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Girls Knit Dresses

Planning and Design

When I asked my SIL what to get my second niece for her birthday she suggested I make her some t-shirt dresses because that’s what she finds comfortable. I enlisted my mum to take measurements but decided not to do a literal t-shirt dress, not only because she has so many cos you can easily buy them, but because I honestly think they are quite boring and not very dress like. Last year I made her a mermaid skirt so I think she does like pretty clothes, but atm comfort outweighs aesthetics which I can totally relate to. My SIL said that she doesn’t like seams etc on her waist so I looked for patterns that were full length but didn’t have completely straight side seams. I chose two from Style Arc.

For the fabric, I ended up importing some from Canada because the patterns were just too cute 😣 I battled internally over ‘well she’s just going to outgrow it so I shouldn’t spend too much’ versus ‘it’s a gift, I shouldn’t cheap out’. I’m glad I stuck to the latter, the quality is really nice. I think she will like the feel of the fabric a lot.

Materials

Construction

It took me a bit to get started because I asked my mum to take measurements for me and none of them really matched up with the measurements provided by Style Arc for the different sizes… I decided to go with size 6 based on the length of the dress. It’s really hard to eyeball kids sizing when you don’t have kids yourself to be surrounded by their clothes all the time 😅

I was a bit worried about the V-neck so started with the Richie tunic. I didn’t get it quite right but it was good enough (I was under a bit of time constraints due to Christmas season, Family Holiday and preparing gifts for January birthday season). It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be and will be able to approach this type of collar with more confidence in future.

The sleeves used a similar attachment method but given the V portion is in the underarm there was even less pressure to get it right 🤣

The Issy Dress was essentially like making a normal knit shirt which is why I saved it for later, end with the easier one. One thing I did for both dresses was to topstitch down thr shoulder and sleeve seams. I thought it would be more comfortable this way.

Reflections

The Richie tunic ended up looking a lot cuter than I was expecting! Whereas the Issy Dress was less cute…I was expecting the skirt to flare out nearer the waist instead of so low… The icecream fabric also ended up looking more suitable as a dress even though I was expecting the cat one to be cuter. You never really know exactly how things will turn out until the product is complete 😅

The sizing turned out pretty good, a bit on the large side so she can grow into it. I think she liked them since she tried on both before waiting to go home 😁

It was also really cute hearing her conversation with my husband afterward 🤣 Because he just provided funds (and approved my fabric selection) he kept forgetting what we were gifting her 😝 So when my niece asked him what he did for the present he explained it to her and said he agreed with my fabric choices because he thinks she likes icecream and cats and she emphatically responded ‘I do!’ So at least that was a definite win 😋

I did ask her for feedback later on about which one she likes more and she said the cat one. Not sure if cos of the print or the style though.

Things I learnt:

  • V neck and sleeves
  • Next time steal some clothing to compare against the pattern pieces LOL

Categories: Sewing

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hikaru

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