Skip to main content

Holiday-ish dress


Pattern: Burda 9/2012 #152 Cap Sleeve Dress
Fabric: Denyse Schmidt Chicopee Simply Plaid Lime
Cost: ~ $17.00
Size: 122 cm
Age: 8

[Cardigan: Target (little girls size 5); Shoes: Target; Hairpin and Tights: Target]
-----------------------------------------------

Ok, so I had bought Monkey Pants a holiday dress at Costco for under $20 bucks.  I didn't love the style, but it was nice enough.  However, I didn't really want a dress that she's only going to wear once and then outgrow by the time she can wear it again.  In my trips to a local quilt fabric shop, I kept eye-ing this green plaid quilting cotton but I just couldn't picture what to make with it.  That is until I got the 9/2012 issue of Burda magazine.  I paired the Cap Sleeve Dress and this fabric together in my mind for a bit of a vintage-y feel. My thought was that it would be cute enough as a holiday dress, but casual enough to wear any time.

Here it is paired up with a sparkly, hot pink cardigan from Target.  I'm still clinging to the little girls section as I find the styles so much nicer than the older girls. Monkey Pants was so little and skinny that until recently she could still fit into the largest size, a size 5 in the little girls, but not anymore. However! I did find that this little cardi fit just fine and even if the sleeves get too short, it can be a three-quarter-sleeve cardi. Yes! I didn't do so well with these light grey, sparkly tights though. The crotch was riding pretty low.  But that was Santa. Not me.


Sometimes people get a little fed up with me when I'm taking their picture.
I was concerned the bodice would be too lose on her as the dress in the Burda photo shoot looks like it's not really fitted and Monkey Pants has such a tiny waist.  But I was relieved to see that it turned out just right.  It's such a simple dress, but the overall look of the cap sleeves, pleated skirt and fabric turned out the style I was going for.


The dress is not lined as it is meant to be made from a thicker fabric.  Since I intended it as an every day wear type of dress, I thought I could get away with just the facings around the collar and under the arm holes, but I realized the quilting cotton would not have enough form on it's own so I lined it. Geez! Why am I lining everything now.  It's not like I really now what I'm doing. It was fairly easy to sew, aside from my inexperience with lining and tulle underskirts.

I had noted that an inexpensive dress from holidays past had a simple lining with a bit of black tulle at the bottom that barely showed past the skirt. I decided to add that thereby making things harder for myself by having to do a lot of arithmetic to figure out how much to shorten the lining by, accounting for the hemming and overlap of the tulle on the lining. But unbelievably, it turned out.  I even got to use my gathering foot on the tulle which can be a blessing or a curse. I think this gives the skirt just enough body without turning it into a party dress.



And voila! That's how I got Monkey Pants into a dress!

Comments

  1. She looks absolutely adorable! Great fun pics too! Great dress mom.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I love the dress and reading about how you did it. I am little afraid of my gathering foot. Now I want to try making my daughter a holiday dress for next Christmas - I better warn the grandparents not to get her a dress.

    ReplyDelete
  3. how cute, lucky girl toreat dress.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular Posts

Tinkerbell Cake

I made something! A friend of a friend ..... needed a cake made for her daughter's fourth birthday. I came up with a few ideas, trying to keep them uncomplicated. She opted for the more traditional nine inch round cake with decorations. I thought it would be simple enough, but it always ends up taking me way longer than I anticipate. I wish I could go to a professional cake decorating class by Debbie Brown or Rebecca Sutterby so I could learn some techniques like how to get things to stay glued on. I could never be a cake decorator -my time to money ratio is kind of ridiculous. But here it is. Monkey Pants now wants a Tinkerbell cake for her next birthday too, of course. I need to wake up early tomorrow to make sure she's not eating the mushrooms off of it. (It's happened before).

Emmeline Apron 2

Just got done with this one. Another Emmeline Apron for a Christmas gift. I wanted to try something different with my choice of fabrics this time, although not too different since they are still Amy Butler prints. I chose some darker blue fabrics from the Daisy Chain (Aquatic) line that I wouldn't normally be drawn too. But I'm glad I did. I really like the result. This time, I did a few things a bit differently. One thing about the pattern I'm not fond of is the wordy, yet poor instructions on how to place the waist straps onto the sides of the apron at the right angle. I really don't know why the correct angle isn't just printed on the pattern. So to minimize the trial and error approach encouraged in the pattern instructions, [TIP:] I laid out the fabric and the strap as it would appear once constructed and simply marked a line on the strap corresponding to the angle of the apron. Then, I flipped both apron and strap layers over together; lined up the strap wit

Face painting

For my daughter's upcoming birthday party, I decided I might try my hand at face painting. I collected some photos from the internet I liked, check out a book at the library, and bought some face paints at the party store. The face paints are not very cheap but cheaper than hiring a face painter, right. Here's a couple of the faces I've tried so far. Now if I can only get my face painting time down to ten minutes from twenty minutes a face for the party. I think I may have to enlist a volunteer to help out too. The painting part is actually much easier than it would seem. The only thing that makes it challenging is that the canvas is constantly moving around (at least my canvas). It's not too hard to wash off, but the black takes a bit more scrubbing as the paint is grease or oil based. It makes for a fun activity especially as it gets too cold to go outside. My 3-year old thought it was "amazing" when she looked in the mirror. I even talked my husband i