Winter Dresses!

I always like to make my girls dresses for Christmas. You can see the ones I made last year by clicking here.  This year I decided to ease the stress of the Holiday season by making them after. That was a great idea, if I do say so myself.

Originally I was only going to make one for my oldest daughter, since my younger two have so many dresses. She helped pick out the material. I ended up having a lot of fabric left over. So I went through my fabric stash and found some black fabric that I thought would go well with the blue. I also had to grab a couple more zippers and some ribbon.

I'm super happy with how they turned out and I hope you like them too.

This one is my three year old's. I used the Butterick pattern B4115. I changed up the overskirt a bit. I just cut out the overskirt exactly the same as the skirt. Then added the ribbon to the bottom.

*A note about adding ribbon - DO NOT CUT the ribbon before you sew it on. I learned this the hard way years ago. It's hard to get exactly the right length of ribbon. I sew it on directly from the spool. When I get to the end, then I cut it with an inch or so extra to fold under itself.*

For my 5 year old's I used Simplicity Pattern 5223. I pretty much followed the pattern on this one. Other than the ribbon - I did not add any around the waist, but instead at the bottom of the skirt. Oh yeah... I also lined the bodice which was not called for in the pattern, but my girls have this thing about itchy dresses and a lined bodice helps a lot with that.

Before, I show you the last one, I have to share my goof up. Luckily noticed this before she wore it anywhere, but she did try it on several times without noticing. See how the seam is on the outside of the sleeve? I was patting myself on the back that I hadn't had to unpick anything this time - then I noticed this. I guess the good thing about sewing is that you can usually just unpick things and fix them.

The last several years I have been trying to improve my sewing skills, by making more complicated dresses. My oldest daughter usually gets the brunt of this experimentation. Usually they turn out well, but there was one that ... well let's just say she doesn't wear it. I think I did okay this time around.

This dress was made from McCall's pattern 4246. I altered the skirt to make it smaller to fit her tiny waist. I should have adjusted the top a bit too. I also added ribbon to the bottom. One thing she doesn't like is that it is two pieces. When she bends over her back shows and she doesn't like that.  I might sew them together - I'm not sure I have enough thread left though. Another thing she didn't like was the itchy sleeves{the raw seams inside the top of the sleeve}. I think if I had a surger that would help, but I don't. On Sunday, I just taped the raw edges so they wouldn't itch her. I need to figure out a more permanent solution. Overall, she loves it and got lots of compliments on Sunday.

Well what do you think? Was it worth the time and effort? Sometimes I think it's easier to just buy them dresses. But I really love the sense of accomplishment I get from making them.

Stay tuned, I'll be sharing my two cents on patterns and how to not spend a fortune on them.