Good Folks and Weekend Sewing

Whooo hooo, I made a dress from start to finish for Ellie on my own!  My sewing skills are starting to get better.  I love this dress and have been wanting to make it since I saw the tutorial here and then further motivated by Weekend Sewing by Heather Ross.  

It makes it even better that Ellie wanted to help me sew and then as soon as I put it on her, she ran to show Daddy her pretty sew.  (which I think means pretty dress mommy made for me!)

Love this fabric and I think it is my new favorite - Anna Marie Horner, Good Folks line.  KC Custom Fabric in Saratoga Springs has a lot from the line.  I really have been trying to use other fabric, but I just can't seem to get enough of this print.  It was in the quilt I just finished, a tote bag I am working on and this.  Fabulous, don't you think?

  

The shirring is done with elastic thread in the bobbin.  So easy and so fun!  

Ellie also gave it the play test.  She was up and down the playset, climbing the rock wall, sliding and swinging.  I think I will make the next dress a little longer, but for playing this is a great length!

This last shot is of her running away from me when I wanted to change her back into her play clothes, since it was a little chilly today for a sundress!

Three hours before the shower . . .

I finished this!  I must say I love, love, love it!  

I might even love the back more than the front.  I am pretty sure some more quilts with lots of white will be in my future.  I just love the look.  Clean.  Simple.  Courtney at KC Custom Fabrics did the quilting for me and the intersecting circle pattern matches the peony print perfectly.  In the past I have used colored thread, but on this chose white and again Loving It!

My friend Lauren is a very fun and hip mom.  I knew she wouldn't like anything too babyish.  I think she really loved it.  

Another thing I did on this, that I will be doing again is using solid color for the binding with a strip of a print mixed in.  It came out so fun.  The bulk of the fabric for this was the Anna Marie Horner Good Folks.  The green print is Meadow, the pink intersecting circles are Peony and the wonderful floral print is Azalea.  The solids are Kona and the other two prints are Alexander Henry prints.  

I think that does it for showers for awhile, but I do need to come up with something fabulous for my own children.  They got my first quilts and Max hasn't even got one yet, which he continues to remind me.  So finishing his baseball quilt is next on my list and then something lovely like this for my own little princess!