Junior Swap January 28

This weekend is a long one for the Australia day holiday, but I have not spent nearly as much of it sewing as I thought I would. I extended my break from the V2925 jacket today, and kept sewing for my daughter. Here is the a vintage pattern, Butterick 435 which I made yesterday as a trial dress for my daughter's SWAP. This pattern was given to me by a elderly lady at church, who had used it for her daughters several decades ago. The fabric print does not show up very well in the photo - it is red/pink/white strawberries with green leaves on a variagated shade dark blue background. The dress is a princess line with a little shape to it, and is lovely and cool to wear in a cotton quilting weight print. I did not have any trouble with the pattern, although the facings seemed to have been drawn from another dress entirely - I made view D. I did not want to re draw the facings for this "trial" dress, so lowered the front and back neckline about 7 cm to accomodate the difference in the facing, and I think the neckline sits at a comfortable and flattering point. There were no finished garment measurements on the envelope or the tissue, so I made the dress up to the size 12 circumference, which fortunately happen to be the same as my daughter's measurements. I lengthened the dress by 10 cm to accomodate her tall figure and the longer length of current fashion. In fitting, I took the dress in 7cm on each side in the bodice, as it was very loose, but left this extra fabric below the waist to increase the flare of the skirt.

The second outfit is the pants from Simplicity 5220, with a shirred top made from a remnant of pink cheesecloth from my stash ( it was originally purchased from my local fabric shop, and most of it made into a Lizzie MacGuire top with bell sleeves). I used the corded buttonhole foot to do the shirring for the first time, and found it much easier than the bobbin elastic method. It also looks neater, and the shirring elastic did not break once - this is now my preferred method of shirring. I made a small folded hem for the top edge (I do not have a rolled hem foot), and trimmed the bottom with an on grain strip of the same grey and pink print used on the pants split hem. I folded the strip with my bias tape tool, making it easy to apply. This was a quick and easy top, and my daughter loves it.