Ruffles!

While blog surfing one day, I came upon this blog post with a tutorial for this totally cute ruffle dress.  It was supposed to be a Hanna Andersson “knock-off”.  I’d never seen the Hanna Andersson dress, but the dress she made was super-cute, and it looked pretty easy to do.  The dress requires a raglan sleeve t-shirt pattern.  I didn’t have such a pattern, but I thought it would be fairly easy to make one by tracing one of my son’s old t-shirts. 

As soon as I sewed on the first ruffle, I knew this dress would be cute.  There’s something about ruffles that makes any outfit so adorable. 

One minor problem, though.  We all know what happened the last time I tried to make my own pattern, right?  Yes, once again the neckline was too big.

It’s not too bad, but it is a little loose.  Not sure what went wrong, since I traced the t-shirt exactly (or so I thought).  I could have fiddled with it some more, but I didn’t have a lot of this red fabric left.  Plus, my sewing time is so limited, I want to spend it actually sewing.  Once again, kudos to pattern makers!  So, a trip to Joann Fabrics and $3.99 later, I was the proud owner of this pattern.

I had only enough fabric left to re-cut the bodice of the dress.  I cut the new sleeves from the first dress I’d made. 

Ah, a little sad to cut up, because it was so adorable, but since I was making another dress, I really did not need the first one. 

I have the pieces of the new dress cut and waiting for me.  I hope to have some time this week to sew it up.  Sewing time goes by too quickly.  Real life makes too many demands...