Happy New Year folks! We hope you and yours enjoyed good
times over the Christmas break. You'll have noticed, not unusually for this time of the year, that our blog has copped a bit of neglect
over the last couple of weeks but I can assure you we've been beavering
away on a couple of new and exciting patterns, plans and announcements
so stay tuned. In the meantime, normal programming is resuming here with this pattern review. Stepgirl R chose the pattern and fabric back in September and what was very much intended as a birthday dress has (fancy that) ended up as a Christmas frock. I know better than to put timeframes on anything I make for the kidlets these days, so she was none the wiser and just as pleased. The pattern is X, from the Girl's Style Book (currently sold out but more are on order)...
... and the fabric is White Line Fever. It's quite light and drapey so to give the skirt some extra body, I lined it with a lovely soft and gauze-y cheesecloth that is available in all stores. Best new thing I learnt while making this dress? That a walking foot is THE foot to use for perfect stripe matching! Subsequent thanks must go to Santa for bringing me one for Christmas. He clearly knows my joy too well.
The pattern features a two piece sleeve that's all pretty and petal-like. The only change I'd make if I had a do-over would be to raise the neckline as it sits lower than I would've liked. I also used an invisible zip instead of the recommended dress zip, and shortened it quite a bit. Could've gone shorter but this kid is TALL so give her six months and that skirt will be sitting above the knee. For sure.
