Red, White, and Pink Tour

I’ve been quiet for the last month because, honestly, I’ve been feeling less than inspired to sew. It’s so cold out that I just want to crawl under a blanket and hibernate! However, when Tibeca of Sewing by Ti announced that her monthly tour would be Red, White, and Pink, I knew it was the perfect opportunity to sew up the fuchsia double brushed poly that I got from her fabric shop Simply by Ti a few months ago. When I pulled it out of my stash, my 9-year-old’s eyes lit up at the beautiful color, so I knew it’d be made into something for her.

Last week, she spotted a dress that had a heart cutout on the back and she fell in love with it. Problem was that it was a women’s size dress and wouldn’t fit her, so she turned to me and asked if I could make one like it. I decided to start by mashing Carlie’s Dolman Top and the Girl’s Capsule Skirt and take it a step further by lining the top and adding a second layer of the skirt.

Her measurements put her into a size 14 for both top and skirt, so I first cut out all the pieces for both, shortening the top to measure 17 inches from the shoulder since that’s where we wanted the waist seam to hit her. Then I cut out another whole set of the top and skirt, but shortened the sleeves 1.5 inches and cut the skirt at the size 7 hemline. Then I laid out all my scraps to find 4 pieces that were big enough for pockets because who doesn’t love pockets?

I added the heart cutout before constructing any other part of the dress. I first drew out the shape, traced it on lightweight interfacing, trimmed around it and ironed it on the right side of the bodice back with the longer sleeves (which would become the lining of the dress’s top). I added the interfacing to help the knit fabric keep the heart shape. I put that piece’s wrong side to the shorter sleeved back piece’s right side and stitched on the line of the heart shape. I trimmed away the inside of the heart, leaving about 1/4 to 3/8 inch inside. I then clipped into that allowance around the heart’s curves and at the point and trimmed off the allowance at the top dip of the heart. Finally, I turned it right sides out and top stitched around the heart outline.

To finish the dress, I carefully sewed up the 2 dolmans so the longer sleeved one sat inside, then sewed the skirt pieces together with the shorter skirt on top of the longer. I attached the top and skirt with a circle of wide gold elastic sandwiched in the seamline for a built-in waistband/belt. Rather than properly hemming the 4 sleeves and 2 half-circle skirt hems, I decided that a ruffley rolled hem would be the perfect touch for this girly look.

My daughter is thrilled with her new PINK dress with a heart cutout. She likes it so much that she barely complained about going out in the 24*F weather to take pictures! She’s such a trooper!

Don’t miss out on any of the Red, White, and Pink Tour stops this month! Let’s get inspired! (Note: The links below won’t work until their scheduled dates, but feel free to check out the blogs any time.)

February 1st: Sewing By Ti (intro),  Mahlica Designs
2nd: Sewing With D
3rd: Sewing With Sarah
Sunday, February 4th: Tenille’s Thread
5th: My Heart will Sew On
6th: Kathy Kwilts and More
7th: Stitched By Jennie
8th: EYMM
9th: With Love In Every Stitch
10th: The Bear and the Pea Atelier
Sunday, February 11th: Our Play Place
12th: My Sewing Roots
13th: Margarita on the Ross
14th: Very Blissful
15th: Seams Sew Lo
16th: Sew Sew Ilse
17th: Aurora Designs
Sunday, February 18th: Sewing Scientist
19th: Manning the Machine
20th: The Fairy Dust Bin
21st: Hazelnut Handmade
22nd: Kate Will Knit
23rd: Lulu & Celeste
24th: Flaxfield Sewing
Sunday, February 25th: Twinado Alley
26th: Ma Moose
27th: Auschick Sews
28th: Oak Blue Designs

Happy Sewing!!  ~  Joelle