Striped Skirt

Over the Summer we were given a sack of hand-me-down clothes for Ady from a cousin.  Ady and I went through them and decided what to keep.  Ady doesn't like tank tops so she decided not to keep the one that was there, but I like the stripes in it so I decided to use the fabric for something else.  It is a nice stretch jersey fabric and was still in good condition so I didn't want to throw it away.  At first I thought I would take it in a bit and make a dress for Evy, but I decided that the way the straps were would be complicated to take in without looking strange.  I forgot to take a before picture, but here is a picture of what is left.  You can get the idea of what it was.

I started by cutting off the top part.  I cut it straight across.  Then I turned it under and sewed a casing for elastic.  I measured the waist of one of Evy's skirts and cut my elastic to that size, then fed it through the casing and sewed it closed.  

I had one long strip of fabric left so I cut it in half to make two flowers.  To make the flowers I sewed a loose stitch all the way across, then pulled it to make a ruffle on one side, then twirled it around into a rosette.  I sewed one onto the skirt and then decided to make another to sew onto a T-shirt.  I decided to make it into a pin rather than sew it on so the T-shirt can still be used under dresses. 

Here is the finished outfit.

I think it turned out so cute!  

It started out as a girl's size 7/8 tank top and is now a 6-12 month size skirt.

Since the tank top was a hand me down, the total cost for the project was basically free!  I had the shirt already, and it can still be used for other outfits.

Here is Evy modeling her new clothes :)

She isn't standing independently yet, so it was hard to get a good shot of her in the outfit.  She loves to stand hanging onto furniture though, so I tried some different poses.

This project was so easy!  I will definitely be on the lookout for other T-shirts and Tank tops to make into skirts for Ady and Evy.

2 little dresses

A few weeks ago Ady and I were thrift store hoping and came across a really cute women's skirt, but not in my size.  It had a nice wide waistband and I thought it might make a cute dress for Ady.  We also found a similar skirt in my size, so we bought them.  Now I am not much of a seamstress.  I can only do basics, but I am learning.  When I got home and took a better look at the skirt I bought to make into a dress, I realized that it wasn't going to be as easy as I had originally thought.  The pleating on it isn't uniform so it will be more complex to take in.  I will work on that one next. The skirt I bought for me was cute, but not extremely flattering, so I decided to use it for the project instead, since it was constructed the way I needed it to be for the dress.  

I forgot to take a picture of it before I started, but this is basically what it looked like, except I have already cut off the excess fabric.  First I had Ady try it on and we held it up to were she would wear it.  The skirt had a side zipper that I wanedt to utilize for the dress, so I kept that side intact.  I pinned it on the opposite side to were it would be in order to fit around Ady's chest.  I was worried that I might not leave enough for the seam allowance, so I ended up being a little too cautious and left a bit too much room.  She will be able to grow into it this way.  With the excess fabric I made straps and then the remainder was used to make a matching dress for Evy.

It needed a little something, so I pulled out some hot pink ribbon and sewed in onto the waistband.

There are definitely flaws, but overall I am so pleased with how it turned out.  There is no way I could have made a dress as complicated as this if I had started from scratch.  I will definitely be on the lookout for similar styled skirts at the thrift store to do this again.

I was hoping that there would be enough of the whole skirt left to make an identical dress for Evy, but it was a bit too narrow.  Fortunately the skirt was full enough that there was still lots of fabric available to use though.  I ended up going with a pillowcase style dress, loosely following this tutorial at Naptime Crafts.

Its a little big right now, so it should fit her for a while.  She wasn't very cooperative with trying it on over and over as I made it, so I had to do a lot of guessing.  Also, I was mostly working on it while she was asleep!

Isn't she cute?!

Here they are together :)

The total cost of the Project:

$4 for the skirt, I had the ribbon on hand, but It was probably about $2 worth.  

I did have to buy pink thread, so that was another $2.

So about $6 for 2 sweet little dresses!  Not bad!

 

I have always had a dream of making cute matching dresses for my two sweet little girls.  ♥