We just had three days of summery weather! When it hit 90 degrees, Ray and I once again felt sure we have made the right decision in moving up here! Neither of us like hot weather and love the cooler weather we have in Washington. We are back to cool temps and a breeze today. Perfect!
In between working on quilts that need to be finished, I have been making two dresses for the girls. Before leaving California, my friend Stephanie was clearing out some fabrics she didn’t think she would use. Stephanie is a generous soul and she gave me so much fabric! Among the pieces were two cute prints.
These two pieces are from a line called Stitch Cats by Clothworks. They are super cute and I thought the girls would enjoy something made from them.
I made the dress for little sister first. I used the Geranium pattern by Rae Hoekstra. I have to tell you, I am so rusty at making garments. Also, I didn’t like the way the closure was done on the back of the dress.
It seemed like there should be an extended overlap (a tab of sorts) for the buttons and buttonholes but the designer just has it overlapped without this. Does that make sense?
Since the pattern didn’t provide this and I didn’t like the way it looked, I decided to use a ribbon closure. Note: The ribbons are cut extra long for now. I want my son or DIL to trim them after deciding how long they should be to take the dress on and off of A. It turns out we only need to untie the top bow to take it on and off.
A’s dress is made with the larger print and the bodice is lined with the smaller print. It is nice and long so she should be able to wear it for a while – these girls seem to grow about 1/2 inch each day!
I added a pocket for her treasures. It was so cute when I first put the dress on her. She had a tiny bag of Skittles that big sister got from a piñata earlier in the day. She immediately put the Skittles into her pocket.
This is the dress I made for H. The Geranium pattern wasn’t a large enough size so I switched over to a free tutorial by Life Sew Savory called Tank Dress Pattern. (Note – I have used a number of her free patterns and they are pretty darn good. She has so many on her site!) This dress is much the same as little sister’s though I used more of the smaller print for the bodice and skirt. The buttons were handled the same way on this pattern, without a tab, but I just gave in and overlapped the pieces as she instructed. (I need to figure out how to fix this issue myself for next time.)
Because H is into all things pink and sparkly, I chose these heart shaped gemstone buttons I saw in JoAnn’s. In actuality, she doesn’t need functional buttons for the dress as it goes right over her head without unbuttoning the dress. I could cut the front bodice as one piece if I were to make this again.
Above is the obligatory picture of the girls in their new dresses. They gave me all of 30 seconds to take this before they ran off so it isn’t the best shot. These two had better things to do than placate Grammy with pictures.
The next morning H was trying on shoes from a box of hand me downs she received. She is in love with these sparkly green flats! I love her pose here with her legs crossed in such a lady-like fashion. (I also love that she chose to put her new dress when she got up the next day). Overall, I am happy with the dresses. Making them was enjoyable and I feel like I am getting back into the groove of garment sewing. I have some fabric for a shirt for myself and hope to work on it soon.
I am not one to write about politics on my blog. Everyone has different beliefs and that is ok with me. I don’t want to get into it. But the last couple of weeks have really been a tough time. So sharing these two pictures of my girls seemed a great way to close – with feelings of hope in our future generations of very strong, capable, powerful women.