Easter Outfit #3

Isabelle's Easter dress is done and I am really happy with it. It is going to look so adorable with Grace's dress and Gabe's romper in our upcoming family pictures. The striped fabric is from Patsy Aiken's Chez Ami line which I absolutely love!! Unfortunately, I don't think they sell it anymore. :( The polka dot fabric is from JoAnn's. I think the two fabrics coordinate well and even though the dress is a little busy, I am ok with it. The pattern is from Simplicity and I have used it before.

I am really proud of two things on this dress:

1. How the dots match up on the right and left sides. I have been trying to work with fabrics that have horizontal and/or vertical patterns more and get better at lining the patterns up. I got good practice at this on Gabe's romper which has a large plaid. The dots on this dress weren't as hard. Look how great the dots match up on the back even over the bottom of the zipper! It did not work out as well at the top of the zipper because somehow I made the back right piece a little bigger than the left piece. That happens because my seam allowance is not always exactly the same on with every seam like it should be...Oh well.
2. The second thing I am proud of is the sleeves. I have made this dress before for a Thanksgiving dress and the sleeves were long and sort of midevil-maiden-style (I made that term up). I really loved those sleeves but since this is a spring and summer dress, I decided to go with the short sleeves. The sleeves are pleated at the top (and one pleat at the bottom) instead of being gathered. Something new to try and I really liked it.

One thing I learned from this dress is to be careful of the fabric material you are using if you have a pattern with a solid colored background and an intermittent pattern like dots. Somehow the polka dotted fabric got snagged or it was messed up before I bought it because you can see areas like the one with the pointer on it below where the pink is pulled out and a white squiggle line remains. The fabric feels almost like linen so I guess this is a danger with that type of fabric. It is on the front of the dress but I am hoping that Isabelle's arm will cover it.
With this dress done, all that is left to do is find some warm weather (hello! Where are you warm weather?!??!) and get my munchkins ready for fun pictures.