There are plenty of little girl dress patterns avaliable and it was difficult to pick just one.
I am a member of Sew Direct. Membership includes 33% saving on the cover price of Sew Today magazine and 40% off of pattern purchased in their online shop. Patterns are available from Vogue, Butterick, Kwik Sew & McCall. Plus there is usually a members only offer or another offer than reduces the price of patterns and postage is free.I love it when an issue of Sew Today arrives in the post. I grab a cup of tea and flick through all the pictures of the newly released patterns.
I recently took advantage of a largely reduced pattern on the website by Butterick. Pattern number 5625. The pattern includes rompers, jumpers, panties and hats.
The first item I made was the reversible dress (described as a jumper on the pattern, item D).
I had 2 fab fabrics in my stash that I wanted to use. They don't really compliment each other but it doesn't matter too much as they are not seen together.
The first fabric is from Art Gallery Fabrics, Lotus Pond organic cotton range. The range is by designer Rae Hoekstra. I like pretty much all the patterns in this range and have brought a couple, but for this make I chose Snail Trail in multi.
(Adorable isn't it!)
Heres the rest of the range.
I've got the first one on my wishlist. I've seen some lovely dresses made out of this on social media.
I purchased this fabric on a trip to The Village Haberdashery, based in West Hampstead, London (they have an online shop here). They stock all the latest fabrics and even though the shop is small, they manage to pack in so much to chose from. I purchased two fabrics from the Lotus Pond range plus some eyelet fabric on my first trip there. My second trip to the shop was after they got in the whole Cotton & Steel range and my bag was heavy when I left :) If you are not close to London, they have a great website. I haven't ever purchased online but I must say the customer service in store is fab and well worth a visit. The staff are very approachable and helpful. They also have lots of knitting and sewing workshops held in store. I was given a list of the current class schedule when I was there and am very tempted. Think I will be booking a dressmaking class in the near future.
The other fabric I chose for the reverse side of the dress is one I purchased in my local fabric shop, Stitch of Wanstead (they also have a website here). The fabric is called Great Flower designs 40' by 40's, superfine cotton lawn. It was only £6 per meter, I have had difficulty finding it online, but Stitch do stock it in their online shop here. There are 3 colourways but I liked the 'forest leaves on green'.
Now to the pattern itself. There are very few pattern pieces. In each fabric there are 3 pieces to cut, and with your main fabric you also cut out 2 pockets. The original pattern uses ric-rac around the edges but I'm not a fan of ric-rac on clothing so I left this part out. Construction was really straight forward, just had to put the two fabrics right sides together and stitch round.
The pattern asked for buttonholes, but as I had to leave for a night shift at work and I couldn't remember how to use the buttonhole function on my machine properly. Instead I had some press studs in my stash so I used these.
I'm happy with the finished garment. I made a size medium which is slightly too big for my daughter but she can grow into it. Shes 10 months and still in 3-6 month old clothes, so its always difficult to know whether its worth getting the smaller size.
Its great over leggings and a vest and can be easily removed if it gets hot.
Update: since I did the draft to this post I have made another garment from the pattern. This time I tried item A the romper. These were really straight forward too. Only 2 back and 2 front pieces to sew together and a back and front facing. Such a quick make that I got out the sewing machine manual and worked out how to use the buttonhole function on my machine. A nice touch I think.
The fabric I chose was August from the ever popular Cotton And Steel range of fabrics. I brought this from the Festival of Quilts this year in Birmingham. It turned out nicely.
