Now that the summer is here I have had fun sewing into the wee hours of the night or morning rather. Sewing for two little girls has been way more fun than I ever thought possible. I do want to sew more for my son, but it is hard to find him a matching outfit to go with the frills and ruffles and pink motif of the girls' dresses. The one dress I wanted to accomplish this summer was the pink chevron maxi dress that I found on pinterest years ago.
I get very frustrated with Pinterest. It has tons of ideas and very few real tutorials or patterns. The dress above was on pinterest as an actual link to the pattern that you can purchase. The pattern is for sizes 2T to 10 years. I needed a size 12m and 7, so I waited and found an almost identical pattern made by McCalls (M6736) for $1 at Hancock Fabrics. The McCalls pattern started at a size 3, so I bit the bullet and created a pattern for the 12m dress! I have created only a few of my own patterns and only one other pattern that I kept the template for. (I might need to work on posting that one soon.)
Materials Needed for the 12-18 month Maxi Dress
1 3/4 yards of material
The first thing you need to do is prep your material by washing and drying it so that it doesn't shrink or pucker on you after it is completed. Iron out any wrinkles and start cutting out your pieces.
Cut the following pieces out of your material.
- Bodice Pattern Piece (Cut 2)
- Front Ruffle Pattern Piece (Cut 2)
- Back Bodice- 12.5" by 3.75" rectangle (Cut 2)
- Skirt - 22.5" by 8.5"rectangle (Cut 2)
- First Ruffle- length of fabric by 3" (Cut 2)
- Middle Ruffle - length of fabric by 3.75" (Cut 2)
- Bottom Ruffle - length of fabric by 6" (Cut 2)
- Stay Skirt - 22.5" by 2.5" (Cut 2)
- Straps - 2" by 18" rectangle (Cut 2)
Once you cut out the ruffle you will make a narrow hem around the long two shorter lengths and the longest edge. There are two methods that you can use to do this. The first is you can sew a stay stitch around those three edges. Then trim 1/8" to the stitching. Fold a small seam around using the stay stitch as your guide. The stay stitch gives the fabric some weight and acts as a guide. In the picture below you can see the stay stitch.
Another way of making a narrow hem is using a hem foot. I found a very useful youtube video that shows you exactly how to use the foot. This video made using my foot very easy! I was able to whip out a narrow neat looking hem for the bodice ruffles in no time. Here are a few pictures of what it looks like looped in the hem foot.
Stitching on top of the hem no looped to go through my seam.
Always keep your needle in the fabric.
The next thing you need to do is ruffle the un-hemmed edge. I normally use my ruffler foot, but as small as this is I used a gathering or basting stitch to give me more control over the amount of fullness I got in the ruffles. Attach the ruffles with the angled side in the center. Be sure to attach the ruffle to the right side of the bodice with the right side of the ruffle facing up. The ruffle should stop about 1.5" from the top of the shoulder seam. You don't want to trap the ruffle in the shoulder seam.
Next, you will fold the strap pieces lengthwise on top of each other and stitch a seam around three of the sides leaving a small side open. Trim and turn both straps right side out and iron. Attach the unfinished edge of the strap to the should seam being sure not to catch the ruffle in your stitches.
Now you should have two complete bodices sewn together; one with a ruffle and one without. Pin them right sides together being sure the straps and ruffles are out of the way only stitching over unfinished edges. (I know I am horrible about taking pictures along the way, but here is a picture of my pinned bodice. You can't see it, but the back piece is also pinned, so I will make a complete circle around when stitching the pieces together.) Double check to be sure straps and ruffles were not caught. If you made a mistake use the seam ripper and resew the area.
Turn bodice pieces right side out and under stitch the lining as much as possible. I could only get to the underarms and a small portion of the V. Iron the bodice.
The next part is making the skirt of the dress. Sew the main dress pieces together at the side seams. If you want an finished look use a serger or use a french seam. Stitch all ruffles pieces and stay skirt together. You should now have a shirt, stay skirt, and three ruffles loops. Hem one side of each ruffle loop. Again, I used the hem foot to make this step so much easier.
I like to use my ruffler foot. I have a Bernina brand ruffler foot for my machine and when it is set on a six it ruffles the material down to about half the original size. I created each ruffle to be equal to half the size of what it is being attached to, so you should be able to ruffle without thinking. If you don't have a ruffler you will have to use a basting or gathering stitch. Many people complain about breaking the thread while pulling the gathers. One way to fix this problem is to run short distances and run two gathering threads side by side. Running two threads may seem time consuming, but your ruffles will look much better when they are attached. Also be sure your machine is set for the longest stitch possible.
Ruffle the skirt and attach to bodice front (not lining). Ruffle the top ruffle (3" ruffle) and attach to the skirt. Attach stay skirt to the bottom of the skirt sandwiching the top ruffle in the middle. Gather and stay the middle ruffle and bottom ruffle together letting the bottom ruffle hang below the middle ruffle and facing out. (I hope this makes sense.) I ruffled the two ruffles together through my machine so that they didn't come apart, but if you look at the picture the ruffles sort of sink into each other since they have the same tucks. I would suggest running them through separate and then attaching them. Attach both ruffle edges to the bottom of the stay skirt.
On the back bodice piece you will now have to gather the top so that it will want to stay on the child's back. Sew a stitch 3/8" from the top edge of the back from underarm seam to underarm seam. From the inside of the bodice run a piece of elastic through to the other end stitching it closed. I am not the best at measuring elastic, but I always pull the elastic tight enough that when stretched all the way out the elastic still has some give.
The last and final step is to the use a blind stitch to sew the bodice lining closed at the waistline seam.
My girls love this dress. They love the length and the ruffles. Even the baby lit up when she put on the dress and immediately wanted to twirl and spin around the room. Something about pink, ruffles, and little girls!
Part of why I sew is to make adorable clothes for my kids and save money at the same time. Of course I love being in my zone and stitching away, but I love saving money too. These two dresses cost about $25 or $12.50 each. The same dress is listed on zulily for $68 retail, but on sale for $40. I think I did pretty good price wise then!
