Hoot Hoot - It's a Wrap!

I few weeks ago I bought this dress from Ebay. 

I wasn't exactly sure what I wanted to do with it considering it was a size 8 and I doubt I could get a size 8 over my head these days! 

So after days of thinking and nights of surfing Pinterest, I decided to try a wrap-around dress. I didn't use a pattern and kind of just winged it. I drew around a size 2 dress of Isabels, and modified it a little to have a wrap around shape. 

I cut the front 2 sides almost identical, except one side was longer than the other. 

I made the lining by cutting out a rectangle big enough to cover the whole dress, then I sewed right sides together, trimmed then zigzagged the rest.  Turned it the right way and did a top stitch along the bottom to look like a hem. 

This is the end result!

Pretty cute huh?!? 

Next time I will draw up a real pattern, so I can measure it all up correctly. One arm hole is smaller than the other, and it doesn't fit Isabel. At all. It is about a size 0-1 if I had to guess. But all you can do is try right? 

From Drab to Fab!

So the other day I gave you a little preview of a gorgeous little dress I had made. Remember? Well I didn't make the whole dress! It did start out as a onesie.

I mentioned that I would possibly write out a tutorial, and guess what?!? Tonight is the night I do it!

I looked at plenty of tutorials on how to make one of these, and I didn’t really like the look of the end product. For some reason the onesie seemed to look all stretched and out of shape. If you have already made this tutorial, or one very similar, I’m sorry, but I honestly made this up as I went along. 

So here we go – This is a little preview of what you are about to create. Isn’t it the cutest?!

First try - first success!

Last night I attempted a baby onesie dress for the first time. After reading plenty of blogs with tutorials and not really liking how they turned out, I tried my own pattern. This is the result:

I absolutely LOVE it! 

This is another piece to add to my Project Charlotte. The stash is getting rather big now! This is my favourite though ;)

I took photos almost every step of the way. So maybe a tutorial will be posted?

Out with the Seam Rippers!

Yesterday I went on a little excursion to the Vinnies close to Imogens school. I found this little (big) beauty!

I have big plans for this! Keep watching this space!

Zoe

xx

Refashion-ista!

A while ago I was feeling a bit glum about my sewing experiences, so I went searching for some inspiration. 
This is what I found - New Dress a Day!
Marisa takes old, worn out dresses and makes them wearable and fashionable again. So I took a leaf out of her book and had a go myself!


I was so excited to get started I forgot to get a 'before' picture. So this is how it went. I bought a womens size 10 'Miss Shop' dress from the Salvation army. Its only cost me $1! The dress is black and white checkered, spaghetti straps and it had an awful ruffle around the bottom. Also it buttons down the front. 


The first thing I did was seam rip the ruffles off, and man oh man did that take a long time! Then I hemmed the bottom (removing 2-3 buttons). I had to take the straps in at the back because it is for my 5 year old daughter, so it needed to be small. 


I put the dress on her inside-out, then I was able to pin the sides so I knew where to sew and cut. 
It was quite dull and boring for a 5 year old to wear, so I wanted to add colour. I added a blue flower with a button center, but it looked terrible. Kind of like those ribbons you win for coming first in something. So I took that off, and replaced it with a mixture of bright pink buttons. Now it's perfect!

Left is the bad, bad flower.. Right is with the pretty buttons. This is only a crappy iPhone shot. Will do a proper SLR shot when Miss Imogen gets home tomorrow.

Zoe
xx