My Niece's Easter Dress

Well, it's not Easter, and this is not my niece. I had a little girl I know model the dress before I sent it to my niece and I am just very late blogging about it.

This pattern may look a little familiar if you have ever really studied my blog. It is the same pattern I used for a little dress last year. But you may not recognize the pattern because it has been tweaked quite a bit.

I bought the pattern on eBay and really liked the look of it. It was a reproduced children's pattern from 1910. I've sewn it twice and they both have looked different from the picture. But I am happy with both of them in spite of the wailing and gnashing of teeth to get them to work and in the case of this dress, remedy my mistakes.

I have to say though, the silhouette is so sweet and adorable on these little girls.

I promised my only sister an Easter dress for her only daughter. My plan was to make a true heirloom style party dress with lace insertion and fancy band and all that. She is 3, and I thought a frothy pink one would be awesome on her! I ran out of time and money, with my husband just getting home from Iraq and preparing to move to another state. So I went through the stash of pattern and fabric and came up with this!

The little pearly heart shaped buttons up the back coordiante with the applique'd heart on the front. I needed something on the front since it was too plain and cut out 3 different fabric hearts before deciding on the one I used.

I like to hang things off the treadmill to take pictures. Have to put that treadmill to good use some how!

I used a machine blanket stitch to trim the neck, back placket and applique'.

In case you are wondering, it is Kitty Yoshida City Girl fabric. I found it on my trip to Utah last year and have now made an apron, this dress and a couple bags. I also bought some in blue and made myself an apron! The colors are so pretty!

I didn't plan to use the brown grosgrain ribbon around the waist but needed something when I messed up the waist band. My 2nd daughter was doing a bit of hand sewing this same week and started crying when she messed up. I told her I mess up all the time. "No, you don't! You're always good! You never mess up!" I called her in when I was making this dress. Not only did I screw up the waist band but I also made it too small and had to add panels and change the skirt. Did it all end up fine and you can't even tell? Of course! But I still made mistakes. And how does the saying go? No good crying over sewing! (Something like that)

AAAHHH!!! My favorite! Spanish hemstitch, the new PC term for faggoting. I love this and would love to put it on every dress I ever sew! I love the bias cute striped trim. It comes out like a candy cane stripe on the bias.

Since moving closer to family, I finally gotto see my sweet little niece wear this dress. She is so cute in it! And I will soon post her latest little dress.

Happy Easter!