Summer Sewing

I've never done a ton of sewing for my kids. I like making dresses the most, but currently both of my daughters have 6 EACH. Not exactly something they need!

The biggest problem with sewing clothes, is by the time you pay for the pattern, the material, and all the notions, you can usually buy it cheaper.

But if you find a free pattern on line . . . it changes everything!

I've been following Sewing in No Man's Land for several months now. When she posted this pattern,  I knew I had to try it!

One note on her patterns: they are NOT super accurate. She talks about that on her patterns page. She doesn't have any fancy program or anything, so you need to do a bit of "intelligent sewing". Just go with your gut for how things should go.

So here was my first attempt:

This one turned out to be free: I bought the fabric like 7 years ago when I was pregnant with Girly-Lou. The white was leftover from my maniac sewing back in November, and I already had the Velcro too.

I love it . . . except for the sleeves.  They stick up so high I feel like they are trying to eat her ears!  But it's still awesome.  I also really changed the pants. My first attempt looked like clown pants instead of shorts.  So I cut off several inches on all the pattern pieces - both length and width.  They were MUCH better the second attempt!

So I thought I'd try to change the sleeves so they stuck down more.

I first tried shirring the hem. It helped, but they still went weird. I finally ended up sewing in a 1/4 inch elastic strip and tucking the sides of the sleeves back into the bodice to help them stay down.

This one is not my favorite, but she sure is cute!

It's also a freebie (I already had the fabric and everything)

But #3 was the charm.

I did buy the fabric this time, but since it only took a yard (with a 40% coupon), that only set me back $2.

 


For the sleeves, I took a 7 inch strip of 3 inch eyelet  and just attached it to the the shirt bands.  It's my favorite by far!  The eyelet was on clearance for $2 each, and it took two spools for it all.  So total this one was about $6.

To make it sound even better, let's combine all of them. So I can say I made 3 full outfits for $6.  Not bad at all! 

*no children were hurt in the staging of this post. Although many bribes were used, the author is not liable for the aggravation of trying to pose 17 month old adorable girls!