Sail Away Dress Sew-Along: Day 2

Welcome back to day 2 of the Sail Away Dress Sew-Along!

If you missed day 1 where I show you how to make your pattern and the ruffles, go HERE.

Yesterday we covered the beginning basics of making your dress. Now, we'll dig a little deeper into the details.

Step 1: Cut your keyhole closure.

Now to make the keyhole for your button closure on the back of your dress.

First, measure the top of your back piece to find the center and draw a line 3 inches long with a disappearing ink marker.

Next, measure 1/2 inch on either side of this line, and draw 2 lines 1/2 inch shorter than the first.

Cut out your keyhole following the lines you drew, making sure the top and bottom of the keyhole are  curved as you cut.

Step 2: Sew your front and back pieces together.

Place your front piece on top of your back piece with the right sides together. Pin from the arm holes to the bottom of the dress. Sew from the bottom of the arm holes down (don't sew the arm holes closed!) with a straight stitch and finish the edges by serging or zig-zagging the edges.

Turn your dress inside out and press. It should look like this so far:

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Thanks for coming back for day 2. Tomorrow will be pretty detailed. We'll be covering bias tape and how to make your own (or, if you want to make things REALLY easy, you could always buy a couple of packages of double fold bias tape from the store.) 

See you back here tomorrow!

Sail Away Dress Sew-Along: Day 1

Welcome to the first day of the Sail Away Dress Sew-Along, which is just a long title to say "here's some steps to make a cute dress using 2 old button down shirts and some scraps." 

But doesn't "The Sail Away Dress" sound much better?

 The sew-along will be going on all week, and I'll cover steps from making your pattern to binding your dress. I use 2 men's button down shirts to make my dress, but you can substitute cotton fabric or knit fabric if you like.

Let's get started!

 Supplies

• 2 men's button down shirts to cut up
• 3 buttons
• 2 inches of elastic thread
• Scraps of knit fabric for the sash
• Sewing machine and basic sewing supplies

Step 1: Make your pattern.

Using a dress that fits your child well, lay the dress on top of the front of your men's shirt that you want to use for your main fabric, making sure it's centered over the button placket and that the bottom of your dress is 1/2 inch from the bottom of your men's shirt (this is so you can keep the original bottom hem - less sewing you have to do!)

Trace 1/2 inch around the dress for seam allowance - add more if you want it looser for longer wear. Also make sure any sleeves are tucked in so you can trace the armholes properly.

Cut out. This is your front piece.

To make your back piece, trace the piece you just cut out on the back of your men's shirt, but add an additional inch to the top since the back is higher than the front. Cut out.

That's it for your main pattern pieces, seriously.

Step 2: Make your ruffles.

Measure the length of the top of your front piece and multiply times 2. Cut 2 rectangles from your other men's shirt with this length and 3 inches wide.

Fold and press one of  the long edges on each rectangle 1/4 inch under, then fold and press another 1/4 inch. Sew your folded edges down with a straight stitch.

For the other long edge, set your machine's stitch length and width to the highest numbers possible, and sew a basting stitch straight across 1/4 inch from the edge, making sure not to backstitch at the beginning or the end. Keep the tails of your string long when you cut them.

Gently tug on one of your thread tails and push the fabric with your other hand to create your ruffle. Keep scrunching your fabric until the ruffle is the same length as the top of your front piece. Tie knots in each end to secure your ruffles. Cut the extra thread.

Step 3: Attach your ruffles.

Line up the raw edge of one ruffle with the raw edge of your dress's front piece (make sure your ruffle is right side facing up.) Set your stitch width and length back to normal. Pin and sew your first ruffle down.

Next, flip your top ruffle up and measure 1 1/2 inches down from that (if a button is in the way just pin it above or below the button a little), pin your second ruffle, and sew straight across.

Both of your ruffles should now be attached to the front of your dress like so, and the raw edge of your second ruffle should be hidden under the first.

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That does it for day 1 of the sew-along! 

Tomorrow we'll cover how to make your keyhole closure and sewing your main pieces together.

Please let me know if you have any questions: myownroad(at)yahoo(dot)com

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A feature and a reminder

Just popping in to say how excited I was to get an email from Summer over at Sumo's Sweet Stuff that she would be featuring my Tunic Dress in her Showcase Saturday today! I just love her blog, it really made my day to hear that she was featuring me.

And of course it made all the effort I put into trying to get Haley to pose for pictures worth it. That kid cannot be bought with anything. Chocolate, toys, nothing will make her stand still and smile for pictures. Out of the 25+ pictures I took, most of them were like this:

I guess 2-year-olds can't appreciate the time it takes for us mama's to sew a dress for them ;)

On another note, just a reminder that my Sail Away Dress Sew-Along begins Monday morning! Hope you'll join me.

Have a great weekend!

Sail Away Dress Sew-Along Sneak Peek

Since the Button Down Rehab series ended, I've been hinting around that I have another mystery piece of clothing that I made out of a button down shirt. You're all probably like, "Yeah whatever, she's been talking about this hypothetical piece of clothing for weeks now. Shut up and give us a tutorial already."  Or maybe you're tired of button down shirt projects?

Well either way, I have one more for you my dear bloggy friends!

I've had this dress done since the end of BDR, it just turned out to be a monster of a tutorial because I take a ton of pictures and try to explain things as much as possible, so I decided to share it with you in several parts as an impromptu sew-along beginning Monday morning.

I hope you don't mind.

I've been loving all the nautical-themed stuff out there, so I decided to make this dress with lots of reds and blues, and of course stripes. Can you ever have too many stripes?


Or blueberries for that matter?

And the greatest part is that the fabric came from 2 men's button down shirts I had laying around (thanks hubs!) so besides the buttons and the tiny piece of elastic thread, the dress was basically free.

And boy do I love free things.

If you want to plan ahead and join me for my little sewing soiree, you'll need just a few supplies: 2 button down shirts to cut up, 3 buttons, some scraps of knit fabric for the sash, and 2 inches of 1/4 inch elastic or elastic thread.

That's it!

I'll even show you how to make your own pattern in 3 easy steps! How's that for an attention-grabbing infomercial? Are you intrigued?

I hope you'll join me for the Sail Away Dress Sew-Along next week.

Grab your stuff, I'll see you back here Monday!

Linking up to THESE great sites!

King of the Sandcastle Shirt {a Silhouette project}

After making a shirt for Haley using my Silhouette, I got brave and decided to give the Silhouette a challenge. I chose a more detailed image for an applique to see if it could cut out tiny details on fabric.

Oh yeah, it can.

On a completely unrelated note, are you loving the baby mohawk? People think we shave his head that way, but it just grows that way somehow. I tell people he was just born cool. It's a burden he'll just have to learn to bear as he gets older :)

Using the flocked heat transfer material, which Silhouette so sweetly included in my prize bundle, I ironed on some wording then used my Silhouette to cut out and iron on some fabric for a sandcastle applique.

Here's how you can make one too!

Supplies:

• White flocked heat transfer material
• Fabric for the sandcastle
• Small scrap of fabric for the flag
• Iron
• Silhouette or X-Acto knife and cutting mat
• Sewing machine and thread
• You can download the King of the Sandcastle Silhouette Studio template found HERE

Step 1: Create your wording.

You can download the Silhouette Studio file for the King of the Sandcastle Shirt HERE. If you don't have a Silhouette, no worries! Just google "sandcastle" and you can find plenty of images to print and trace onto fabric to make your sandcastle and wording.

If you want to make everything from scratch, use Silhouette Studio to create your wording. I typed "king of the sandcastle" roughly 5 1/2 inches wide and 2 1/4 inches tall. Next, I inverted the wording so when I ironed it on my shirt it would read correctly.

I positioned a square of my flocked heat transfer material on the sticky cutting mat and sent it through the Silhouette using the pink blade to cut it.

When I peeled away the negative space, this is what my wording looked like. Use tweezers to remove the little pieces inside the lettering.

Step 2: Make your sandcastle

To make the sandcastle, I used the "Echo Park Sandcastle" design from the Silhouette store and sized it to fit my shirt (approximately 4 inches tall by 4 inches wide). I wanted to cut the flag out of a different color of fabric, so I ungrouped everything by right clicking on the castle and choosing "ungroup," then I moved the flag away from the rest of the sandcastle so I could cut it out of different fabric.

Next, iron on some sewable interfacing to the back of the fabric you want to use for your sandcastle. Make sure the interfacing is an inch or so larger than you want your final image to be. For example, my sandcastle was 4"x4", so I Ironed on a 5"x5" piece of interfacing to the back of my fabric. Repeat with the fabric you're using for your flag. Cut out and remove the paper backing.

Step 3: Cut out your sandcastle and flag.

Follow the instructions for cutting out fabric on your Silhouette. Place your fabrics on the sticky carrier sheet with the right sides facing up and the interfacing down on the carrier sheet. Make sure you pay attention to the positioning of your fabrics relative to your design in Silhouette Studio. You want to make sure your fabric is lined up where your design is located in Studio so the Silhouette will cut your fabric in the correct places. I like to double cut my fabric to make sure I have clean edges.

Send your carrier sheet through the Silhouette for cutting.

Remove the negative space around your sandcastle. Use tweezers to remove those little pieces of fabric in the windows.

Step 4: Iron on your images.

Position your sandcastle and flag where you would like them on your shirt.

Follow the instructions on your interfacing to iron on your sandcastle and flag. Mine said to place a damp cloth on top of my image and iron.

Once ironed on, stitch around the perimeter of your sandcastle and flag. Usually, applique is sewed on with a zig-zag stitch, but I chose to use a straight stitch because I wanted the edges to fray a little to give it some personality.

For your wording, position your words with the shiny side up (the letters should be right reading now) on top of your shirt and using a hot iron on the "cotton" setting, place a washcloth on top of your image and iron for the amount of time indicated on the your interfacing instructions. Silhouette flocked transfer material suggests 45-60 seconds.

Tah-dah!

Every man needs to be king of some kind of castle, right?

It's a great little summer shirt, even if you don't have a beach (*sigh*)

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I'm a vegetable murderer

Aren't these lovely squash? The only problem is that they're not squash, they're cucumbers from my garden.

They're HUGE and lacking that certain greenness that cucumbers are supposed to have. At the beginning of spring, I planted 2 cucumber plants, 3 tomato plants, 2 strawberry plants, 5 lettuce plants, and a handful of red onions. Fastforward many, many hot Tennessee days later, and all of the plants except for the tomato and cucumber plants have died. Actually, one strawberry plant is hanging on for dear life and has produced 5 strawberries the size of dimes - does that count?

I had some hope for my lettuce plants, but when we went on vacation to Pittsburgh for a week in June, this is what I came home to:

My heads of lettuce had bolted. I had never heard that term before, but from Googling "my lettuce plant looks like a mutant," I discovered that "bolting" basically means my lettuce plants thought they were going to die so they decided to flower, which makes them grow upward and flower. Unfortunately this means the leaves become bitter and inedible. Which meant I got to add to my compost pile.

I had some hope for my cucumbers, so when they were growing in humongous proportions, I looked past the fact that they were yellow instead of the typical green cucumber-y color. After realizing that they had yet to green up, I picked one and cut it open to see how it tasted.

Yuck-o.

It was bitter and had this gross white inner rind. After visiting my friend Google again, I found out that cucumbers weren't supposed to get this big (oops) and that the yellow color probably meant that they had some crazy plant virus or that the weather was too hot. Sigh.

So now I have a big pile of these cucumbers the size of my calf that taste like a shoe. Anybody want one?

The (not so) Reversible Tunic (Dress)

Have I mentioned how much of a Pinterest junkie I am? Oh, it was that obvious huh? Yeah, well I'm definitely addicted. I have found so much inspiration and so many great projects just by browsing through all of the amazing eye candy every day. When I need inspiration for a project, I just go to Pinterest. It's like scrolling through Google images but with no weird pictures of cats in sweaters and stuff. Ok, there are a few of those too, but it's mostly awesome artsy pictures.

How many of you have seen this awesome Reversible Tunic by Kelly from Sewing in No Man's Land floating around in Pinterestland (and all over the blogosphere for that matter)?

I was practically drooling when I saw this tunic appear on my Pinterest screen, and I was pretty sure I could make one for myself.

Wait...did I just decide to make something for myself? I should have just stopped there. Embellishing an existing piece of clothing I can do, but I decided to go ahead and make myself something from scratch. Can anyone tell me how I got it in my head that I could venture away from children's clothing and actually make myself something? The minute I began the project, it was almost as if everything I knew about sewing completely left my head and I became a madwoman with a needle stabbing wildly at a pile of fabric.

Firstoff, I chose a very busy pattern that, while cute on Haley, looked more like hospital scrubs on me. Next, I made the mistake of not using one of my own shirts as a guide when cutting the fabric - this is something I do EVERY TIME when making clothes for both of the kids. I don't know what I was thinking. I ended up with a mumu/hospital scrub shirt that was wayyyy too narrow at the top. Luckily, since I have a daughter, I was able to alter it to make a cute tunic dress for Haley.

I didn't want to make it reversible like in the tutorial so I only used one fabric. I also made the tunic long enough to hit right above my daughter's knees so it became a dress. Because I decided not to make the dress reversible, I had to make the slit in the front differently. I used THIS method that I used when making the button closure in The Haley Dress.

Rather than making a casing for the elastic, I did things the lazy way and cut a piece of 1/2 inch wide elastic 1 inch smaller than my daughter's waist. Then using a zig-zag stitch, I stitched the elastic around the inside of the dress while stretching the elastic as I sewed.

The tutorial was actually really easy had I actually made it right the first time, and I have tenative plans to try again at making myself a tunic. But maybe I should just stick to what I know. I'm kind of glad things worked out the way they did though, I think the dress looks really adorable on Haley.

See how excited she was to model her new dress for me?

The thing I love about this tunic is that it's flowy and breatheable - which is perfect for wiggly little girls who love to jump and spin like my little ball of energy.

Here's where you can find Kelly's tutorial for the Reversible Tunic. Or in my case the Not-So-Reversible-Tunic-Dress :)

Happy sewing!

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