Apron knotted dress

Last Christmas, I decided to let Isabelle pick out the fabric for her Christmas dress and I was determined to stick with what she chose.  She actually has a strong aesthetic sense and I want to encourage that as much as possible.  Well, one of the fabrics she picked out was this red and green swirly fabric that I really did not like so I tried to find a pattern that would let me highlight the fabric she chose with the candy canes and chocolate on it and de-emphasize the swirly one.

I decided on this Simplicity apron dress pattern.  It is a very simple pattern and I really recommend it to beginner sewers.

I appliqued this candy cane on the bodice.  I am not thrilled with how it came out but it helped tie everything together.  I really like the knotted straps because that helps the dress fit your child for more than one year.

 Even though I did not like the swirly fabric, I think the Christmas outfits came out really well.

A friend of mine from church sent me this picture of her precious daughter Chloe and asked me if I could make Chloe a vintage apron dress with knotted straps like the one she is wearing in this picture.

 

I told my friend that I would love to do that for her.  I knew I had the pattern to do it but it took me a little while to find the fabric.  Vintage clothes are not really my style so I was concerned about whether I would b able to piece together fabrics that would have a vintage flair.  I think I found the right fabric.  I hope she likes it!

 

There will be pants to go with it and I will post those when I have them.

 

I love Easter

Happy Easter!!  He is Risen!!

Easter is by far my favorite holiday.  Preparing my heart for the celebration of Easter is amazing, too.  I love seeing the new flowers and thinking of how we are new creations in Christ and how His blood over us makes us pure and beautiful before our heavenly Father.

Making new Easter outfits for the kids is really fun for me.  

I love dropping the heavy flannels and corduroys of the winter and finding the light cottons of spring and summer!

I will post individually about each outfit in separate posts for those interested in the sewing info; this post is just to show you how they look on the kids and hopefully inspire you to get sewing!

Great pattern for babies

This Butterick pattern has been one of my favorite patterns for babies.  Why can it be difficult to sew for babies?  You need to be more exact in your measurements when sewing for a baby.  While you can adjust a 3T dress to fit a 2T toddler, you can't really make a 6 month dress and fudge it for a 3 month old or a 9 month old.  That being said, I like this Butterick pattern because I feel like the sizes are the most accurate to baby sizes. 

Fall 2011 Sunflower (one of my favorites!!)

It is a little strange at first because the sizes are small, medium, large and x-large but once you read the measurements, it is easy to find the right size you need.  Remember, since you need to be more exact on baby clothes sewing, don't mess with the 5/8" seam allowance (like I am prone to do because I think I am wasting fabric by using such a wide seam allowance) or you will quickly make the dress to big or small for the baby.

Christmas 2011 Candy Cane

I also feel like it is a pattern with flexibility in sizing because it does not have straps that you need to worry about being too long or too short.

January 2012 Cupcake dress (the coordinating pants aren't pictured here)

I also love the little bloomers or pants that you can sew with the dress/top so that the dress that can last the baby longer.  The pants have been great for us since my daughter isn't walking yet and the pants protect her legs from being scraped on the floor.

Hooting for Owls

This fun owl dress was inspired by a dress that I saw (as are most of the dresses that I make), but this one was a little different.  This dress was made in a different fabric and was on a mannequin at JoAnns and the design totally grabbed me when I walked by it.  I never really look at those mannequins in the store.  Normally, I am bee-lining my way to the fabric section before my kids have a meltdown because they are bored (or because they know they get away with a little more trouble in stores than they do at home).

Owl dress front

{Total mommy sidebar here where I must brag on my kids...  My kids are usually amazing in stores for which I am very thankful.  I try to set both them and me up for success by going at good times and making sure everyone has a full stomach.  We try and have fun out and about on errands.  Ok, shameless mommy moment is over.}

Back to the dress... what I liked about this McCalls M5838 pattern was how even with very simple fabrics, the dress (on the younger girl) is very fun and feminine with the gathered sleeves and gathered top.  I am not a big fan of the older girl's dress (sorry, older girl).

I made this dress for my daughter's friend Hannah.  I don't know how girlie she is so I did not want to go overboard on pink like I tend to do with Isabelle.  I used this cute owl flannel that I have had for a while.  I really like the gathered top, don't you?

The back has a zipper instead of buttons.  I just have to be honest and say that I am not good at doing zippers yet.  I can put them in but I am not good at sewing a straight stitch all the way around the zipper.  I lose my focus somewhere along the way around the zipper and I get a crooked line of thread which is of course on the yellow midriff section of this dress (with black thread).  Oh well.  I am going to try to use zippers more often to get better at them.  I will defeat you, zippers!!!!

Owl dress back

Comments on the pattern:

1. I would rank this pattern as a medium skill-level.
2. You need to follow the 5/8" seam allowance on the top, especially where the straps are inserted.  Be very consistent or you will have extra fabric on either side of the straps.
3. When you sew the top to the top lining, you will sew the straps into the front of the top.  Since the straps are gathered, make sure you pinch the entire strap so that you do not catch the side of the strap into your stitching coming up the armpit or down the neck.  I did this  - ugh!!
4. The steps describing attaching the midriff lining was VERY confusing.  I just skipped those steps and did it how it made sense to me.  
5. The midriff lining wound up being too short to cover the gathering of the skirt.  Not sure how this happened.  Could it have to do with the comment #4 above?  Next time, I am going to cut these lining pieces wider than the pattern says to in order to make sure I can use them to cover over the raw gathered edges of the skirt.

Here is Hannah in her dress.  Isn't she precious?

Cupcake Party Dress

This dress just makes me happy!  Winter can be so dreary but this winter is full of fun and color in my sewing repertoire. 

Cupcake dress front

I made this dress for my younger daughter to coordinate with the below Feliz party dress that I made for my older daughter.

 

 This Butterick 5017 pattern has been a favorite of mine for babies/one-year-olds for a while.

The pattern has horizontal panels but I like the vertical panels instead.

Cupcake dress back

To make sure that the dress coordinated well with the Feliz dress for my older daughter, I tied in the cupcake corduroy, purple plaid twill, hot pink rickrack, pink and green pom pom fringe.

 My daughter still is not walking, so I made coordinating pants to go with the dress. 

 

I love the idea of sewing elastic about 2 inches above the hem and creating a cute ruffling at the bottom.  I also sewed a ribbon onto the ankle area that helps tie the pants into the dress.  I think next time, I will make the pants longer so the ruffle can be more distinct.  It is  too subtle for me on these pants.

 

Excited about twirling

My precious daughter Isabelle loves all the typical little girl stuff - dress up, princesses, pink, sparkles, accessories, dancing, twirling, etc.  I have gotten the creative juices flowing and sewn with this super fun twirly skirt for her and two of her little co-princesses, Ruthie and Vivian.

Twirling skirt mania!
This all started with an awesome book my mom bought me last Christmas called, "Sewing Clothes Kids Love"

In the book, there are clothes that just make you smile!  The patterns have a ton of possibilities with all of the embellishments that you can add so you can stay simple (and "get her done") or you can go wild with trim galore!  The pattern that seemed like a good place to start was the Insa dress.

 It is a double layer skirt where each layer (or gore) has 4 equal sections so you can add in as many fabrics as you want.  I chose four different fabrics for the top layer 

and then one fabric for all four pieces of the bottom skirt.  

There are placement guides to help you put in vertical elastic strips on the top skirt to give the scalloped effect.  Isn't it cute?

The skirt has a wide waist band that helps you put in a complimentary fabric to the rest of the skirt.  I really liked the look of putting the plaid on the angle.  This uses up more fabric but it was not that big of a pattern piece.

Can you see the circular beaded things that I appliqued onto Isabelle's skirt (above)?  They were special to me because I bought those in Central Asia when I visited my friend Leslie in October.   Unfortunately, they disintegrated in the wash. :(

Do you like the ruffle that is sewn on the hem here?  The technique is new for me and is called ruching.    All ruching means is gathering, ruffling or pleating.  I really love how it adds some more femininity to the skirt and helps give a finished look since it is the same fabric as the waste band.  I am going to do a post to give some tips on how I did it.

If you look closely, you can see the row of basting stitching that I never took out.  I can be really lazy sometimes with those finishing touches!!

 After I did the trial run with Isabelle's skirt, I decided to make two more for two little girls that live in Central Asia.   One of the girl's mom sews so I put the elastic in the waist casing but left the safety pin attached so the mom could adjust it for the girl's waist size.  I don't think the other girl's mom sews, so to avoid the issue of guessing at how big her waist is, I put in a ribbon that she can use to cinch the waist.  I hope that works out.

 So, off these two skirts go...

 in this duffle bag... 

 to go make two little princesses very happy (I HOPE!!!).  We love you Ruthie and Vivian!

Here is a picture of one of the little girls getting her skirt... How adorable is she???????