Christmas Dresses - more details

Remember these?

Christmas dresses

Way back, I posted about these dresses when I started working on Christmas projects. The dresses were destined for 3 nieces and 2 daughters as Christmas presents. The red ones for the littler ones and the purple ones for the more grown up among the gang.

red pinafores

 The red dresses were made from this pattern (see below) which, annoyingly, stubbornly refuses to rotate so you will have to bend your head I'm afraid to get a good look. Otherwise, it is a great pattern - very simple and quick to make up and lends itself to both plain and very patterned fabric. The pattern also contains appliqué patterns to imitate the illustrations on the pattern of hearts, round or stars, if you should so desire.

I kept both red dresses simple as I had spotted some red and white spotty tops and stripy tights to go with them and here, modelling the smaller version perfectly is my gorgeous niece:

You will see that I added large navy buttons as closures and, if you look closely at the second image, you might be able to spot that I used ladybird fabric tape as hem tape. As my little niece is only 6 months and I was using corduroy fabric I used a contrasting cotton fabric for the facings rather than the corduroy. This stopped the top of the dress being too bulky and (if you look back at the first image) makes it look rather funky on the hanger, even if i do say so myself!

Now for the purple dresses.

purple pinafores

They were all made from this pattern

purple dress pattern

which gives 6 variations of a basic pinafore. The larger two dresses were basically the same variation - the same as the model on the envelope wearing the orange dress - made up of a bodice with facings which attaches to a skirt section and the closure is a centre back zipper. The smaller dress, for Mlle Evie was based on the variation show by the model on the envelope wearing the green dress only I didn't add the section on the bottom of the skirt as, either my daughters are very short or the pattern was drafted for very tall children!

The largest dress, a size 8 years I made up exactly as per the instructions but instead of using a lapped zipper at the back I inserted an invisible zipper. I used Liberty bias to finish the sleeves and the inside of the hem.

The second dress, a size 7 years I made up in the same variation but I added Liberty covered piping where the bodice of the dress attaches to the skirt. I also bound the sleeves with matching Liberty bias and again used the bias to bind the hem. I did, for this dress, use a lapped zipper as I wasn't sure that an invisible zipper would 'like' the piping!

The third dress is made up of a lined bodice with straps which again attaches to the skirt sections and closes with a centre back zipper. I again used an invisible zipper here (partly because in clearing out my cupboard I found a bag full of invisible zippers!). Mlle E then decided that the dress should have a bow on the front, as it does on the pattern envelope, so I foraged amongst my scraps and found the perfect Christmas bow

Even she had to admit that that is a bow!!