Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Ruffle Dress Refashion

I've seen a lot of cute things in blogland made from this ruffle fabric and have been wanting to try it. Until recently it wasn't available in my local fabric shops and at $17 + a yard I didn't jump on it right away. One day I saw this XLarge top at a thrift store and grabbed it for a few dollars. I thought it would be an inexpensive way to see how I liked sewing with the ruffled material.

I used the Sienna Dress pattern that I had from Lil' Blue Boo to make a cute little dress for my toddler:

Since the shirt already had some interesting details with the crisscrossing ruffles at the top of the shirt, I was able to keep that same look by my pattern placement. I reused the shimmery neckline to finish my smaller neckline adding a flower made of the ruffles to cover the spot where my new seam ended up. I think I might add a few more flowers there so it doesn't look so lonely.

Cutting the ruffled fabric and sewing it, I had to be careful to keep the ruffles laying the same direction, so it took a little more pinning than I might otherwise have needed. Matching the ruffles at the shoulder seams to the front was a little tricky too. Overall, however, it is a quick way to get a much more complicated looking dress from a really simple style. I've already got plans for a few more ruffle fabric dresses for my older girls.

I couldn't get baby girl to pose wearing her new dress and wasn't up for a power struggle over a blog post, but she does like it and looks so cute in it!

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

Learning our Colors

So far our summer has been filled with as many indoor activities as I can dream up during the day, saving the outside time for the evenings when the temperature is more bearable for a cranky pregnant lady. This is one we did last week. I saw the idea on Pinterest, pinned from the blog Gluesticks... and thought it would be a good craft for the girls to help with as well as a fun way to have the older girls help baby girl learn her colors. I got the unfinished wood pegs and candle holder cups at Hobby Lobby. Even though they were pretty inexpensive to begin with, all their unfinished wood was 30% off last week... even better. The girls helped me paint all the solid colors and I finished the hair and faces after they were asleep. They've already had a lot of use. Now I just need to whip up a little drawstring bag to keep them together.