A new dress for Anna

Well, I decided to make Anna a dress. I've never made any kind of clothing before, other than scrunchies and I don't think that counts. So I was a little nervous, but then again, it's for a little girl, not me, so if it didn't turn out perfectly, it would still be okay.

I found a really cute little dress tutorial online at www.made-by-rae.com. The original is for an infant, but a reader did one for a 3T size. It was just a pattern you print out, then tape together and trace onto the material. This pattern has the top lined, which I really like, because it makes it seem more put together.

The pattern pieces cut out.

Ta-da!

Anna's new dress!

The top has long flaps that you tie together in knots, to hold it in place.

Here is the bottom of the dress. I had to sew the seam as close as I could to the edge. It wasn't too hard, because it lined up with the needle foot, so I could tell where I needed to be at all times.

This was the most frustrating part of the dress. The brown piece in between the top and bottom. The pattern calls for piping. Well, I didn't have any and thought I could get away with kind of making my own, but I couldn't. Plus, the instructions were not very clear with this step. I ended up calling my mom and skyping with her to try and figure it out. I ended up just sewing this brown piece of bias tape on the top and then sewing the skirt on after.

My mom told me to sew as close to the edge as possible. I thought I was close enough, but obviously wasn't. I sewed this before I did the hem on the bottom and should have done it like that. Oh well.

Sadly this is the best picture I could get of her in it.

The other ones were much worse.

It's actually a little big on her. It looks like it fits in the picture, but the top is just too big. I took it in a little, from the original pattern. But she would barely let me try it on her, without causing a big fuss, so I had to kind of guess. Soooo, hopefully it will fit her next summer. You can tell the ties are too loopy and big on her shoulders.

But overall, I'm pleased with how it turned out, especially for my first project. It wasn't really difficult, just took some time, especially since I could really only work on it in the evening, after the kids went to bed. I have a question for you all though, does it scream homemade??? You know how some clothes, you can tell a mile away, it was homemade? I've been staring at it too long to be able to really tell. Go ahead, be honest, be brutally honest! Okay, well maybe not brutally, but I am interested in what you think. I won't be offended if you think it does, or a little or a lot. :)

I am looking forward to trying some other sewing projects. I found an easy tutorial for some skirts, that I want to try.