DIY Garter and the Search for Undergarments

Mom and I went shopping this afternoon. We had some time to kill, so we started to look for a mother-of-the-bride dress, then we started looking for purple shoes for me, and somehow we started looking for undergarments for me. To keep this post family friendly, I will just say that I am "well endowed" on top, and the seamstress at the bridal shop already informed me that it would not be possible to add a built-in bra to my dress. So I'm looking for a corset. To spare details, I will just say that I have a couple of contenders, and Tom and I will be going corset shopping in the near future. I plan on ordering my dress in November, so I will need to have my undergarments figured out by then so that I can have accurate measurements taken. Since we were working on under-the-dress things, I decided to make my garters for my project this week. I made two, and they are identical. They were fairly easy to make, and brought back memories of middle school when my home ec teacher taught me how to make hair scrunchies.

You will need:

• 3" satin ribbon 
• 1" lace
• 1/2" elastic
• Safety Pin
• 1/8" satin ribbon in a contrasting color to the other ribbon
• Shells, pearls, charms, or whatever else you want for embellishment
• Measuring tape
• Pins
• Sewing machine or needle and thread
• Iron
• Hot glue gun

What you do: 

1. With the measuring tape, measure around your mid to upper thigh (this is a fun project to have your fiancé do). Add about an inch to that measurement, that is how much of the 3" satin ribbon and lace your will need. 
2. With the right side of the 3" ribbon facing you, line up the top edge of the lace with the top edge of the ribbon. Fold the ribbon in half, the lace should be completely inside the ribbon. Use pins to keep everything together.
3. Stitch through all three layers (ribbon, lace, ribbon) with a 1/4" seam allowance. You should have a narrow tube. 
4. Flip the tube inside out, if you did this correctly, you should have a tube of ribbon with the lace underneath and the seam on the inside of the ribbon. 
5. Iron the ribbon so that it lies flat. Run a top stitch next to the crease formed by ironing. This will create a ribbon casing that lies flat.
6. Cut your elastic about 3/4 of the length of your ribbon, it should be able to stretch around your mid to upper thigh comfortably. 
7. Pin the safety pin through one end of the elastic, and insert the elastic into the ribbon casing. Be careful not to twist the elastic, and hold the end. Thread the safety pin through the ribbon casing, gathering the ribbon as you go. 
8. Stitch the two ends of the elastic together. 
9. Pull one end of the ribbon over the other end, tuck it under to hide the raw edges, and stitch closed.
10. Cut about 6" of 1/8" ribbon. Put a drop of hot glue on the front of the garter, and attach the narrow ribbon. I also added a string of pearls at this point.
11. Once the glue is hard, tie the narrow into a bow. 
12. Put a drop of hot glue on top of the bow and attach any other embellishments, I added a seashell to continue my beach theme.

You now have a handmade garter that will match your wedding colors perfectly. It is also more comfortable to wear than many commercially made garters because the elastic is completely covered by ribbon.