A gift for a new baby

Our mothers' group welcomed its 16th baby last week! We have 11 two year olds and now five babies 10 months and younger.

Little Arabella was the first girl after a string of boys, in fact until she was born all of the 'second' babies have been boys.

We usually give the new babies a cot linen set or sleeping bag made by one of the very talented mums in our group. But as she is heavily pregnant with her own 'baby #2', I put my hand up to make Arabella's gift.

I decided on a little dress - the O+S birthday party dress. Yes, I have made it before (three times, in fact) but I think it is just so beautiful and a bit special. I'm also so familiar with the construction now that it is very fast to make up, I didn't need to refer to the directions. I also made a pair of matching bloomers using Lotta Jansdotter's pattern, and some matching button snap clips. The dress and bloomers are both in size 6-12 months.

As I mentioned above, this is the fourth time I've made this dress so I decided to do a few things differently to relieve the boredom.

First of all, I used French seams rather than overlocking. I only learnt how to make French seams on my last project, so these and still a bit of a novelty to me and I love them! Seriously, they look so neat and I really like that I'm able to finish the seams as I sew. The pattern is pretty well suited to this method of finishing, although I did have to improvise a little when attaching the top facing, which calls for the seams to be opened out.

The second thing I did differently was to use a different/coordinating fabric for the facings. I really love this look and to be honest it never would have occurred to me to do it when I first started sewing last year. The fabric is from Lila Tueller's Soiree range. I used Meadow Paisley in Aqua for the dress and Leaf Confetti in Sun for the facings and bloomers. Both were fabrics I already had in my stash. I was worried they'd be a little busy but think they look pretty good.

Finally, I sewed the pleats in this time round (using a narrow line of stitching at the inner edge of each pleat) and really love the result, it's so crisp and will be much easier to iron. I have no idea why I haven't done this in the past, but will certainly do it from now on.


The finished gift: dress, bloomers and matching snap clips.


The bloomers match the dress's facings.


I secured the pleats with an edgestitch on the inside of each pleat. Really love the crisp finish.


The inside of the dress. My overlocker may gather dust now that I have discovered the beauty of French seams. It makes the dress look so neat and professional.

Birthday party dress, take 2... and 3

I blogged my last (and first) attempt at the Oliver + S birthday party dress last December. I love the pattern so much that I've since made it twice more, once for a friend's little girl and once for my daughter's birthday party.

This time I used satin ribbon instead of the tabs across the pleats and am happy with the results. It gives the dress quite a different feel and is much more girly. I think I prefer the tabs though, they're a bit different and look so cute.

I made the first dress out of fabric from Lecien's Grandma's Flower Garden collection. I'd seen this fabric numerous times online and loved it, and fell even more in love when I saw it 'in the flesh', so just had to buy it. Although the print and colour were even better in real life, I was so disappointed by the weight of the cotton. It was extremely lightweight, almost flimsy. It was so thin that the pins slipped out on their own as I was sewing.

I also should have thought more about fabric placement - lesson learned for next time.

I used an old favourite fabric for my daughter's dress, Fresh poppies in green from Amy Butler's Midwest Modern collection. I adore this fabric and will really miss seeing it in my sewing cupboard, although I only had one yard of it so it really was a case of use it now while my daughter is still little.

I'm very happy with the end result. It's a very fresh and girly dress, and best of all it's NOT PINK! (I love pink, but we have way too much pink in this household). The dress took a lot of punishment at the teddy bear's picnic we had to celebrate my little girl turning two, and washed up beautifully.


The finished Lecien fabric dress. This photo is a little dark as I took it in artificial light.


Close up of the ribbon detail. Still not convinced I shouldn't have used cream ribbon instead.

My daughter's 2nd birthday party dress


I used pearly buttons down the back. I thought about using pale blue but am very pleased with the neutral colour.


Close up. I sewed the ribbon on before I tied it to prevent it from drooping.

Oliver + S Birthday Party Dress

A few months ago I discovered some money in a PayPal account that I'd forgotten about, and decided to spend my 'free' (ie, husband won't miss it) money on some fabric and patterns.

I bought a heap of fabric but my favourite by far was Verbena in pink, by Kaffe Fassett. I'm not normally a huge Kaffe Fassett fan but I just fell in love with this fabric. I think because the print reminded me of my favourite flowers - hydrangeas - but also because I just love the use of colour.

I also bought a few patterns by Oliver + S, including the especially fabulous Birthday Party dress pattern.

I've wanted to make up the Birthday Party dress in the Verbena fabric for some time now, and with a few special occasions coming up I had the perfect excuse to whip one up for my daughter.

I'm pretty happy with the results. The process itself was hassle-free too. The pattern is so easy to follow - it has lots of pictures that help explain each step and I found it easy to follow, even though I am a novice sewer.

Even though I love the dress, I think the pattern lends itself more to a less 'busy' print, so next time I make it I will use a less fussy fabric. I can picture the next incarnation of this dress in a simple cornflower blue fabric with ribbons instead of the tabs across the pleats... Now I just need to find the fabric.



Detail of the tabs and box pleats

The back: I really love the cloth buttons I found