirt.

I made a skirt, all by myself, my first ever proper full item of clothing I have ever made. Well not including the mini skirts we made aged 14, back when bright orange and lime satin were all the rage, and we didn't comprehend openings/ zips. The results being skirts that would not pull up past our knee's. But enough of that...

I made a skirt!!!!!!! woop.

It is a maxi skirt, made from jersey fabric which I hand sewed myself. Go me. I am really quite proud, but up close it is not perfect, and frankly there is no chance of Vivienne Westwood calling me to join her team. But I have worn it several times and it is fine.

I'd spotted a maxi skirt in a shop, but didn't want to spend the money. It was £13 from Primarni, what was I thinking? I had a little google and found this Tutorial (great blog). I decided to use jersey as I would not need to hem it. This was not out of laziness, purely as it my first project and I wanted it to be as straight forward as possible. I knew I wanted something with navy and stone and this fabric was perfect. I still scoured the shop for an hour, I LOVE haberdasheries. I bought 1metre, it was 1.7m width. I pretty much followed the tutorial, the only difference being I did not make it as wide. Instead I loosely put the fabric around me then added about a 20cm extra overlap and cut it there, I did not want it as poofy as the tutorial, I figured this would not work well with jersey. Once complete I added some belt loops as it will always be worn with a belt... (shhh: the waist stitching is D.O.D.G.Y). Two loops at the front, two crossed loops on the reverse, bish bash bosh, done. 
I used a basic stitch (note to self: go google the name of stitches) and I used embroidery thread throughout. Not sure why, would not use again, but it worked. To be honest I actually later went over the back seam with a sewing machine, it did not need it, but I had my dad's machine set up and I was wearing the skirt so thought it wouldn't hurt. When I have time in the future I will sew up the hem too, then it will be indestructible for ever I am sure.

The front:

The back:

The truth:

Featuring a cameo from the little chap who conveniently colour coordinated.
Terrible stitching isn't it. ha.

Cost: Fabric £4 per metre, elastic £1 per metre. Everything else I previously owned.
Supplies: 1metre Jersey (t-shirt type) fabric, 2cm width elastic, cotton, needles and scissors.
Time taken: 5 hours(ish). Consisting of 3 evenings, sewing whilst watching TV and sipping a fine wine. Or two. The moral of which, this did not require too much time or too much intelligence/ coherence.

So what do you think? Do you have any first DIY fashion successes and failures you would like to share with me? I would love to hear your stories/ see the results.