A dress for baby Ilona

After the Princess crafting experience, Bella is now rather obsessed with sewing and is now determined to make more things with me.  I'm not complaining, I'm over the moon that she wants to join in and learn at the grand old age of 3!!  Her big brother was out for a sleepover last week, so she decided that we were going to make a new dress for her baby.

I had some material left over from a dress that I'd made for Bella recently, so I thought it might be sweet for them to have matching outfits.  It was a good theory, except she was horrified when she saw the fabric and thought I was chopping up her dress.  After a quick trip upstairs to prove that hers was still safely in the wardrobe, we managed to make a start.

After a few minutes of planning, I got one of the existing doll's dresses to use as a template for the pattern.  Working on the optimistic assumption that it would turn out ok, I figured that it wouldn't hurt to have one in stock to use up my leftover fabric stash on any future efforts!  Bella ended up a little distracted while I was faffing around with the scaled down version of the pattern (and the very accurate process of trying to draw around a finished dress!!) and wandered off to the conservatory to sing Katy Perry songs for a bit.  She wandered back when I promised it was about to get more interesting - once the pattern pieces had been created and cut!

We started off by assembling the bodice, which was lined inside with the same material. Due to tiredness/stupidity I might have accidentally sewn the first armhole closed - but that's why a quick unpick is the favourite tool in my sewing box! On Bella's version of the dress the bodice was also lined, but I included a small invisible zip. For baby Ilona, we sewed the bodice centre back closed because my sanity would not survive a zip of that size.

Bella was really excited to be using the sewing machine. She sat on my knee so that I could control the pedal, and help her guide the fabric without a trip to A&E. I think one of the big plus points of the doll dress was that it was quick to make - essential for the instant results required to keep a 3 year old interested ;)

Once the bodice was assembled we made a slight overlap and then pinned it to the skirt. I mirrored the pattern for Bella's dress again by having two identical pieces, joined at the side seams, rather than at the centre back. If I did feel brave (read insane) enough to add a zip to any future incarnation it would be pretty easy to tweak the pattern. When the bodice and skirt had been joined, all that was left was to hem the skirt. By this point I was the tired embodiment of 'do what I ask, not what I do' - I was ironng the hem and accidentally burned my fingers. It was a very effective demonstration for Bella, albeit a painful one for me!

To finish off the dress we added a press stud to the top of the bodice on the overlap and *ta dah* one finished baby dress. Bella was rightly proud of what we'd made together and is really keen to continue. My ongoing project for dedicated craft space in the garage has now been modified to give Bella her own area. Already she's got her own sewing kit; pin cushion; frisbees; princess perfume and tape measure in there!?! I just need to get a picture of them together in their matching dresses now...