Balancing the giving

Having just given Aytan the quilt, I had to make something for Shira. To be fair, she gets a lot of handmade dresses from me. I could make some more shirts for Aytan, but that can wait.

Of course I already have a collection of children’s patterns, mainly little girl clothes. What I like about this is the semi circle skirt. It flows differently from a gathered skirt, I like it on myself and I like it on little girls. I collected my materials, yes, this fabric is Liberty of London that I bought at Pearl Soho Orange County, CA. It was no cheaper there than other places, but I think it may have been the bolt end so I got a break on the price.  Liberty has wised up to us quilters, this is from their quilting line.I do not like the facings for the neckline and armholes that home sewing patterns have you do. I either line the bodice, or use bias binding. It can be either decorative on the outside or pulled inside and top stitched. In order to do that I needed to remove the seam allowance from the fabric. This time I am using fold-over elastic for that purpose.It was easy and worked well, next time I may stretch it a little more so I don’t get that wavy look. I didn’t have lime green thread, but I think the top stitching in the aqua works well.Exposed zipper are still very popular. I’ve seen zippers that are so decorative, they are made to be installed this way. I feel this upgrades the dress from pretty – to pretty stylish.That wasn’t enough for me, I had to do more. Lately I’ve been playing with EPP, English Paper piecing. I will have to write a whole post about that. Here is the wonderful Fisker paper cutter and the resulting hexagon flower.Using the same aqua thread to attach to the dress. This time I ‘quilted’ each hexie. At the age of 5 I was taught how to cross stitch by a wonderful German woman. She told me that the back of the work must be as neat and clean as the front. I try and do that with everything I make.  Having a serger makes this very easy when sewing.The dress looks very nice on a hanger, but ten times better on an adorable model.  I had given her the dress the night before, of course she wore it then and demanded to wear it again – WIN!Looking good from the back.One more, just because she is so cute and models the dress so well.