Turning a pair of old jeans into a jean skirt is both practical (hello comfy pairs of jeans with holes in the knees) and easy! I hadn't ever done it before because I wasn't sure I'd be very good at it since I'm still learning, but the only way to learn is to practice, right? So with two of the three Wee Ones at school, I attacked a cherished pair of jeans with seriously ripped cuffs and a few sad holes in the knees. It took about 45 minutes, and most of that time was spent ripping out the seams. In under an hour I had a cute jean skirt and some denim left over for...what? A teeny denim skirt for Wee One #3? I'd better get on that before she's too big!
First you'll need a pair of jeans that fit, big scissors, little scissors, a seam ripper, a sewing machine (with a needle that will go through denim) and thread.
Cut the legs of the jeans off longer that you think you'll want, just in case, then rip up the insteam, like this. In the front, rip up to the zipper.
In the back, rip up to where the waistband starts. Different styles of jeans will have a different natural spot to stop, here there is another decorative seam below the waistband, that's where I stopped.
Now when you pin it together, if you just pin it without doing any tucking (rookie mistake) you'll end up with this very unfortunate piece of denim poking out.
So when pinning it together (inside out of course), be mindful that you'll want any unfortunate bumps like that on the inside, so you can trim them off once you've sewn it together.
This is what it looks like on the inside of the front.
And this is the inside of the back.
So here you go. Make sure your bobbin is full and your sewing machine threaded and away you go! Sew the seams you've pinned first.